Tightrope (Burning Cove #3)(87)

“It sounds terrific. I assume the M stands for your first name. What about the S?”

Matthias winced. “Sylvester. Unfortunately.”

Amalie smiled. “An old family name?”

“Very old. I had an ancestor in the sixteen hundreds named Sylvester Jones. The name has been handed down through the Jones family. I was the one who got stuck with it in this generation.”

“Was your ancestor an engineer, too?”

Matthias looked deeply pained. “Alchemist.”

“Not such a very different line when you think about it. The old alchemists were always trying to turn base metals into gold, right? That strikes me as a kind of engineering.”

“According to Jones family lore, Sylvester was the walking definition of a mad scientist. Obsessive. Paranoid. Reclusive. Some say he conducted experiments on himself that probably affected the bloodline. I’d rather ignore that side of my family tree, if you don’t mind.”

Amalie smiled. “You don’t have to worry about the obsessive, paranoid, and reclusive stuff. We’ve already established that you are in full control of your gift.”

“I’m not in full control of my heart. I’ve lost it, Amalie. You’re in charge of it now.”

“That’s good to know, because you hold mine in the palm of your hand. Yes, I will marry you. There’s just one problem that I can foresee.”

“What’s that?”

“I have a feeling any clan that is handing a name like Sylvester down through the generations probably does big, elaborate family weddings.”

Matthias looked wary. “Tradition. Why is that a problem?”

“It’s a problem because my family consists of exactly two people, Hazel and Willa. My side of the aisle is going to look very sparsely populated.”

“Forget the big family wedding. We’ll go down to the courthouse here in town with a few witnesses. Hazel and Willa and Luther and Raina. How does that sound?”

Amalie smiled. “A small, quiet ceremony. I like the sound of that.”

“So do I.”

Matthias pulled her gently into his arms, careful not to hurt her injured side. He started to kiss her. She stopped him with a fingertip on his mouth.

“What?” he asked.

“Your family . . . ?”

“What about them?”

“Don’t you think you should introduce me to them before we get married?”

“Trust me, there will be plenty of opportunity to meet the Joneses.”

“Do you think they’ll like me?”

“Honey, they are going to adore you.”

“What makes you so sure of that?”

“Because of you I’m going to take up a respectable engineering career. You are single-handedly saving me from a life of crime.”

She started to laugh, but she did not laugh for very long, because he silenced her with a kiss.





Chapter 60


The phone rang the following evening just as Matthias was preparing to sit down to dinner with Amalie, Hazel, and Willa.

“Probably another reservation,” Willa announced.

She jumped up from the table and disappeared into the lobby, only to return a moment later. She looked at Matthias.

“It’s Luther Pell,” she announced. “He wants to talk to you. Says it’s urgent.”

“With Pell, it’s always urgent,” Matthias said.

He got to his feet, went out into the lobby, and picked up the phone.

“Considering the fact that you’re calling during the dinner hour, I’m assuming that whatever is in that notebook, it isn’t poetry written by a depressed rogue agent.”

“No,” Luther said. “The verses are definitely some sort of code. My expert hasn’t been able to decipher the encryption. He’s still working on it. But whatever the case, I don’t think those poems were written by Smith. It’s a good bet that he stole the notebook.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because the Broker just called. He says he’s got a client who is extremely eager to recover a notebook full of poems that went missing a few months ago.”

“What makes the client think the notebook might be here in Burning Cove?”

“I don’t know. But something tells me Calloway’s death may have opened a door into a very dark chamber.”

“That sounds like a line out of a horror movie.”

“Calloway did promise me a sequel.”





Chapter 61


The wedding ceremony conducted a few days later was a small, quiet affair at the Burning Cove courthouse. The surprise reception held at the Paradise Club that evening, however, was neither small nor quiet.

Matthias, with Amalie on his arm, took one step through the front door of the club, saw the big grin on the face of the normally somber ma?tre d’, and knew that the plans he and Amalie had made for the night had gone up in smoke.

“Sorry about this,” he said.

“What in the world?” Amalie whispered.

“Looks like we are the targets of a conspiracy.”

“Define this conspiracy.”

“Brace yourself. You’re about to meet my family sooner than we planned.”