With a start, Kaitlin recognized it as the coin her friend had purchased from the antique shop. Lindsay was wearing it around her neck?
“What’s that?” he demanded.
“Booty from your ancestor’s plundering.”
“It is not.” But Dylan took a closer look. “From the Blue Glacier,” she informed him in triumph.
“Okay. That’s it.” Dylan captured her arm and tugged her back across the deck. “Come here.”
Kaitlin watched Dylan hustle Lindsay through the open doors into the great room. “Where’s he taking her?” she asked Zach with curiosity.
“My guess is that he’s showing her the Letters of Authority.”
Kaitlin shook her head in amazement over their willingness to engage in this particular contest. “Lindsay spent two thousand dollars on that coin from the Blue Glacier,” Kaitlin told Zach. “Apparently, it was sunk by the Black Fern and Captain Caldwell Gilby.”
“I know the story,” said Zach.
“So, when do I get my ten bucks?”
He gave her a look of confusion.
“The bet at the baseball game,” she reminded him. “Lindsay has unrefutable evidence that Dylan is descended from pirates. I believe that means she’ll win the argument. And I believe that means you owe me ten dollars.”
“Signed by King George…” Dylan’s voice wafted through the open doors.
“Here we go,” Zach muttered in a dire tone.
“It’s still not legal,” Lindsay retorted.
“Maybe not today.”
Curiosity getting the better of her, Kaitlin settled to watch the debate through the open doorway.
Lindsay and Dylan were turned in profile. They were both obviously focused on something hanging on the wall.
“Forget the fact that Caldwell Gilby plundered in international waters,” said Lindsay. “Just because a corrupt regime gives you permission to commit a crime—”
“One point to me,” Kaitlin murmured to Zach.
“You’re calling the British monarchy a corrupt regime?” Dylan demanded.
“That one’s mine,” said Zach, leaning back on the deck rail and crossing one ankle over the other.
“Your great, great, great, however many grandfathers held people at gunpoint—”
“Go, Lindsay,” Kaitlin muttered, holding out her hand for the ten.
“I suspect it was swordpoint, maybe musketpoint,” said Dylan.
“Held them at gunpoint,” Lindsay stressed. “And took things that didn’t belong to him.”
Kaitlin gave Zach a smirk and tapped her index finger against her chest. Dylan didn’t know who he was up against.
But Lindsay wasn’t finished yet. “He sank their ships. He killed people. You don’t need to be a lawyer to know he was a thief and a murderer.”
“Oh, hand it over,” Kaitlin demanded.
Dylan suddenly smacked Lindsay smartly on the rear.
She jumped. “Hey!”
“You crossed the line,” he told her.
Kaitlin’s jaw dropped. She sucked in a breath, waiting for Lindsay to react.
This was going to be bad.
Oh, it was going to be very, very bad.
Dylan said something else, but Kaitlin didn’t hear the words.
In response, Lindsay leaned closer. It looked as if she was answering.
Kaitlin stayed still and waited. But the shouting didn’t start, and the insults didn’t fly.
Instead, Dylan reached out and stroked Lindsay’s cheek. Then he butted his shoulder against hers and left it resting there.
For some reason, she didn’t pull away.
Suddenly, Zach grasped Kaitlin’s arm and turned her away.
“Huh?” was all she could manage to say.
“They don’t need an audience,” said Zach.
“But…” She couldn’t help but glance once more over her shoulder. “I don’t…” She turned back to stare at Zach. “Why didn’t she kill him?”
“Because they’re flirting, not fighting.” Zach leaned on the rail, gazing into the setting sun. “Just like you and me.”
The breath whooshed out of Kaitlin’s chest. “We are not—”
“Oh, we so are.”
“So far, so good?” asked Dylan, parking himself next to Zach at the rail of the deck after dinner. Lights shone from the windows of the Gilby house. The pool was illuminated in the yard below. And the twinkle of lights from Zach’s house was visible in the distance.
“I think so.” Zach motioned to the three women inside, where Ginny was playing right into his plan. “She’s showing them photographs from when she and Sadie were girls.”
“I dropped a hint to Lindsay,” said Dylan, taking credit. “She immediately asked Ginny if there were any pictures.”
“Good thought,” Zach acknowledged. Ginny and Sadie had grown up together on Serenity Island. And though Ginny’s short-term memory was spotty, she seemed to remember plenty of stories from decades back. She was in a perfect position to give Kaitlin some insight into his grandmother. And it had the added advantage of coming from a third party. Kaitlin couldn’t accuse Zach of trying to manipulate her.
The thought that Zach could execute a master plan through the eccentric Aunt Ginny was laughable. Though, he supposed, that was exactly what they were doing.
“Lindsay’s a fairly easy mark,” Dylan added. “Mention a pirate, and off she goes like a heat-seeking missile.”
“I notice you’re protesting a bit too much about the pirates,” Zach pointed out. Sure, Dylan was sensitive about his background, but Zach had never seen him pushed to anger over it.
“It sure makes her mad,” Dylan mused.
“Our ancestors were not Boy Scouts,” Zach felt compelled to restate.
“And the British monarchy was not a corrupt regime.”
“There were a lot of beheadings.”
Dylan shrugged. “Different time, different place.”
“Yeah? Well, good luck getting Lindsay into bed with that argument.”
Dylan’s expression turned thoughtful. “Don’t you worry about me. Lindsay likes a challenge. And I’m a challenge.”
“That’s your grand scheme?”
Dylan quirked his brows in self-confidence. “That’s my grand scheme.”
Zach had to admit, it was ingenious.
“Now let’s talk about yours.”
“Zachary?” came Ginny’s imperious voice as she appeared in the doorway.
Zach glanced up.
“Over here,” she commanded.
Dylan snickered as Zach pushed back to cross the deck.
Ginny beckoned him closer with a crooked finger.
“I need your help,” she whispered, glancing into the great room.
“Sure.” He bent his head to listen.
“We’re going downstairs for some dancing.” Ginny had always been a huge music fan, particularly of the big bands. And dancing had always been an important part of social functions on the island.
“No problem.” He nodded.
“You ask the redhead, Miss Kaitlin.” She gave Zach a conspiratorial nod. “I have a good feeling about the other one and Dylan.”
“Lindsay,” Zach prompted.
“He seems to have a particular interest in her rear end.”
“Ginny.”
She gave a short cackle. “I’m not naive.”
“I never thought you were.”
“You young people didn’t invent premarital sex, you know.”
Okay, Zach wasn’t going anywhere near that conversation. “Dancing,” he responded decisively and carried on into the house.
“Kaitlin,” he called as he approached the two women huddled together on one of the sofas, their noses in one album and another dozen stacked on a table in front of them.
She glanced up.
“Downstairs,” he instructed, pointing the way. “We’re going to dance.”
She blinked back at him in incomprehension.
He grinned at her surprise and strode closer, linking her arm and swooping her to her feet.
“Ginny’s matchmaking,” he whispered as they made their way to the wide, curved staircase. “I’ve been instructed to snag you as a partner so Dylan will ask Lindsay.”
“She’s very sweet,” Kaitlin disclosed, sorting her feet out underneath herself.
“They’re a family of plotters,” said Zach.
“Yeah? Well, you’re a fine one to talk.”
Zach couldn’t disagree.
They reached the bottom of the stairs, and the huge party room widened out in front of them.
“Wow,” said Kaitlin, stepping across the polished, hardwood floor, moving between the pillars to gaze at the bank of glass doors that opened to the patio, the pool and the manicured lawn. She tipped her head back to take in the high ceiling with its twinkling star lights. She put her arms out, twirled around and grinned like a six-year-old.
Not that she looked anything remotely like a child.
She wore sexy, high-heeled sandals and a pair of snug black pants. They were topped with a metallic thread tank that shimmered under the lights. While she moved, she reached up, raking her loose hair back with her fingers. It shone, and she shone, and he couldn’t wait to hold her in his arms.
A member of the staff was working the sound system, and strains of “Stardust” came up to flow around them from a dozen speakers.
Ginny, Dylan and Lindsay arrived, laughing and joking as they spilled onto the polished floor.