“To what?” she said impatiently. Maybe he’d been punished enough. Maybe she’d been punished enough. Maybe she ought to tell him that she knew.
Alex walked to her. “Look at this.” Up to the moonlight, he held between his fingers a fat, perfect pearl.
“Pearls?” Jess gasped. “In these waters? No wonder Pitman wants to buy my cove. Alex, he’ll be rich.”
Alex kept looking at the pearl. “I wondered what had happened to it.”
“To what? Here, let’s open these oysters.”
“My mother’s pearl necklace.”
“Your mother’s…Alex, are you saying these pearls were planted?”
“Think Pitman will notice the holes drilled in the pearls? I can’t see in this light, but the hole seems to have been filled with a paste.”
“Filled? Seeded?” Jess asked. “Nathaniel. He did this. Wait until I get him.”
Alex caught her arm before she could move. “I’m sure Nate did do this but he didn’t make the plan.”
Alex put the pearl in his pocket. “My brother-in-law embezzles Montgomery funds, then uses that money to buy your land, thereby keeping the money in the family.”
“Your father,” Jess said.
“Exactly. My father. That crafty old devil. I had no idea he knew what his son-in-law was doing.”
“He’ll go a long way to protect his children,” Jess said, but Alex didn’t seem to be listening. “Maybe he didn’t want to hurt your sister.”
Alex started walking. “Let’s get back.”
“Yes, you need your sleep.”
Alex just kept walking, Jess having to run to keep up with him. At the house, he left her in her room and gave her orders not to leave. Jess started talking about his poor health, but the look he gave her made her sit down on the bed.
“I swear I won’t leave,” she said and meant it.
Alex nodded and left the room. He went down the hall to the boys’ room, picked up a sleeping Nathaniel and carried him to his father’s
room. He dropped Nate into the feather mattress beside Sayer.
“What the hell!” the old man yelped.
Alex lit a lantern.
Nate sat up in the bed while Sayer floundered about, trying to right himself. “Hello, Mr. Alex,” Nate said. “Did something happen?”
Alex pulled the pearl from his pocket and tossed it to his father. “Familiar?”
Sayer looked at Nate, then back at his son. “Possibly.”
“How many did you put in the oysters, Nate?”
Nathaniel looked like he wanted to run away. He didn’t like being caught between the two men.
“I think we’ve been found out,” Sayer said. “Took you long enough,” he said, looking at Alex.
It took Alex a moment to comprehend just what his father was saying. “What do you know?” he asked in a low voice.
Sayer locked eyes with his son. “I breed no cowards.”