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“Just not a fan of heights,” she said, her cool, polished exterior slipping slightly.
“Yet you booked a helicopter tour?” He couldn’t suppress the chuckle that escaped him.
She shot him an annoyed look. “Facing a fear, I guess.”
There was definitely more to it than that.
“So...what draws you to the Winters Lot fortune?” It was a considerably small treasure in comparison to most lost riches. Rumor had it that Winter Sullivan had been smuggling contraband into various Alaskan ports for his friend Earl Wakefield, collecting large amounts of gold in exchange for alcohol and cigarettes. However, on their last mission before Sergeant Beaumont busted the operation, Winter had caught wind of the trouble brewing onshore and had veered off course with his ship, docking on the side of what was now called Winters Mountain, just off the coast of Port Serenity. He’d taken all the money he could carry and hiked into abandoned caves nearby, where he’d hid the fortune. Over the years the amount of gold buried had escalated as the tall tale was passed down through generations and to the tourists who came in search of it. Eyes lit up at the prospect of discovering the secret caves from the air, catching a glimpse of the fortune, as the path was unhikable now due to erosion and climate change.
Anna shrugged next to him, peering out the window. “Just thought it would be interesting...”
His gaze slid over her. The hiking boots were worn at the toes and the edges of the pockets on her cargo pants were frayed, meaning she wore both items often. This wasn’t just to look the part for that day’s adventure. She wasn’t snapping selfies for an Instagram profile...nor was she relaxing and taking in the sights.
Her gaze was surveying the ground below with the intensity of someone searching for something...
Did she really think she was going to find a lost treasure on this two-hour aerial journey when no other tour group ever had?
“Where are you going?” she asked as he headed south at the ridge, over the mountains.
“Along the treasure route,” he said, nodding to the map on the brochure in her hands that his mother must have given her at the office. It detailed the route that Winter supposedly took from the coast inland to the caves.
Anna’s eyes narrowed and all nervousness seemed to evaporate as she turned in the seat next to him. “We both know this is not theactualroute.”
Dwayne shrugged as though he had no idea what she was talking about, but the hair on the back of his neck stood up. “Sure it is. He docked the ship on the east side of the coast, in an alcove where the ship wouldn’t be discovered, and then hiked all the way into the caves, through the Golden River Valley.”
“Only he didn’t. He couldn’t have. Back then, those trails through Golden River Valley weren’t crossable because of a large lake. The lake has since dried up and hiking trails cut through there, but in the late eighteen hundreds that wouldn’t have been possible.”
Dwayne sighed, pretending to look annoyed at her believing in all of this anyway, but his pulse was secretly racing. “Look, this is a fun tour. Most guests don’t question the story and they just sit back and enjoy the ride.”
“I’m not most guests.”
Man, she was stubborn, and those emerald eyes were even more mesmerizing when she was fired up. He cleared his throat and looked away before they had a hypnotizing effect on him. “Well, I’m sorry, but this is the story...and the route that has been passed along for generations. I don’t know any other...”
He stopped when she retrieved a different map from her bag and handed it to him. It was old, the edges torn, brittle looking. The paper was yellowed, and the ink was faded with age. Hundreds of different fold marks indicated it had been bent and crumpled many times, but he could clearly see the Alaskan landscape they were currently flying over.
“Lucky for you, I have the correct one,” Anna said, her determination both a major turn-on and a huge inconvenience.
DWAYNEMADDENHADthe worst poker face. He should never try his luck at the local casino, or he could kiss his inheritance goodbye. His too-handsome-for-his-own-good face was flushed and his sudden eye avoidance told her everything Anna had already suspected. He knew the route he took tourists on was bogus.
Well, he wasn’t fooling her.
He glanced at her map and then back at his flight path...still headed in the wrong, opposite direction. “Where did you get that?” he asked casually.
“Passed down from family,” she said simply. If he didn’t know who she was or anything about her family’s reputation for being the most successful treasure hunters in the country, that was on him. She wasn’t about to fill him in. Men got a little...weird when they heard what she did for a living. Apparently, chasing something most people thought was a fantasy was too much for the guys she’d met to get on board with. Which was why she was still single at twenty-nine.
“Well, it’s a nice antique drawing of old Alaska,” Dwayne said. “But I can’t take that path.”
“Why not?” She refused to be deterred.
He sighed. “It crosses military airspace, for one, it’s two hours off course, and there’s nowhere to put the helicopter down for miles all around those caves. An aerial view of where they are supposed to be is all this tour provides.”
She cocked her head to the side. “So, you admit that you’re in the business of duping people?”
His jaw clenched. Ah, just as she suspected. He wasn’t a fan of the town’s way of misrepresenting certain things to turn a profit. She liked him, despite her better judgment. In her line of work, people were best kept at a distance. Colleagues, collaborators...never friends. Only family was allowed to get close. And even then, that could be problematic.
“We give people an exciting, entertaining helicopter ride over some of the most breathtaking scenery on earth,” Dwayne said. “That’s all that we promise. If they happen to spot gold or a sea serpent swimming in the water, then that’s a bonus.”
He was stalling...and getting farther away from where she needed to be. “Look, I hired you for a private helicopter tour and I insist we go this route.”
