Sea of Dreams (The American Heroes Series Book 2) (53 page)

“Ed!” her hands flew to her mouth in shock. “What happened? Has someone called an ambulance?”

Beck hadn’t realized she had followed them.  He had been gazing down at Ed Masterson with some curiosity but now moved towards his wife as she stood in the doorway.  He put his arms out, collecting her against him.

“We don’t need an ambulance,” he told her grimly, his gaze returning to the man lying prone on the floor. “He’s dead.”

Blakesley gasped again and turned away. She didn’t want to see the carnage anymore.

“Oh, my God,” she breathed. “What in the hell happened?”

Beck was looking at Ed. “I don’t know,” he said honestly, looking to the men he had left behind to watch over Masterson. “Miller, what happened?”

He was addressing one of his men, a young half-Asian man who had been with him for four years.  The kid tried not to look too contrite or emotional.

“It happened pretty fast, Commander,” he said. “I was standing next to him and suddenly, he kicked out my knee and grabbed my sidearm. I went stumbling sideways and the guy fires off a round. I think it went into the fireplace or something.  Before he could cap off another round, Guerrero and I capped him.”

Beck was listening intently. “So the first shot we heard was Masterson’s,” he clarified.

“Yes sir.”

“Then the second two were you and Guerrero, shooting the man because he took a shot at you.”

“Yes sir.  He was aiming to kill us, sir.”

Beck just stood there, a little dumbfounded, looking at Ed’s body on the old adobe tile floor.  He thought that it probably wasn’t the first time that floor saw bloodshed considering the history of Ben Earp and the house in general.  But the severity of the situation began to weigh on him and he turned to Anthony, standing a few feet away.

“Call Davis,” he said quietly. “Tell him what happened. Tell him he’d better get up here.”

Anthony nodded sharply and pulled out his cell phone, moving outside to make the call as Blakesley uncovered her face and dared to turn back around again.  Ed was very dead, dark red blood ruining his expensive new suit.

“Oh, God,” she breathed. “He’s really dead.”

Beck nodded faintly. “Yes.”

Blakesley sighed, feeling braver about looking at the dead man. “I can’t believe it.”

Beck just shrugged. He wasn’t going to apologize for what happened. He was glad and that was the truth.

“I wonder why he made a swipe for the gun?” he wondered aloud. “Did he really think he could get away with shooting one of us?”

Miller thought there question was meant for him. “He didn’t say anything, sir,” he replied. “He just kicked out my knee and grabbed the sidearm.  He must have been aiming for Guerrero based on the shot he got off. He just missed his head.”

Blakesley and Beck looked over to the massive fireplace, plugged up and useless for so many years. They could see a hole right above the bricked hearth.

“But that’s so stupid,” Blakesley shook her head. “He’s in a room with armed men and he tries to grab a gun? It doesn’t make any sense.”

Beck thought so, too. “Maybe he was trying to make an escape. He knew I was coming back for him… maybe he was just trying to be a tough guy and get away.”

Blakesley shrugged. “He was pretty arrogant,” she agreed. “He didn’t like anyone to tell him what to do and he really didn’t like cops. I’m sure the fact that you beat him up pissed him off a lot. But to grab a gun… that goes beyond anything I thought he was capable of.”

“Prison changes people.”

“I would believe that.”

 Blakesley pulled away from her husband and wandered over to the fireplace, giving Ed’s body a wide berth.  She really didn’t want to look at him but she wanted to see the damage that the bullet caused.   Not that it was her house anymore but still, she cared.

The hollow point armor piercing round had made a big hole.  It was about at eye-level, taking a chunk of the old tiled mantle with it.   In fact, as Blakesley peered closely at the hole that was, more or less, a couple of inches in diameter, she could see pieces of the yellow painted tile pushed back into the bulk of the big stone hearth.  At least, she thought it was tile until it oddly seemed to glimmer back at her.  Curious, she cocked her head and gingerly stuck her fingers in to the hole.

Something cold, hard and loose met with her finger tips.  She could feel some kind of texture.  It took her a few tries to get a grip on it but she finally managed to, pulling the cold, hard object back out of the hole.

Blakesley stared at the object in her hand.  It took her a couple of seconds to realize that it wasn’t a piece of broken tile at all.  It was dark gold, heavy and round.  Looking more closely, she could see some kind of lop-sided cross stamped on it and intricate designs around the edges.  It was a gold piece.  Startled, she held it in Beck’s direction.

“Beck!” she called her husband. “Oh, my God! Look at this!”

Beck had been speaking with Miller but he looked up when Blakesley called his name.  He could see she had something in her hand and he went to her, curious, as she began to grow more excited.

“Look!” she was practically jumping up and down by the time he reached her. “It’s a gold piece! Beck, it’s gold!”

Startled, Beck took the piece from her and took a hard look at it.  It was indeed a gold piece, with Spanish writing on the edges and a cross emblazoned across the center.  He blinked as if he didn’t believe what he was seeing.

“Where’d you get this?” he demanded.

Blakesley was already sticking her fingers back inside the bullet hole, pulling forth two more round golden pieces.

“In here,” she said excitedly. “It’s in the mantle. Gold coins!”

He wriggled his eyebrows, peering inside the hole and seeing more gold pieces glittering back at them.  His men began to crowd around, watching curiously, as he pulled out several more gold coins, all of them emblazoned with the same Spanish marks.

“Holy Crap,” he exclaimed softly. “Who in the hell would have put this in there?”

Blakesley was looking at some of the pieces in his flat palm. “Have you ever seen anything like this before?”

Beck shook his head in awe. “Never,” he replied. “It looks like there’s Spanish writing on them, which I guess would make sense since this entire area was under Spanish rule about the time this place was built. But why hide gold coins in the fireplace?  It seems like a strange place to hide money.”

Blakesley was still staring at the coins in his hand. “Not…,” she paused and looked up at him. “Not if you’re Ben Earp and you just stole this stuff from the padres at the San Diego Mission.”

Beck’s eyes widened. “The cursed gold?”

Blakesley couldn’t help but grin; she was genuinely excited and amazed by what they were seeing. “It makes sense,” she insisted. “No one has been able to find it before now. So Ben steals the gold and hides it until the search for it dies down.  I don’t know why he left it here, but he must have had a reason. Maybe… maybe that’s why the fireplace has been blocked all of these years.   Maybe it’s because Ben stashed the gold in it.”

Beck could only shake his head in wonder. “So that’s where old Ben put it.”

“Maybe. I’m sure Dr. Welton’s going to spend a lot of time trying to figure it out.”

Dr. Welton spent the next two years excavating the cursed Bouchard gold from the fireplace; in fact, the entire exterior of the mantle and fireplace had been built around the stash, including a big section of it that blocked off the chimney so that smoke couldn’t escape.  It was only one in a series of mysteries that the Benjamin and Dulcinea Earp House revealed, like layers peeling off of an onion. Some mysteries had no answers, but most did. Dr. Welton would spend the rest of his professional career trying to figure them out.

The cursed Bouchard gold ended up with an estimated worth of over one hundred million dollars.  Beck and Blakesley donated some of it back to the San Diego Mission, some of it to the Benjamin and Dulcinea Earp Museum, while the rest of it, along with many valuable pieces from the jewelry collection, were auctioned off through Christies of London, netting them more than enough money to replace the thirty million Blakesley had paid for Beck’s release and then some.

Blakesley and Beck, and their family, were set up for life with an astonishing amount of wealth.  For whatever bad deeds Ben Earp had accomplished in his lifetime, he finally did some good with it in seeing that his descendents were financially well taken care of.  The curse was gone.

Naval Criminal Investigative Services and the San Diego Police Department eventually determined that the death of Ed Masterson had been in self defense, clearing anyone associated with his death of any charges. He was quietly buried in Encino next to his father and mother, with Marshall Thorne and Cadee Masterson in attendance. 

Cadee, the only one of the three sisters that truly remembered or had any connection to her father, decided that she wanted to be there when he was buried because she felt bad that he was going to be buried alone. So Marshall escorted his granddaughter to the burial because her mother didn’t want to go, and the two of them said their farewells to a man who had done little good for them in life.  Cadee never asked how her father died and those who knew never offered up any information. He was dead and that’s all she ever knew.

Nikki ended up going back to live with her mother after Blakesley fired her.  In Nikki’s place, Blakesley hired an older woman who had already raised her own three children, and the three Masterson girls loved Ms. Sarah.  Ms. Sarah, in turn, grew very attached to the Masterson girls, Lizzie, and little Emma as the baby grew into an adorably angelic toddler.   It was a good thing that Beck and Blakesley had hired the woman because their child-bearing days were apparently not over.

When Emma was fifteen months old, Blakesley went into labor and, in roughly an hour and forty-two minutes, delivered a nine pound baby boy who came into the world screaming his lungs out.  Beck had wept when the nurse handed him Marshall Colton Seavington, a healthy boy who howled and screamed his displeasure as he was held by his father for the first time.  Between the baby’s crying and Beck’s weeping, Blakesley had her hands full trying to calm both of them down.  Putting the newborn on the nipple shut him up quickly, and soft kisses and gentle comfort pretty much did the same for her husband.  Finally, they had the tow-headed healthy boy they had been waiting for. Mother, father, sisters and grandparents were thrilled.

The first time Charlotte and Emma put a princess crown on little Colt, they didn’t have to call an ambulance for Beck.  But Blakesley did have to ply him with drink, enough so that he calmed down and fell asleep on the couch as the children played around him. It was his mistake.

When he woke up, the crown was on his head.

Epilogue

Four years later

Beck had never seen anything like it.

He had expected the opening of the Art Bar to be an event, but he had no idea just how much of an event.  Blakesley had hired a publicist to arrange for a grand opening and the man had used the Hollyhock notoriety to its full advantage, and when the sleek and modern Art Bar opened for business at 5 p.m. on a balmy Friday night, there was a line out the door to get in.

Everyone who was anyone in San Diego had shown up for the event, plus a lot of people that Blakesley knew from Los Angeles had come as well. It was an invasion from the north of people driving expensive cars and wearing expensive clothes, including some actors that Beck had seen on television.  He could hardly believe it.

Dressed in clothes that his wife had picked out for him, he looked like he had just walked off the pages of a Tom Ford ad.  With his stunning good looks, he had the attention of every woman, and some men, that walked into the place as he and Blakesley greeted the throng. 

“This is crazy,” Beck hissed to his wife as they finished greeting a group of high-powered restaurant publicists. “I’ve never seen anything like this in my life.”

Blakesley grinned at him; clad in a designer gown that flattered her delicious figure to a fault, she looked amazing. “Impressed with my contacts?”

He rolled his eyes. “I had no idea you were so popular.”

She laughed softly. “Stick with me, sonny. I’ll take you places.”

“I kind of like where we are.”

She put her arm around his waist, hugging him as he squeezed her shoulders and kissed the top of her blond head.

“So do I.”

“Are the kids coming around later?”

“Yes,” Blakesley waved at a group of well-dressed men who had waved at her. “Ms. Sarah is bringing them over later.”

Beck caught sight of the men waving at his wife. “Great,” he said, rather sarcastically, as his eyes narrowed. “Who are they?”

Blakesley stopped waving, smiling up at him. “My attorney from Los Angeles who handled my divorced with Ed.”

“He’s good –looking. You’re forbidden to talk to him without me.”

She laughed softly. “Baby, your jealousy is flattering but unnecessary. He’d date you before he’d date me. He’s gay.”

“Oh,” Beck felt much better. “Then feel free to talk to him all you want.”

She laughed again, shaking her head reproachfully at the man as another group of well wishers came through the door. One of the happy visitors was a very old woman who had been a big “B” picture starlet back in the 1950’s and she entered the Art Bar on the arm of a man who was young enough to be her grandson. 

Wearing a fur and a bullet bra, the overly-made up woman was quite solicitous at Beck until Blakesley politely pulled him away.  Even then, the old woman slipped him a note with her phone number on it.  Beck and Blakesley laughed about that one, laughing harder when Beck slipped the note into Anthony Solis’ pocket and told him it was from a pretty woman across the room who was admiring him.  Anthony fell for it. 

Blakesley had to tell Gina, who was working the bar. They had a huge laugh over it. Having worked in restaurants most of her life, Gina was in charge of the bar and doing a smashing job.  She was lovely, charming and ruled with an iron fist, which worked well in the position.  She was swift with service and always had a few words and a smile for the patrons, who quickly came to like her.  Her boyfriend of two years, another Naval officer who had been a distant acquaintance of Butch’s, showed up early and sat at the end of the bar, keeping her company while she worked. Beck kept glancing over the bar, seeing how happy the woman was and knowing how thrilled Butch would have been.