Page 60 of Sailor's Delight

“Because my uncle never told anybody about it. Not a word about it to anyone. When he died, the family sold off everything in his shop that they didn’t have any feelings about. Nobody knew anything about the bracelet, so it just got sold.”

“So, how did you come by the information?” Trey asked, equally intrigued.

“Years after his death, somebody was reading his journal, doing some work on family history or genealogy or something, and he talked about it there, along with a sketch of the bracelet.”

Trey and Jenn looked at one another. “So, your family has just spent the last sixty years looking for this bracelet?” Jenn asked quietly.

Trey nodded. “Sort of. A lot of them tried really hard to track it down at first, but nobody knew anything about it at that point. Over time, it mostly just became one of those family stories you know, ‘Oh, if only Uncle Herbie hadn’t lost the Eagle diamond, things would be so different!’” Casey laughed. “Most people moved on, got their own jobs, did their own thing. I–” He lowered his eyes, and his shoulders slumped. “I haven’t really had anything going for me up to this point.”

Jenn and Trey looked at each other.

“That’s… really something,” Jenn said quietly.

“So, are you gonna keep it?” Trey asked.

“Probably? I mean, I’ll try and sell it, probably. I’ve been wanting to try and start a business. I thought this might help.”

Jenn sat back and slurped a wide swath up the side of her neglected ice cream cone. “I think you deserve it. Maybe I’m crazy, but I still think that somewhere, under all those muscles and bad decisions, you still have the capacity to be a decent dude.”

Casey looked up, suddenly bashful. “Thanks,” he smiled.

“Don’t mention it,” Jenn said, and offered Trey a lick of her cone. “Help me finish this?” she asked.

Trey made an unreasonable amount of eye-contact with Jenn as he lowered his mouth to her cone and began to slurp loudly.

Jenn yanked it back. “Oh, good lord, stop that! Can’t anything ever just be what it is with you guys? Why does anything that goes into my mouth have to be sexual?” She stood to leave and looked down at Casey. “I mean it: use that to do something good. You don’t owe anyone else a damn thing from it. You did all the work; you should get all the reward.”

“Thanks,” he repeated.

Trey stood to leave, as well, putting a hand on Jenn’s ass. She hip-bumped him as she started walking. “See you around, Casey!”

When they were a few tables away, Trey said, “It’s pretty big of you to just forgive what he did. I can’t imagine how scared you must have been.”

Jenn shrugged. “Eh. Honestly, I was never really that scared. I was mad! At you, though.”

Trey scoffed. “Really? You were literally kidnapped, and you were still mad at me for something you only thought I did?”

“Yes!” Jenn responded quickly, smiling into her strawberry soft serve. “I had no idea you were planning…” She glanced at Trey, who raised his eyebrows and glanced at her, as well, waiting for what she would say. “What you were.” Jenn’s eyebrows knit together. “Hey, by the way, how on earth did you arrange the entire Moonlight Lounge to ourselves for our little ‘party?’”

Trey shrugged. “I paid off Ricardo.”

Jenn choked on a mouthful of ice cream. “You did?”

“Yeah.” Trey’s eyes were thoughtful now.

“For how much?”

He glanced at her again.

“How much, Trey?”

“Ten thousand dollars?”

Jenn stopped short, staring sightlessly down the hall.

“What?” Trey asked, turning to look at her. “You just closed the biggest merger of your career! Your bonus will be unreal!”

Jenn turned around and began walking back into the cafeteria.

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