Page 93 of Dukes Do It Better
Calvin, Ethan, and Simon were tending sails, and doing a rather poor job of it. Their time at sea had been spent learning the basic skills of a sailor. Malachi was grateful for the crew he’d hired in the village. If he’d had to depend on this bunch of Mayfair men, they would have been in trouble at the first sign of weather. As it was, Calvin and Ethan were making progress and getting in the way of the crew in equal measure. Simon was utterly hopeless with sails, but could sing a shanty with the best of them.
At least they were trying.
Adelaide and Lottie leaned against the railing next to Emma, looking perfectly at home in their practical breeches. When Emma caught Malachi staring at her bottom in the snug clothing, she threw him a saucy wink and wiggled her hips. He offered her a wolfish grin in return.
“How much longer, Captain?” Lottie asked, shielding her eyes with a hand as she stared toward the tiny sliver of land on the horizon.
“Soon now,” Malachi answered, making an adjustment to their course with the giant ship’s wheel.
Their voyage had first taken them to Dago, an Estonian island on the edge of Russia’s territory in the Baltic. The coordinates and riddle-like instructions revealed by his father’s bank book had led them to a cave inland, tucked into the rocks and trees.
At first, Alton had thought someone else had beat them to the treasure, and the boy had nearly been in tears at the thought. But no, after studying the page in the bank book, Malachi spotted a line that meant something new in the cave. You’ve grown into a man. Far beyond even my reach.
Leave it to his father to not waste kind words on a mere single meaning.
With instructions to fan out in the cavern, they’d run their hands over the walls as high as they could reach. The rock had been cool and damp under his fingers. On a shallow ledge he would have missed if he hadn’t been searching for it, the squared edge of a wood box brushed his fingertips.
Remembering the moment he’d found the box made Malachi smile now. As inheritances went, traveling all the way to Estonia for a box no bigger than his hand had been underwhelming. If he’d only known then, what he knew now, he’d have been giddy.
Three slim silver spinning dials had guarded the latch of the box. Tarnish blackened the letters on the dials, but he’d been certain of the combination. Yet, as his fingers spun the silver pieces until they spelled M-A-L, the box stayed stubbornly closed. It had been with a bittersweet pang that he’d spun the dials again and held his breath as he spelled S-O-N. The latch opened with a click, and breath had whooshed out of him with a sound bordering on a sob.
In the days and nights since, as Malachi clutched the contents under that weathered lid, he’d made those sounds more than once. Each night, he held Emma in his arms and they exchanged stories about their parents. Funny stories, sad stories, awful stories. They’d opened a vein of memories and let them pour out in the safety of the captain’s quarters.
A clear emotional outcome might be too much to expect when it came to his parents and his childhood. But as he and Emma shared, much of the anger and pain had fallen away, until only grief remained. There’d been so much of his father he hadn’t known.
Even with the entire bank book of countless secrets and anecdotes, the contents of the box were Malachi’s most prized pieces of his inheritance.
Inside the box, a piece of parchment had been wrapped around an object with a blue silk ribbon. He would recognize his father’s handwriting anywhere. Although to see it in English and not in damned code had been a surprise.
The words were forever imprinted in his mind now.
Malachi,
This was the only way I could think of to return to you what was lost. May you forever live in the joy of that summer.
Love, Father
