“It might not exist, you know. Even Dad was aware of that possibility. Maine is not a state known for gold.”

“It exists,” Eric said through gritted teeth. “Frank spent the better part of his life looking for that gold.”

“As a hobby, Eric. He found some writings on Jedediah Plum, even unearthed an old journal. But it all could have been the romantic delusions of an eccentric old hermit.

Jedediah claimed he’d found the source of Prospect River’s placer gold, but the man died a pauper nearly eighty years ago.”

Eric’s face suddenly brightened, and he handed her the papers he was holding. “I’ve been doing some research of my own,” he said as Sadie took the papers and unfolded them.

She gasped when she saw what they were. “Where did you find this?” she asked, leafing through the photocopies of an old handwritten journal. “This is the diary Dad found just before… well, just before the fire.”

“It is?” Eric asked, moving to look over her shoulder. “Frank had this diary? I found this in an obscure little logging museum about sixty miles north of here and got permission to photocopy it. It’s the journal of a logging camp cook who lived in Jedediah’s time. It seems that just before the old hermit died, he came back out here one last time. The cook, Jean Lavoie, thought he was after some of the gold. But Jedediah disappeared a few days later. They found his body after the spring thaw.”

“Yes. They also found that he had been shot,” Sadie added. “That part of Plum’s life—

or, rather, his death—is well documented. I can’t believe you found this.” She looked at Eric, smiling sadly. “I tried cajoling Dad into gathering back his research, but after the fire he lost his passion for the hunt.”

Eric moved back to face her, smiling sympathetically. “I’m sorry, Quill. But maybe now you can study this diary and finally come up with a location. I’ve read it at least a hundred times, but I don’t know this valley as well as you do. Maybe you can find where these logging camps were, and that will tell you the vicinity of Plum’s claim.”

“I wish I had the rest of Dad’s research. We’d been so close eight years ago.”

“Everything burned?” he asked, tempering his voice with kindness.

“Yes. The fire started in the study where he kept his research,” Sadie confirmed, turning away and walking to the driver’s side of her truck. She opened the door and put the papers inside.

“You’re going home? It’s only Thursday,” Eric said, seeing that the truck was packed with her belongings.

“I need a few days off. And I want to contact the geological people in Augusta.”

“Why?”

“I’ve been studying my model and began wondering about approaching the mystery of Plum’s gold from a different angle.”

“A geological angle?” he asked, suddenly not looking so disgruntled about her self-approved vacation.

“Yeah. Instead of only trying to follow Jedediah’s path, which is all but nonexistent, why not see where Mother Nature would most likely have set her gold?”

He looked skeptical. “Frank never tried that approach?”

“Sure he did. But all his maps and aerial photos burned with his research.”

Eric got a far-away look in his eyes as he rubbed the back of his neck and stared over the hood of her truck. “I never thought of that. And I wasn’t aware Frank had, either.”

Sadie climbed into her truck and looked at Eric, still standing in the open doorway.

“Come by my store Sunday,” Eric said. “I’ll have a new cell phone for you. And you can pick out a new GPS while you’re at it.” He gave her a stern look. “You pick out a waterproof one, and you wear the damn thing tied around your neck. The budget we’ve allocated for this phase of the project is nearly spent. And until we can raise more funds, or you can find that gold, anything else you lose is coming out of your paycheck.”

She gave him a salute. “Gotcha. I’ll cherish my new equipment as I would my own child,” she promised, reaching to close her truck door. Eric stopped her by grabbing the handle.

“Oh, one more thing,” he said. “The Dolan brothers are in town. It seems they’re actively looking for the mine again. You keep an eye out for them, Quill,” he told her. “You also be sure you stay one step in front of them, not behind them. If they find that gold before we do, our plans for the park will be set back by several years. We’re counting on that gold for funding.”

That reminder given, he closed the door, walked back to his own truck, and headed back toward town as quickly as he had arrived.

Sadie was about to start her own truck when the wolf stepped out of the woods right beside her. Only he wasn’t looking at her but in the direction Eric had gone. His hackles were raised on his back.

Goose bumps lifted on Sadie’s arms. What had Father Daar said? Something about Faol protecting her from strangers?

Oh, she needed to get out of here. Now.

But even before Sadie realized what she was doing, she rolled down the window and actually spoke to the wolf. “Thank you, big boy,” she said in a whisper.

Faol turned his head and looked up, his regal green eyes calm and direct, and whined.

Sadie gaped at the animal, then shook her head to clear it. She was acting more foolish than the priest, endowing the wolf with human emotions.

It was definitely time to go home.

But home had its own host of surprises,not the least of which was a very tall, very naked man standing in her mother’s darkened kitchen. He was peering into the fridge, singing rather loudly and off key as he sorted through its contents.

Sadie yelped and nearly dropped the cat carrier on the floor. The man’s song turned to a shout, and he spun around as if ready to fight. His eyes wide and his mouth frozen open in shock, he suddenly grabbed one of the kitchen chairs and held it up in front of his waist. The man turned as red as his hair, from his forehead to his feet, as they stared at each other in silence so thick Sadie actually could hear her heart beating.

“Why did you yell, Callum? Did you drop the milk?” Charlotte Quill asked as she walked into the kitchen.

Sadie’s jaw dropped. Her mother was dressed in the sexiest, most beautiful nightgown she had ever seen.

“Mother?” Sadie croaked. She looked back at the man. This was Callum? In her mother’s kitchen? Naked?

She looked back at her mother, who had stopped dead in her tracks and was blushing to the roots of her blond tousled hair.

“Oh, dear,” Charlotte whispered.

It was Callum who broke the triangle of stares. Still holding the chair like a shield to protect what modesty he had left, he sidled over to Charlotte, then backed through the doorway before disappearing into the darkness of the hall. Her mother walked over and closed the refrigerator door, then walked over to Sadie and took the cat carrier out of her hands and set it on the floor. Charlotte leaned up and kissed her still shocked daughter on the cheek.

“Hi, sweetie. I wasn’t expecting you home tonight.”

“I see that.”

“He’s a fine figure of a man, don’t you think?”

Sadie stared at her mother, then suddenly broke into laughter. She gave her mother a huge hug. “Oh, Mom. Only you would ask your daughter what she thought of your lover’s bod.”

“Well, you did get a good look, I take it,” Charlotte said into her shoulder, hugging her back.

“I guess I did.”

Charlotte pulled away and took Sadie by both hands, absently running her thumb over Sadie’s glove-covered scars. “He’s so embarrassed, sweetie. He’s probably dressing right now and practicing what to say to you when he comes back out here.”

“Maybe I have something to say to him. Like asking what his intentions are toward you.”

“I intend to marry your mother, lass,” Callum said from the entrance to the hall.

He was fully clothed now and no less impressive for being dressed. He had obviously tried to smooth down his hair with his hand but had fallen quite a bit short of taming it.