The Grey Gull
September 23rd, 2011
A banner strung above the Gull's door declared that it was "Fall Fest!" in large letters, and underneath in smaller wording was a statement about all well drinks being $3 each for the event. It was likely the latter that explained why there were people packed into the entire restaurant than the desire to celebrate the first day of autumn.
Duke hadn't officially scheduled himself to work during the party, but was occasionally giving the bartender a hand until he and Audrey decided to leave. He was in the middle of pouring shots when she slipped behind the counter with him. Grinning, he said, "You know, anyone else who tried this would be out on their ear."
"Well, dating the owner comes with perks," she shot back.
"Does it?" he asked archly.
"It-" She stopped talking suddenly, eyes on the far end of the room. "Nathan?"
He followed her glance and saw a familiar figure lurking about as far away from the bar as possible. Nathan held a beer in one hand, and seemed to be talking to someone. "Huh. I can't believe we didn't see him come in."
"He can be sneaky like that," Audrey replied easily. "Scares the hell out of suspects sometimes."
"I can imagine," Duke replied drolly.
After people steadily streamed in over the next half an hour, Duke scanned the size of the crowd before leaning towards Audrey. "You wouldn't happen to have an in with the fire chief, would you? We're under the occupancy limit now, but..."
"Sorry. Maybe you'll have to switch to bouncer to thin the herd."
"Ha."
"So," a slightly accented voice asked, "do you plan to make Fall Fest a yearly event?"
Before Duke could reply, Audrey went around the counter and gave Jess a hug. Duke was a little surprised by that affectionate gesture until he realized that she'd caged at least a couple of drinks herself while behind the counter with him. As he studied her enthusiastic greeting, he upped his estimation to three. Maybe four.
Setting down the bottle he'd been holding, Duke followed her around the bar. "Hey, Jess. I hadn't decided, but it looks like it might be a good idea."
"It looks like half of Haven is here," Jess remarked.
"Everyone loves Duke," Audrey said seriously. She pressed herself against his chest and the front of his thighs when he wrapped his arms around her from behind. "Except Nathan."
Jess looked around expectantly. "He's not here, is he?"
"Actually, he's over there." Audrey pointed vaguely.
"I think I'll go talk to him," Jess said brightly.
Before she could move, Nathan noticed them standing before the bar and stalked towards them. It was Duke's assumption that he was coming over to speak to Jess, which is why he was in shock when Nathan reached over Audrey's shoulder and grabbed his shirt. "Did you forget to pretend tonight?"
"Wha?" Duke started to ask before he realized exactly when Nathan meant. He and Audrey had somehow forgotten not to act like a couple when they knew they were in his line of sight. He mentally kicked himself; Audrey had been drinking and therefore careless but he himself had no such excuse to explain it away.
Audrey squirmed out of Duke's arms, drew herself up to her full height such as it was, and pointed a finger at her belligerent partner. "Nathan, back off."
"No," Nathan snapped. "What is wrong with you? You're one of the smartest women I know, but you've always had such a blind spot when it has come to him. How am I supposed to just stand here and accept it when you seem to have no idea that he's just using you?"
"Wait, hey," Duke protested, holding his hands up. "I'm not using anyone."
"This is exactly why we didn't tell you," Audrey hissed. "I knew you'd overreact."
"I'm only overreacting because you've been hiding this for weeks," Nathan shot back hotly.
"Jesus, Nathan, did you bug her apartment or something?" Duke asked, disgusted.
"No." Audrey spun towards Nathan. "How did you-"
"The night he came back your door was unlocked and I saw you. Saw you under him," he spat out.
Duke grabbed Audrey's arm before she could punch Nathan. Whatever she was planning had been meant to hurt, he could that tell from how the muscles of her arm felt in his grasp. She yelled at Nathan anyway, though. "You spied on us. God dammit, Nathan, why don't you get a life of your own and let me live mine?"
"You want me to have a life of my own? Fine." To everyone's surprise, probably Jess's most of all, Nathan leaned over and kissed her. At first it seemed like she wasn't upset, but then Nathan groped her behind.
A loud crack rent the air, and Nathan put his hand to his cheek. Jess stared at him, breathing hard.
"That's it," Duke declared, pushing past both women and yanking Nathan to the door. "You're out of here. Yelling at me is one thing, but I'm not standing for you molesting my other customers."
"I'm gone," Nathan muttered, stalking off.
"Jess, are you okay?" Duke asked as he rejoined her and Audrey.
"I'm okay. I think I'm going to check on him."
"Wait, do you think that's a good idea?"
She patted Duke's arm. "I'm a big girl. And I have pepper spray."
After she walked out, Audrey looked at Duke and giggled. "I guess that cat's out of the bag."
Shaking his head, he smiled at her. "Somehow, I was excepting worse."
"Duke, how could it have been worse?" Audrey gapped at him.
"I had something with a horse head in mind."
Crisis passed, they squeezed back behind the bar and he helped the beleaguered bar tender fill drink orders. Practically the whole bar had stopped drinking to watch the spontaneous live entertainment they'd provided, but now the orders were piling up.
As Duke scanned the room, he was relieved that he didn't notice anyone who was loyal to the Rev in the crowd. Someone had told him that most of his followers were teetotalers who took the Rev's hypocritical admonishments against the evils of alcohol to heart, but it had been hard for him to believe considering the popularity of drinking as a pastime in Maine. But no one who was likely to report to the Rev had been there to witness the blow up, so he felt grateful.
If there was one thing that Nathan was glad about, it was that the cool night air cleared his head a little. What he'd just done was very stupid, and he could only blame the drinks he'd downed a little for the outburst. More of the blame lay in allowing the knowledge to eat at him for weeks. No wonder he'd finally exploded.
"Nathan?" a voice behind him called.
His first impulse was to walk faster, but if he knew Jess Minion at all, he knew that tucking his chin in and upping his pace would only strengthen her resolve to talk to him. So, against his better judgment, he stopped.
"I'm sorry," Nathan said as he turned to face her.
"For?" she asked pointedly.
Flustered, he flapped a hand ineffectually. "Everything?" he ventured. In all honesty he wasn't in fact sorry for kissing her because it had almost been a good kiss. Had been, at least until he'd grabbed her butt and freaked her out.
Jess sighed. "I'm not mad that you kissed me, Nathan. I'm mad that you did it to make a point."
"I..."
"For someone spouting off about using people, maybe you should look in the mirror yourself."
He winced. "I deserve that. And I really am sorry."
Some of the anger drained from her expression. "And I'm sorry I slapped you."
"I deserved that too."
She tilted her head. "And you felt it," she remarked. "I know you did. Is your trouble...gone?"
"No," Nathan said quickly. "But you're right. I did feel it."
"How is that possible?"
"I don't know. I never figured out why I can feel Audrey, either. I guess you're both special," he said, giving her what he hoped was an endearing smile. It must have been because she no longer looked mad at all. "Do you think we can start over? Friends?"
"Friends," she agreed. "Now let's make sure you get home all right. Where were you walking to, anyway? You don't live anywhere near here."
Nathan looked around, really noticing where he was for the first time. "Uh...I have no idea where I was going."
Shaking her head, Jess looped an arm through his and pointed him in the right direction so they could get her car. He knew without asking that he'd have to get someone to bring him to his truck in the morning, and Audrey wasn't on the short list of people he thought he could hit up for that ride. He could only hope that she was half as forgiving as Jess was.
Tuesday
Audrey walked in to find Nathan had the office window cracked open. A slight breeze was coming through it, stirring the papers on both of their desks. Nathan himself was oblivious to the cresting chorus, staring intently at a report on his desk. He had the oddest expression on his face: a mixture of resignation, and yet a little bit of hope, tempered with bitter satisfaction.
"What's up, Nathan?" she asked as she entered the office. She caught an errant report as it tried to escape out of the door on the wind's back.
"Fishing Museum had a break in." Nathan didn't make eye contact with her, continuing to stare intently down at what must have been the police report for the incident.
Audrey tried to crane her head to see the report, but wasn't succeeding to well, largely because Nathan had picked up the report and seemed to be trying to hide it from her. They danced around each other for a few minutes, Audrey trying to see the report, and Nathan seemingly deliberately keeping it from her.
Finally Audrey rolled her eyes and went to her desk. "Nathan, what is the big deal with a break-in at the Fishing Museum. Did someone steal the town's first net or something?"
"No. The Museum had a rather large scrimshaw collection, donated over a long period of time by the children of whalers that used to live on the coast. Some of those pieces are worth thousands of dollars. Someone broke in, cherry picked the ones worth the most, and then broke out again." Nathan turned to look at Audrey significantly.
Audrey returned his significant look with one involving a well-arched eyebrow. "Ok, so I can see that being a big thing. Are there any suspects?"
Nathan consulted his report. "Yes."
"Do I get to find out who they are?" Audrey was growing increasingly frustrated with Nathan's game of cat and mouse.
The other officer considered it for a moment. "I'm pretty sure you don't want to know."
That was all the information Audrey needed to draw the conclusion. Nathan was right. She really didn't want to know. She sighed. "Why is Duke one of the suspects, other than for some reason everyone thinks he is a thief?"
Nathan did his little boy shuffle. "Duke isn't one of the suspects. He's the only suspect. And it's because he visited the fishing museum three times last week. One of the pieces that was stolen was one he had been seen taking a considerable interest in."
"Maybe he just likes to go to museums?" Audrey asked, hopeful. She thought about adding that they'd gone to an art museum recently, but decided that it wouldn't help.
Nathan shook his head. "No. Before the scrimshaw exhibit opened, he'd never gone according to the curator, who is also the head ticket taker, and has been for 20 years."
"Great." Audrey looked up the heavens, trying to see them through the ceiling. She knew a relationship with someone that lived in the gray space of the law wasn't going to be easy, and that she was going to have to decide if she was going to turn a blind eye to his activities or not, but she really wasn't expecting it to be so soon. Why had he done this? Wasn't the restaurant enough for him?
She had suspected that Duke had never really turned to the straight and narrow. His roguish nature just wouldn't ever allow him to be on the path too long. In the year that she'd known the man, she knew he had a problem with authority, but still, she had hoped that maybe the "thrill of the hunt" that seemed to drive him would be satiated when he caught her.
Nathan looked rather apologetic as he told her, "I'm trying to get a warrant to search Cape Rouge and the Gull for the missing pieces. I have to act now because we can't give him too much time to fence the things, or get them somewhere they can be stored until the case is marked cold."
"Let me try talking to him, Nathan," Audrey pleaded.
A gust of wind whipped through the office and set the mountain of paperwork on Nathan's desk in a dervish's whirlwind. Silence reigned for a few moments while he considered her request and the two of them gathered the scattered documentation.
After the strays had been corralled and returned to their point of origin, now with a paperweight, the once and future chief turned to his partner. "If he confesses, you have to bring him in. If you find the pieces, you have to bring him in. There is no hiding this. He is not troubled, and we can't fake reports to say he's not guilty."
Audrey nodded. "I know my duty, Nathan. My responsibility comes before my relationships. Let me at least try. You know that the courts will go easier on him if he turns over the things on his own."
"I'll have the warrant by four," he told her.
Audrey choked the life out of her steering wheel. Duke wouldn't betray her like that, would he? He seemed to be one of Haven's more colorful characters, and certainly he had a past, but he had too much to lose now, didn't he? Duke seemed to enjoy running the Gull, and had seemed far more stable than so may others of Haven's residents. While he had changed a bit when Evi showed up, and slightly more after she died, Audrey had seen nothing to indicate theft had become an active part of Duke's life. Still, Audrey had little clue as to how he spent his time when he wasn't at the Gull or with her.
She listened to the repetitive thuds as her tires carried her over the dock, down to Cape Rouge's pilot house. Audrey tried to use the sound to drive away the thought that Duke could unfaithful to her in this way. He had seemed to understand so well that her work, her duty, her responsibilities to everyone in this town had to come first. Surely he didn't think that their relationship would shield him.
The blonde detective reluctantly boarded Cape Rouge as the wind tossed her hair around. It had picked up even more since earlier in Nathan's office. So much for the clear afternoon that the weathermen had predicted.
It took a while, whether because the ship was big or Audrey was delaying this conversation, she wasn't sure, but she found Duke in the ship's engine room. He was covered in sweat and oil, and actively swearing at a nut he couldn't get tight or maybe loose.
"Hi, Duke."
"Hey, Audrey. What are you doing down here? I thought you were on duty with Nathan today." Duke let go of the wrench, and it hung on to the bolt.
Audrey walked a couple of steps closer. She hadn't seen the engine room up close before, and she wondered about all the tubes and valves it contained. Idly she wondered how many times Duke had brained himself on some piping given that at least one small white washed tube was clearly labeled "DUCK!". "Oh, Nathan wanted to look into something. I thought I'd ask if you knew anything about it, and well, after the scene at the Gull the other day..."
Duke snorted. "You got nominated, right. What is it?"
"There was a break-in at the Fishing Museum." Audrey stared at the decking below her feet.
Duke leaned up against his stuck wrench. "What was taken?" he asked, wary but curious.
Audrey mirrored the pose, leaning up against some thing she thought might have been a giant piston case. "Artwork."
Duke looked even more wary than he had previously. "And?"
"And we were wondering if you had heard anything about it." Audrey met his eyes.
Duke snorted, and then his expression turned cold when the full impact of her inquiry hit him. "No, Audrey. I didn't know the museum had been broken into. I don't know what 'artwork' was stolen, and no, I won't tell you the names of anyone that might have been interested in any such 'artwork' if I knew of anyone who was." He stopped and glared at Audrey and then brushed by her, returning to the stairs that would carry him to the upper decks.
"Duke, I just want-" she started.
He turned on her. "I know. You just want to give me a chance to turn myself in so that I can throw myself on the mercy of the courts. You just want to believe I decided, 'hey, I know, I'll steal something today, and it'll get Audrey's attention.' Well, I didn't. And I'm pissed off that you think that I could have done it."
Audrey's temper flared. "Duke, what do you want me to say? The curator said you went to the museum three times last week and stared at the scrimshaw exhibit and then suddenly this week the most valuable pieces are gone? Unfortunately you've got a bit of a reputation in this town, and everyone believes that you plus missing art equals you having the missing art."
Duke was vibrating with anger. He took a couple of deep breaths before he responded to her. "Everyone, huh? I thought maybe you would be different, but I guess not. Child of the town lush, I must be no good either. I thought maybe you knew me better than that. Here's a lesson for you from the Thieves Handbook, Audrey, since you won't believe me because I tell you I didn't do it. You don't piss where you live. Even if I was stealing anything from anyone, which would be damn hard to do with a restaurant I need to run, I wouldn't steal from people around here."
Audrey wasn't one to take verbal abuse lying down. "You want me to trust you, to believe that you are different from what everyone says you are? Hard to do when you never tell me the whole truth about anything, and you frequently have three or four motives for what you are doing. Makes it a little hard to know where you are coming from there, Duke."
"I guess that's why you have never said 'I love you' back. Tell me, am I just an interesting diversion while you wait for someone else?" he asked bitterly. "Nathan's jealous little display the other night shows that he's interested. But you are just too damned scared to commit to someone like him. It's just easier to play with Haven's resident bad boy." Duke turned and stomped up the stairs.
Audrey followed, grinding her teeth. She cornered the tall man in the Galley. "Duke, I walked into this relationship knowing that you had a past. I was willing to set it aside because I felt strongly about you. However I didn't expect that past to rear up and come between us like this. Now did you or did you not steal the art?"
The sorrow and pain in Duke's eyes could have been real or could have been a masterful act. "No. I haven't stolen anything since I took over the Gull."
She walked over to him, reaching out but he backed up, and then turned away. "I have to go. I need to cover for Nora."
She heard his footsteps as he disembarked from his boat, then heard the roar of the Land Rover's engine.
Audrey had grimly led the way to her gray sedan, Nathan following her. The warrant had come in a half hour before. She had told Nathan the results of her aborted request of Duke, leaving out how badly the discussion had gone. However, he appeared to have guessed. He hadn't said a word to her after, and hadn't pressed. He hadn't even come back with some sort of comment about Duke being a perpetual liar.
Together they went down to the docks to serve the warrant and search the ship.
Unfortunately, the ship to be searched was gone. Where the Cape Rouge should have been was just an open expanse of water. A quick search around the dock revealed that Duke's truck was gone as well. Jake, one of the old fishing hands, had only offered that Duke had lit out like his tail was on fire when he got back from the Gull. He'd been gone for well over two hours at that point.
"Probably heading out to international waters. Won't be able to catch him out there," Nathan commented. He stared at the horizon, and Audrey wasn't sure if he was wishing to see the Cape Rouge come in, or if he was wishing he never laid eyes on it again.
"I didn't tell him that there was enough for a warrant," Audrey protested.
"I know. But he ran. It's all he knows, I think."
At eight he next morning Audrey was down at the docks, hoping Duke had returned. He hadn't.
She'd been worried about him in the night. The storm that had been threatening most of the day had hit and the fierce wind smashed her chimes made out of flatware into the side of the Gull with a vengeance When it was over, she realized it wasn't the only thing over: she was over being angry at him, and she wanted to apologize. She wanted to tell him that he was foolish to think that she would choose Nathan. The only thing worse than getting into a relationship with a felon was getting into one with your partner. When she did fall into a fitful sleep, she dreamed the Cape Rouge broke up on the rocks and she found Duke's body on the shore.
She swung back to the Gull, but the staff all claimed that Duke hadn't contacted them. He had just disappeared.
The second day was a Thursday, and the Haven Herald was mentioning that the storm from the previous night was the second "Storm of the Century" in the past century. The storms had collided just south and east of Haven, and had carried up the coast line staying mostly out to sea. They were still looking for boats that had put out distress calls in the night. So far there had been no evidence that anyone had capsizes, but nor was there evidence that all souls had been found, either. Beattie was too busy out looking for ships in distress to field Audrey's calls, other than a quick check to verify that the Cape Rouge was not one of the missing ships or ships that had called out for help.
Duke docked the Cape Rouge at nearly 4 a.m. on Saturday. He hadn't really slept since the day he and Audrey had fought. Part of him wondered why he accused her of disloyalty so quickly, and another part realized exactly why. He fully expected Nathan or Stan to be on the docks ready willing and able to execute the search warrant he knew had to be coming his way. Nathan had worked too long trying to find something to pin on him as a smuggler. He was surprised that there was not a cruiser on the dock waiting to take him in. Still, given that he'd been out in the weather for the better part of four days, he was grateful for small mercies.
Duke was tired enough that mooring Cape Rouge to her dock seemed to take twice as long as usual. Still, once the old lady was firmly home, he could finally retire. He stumbled into the master bedroom, stripped down and fell into bed. The sailor buried himself in the middle of the bed, taking up much of the mattress with his lanky form. Of course, now that he'd found himself in his bed, Duke couldn't sleep. He cursed his body's perversity that it was too tired to rest. The smuggler mused that he could have called Audrey, but he didn't have any cupcakes on hand. He figured he would need them to slow her down before she scalped him because of his abrupt departure.
The dark haired man tossed fitfully on the bed. Most of the fleet had gone out to chase down the phantom cries for help that had come in on their radios. The Cape Rouge was, despite her someone decrepit appearance, a very good vessel. Duke had been able to leave the Harbor before the storm broke and head out to search for the missing boat. He'd stayed out, along with most of the fleet, searching and scanning for ships in distress. No one had found any. The calls had stopped coming in after the first night of the storm, but the fleet had stayed out there looking for the lost souls for a few more days. Even now, the big trawlers and the sport fishers that were still out there kept an eye out for flotsam or jetsam in the hopes it might lead to the boat and her crew, that they still might be found alive.
His body at last began to warm up under the blankets, and he felt himself dozing off. He sent forth a quiet wish that the crew of the lost ship was found before his own personal undertow took him.
The normal hustle and bustle of the Gull greeted Audrey as she walked down the gray staircase. The morning crew were there, obscenely cheerful for that early in the morning. One of the cooks was drawing on the sacred blackboard. She waved to Audrey as so continued doodling something that looked like a lobster that had decided to don a chicken suit. Audrey walked closer, slightly resentful that someone else had used the blackboard.
"I thought tuna was the chicken of the sea?"
The blonde cook grinned. "That is a tuna."
Audrey stepped in for a closer look. "If it's a tuna, why does it have feet?"
The cook considered it for a moment. "It's the chicken suit's feathers. I thought it would look more realistic. And of course the chicken suit had to have feet."
Audrey thought it best not to respond. She still sometimes couldn't tell if the natives were having her on with their wild comments like that. Sometimes they seemed so serious when they said the oddest things. Either the citizenry of Maine were the best deadpan comedians she'd ever met, or they really were just that warped by long winters.
Finishing her master work, the cook scribbled something completely illegible on the board and turned to go back into the restaurant. At the door she paused, "Oh, hey, the fleet's back in. My husband woke me up about three this morning to tell me he was home. He was happy to see me... I bet Duke will be happy to see you too!" she said with a sly, knowing grin. "Gotta love it when the boys come home from the sea." With that she turned and bounced into the building.
Audrey paused for a moment, dumbfounded and then jogged over to her car. She would be late for work, again, but dealing with Nathan's wrath would be worth it if Duke really had come back to port.
The things the detective told her during the few days that Duke had been gone didn't really mean much to her. Truth was she was starting to learn to ignore Nathan on the subject of Duke, until this last catastrophe. She'd never seen Duke be any less than a gentleman, and while he did walk in the gray space of the laws, and likely into the she'd-be-very-pissed-if-she-found-out-about-it areas of illegal, he'd acted too many times with kindness to total strangers, offering to help her help the troubled. Maybe Nathan had been right, and Duke had just done it to get into her pants, but maybe she could coax him back to the light side, well, lighter side. She'd seen too much of the pirate to disregard that he could and did act with surprising care for those he felt affection. Hell, he'd been willing to risk his hide to save Henry. Maybe he hadn't run after all.
Audrey drove down the dock, once again listening to the quiet thuds as the tires cleared the widths of the old boards. Cape Rouge was riding high on the tide that had just switched to ebbing, and she had seen the boat clearly from the ridge as she drove down to the marina. Now the sedan carried her past the vessel. Duke's Land Rover was still missing, she noticed but the Cape Rouge's presence gave her hope that even if she couldn't find Duke present on the boat, he'd be back soon.
She was out of her sedan faster than she thought possible as she slipped on board. The deck was odd, and it took her a few minutes to realize that Duke's normal hodge-podge of lawn furniture, laundry and lobster traps were all missing. Without them, Audrey could begin to see the Cape Rouge as she once must have been, a fine fishing ship. The notion that Duke hid the quality of his ship in poor paint and refuse much as he hid the quality of himself lodged itself in her mind, but before she could begin to explore it too far, she ran up to the pilot house.
As she looked through the window, she was taken aback. The place looked like it had been thoroughly tossed. There were maps spread everywhere, and the hand piece for the ship to shore radio was clearly across the room from where it should have been. There was a few coffee cups scattered around the bridge, as well as a couple of plates. Given their presence, Audrey realized Duke himself must have likely caused this mess rather than someone else. She began to wonder if he did run again, but then if he did, why come back? And why leave everything in disarray. His deck not withstanding, Duke was nothing if not a perfectionist and neat freak when it came to most things.
Audrey descended as quickly as she safely could down the ladder and began looking at the hatches. Looking down into the various hatches, she could see that Duke, wherever he had been, had been living hard for a few days. Duke slept towards the bow of the ship, and as she approached the final hatch, she found herself grinning. Her sailor was laying in his bed on his back, looking dead to the world. As she watched he rolled over, and curled himself up on one side of the bed, one arm reaching out until it brought a pillow up to his chest.
Her relief at finding him alive, seemingly well, and asleep in his bed gave her a warm glow for a few moments, before she reminded herself that she was going to kill him for causing her to worry. For a few moments she wished that one of the buckets that seemed to always be on the deck was around just so she could haul up the sea water and drop it on him through the hatch. Fortunately for him, the buckets had joined the lawn chairs in temporary exile.
Audrey decided that since Duke had told her where he kept the key to get in, that was as good as a standing invitation, and she used it to let herself in. The galley was a mess, and it was unusually dark without the lights. She flicked a switch and noted irritably that the light did not come on. By the light of the hatches she made her way to the stateroom. Duke hadn't stirred at her approach.
Duke thought that maybe Sleeping Beauty had it right; everyone should be woken up by a kiss. A dream of mermaids faded from him as he found himself drawn up by the feel of soft, strong lips on his. When the mouth lifted away, he arched up to follow it, opening his eyes only as an after thought. Audrey sat haloed in the hatchway light. She looked at him with unfathomable eyes. "That was for coming back safely." She then reached out and punched him on the arm, which Duke found surprisingly forceful. "And that is for being an ass."
"Ouch!" Duke sat himself up and rubbed his arm. "Not nice, Audrey. Friends don't beat on friends. And that goes double for girlfriends."
The glare Audrey shot him spoke elegantly in and of itself.
"Yeah, ok, so I deserved it. I was an ass. I'm sorry." Duke looked at her, hoping that admission would be enough to slake her wrath, because he still didn't have any cupcakes.
"For?" Audrey could do a wicked imitation of his drawl from the first day they met, when he had made Nathan apologize for accusing Duke of killing Lester.
Duke winced. "For yelling at you?"
Audrey blinked. "Yelling at me," she said quietly. She paused, and then spoke, each word growing more heated. "For four days, Duke, I have been convinced that you pulled out of Haven and ran from me without even telling me goodbye. Nathan and I had to come back with a warrant to search the Cape Rouge and the Gull for those scrimshaw pieces. When we showed up, you weren't here. We both thought you'd left for good. We just differed on if you'd taken the art. Despite what you accused me of, I wasn't convinced you did it. However, when you disappeared, everyone else in town was convinced."
"If you want to look for the scrimshaw, have at it, but I'm telling you now, you won't find it." Duke gestured openly to the boat. "I have never lied to you when I was naked and I assure you, I am quite naked under here."
Audrey stifled a laugh. "Oh, I know that, Duke. You see, one of the staff was out on vacation and came back two days ago. She had heard there was a break in and some things had been stolen. When she found out what, she went to the curator and told him that she'd taken the scrimshaw off display because she thought the exhibit ended. Turns out she had the wrong dates in her office calendar. All the pieces were found stored safely in the museum's vault." She closed her eyes and sighed. "So then I had to wonder if you left just because I had doubted you."
Duke held out a hand and cupped Audrey's jaw. "Audrey, didn't Sal talk to you? I asked him to let you know... I would have called you myself, but first I was angry and then I found out that the ship to shore was broken. There are no cell towers out there so it wasn't like I could call you on my phone."
"Sal? No. Who is Sal?" The completely puzzled look on Audrey's face was amusing.
"Sal owns the tub at the north end of the marina. He never leaves dock, and the bets are on as to how long his ship will even float. He couldn't take her out in the weather." Duke scrubbed his hand through his hear and then rubbed at the ache he always seemed to have at the base of his shoulder and neck. "That storm that came in? There was a boat in distress. No one could find it. Those of us that had ships that could take on the storm, like Gerty here, were asked to help try to locate the vessel. I went out as soon as I could. You don't..." he paused. "You don't let people die alone out there if you can help it. It's no way for a person to go, and have their loved ones never know. You get a call like that, the whole fleet goes out, if it can. Even now they're still looking."
"No one said anything to Nathan or me. Not even Beattie." Audrey angled around behind Duke, and rubbed at the knot that always seemed to bother him.
Duke leaned back into her touch. "Beattie had her hands full, trying to ensure everyone was ok here. Sal must have forgotten, or gotten drafted to help Beattie. I'm sorry, Audrey. I was angry, yes, but I would never have left you like that, not if I could help it."
The two took comfort in each other for a few moments before Audrey's phone buzzed in her pocket. Duke laughed, "Wow, Audrey, I guess you really were happy to see me."
She rolled her eyes. "Nathan calls. He's cranky I'm late for work again."
"He'll be even crankier that he didn't get to arrest me."
Audrey got up while Duke lay back down intending to go back to sleep. She leaned down over him, and he lazily watched her pendant sway in the shadows. She kissed him on the lips. "Duke, I do want you to know one thing. I... I do love you, even if I don't say it." With that she turned and left.
If she'd turned around, she would have seen him smiling still even as he sank back into the arms of sleep.
A/n: So...what do you think? Based on the story stats, a lot more people are reading this than say anything...sigh.