Chapter 11

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Dralx- I love that me updating makes people happy! The first time I saw National Treasure I actually could not stand Riley-but after the billionth time I saw it I'm in love with him. Thanks for the conversation complement! An English teacher once told me that I couldn't write conversations to save my life (In more polite form, of course) So I try and work extra hard on those. Hah, you are the only person I know besides myself who will use the phrase "and all that jazz" in a sentence. Rock on!

Kestrel- I'm pretty sure that no one has ever written me out the Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang lyrics before. I thank you. I decided to make Riley have a big family because I could picture him as the middle child in a huge family and kind of being ignored and spending all his time on the computer- (sob) Err, maybe I'm getting a little too into this. Wow! You're one of seven! I'm only one of four and I consider my family obnoxiously large! I decided to have the semi-bonding scene between Claire and Riley because I didn't want have their arguing get repetitive and boring, so I threw an actual conversation into the mix. Now back to the arguing! (Rubs hands evily)

Ali- Thanks for reviewing again! I hope I can post this chapter sooner than the last one!

Me- Haha, I read this one and couldn't decide whether I had reviewed my own story really late while I was punchy, one of my friends reviewed it and expected me to know who they were, or more likely you just felt like putting "me". Well, more power to you, whoever you are. Thanks for the review and I tried to update quicker this time because you asked :P

Isabella- Yay! You're the second person who's reviewed that I actually know! I'm kind of honored that you actually read my story, and I can agree that fanfiction reading can lead to obsession compulsion.

A/N- I case anyone was wondering about my obscure good ship lollipop reference, it's an annoying children's song that I had to dance to when I took tap when I was like, five. I just couldn't resist putting it there. Plus a way overdue shoutout to my beta, whos fanfic name I don't really know, but keeps this story good by making me delete all the shit parts that I try to sneak in. Thanks Jo!

Chapter Eleven

Nassau was like something from a children's book. The buildings were pastel colors that shone in the tropical sun, and palm trees were scattered everywhere. Claire took in the beautiful shoreline as the ship sailed toward the docks. She felt like she was walking into a postcard, or a movie set. Clutching her disposable camera, she began to rapidly snap photos of the coast.

Riley announced his presence with a snicker. "You know, if you keep that up you're going to be out of film before we even set foot on land."

"But look how gorgeous it is!" she protested, waving her hand around.

"Yeah, yeah, I'll enjoy it once we're off this floating death trap."

Claire patted the boat fondly. "I like it."

"Yes, of course, after the peaches and cream voyage we just had, who wouldn't have fuzzy feelings for the good ship lollipop?" Riley deadpanned.

"You're such a pessimist!" Claire complained. "Things could have been worse! The ship could have sunk!"

"Yes, thank goodness we were only thrown overboard and almost asphyxiated under the ocean."

Claire threw up her hands in defeat. "I give up! I'm going to go pack."

As she descended into the cabin, Riley relaxed, smirking. Now he could enjoy the view by himself, without anyone to annoy him. He tried to convince himself that it wasn't even the tiniest bit lonely. It wasn't working.

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Claire was going to get lost, Riley realized, with surprisingly little amusement. Every time they walked by a particularly interesting building or a street vendor she would stop and gawk in admiration like the greenest of tourists. Since he wanted to get to dinner at the hotel on time, he had designated himself her official babysitter.

"Ben, exactly how much farther is it to our hotel? I'm hungry." He complained.

"Just a few more minutes Riley."

Glancing behind him, Riley groaned and realized that they had once again lost Claire. Running back through the crowd, he scanned around, looking for a flash of blonde hair.

Nothing.

He ran a hand through his hair in frustration and was about to call for Ben when he saw her. Claire was standing next to a street vendor selling bananas and laughing in surprise asthe street vendor's parrot landed on her shoulder.

For a split second, Riley just stood and watched her stroke the stupid bird and acting childishly thrilled when it croaked out a few words. Then he realized that a stupid grin was threatening to burst out onto his face and quenching it, brusquely walked over and grabbing her arm.

"Come on Claire! We don't have time to spend hours searching for you every time you wander off!"

Rolling her eyes, Claire happily waved goodbye to the man and his parrot.

"Jeez Riley, I thought you were the all play and no work guy. Where's your sense of fun?." she muttered

"I'll have fun after I satisfy my crippling hunger."

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The message on his answering machine only said, "I found him. Meet me as soon as you can at my office."

Ian was there within ten minutes of hearing the message.

Agent Dawes was grinning like Christmas had come early as she accessed some files on her computer.

"Thank God for Big Brother!" she exclaimed happily.

"Yeah………" Ian agreed, completely lost. "While I love infringement of public privacy as much as the next guy, what does this have to do with our case?"

"We accidentally picked up these emails because we thought that the content pertained to some suspected terrorist attacks. However, when they were actually checked they were found to be completely irrelevant and they were trashed. When I did a search of Drew Deachat or Eric Robinson on anywhere in our database, these were pulled out of the trash."

Scrolling down, Ian could see that they were emails between Robinson and Deachat.

"Bingo." He said, smirking.

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The four of them managed to squeeze into a booth in what looked suspiciously like a TGI Fridays. (Riley had insisted on choosing the restaurant.)

After placing their orders, Ben wasted no time. "Claire, I want you to tell us all the clues you've found so far. If we get separated, all of us need to know the clues, starting with the one that led you to Nassau."

"That's reasonable." Claire agreed. "We should all level with each other." Reaching down to retrieve her notes, she started when Riley grabbed her arm.

"Just give us the Cliff Notes version." he warned. "We don't want to attract any attention."

Be looked almost insultingly surprised at Riley's burst of good judgment.

Claire nodded warily. "Alright." she began. "I left off where I found out that the treasure was located somewhere in the Bermuda Triangle, or the Devil's Triangle, as it was called. However, I had no idea where in the Bermuda Triangle it was. So, I scoured over the letters for weeks, trying to find some sort of secret message hidden in the words. I kept coming back to his signature."

She grabbed a napkin and a crayon out of the little kiddie container on the table. Riley grinned. "Do they use purple crayolas at Harvard?."

"Shut up please. Anyway, Blackbeard always signed his letters E.D., for Edward Drummond."

"But I thought you said his name was Edward Teach?" Abbie commented.

"Actually, he was born Edward Drummond, and changed his name later in life, I'm guessing to protect his family." Claire explained. "Now, underneath his initials he always wrote the numbers 1 and 26. There was no explanation for these numbers, and he had them in every letter. So, I tried them as latitudes and longitudes, possible addresses, and many other purposes, but it was really much simpler."

"The alphabet!" Ben exclaimed. "It has 26 letters!"

"Exactly. So, I plugged in the numbers into the alphabet, with E as 1 and D as 26 and go this."

A-23 B-24 C-25 D-26 E-1 F-2 G-3 H-4 I-5 J-6 K-7 L-8 M-9 N-10 O-11 P-12 Q-13 R-14 S-15 T-16 U-17 V-18 W-19 X-20 Y-21 Z -22

"Well," Riley said. "I feel like I'm in the Da Vinci Code, but how does this cool puzzle-thing tell us where the treasure is?"

"Well, while I was looking at the envelopes of the letters, I noticed that there was a sequence of numbers under Mr. Hornigold's address. Now, I had previously looked these numbers over, because all of us are used to such numbers: zip codes. But then I realize that zip codes weren't invented until the twentieth century, so the numbers must mean something else."

She once again returned to scribble on her napkin.

102315152317

"Now, Mr. Langdon, looking at the "Da Vinci Code", could you tell me what that says?" Claire said, smirking as she handed the napkin to Riley.

Peering down at the numbers, Riley grabbed another crayon and quickly translated them.

10 23 15 15 23 17

N A S S A U

"Genius." He breathed.

"Thank you." Claire replied, beaming.

He rolled his eyes. "I meant Blackbeard."

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Riley yawned his way through most of dessert. "I think I'll catch a cab back to the hotel. All this swashbuckling adventure made me a bit drowsy."

"I'll come with you." Claire volunteered. "I need to do some research."

"Ugh, do you have to?" Riley groaned.

"Someone has to keep you from getting mugged." Claire shot back

"We'll meet you guys back there in a few hours." Ben offered. "Abby and I are going to do some late-night sightseeing."

"Yeah right." Riley snorted. "You two have fun sightseeing." He turned and followed Claire out.

Ten minutes later, they still were having trouble hailing a cab. Apparently every driver in Nassau had his Riley-radar on.

"Come on, let's just walk." Claire suggested. Riley hesitantly agreed and they started down the sidewalk.

"So how did you end up in league with Ben and my brother a few years ago?" Claire asked conversationally.

"Well, I was a poor innocent college graduate who was sucked into the evil of corporate America when I was forced to work for a computer programming company." Riley began. "Apparently I was also the only computer programmer who believed in the Gate's conspiracy theory. Working for one on an Ian Howe payroll was too good of a chance to pass up."

"You knew my brother?"

"Never met him in my life. His money, however, patched up any differences I had with the guy. You know, until he tried to blow me up on an eighteenth century boat." he said, laughing.

Claire was silent. Riley glanced over, surprised that she wasn't immediately jumping to her brother's defense as she usually did. Claire was glancing behind them discreetly (well, what she obviously thought was discreetly. Riley was strongly reminded of his dropping-of-the-fork ruse.)

"What is it?"

Claire started to laugh loudly like he had just cracked the funniest joke she ever heard, punching his arm.

"Claire, are you going crazy?" Riley asked incredulously.

"Act normal." she whispered through clenched teeth. Riley just kept staring at her.

"What's going on?" he demanded,

"She pushed him to turn onto a less occupied alleyway. "Walk faster." she urged. "I think we're being followed."

"How the hell could you possibly know that?' Riley questioned.

"Try growing up with a teenage Ian Howe-you get followed a lot." Claire replied. She gulped as a man in a floral shirt and khaki shorts turned into their alleyway.

"That's him." she hissed.

"Way to lead him into a deserted alley!" Riley whispered furiously. "He's probably part of the Nassau-ian mafia!"

"Or the man that killed Professor Robinson. How far is it to our hotel?" Claire asked, sneaking a look behind her again as the man crept closer to them.

" A good mile." Riley replied quickly. "What should we do?"

Claire hesitated. "On the count of three, run as fast as you can."

"That's it?"

"I'm the historian, not the getaway specialist, okay!" Claire snapped quietly.

"Alright. On your count."

"One……" Claire began softly. "Two……."

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"We got it!" Dawes crowed triumphantly. "The internet café found this in the dumpster behind their store. It's the laptop Deachat used."

Ian rushed over to it. "Why would he trash his laptop……unless he knew there was incriminating evidence on it!"

Scanning the files, Dawes opened the Internet History folder. her eyes widened. "Howe…you're not going to like this."

"What is it?" Ian commanded.

"His history says he was looking up flights and ticket prices to Nassau."

Thanks Guys! Please Review and I promise I'll go faster than the speed of the government!