Free The Midas Legacy (Wilde/Chase 12) by Andy McDermott Page B

‘See you again soon.’ She hugged him, then waved to Nina. ‘Tell Macy I said goodbye.’
    ‘We will. Thanks,’ Nina replied. Holly grinned, then departed.
    ‘She’s a good kid,’ said Eddie.
    ‘She is,’ Nina agreed with a smile, which turned into something more pensive. ‘Do you think I’m a good mom?’
    The question surprised him. ‘Course I do.’
    ‘Because if Olivia really is my grandmother, that means my own mom lied to me – and my dad – about her my whole life. And they had such a huge fight that they never spoke to each other again. It was so bad that my mom told me she was dead rather than try to repair the relationship.’ She looked towards her daughter’s bedroom. ‘I don’t ever want that to happen with me and Macy.’
    ‘Well, one day she’s going to be a teenage girl,’ said Eddie. ‘Then she’ll hate you no matter what.’
    ‘Gee, thanks!’ But the wisecrack had disarmed her. ‘So when did you become an expert on the thought processes of teenage girls?’
    ‘I’ve got an older sister, remember? Lizzie and my mum used to argue all the time.’ He picked up one of the manila folders. ‘So what’re you going to do with this lot?’
    ‘Read it.’
    ‘You really think your mum wrote all this?’
    ‘If it’s a forgery, then somebody’s gone to an insane amount of trouble. There must be two hundred pages here.’ She pulled out a sheet at random. ‘It’s definitely her handwriting.’
    ‘Two hundred pages? She really was as bad as you.’ He tugged off the tie he had grudgingly worn for the premiere. ‘I’m going to bed. You coming?’
    ‘Sounds like a good idea.’ She put the folders on her desk, pausing to peruse the loose page. ‘I’ll be right in.’
    He paused at the door. ‘No you won’t.’
    ‘Hmm?’
    ‘You’re going to start reading it right now, aren’t you? I can tell.’
    She hurriedly put the page down. ‘No, I wasn’t, I . . .’
    He chuckled. ‘It’s okay. I know what you’re like – but considering what that stuff is, I don’t blame you. If someone gave me a bunch of letters from my mum, I’d want to read ’em straight away too.’
    ‘Thanks, honey,’ she said with a smile. ‘Are you the most understanding husband in the world, or what?’
    ‘I’m the sexiest, definitely.’
    ‘Uh-huh.’ They both laughed. ‘I’ll see you in a little while, then. Thanks.’
    ‘Don’t stay up too late. Night, love.’
    ‘Goodnight.’ They blew each other kisses, and Eddie left her with her mother’s work.
    Nina stared down at the folders. Where to begin?
    At the beginning, she decided with a smile. She found what appeared to be the oldest pages, and started to read.

5
    ‘ P lease don’t tell me you were up all night,’ Eddie said as he padded into the lounge.
    Nina was at her desk, picking through her mother’s notes. ‘I wasn’t, don’t worry. You were asleep when I came to bed. I didn’t get much sleep, though – I kept thinking about what I’d read, so I got up first thing and carried on working.’
    ‘It’s work now, is it?’ He peered over her shoulder. ‘So what’ve you found?’
    ‘That there are other explorers in my family,’ she said, unable to contain her enthusiasm. ‘My great-great-something-grandfather, Tobias Barrington Garde, visited India and Nepal in the 1840s.’ She rifled through the pages to find a particular passage. ‘Some Buddhist monks showed him an artefact that described Talonor’s expedition!’
    ‘What, so your ancestor from a couple of centuries back found something from Atlantis?’ Scepticism was clear in his voice. ‘That’s a bit of a coincidence. Are you sure this lot isn’t fake?’
    ‘More than ever,’ she said, indicating a box of her parents’ work she had brought in for comparison. ‘It’s definitely her writing. I don’t believe in destiny, but it might explain why I’ve always been so obsessed with Atlantis, just like my mom and dad; it’s woven into our family