It seemed to her Sasha felt the same as she sat in the kitchen lounge sketching. Doyle had said something about a hot shower and disappeared. Since she thought he wanted space, she provided it.
She noted idly that Bran was absent for at least an hour, came back in, left again. Shortly after helping Annika form balls of bread dough, Sawyer told her to cover them with a cloth, time it for an hour.
He slipped out.
Riley lowered her tablet. “What if we tried something like a scavenger hunt?”
“Why would you hunt scavengers?” Annika wondered.
“No, it’s like a game.”
“I like games. Sawyer taught me one with cards, and when you lose, you take off a piece of clothes. Oh, but he said we only play it for two.”
“Yeah, that’s better as a duet. It’s when you have a list of things to find, and you hunt for them.”
“Like the stars. So it’s a quest.”
“In a way.”
Sasha glanced up from her sketch. “How does a scavenger hunt help us find the star?”
“It’s a way to get us to comb through the house, to look for the unexpected. I don’t know. Reaching,” Riley admitted. “Doyle’s family built on this spot. He was born here. Bran built, three hundred years later, on this spot. We’ve been driving and hiking around Clare, diving in the Atlantic. But it’s making more sense, it’s just more logical, the answer’s right here.”
“Don’t you think Bran, being Bran, would have sensed it?”
Because Riley had rolled that around, she had a theory. “I think, somehow, it didn’t really begin for us until January—and Doyle’s unwilling rebirth. Yes, everyone but you already knew about the Stars of Fortune before we hooked up on Corfu—and that’s another in the mix. We all knew; you didn’t. The clock started when Doyle hit the magic number.”
She pushed up, poured more wine. “It’s a solid theory. January starts the clock, you start having visions about us, about the stars. It takes you a while, but you go to Corfu—and so do the rest of us. Same time, same place.”
“Riley is very smart.” Annika poured more wine, too.
“You bet I am.” She clicked her glass to Annika’s, and feeling generous, took the bottle to where Sasha sat, topped off her glass. “You’re drawing the house.”
“I love the house. I don’t think it’s any more than that. But I do follow the theory. And . . . Bran brought the other two stars here, into this house. So maybe this is why.”
“Good point. So we could go through it, top to bottom. Your visions, so far, say it’s somewhere cold, talk about a name on a stone. First on the hunt list is a name, a stone. You talked about the boy seeing the man, the man the boy.”
“We have three men,” Annika pointed out.
“Right you are. One of them was born here, was a boy here. That could be it. Or . . .” Riley sipped. “It could be symbolic again. Something in the house from Doyle’s time, or that represents—”
She broke off when Doyle came in.
“Who knew it was that easy to shut you up.”
“She doesn’t want to poke at a sore,” Sasha told him.
“Nothing sore.” He looked at the wine, and since it was handy, got a glass. “You had a point before. The whole whims-of-fate deal pisses me off. It wasn’t you, but like this wine, you were handy.”
“Riley wants to hunt scavengers to find the star.” Annika peeked under the cloth, pleased to see the balls were bigger.
“A scavenger hunt?”
“A form thereof,” Riley said to Doyle. “We compile a list of things, symbols, possibilities that may apply, and we start looking. Hell, what else have we got to do on a rainy night?”
He shifted, caged her back against the counter. “Seriously?”
“You can have sex now,” Annika suggested amiably. “There’s time before dinner.”
Doyle smiled at her. “Gorgeous, are you sure I can’t talk you into tossing Sawyer over for me?”
“Nice.” Not too subtly, Riley lifted her knee, pressed it firmly against Doyle’s crotch.
“He’s making a joke because he knows Sawyer is my only true love.”
“Good thing,” Sawyer said as he came in with Bran behind him.
“Sawyer, the balls are bigger!”
“Not mine.” Doyle eased Riley’s knee down.
“No, yours, too— Oh.” Tossing her hair, Annika laughed. “You made another joke.”
“He’s a laugh riot.” Riley shoved Doyle’s chest, didn’t budge him. “You’re blocking me.”
“I’m thinking of time before dinner.”
“I’m using the time before dinner,” Sawyer announced. “Anni—”
“But we can’t have sex now because I have to make the dinner. It’s my turn.”
“Anni,” he said again, and went to her, cupped her face, kissed her.
“Sasha could watch the balls of dough,” Annika murmured, and circled his neck with her arms.
“I love you. Everything about you. Everything you are.”
“Is this happening now?” Doyle muttered at Riley.
“Shut up.”
“Do you remember when Riley and I went to Dublin?”
“It hurt my feelings you didn’t take me with you, and the others were angry because—”