The Reef

not true.” She hoped her basic psych course in college, and her understanding of the man beside her, would guide her instincts. No one spoke of the fact that he didn’t dive. Perhaps it was time someone did.“None of us could get along without you, Buck. Not diving doesn’t mean you’re not productive or an essential part of the team.”
    “Checking equipment, filling tanks, hammering rocks.” He winced. “Taking videos.”
    “Yes.” She leaned forward to lay a hand over his restless one. “That’s as important as going down.”
    “I can’t go down, Tate. Just can’t.” He stared miserably at the table. “And when I watch the boy go, it dries up the spit in my mouth. I start thinking about taking a drink. Just one.”
    “But you don’t, do you?”
    “Guess I figured out just one’d be the end of me. But it doesn’t stop the wanting.” He glanced up. “I was gonna talk to Ray about this. Didn’t mean to hit you with it.”
    “I’m glad you did. It gives me the chance to tell you how proud I am of the way you’ve pulled yourself together. And that I know you’re doing it more for Matthew than for anyone else, even yourself.”
    “At one time, all we had was each other. Some wouldn’t think so, but there were good times. Then I cut him off, or tried to. But he stuck by me. He’s like his dad was. He’s got loyalty. He’s stubborn, and he keeps too much inside. That’s the pride working there. James always figured he could handle whatever came, that he could do it on his own. And it killed him.”
    He lifted his eyes again. “I’m afraid the boy’s heading the same way.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “He’s got his teeth in this, nothing’s going to shake him loose. What he brings up day after day, oh, it’s exciting for him. But he’s waiting and wanting just one thing.”
    “The amulet.”
    “It’s got hold of him, Tate, just like it got hold of James. It scares me. The closer we get, the more it scares me.”
    “Because if he finds it, he’ll use it against VanDyke.”
    “Fuck VanDyke. Sorry.” He cleared his throat, sipped at the tea. “I ain’t worried about that sonofabitch. That the boy can handle just fine. It’s the curse.”
    “Oh, Buck.”
    “I’m telling you,” he said stubbornly. “I feel it. It’s close.” He looked out the window at the lashing rain. “We’re close. Could be this storm’s a warning.”
    Struggling not to laugh, Tate folded her hands. “Now listen to me, I understand the seafaring superstitions, but the reality here is that we’re excavating a wreck. This amulet is very likely an artifact of that wreck. With luck and hard work, we’ll find it. I’ll sketch it and tag it and catalogue it just the way I do every other piece we bring up. It’s metal and stone, Buck, with a fascinating and tragic story attached. But that’s all it is.”
    “Nobody who ever owned it lived to see a happy old age.”
    “People often died young, violently and tragically during the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.” She gave his hand a squeeze and tried another tack. “Let’s say, just for argument’s sake, that the amulet does hold some sort of power. Why would it have to be evil? Buck, have you read Angelique’s diary? The part your brother copied down?”
    “Yeah. She was a witch, and she put a curse on the necklace.”
    “She was a sad, grieving and angry woman. She was facing a terrible death, convicted of witchcraft and of murdering her husband, a man she loved. An innocent woman, Buck, helpless to change her fate.” Seeing he was far from convinced, she blew out a breath. “Damn it, if she’d been a witch, why didn’t she just disappear in a puff of smoke or turn her jailers into toads?”
    “Don’t work that way,” he said stubbornly.
    “Fine, it doesn’t work that way. So she put a spell or whatever on the necklace. If I read correctly, she cursed those who condemned her, those who would take her last link with her husband through greed. Well, Matthew didn’t condemn her, Buck, and he didn’t take her necklace. What he may do is find it again, that’s all.”
    “And when he does, what’ll it do to him?” Desperate concern made his eyes glossy and dark. “That’s what eats at me, Tate. What’ll it do to him?”
    A shiver raced through her. “I can’t answer that.” Surprised at how uneasy she’d become, she picked up her cup and tried to warm her suddenly chilly hands. “But whatever happens,