Treasure in the Sand

About the Book

Molly Waiter grew up on the fantastical stories of sunken ships, pirates and lost treasure.  As guardians of lost Le Cœur Surveillé – the Guarded Heart – each young Waiter is warned of the curse: the one who possesses the Guarded Heart will never find happiness in love.  Fine with Molly!  Ever since the hurricane that tore through Mimosa Key, she’s been off love and on the lookout for cash. 

Bad boy adventurer Cooper Overton has been hiding a big secret – he has half the map leading to Le Cœur Surveillé.  He’s determined to have Molly’s half, too, to save his tanking career.  When the sexy beauty turns him down flat, he decides to heat things up – with seduction. 

Molly’s determined to resist the gorgeous modern day buccaneer.  She wants all or nothing, and no sexy usurper is going to horn in on her family’s two-centuries long quest.  But how does she get the map from the man whose touch she can’t forget?  Will she become one more Waiters to lose her heart?  Or is Cooper her chance to find the jewel and break the curse?

This story is set in a world created by Roxanne St. Claire as the Barefoot Bay series, and this work has been published with her permission. Information and links to Roxanne St. Claire's Barefoot Bay books can be found at http://www.roxannestclaire.com/barefoot-bay-series/.

A Message from Roxanne St. Claire

Welcome to Barefoot Bay World, a place for authors to write their own stories set in the tropical paradise that I created!  For these books, I have only provided the setting of Mimosa Key and a cast of characters from my popular Barefoot Bay series.  That’s it! I haven’t contributed to the plotting, writing, or editing of Treasure in the Sand.  This book is entirely the work of Jill Monroe, a talented author I handpicked to help launch this world.

Jill and I have been friends for years, sharing lives as Harlequin authors and many mutual acquaintances. She is as vivacious in person as she is on the page, and always delivers a love story that makes you smile as you race to the finish.  I’m thrilled to have her bring her lively brand of romance to the sands of Barefoot Bay and even more excited that Treasure in the Sand includes my absolute favorite storyline: the treasure map! Throw in a modern day buccaneer and a two-hundred year old family curse and I’m all in. I know you will be, too, so kick off your shoes and start digging for love in the sands of Barefoot Bay!

Roxanne St. Claire

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Barefoot Bay Series

www.roxannestclaire.com

A Message from Jill Monroe

Hello!

I can’t tell you how excited I am to be writing in the world of Barefoot Bay!  It’s truly an honor for me.

Roxanne St. Claire is not only a dear friend, but she’s also one of my favorite writers.  It’s been so much fun to meet the other amazing authors writing in this incredible world Roxanne has created.  I can’t wait to read their stories. 

Treasure in the Sand was a blast to write.  For this book, I wrote the ending before I completed the beginning.  I worked my way backwards and that’s a first for me.  I hope you enjoy reading about Cooper Overton and Molly Waiter as much as I did writing their story.

I hope Treasure in the Sand transports you to a sunny beach, lets you smell the surf, taste the zest of an orange margarita, feel the waves as they lap at your feet...and the burn of a new and passionate romance!

All my best,

Jill Monroe

Dedication

For my grandma.

Acknowledgments

Iwouldn’t have Molly and Cooper’s story if it weren’t for the amazing Roxanne St. Claire.  Thank you, dear friend.  If it weren’t for the talented Gena Showalter and the sharp eyes of Sheila Fields, my characters would just be staring at the walls, so thank you ladies – you’re amazing.  I’d also like to thank Gena for Peeps.  I’ll always save a box for you.  You’ve earned them.

To my family – thank you!  You all are amazing!

Chapter One

C heck out that guy .

Molly Waiter’s hands fell from the ancient blender that had survived not one but two Florida hurricanes.  She glanced over her shoulder, her gaze following the direction in which her best friend, Deanna, pointed.  When you lived on beautiful Mimosa Key, scoping a guy usually meant viewing a gorgeous set of sun-warmed shoulders and swim trunks riding low on a toned waist. 

Today it involved... What’s in his hand?  Dowsing rods? Molly asked, squinting against the light.

Today it involved holding two parallel copper wires over the ground to find buried treasure. 

You’ve got some strange ones today, Deanna said, kicking off her flip-flops and stretching her legs to rest on the one piece of intact railing that surrounded the wrap around porch of Molly’s girlhood home, Brecon.  Two years ago, Brecon was situated within a magnificent orange tree filled oasis.  A testament to her grandma’s environmental research and her grandpa’s hard work.  Now ramshackle was the nicest possible adjective to describe Gram’s beloved cottage.  The once thriving grove was now a broken graveyard of twisted limbs and trunks. 

I still can’t believe you’re allowing treasure hunters on the property.

The hurricane churned up a lot of debris from the ocean floor.  Whenever a single Spanish doubloons washes up on shore, it stirs up interest in what might be buried here all over again, Molly said with a shrug. 

Deanna waved her fingers.  Ahhh, the priceless jewel.  Still, don’t you find it creepy?  These strangers crawling all over the property?

They have to be gone in thirty minutes, so they’re not combing the place all night.  They’re actually pretty friendly.  Mostly hobbyists.  Besides, they are paying for the privilege of creeping around here.  Each one adds a little more to the till.  Another quarter to my bottomless bucket for the renovations, Molly said, unplugging the blender and pouring two glasses of her family’s signature drink, The Brecon Orange Margarita.  Trendy bars in Naples referred to it as The BOM, but after tonight, it would only be a memory.

Mmmm.  This is good, Deanna said after taking a slow sip.  How many more of these quarters do you need?

About forty-eight hundred...thousand.

Danna choked on her drink. 

Hey, don’t waste the greatest thing you’ll ever have in your mouth.  Molly told her with a wink, and tapped the stem of her chilled and salted glass.  What you have in your hand is a margarita made from the juice of the last Brecon orange courtesy of Hurricane Damien, which from now on I’ll only call The Demon.

Molly couldn’t even scrape together enough money to remove the twisted and mangled remains of the orange grove that once covered this stretch of land.  A shambles of branches and leaves was all that was left of the once beautiful orchard – a testament to the power and destruction of the violent hurricane.

Insurance had helped make the cottage livable; restoring the electricity and running water, but every leftover cent went to cover the cost of her grandmother’s care in a rehabilitation facility in nearby Naples.  When The Demon tore through Mimosa Key, he left one final gift as the murky floodwaters receded.  A debilitating stroke, brought on from the stress, robbed Abigail Waiter, Molly’s grandmother, of speech. 

To Brecon, Deanna said and raised her glass, her tone gloomy and sad.

To Brecon, Molly echoed.  Good friends knew sometimes the best thing to say was as little as possible.  "Oh!  A bit of good news.  Tomorrow a geologist is doing a flyover with a small biplane.  I charged him a very pretty penny.  I increased my rates."

Deanna gave her a fist pump.  Good for you.  It’s about time you started charging more.

"I always feel guilty making people pay something for nothing.  I mean they’re never going to find Le Cœur Surveillé.  Believe me, if a priceless necklace was any where on Brecon, one of my ancestor’s would have found it by now.  But if the geologist wants a turn to use his telemetry device here, more power to him.  I charged him enough to square up Gram’s hospital bills, and he never balked."

That’s great.  How’s she doing?

Molly licked the salt from around her lips.  Better than I ever hoped, but then she’s a fighter.  She’s responded to the physical therapy really well.  She’s getting stronger, and even took a few steps yesterday without her walker.  Gram might even be able to walk up this porch by Thanksgiving.  Her gaze fell across the broken limbs and shoveled dirt where once rows of vibrant orange trees reached toward the sun.  I just don’t want her to see the grove like this.  It would break her heart.

Some of the treasure seekers had stacked the branches and washed up debris in a pile so they could more easily run metal detectors across the ground, but for the most part, there’d been little cleanup to the property that had been Molly’s home since she was seven.  We had the best hide and seek games here when we were kids. 

Deanna chuckled.  I bet.  And probably the best make out session with the guys when you got older.  With the breeze from the ocean and the citrus scented air–

Ha.  You forget I was raised by my grandparents.  Permissive they were not.  Watchful, yes.

Deanna’s eyes narrowed as she watched a man stab the earth with a large metal prong.  Wires, curling like rigatoni noodles, attached the prong to a monitor on the ground at his feet.  What’s he doing?

Molly propped her hip against water-warped railing.  He is listening to the earth.

We do that now? 

Molly nodded.  Apparently different minerals and elements buried deep in the ground emit varied frequencies.  Gold for instance.  Or silver.  He’s sending down a pulse through that prong and if it hits anything other than dirt, he’ll be able to detect the wave and figure out where and what it is.

Sounds legit.

I can’t tell if you’re serious or not, Molly said, studying her best friend. 

Deanna laughed.  Maybe a little bit of both. I mean, don’t men have better things to do with their prongs?

Shhh, someone will hear.

"They’re too far away.  So if a treasure seeker does find something, you are getting a cut, right?"

Absolutely.  I did spring for a lawyer to devise a contract.  Felt kind of stupid about it at first, but it’s paying off.  Everyone who searches the grove and my beach has to sign it.

Why don’t you try to find the treasure yourself? Deanna asked.

"Yeah, like no