A Coral Kiss Part 36

"Yes."

"Things might be a little tight financially for a while," he said tentatively. "I mean, I've got some money saved and the cages will bring in a bit, but-"

"The cages are going to bring in a lot. I went down to the Caliph Bay Gallery and upped the prices on all the cages you had there. Two of them have already sold," she told him smugly. "And when I put them into a San Francisco gallery, the prices are going even higher."

He laughed ruefully. "I was about to say I was going to try to get back into engineering. I can do it on a freelance basis, short-term a.s.signments for companies in need of temporary engineering help. It might mean some travel or we might have to move, but you could come with me. If that doesn't work out, I might be able to do some security consulting work."

"Whatever," she agreed blissfully. "In the meantime we won't starve. There's my writing and there's also something else." She pulled herself free of his arms, slid out of bed and hurried into the living room.

Jed followed curiously. "What are you up to, sweetheart?"

She plucked the green stone off the windowsill and handed it to him. "You are looking at a nice little financial cus.h.i.+on, Jed Glaze."

He frowned, turning the stone over in his hand. "What kind of cus.h.i.+on?"

"Maybe fifty thousand dollars worth of cus.h.i.+on. Mr. Albright wasn't certain." She laughed at the expression on Jed's face.

"Who's Mr. Albright?"

"A jeweler I looked up last week. On a whim I had him check out that rock, Jed. It's real."

His fist closed around the emerald as he stared at her in astonishment. "You're joking."

"Nope. Apparently the Russians really did pay off Wyman. The government's inside man was wrong."

"And you gave the other five stones to Renner," Jed yelped.

"Daniel Renner is Wyman's son. If anyone deserves them, Renner does. But I figure you and I are ent.i.tled to that one for all our trouble."

Jed looked torn between laughter and shock. He flipped the gem into the air, caught it and reached for Amy. The laughter won out. "Amy, my love, I have a feeling the next sixty or seventy years with you are going to be very interesting."

end.