Page 12 of Only Time Will Tell

“Hey, handsome, whatcha doing?” he slipped his arm around my waist.

“Just browsing. I wanted to give you and Mom some privacy.”

“Baby, I don’t say anything to her that I wouldn’t say in front of you. But thank you for your thoughtfulness. See anything we can’t live without?” He scanned the selection in front of us.

“I was eyeballing Deadpool. You up for a superhero movie fest?” He knew I was a huge Ryan Reynolds fan, so this one was a no-brainer.

“Always, if that includes curling up with you while it’s on. Dinner in our pj’s and a movie is the perfect date night.” He snagged the DVD and flitted off toward the cashier.

God, how I loved this man. After purchasing the movie, we got in the truck and headed home. Charlie wanted to tackle his dad’s filing cabinet this afternoon, having found the keys to the lock yesterday. Not sure what he was searching for, but I hoped he didn’t get too obsessed with it.

At home, while he was in his dad’s room, I was in the home office tackling work-related emails and such. A couple of hours later, I went in search of Charlie, making sure he was alright. It was time we both took a break.

“Hey, babe, you okay?” I asked as I peeked in.

He was sitting surrounded by a pile of papers he’d likely dug out of the filing cabinet, intently sifting through them. His hair stuck up in all directions from yanking at it. Dare I ask what frustrated him?

“Mmm hmm,” he mumbled, without looking up.

“Do you need me to bring you anything? A drink? A snack? Possibly trash bags?” I scanned the chaos scattered around. That caught his attention and he finally looked up at me.

“Alex, you won’t believe what I’ve found. Have a seat.” He pointed to the bed, which appeared to be the only clean spot in the room.

“Looks like a bomb went off in here,” I said, stepping over the various stacks of papers covering the floor like I was playing hopscotch.

“I’m not sure how he did it, but a lot of these notes coincide with the artifacts we have on the shelves throughout the house.”

“What do you mean? Like certificates of authenticity?” I asked.

“No, better than that. I think we need to take some of these things to an appraiser and have them cataloged. My dad literally traveled the world, and I’m not sure what he was looking for or if it was only to meet with various collectors. But according to his notes, some of these are hundreds of years old.”

“How in the world would he have gotten the cash to purchase them? Does any of this explain what line of work he was in?” My interest was piqued, but I wasn’t sure if I was heading toward the idea that his dad was one lucky bastard, or if he was nothing more than a thief.

“I’m gonna start matching these papers to the respective item. Then I’ll contact the local museums and see if they can point me in the right direction.” He leaned over, placing the current paper in his hand on top of the desk. “One thing is still bugging me though.”

“What’s that?” I asked.

“In the letter, my dad said he’d been searching for a way to have prevented my mother’s death. What do you think he meant by that?”

“I’m not sure. Your father seems to have had questionable obsessions, so that could have been a statement more than an action.” My gut was telling me this wasn’t going to end well, and that we were about to uncover things we were better off not knowing. Especially for Charlie. I hoped for the best but expected the worst. “Have you found anything about the pocket watch he gave you? It must have some sort of sentimental value since he kept it separate from all the other stuff.”

For a moment, I thought I saw a hint of fear cross his face. Maybe I was mistaken. “Nah, nothing yet, but I’ll let you know if I find anything.” Brushing me off, he returned to his latest obsession.

Most of my work was done online with the marketing firm I was employed with, and my boss had no problem with my continuing to work from home when I’d reached out to him about bereavement leave. Charlie, on the other hand, taught high school history. History had always been his passion, which told me uncovering his father’s treasure trove would keep him occupied for the foreseeable future. I was surprised, though, that he hadn’t already researched some of the trinkets his dad collected before now.

I dove back into the proposal I’d been working on for a new client our firm recently acquired and before I knew it, it was ten o’clock and I hadn’t heard from Charlie for a few hours. This wasn’t a good sign and clearly, he had more of his father in him than he cared to admit.

I came into his father’s room to the sweetest scene. Charlie was curled up in a ball, asleep amongst the piles of papers. He’d emptied the entire filing cabinet and likely dozed off mid sorting. Some documents were still clutched in his hand, while the others were scattered about. As carefully as I could, I waded over, plucking a yellow sticky note off his forehead and tossing it to the floor. His only movement as I picked him up was to wrap his arms around my neck. Too tired to shower, I undressed and tucked him in, joining him after I’d showered.

I woke the next morning to the wonderful smell of bacon.

“Good morning, sleepy head,” Charlie said, standing on his tiptoes to give me a good-morning kiss.

“Good morning, handsome. How did you sleep?” I patted his ass and reached above him for two coffee cups.

“Pretty good, but I was bombarded with dreams of artifacts. It was like I was in the basement of the Smithsonian on a field trip. I really think my dad was on to something.” He turned back to the bacon pan.

“On to something such as?” I paused, unsure where this was going.