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Claire stared at the screen in front of her.
There was no sign of the Royal Merchant like they'd thought and the disappointment was clear on all their faces. None more than John B.
John B sighed, "It's not there. Look, just pull the drone up."
Pope did so and thunder rumbled in the distance. John sighed again and walked away from the screen in frustration.
"Look, we can do another pass, recharge the battery. We–we can go back down." Pope said.
"Guys we've been through it three times, there's nothing there." JJ called out.
"Shut up!" Kiara yelled at him.
"What? It's true!"
"The gold could be buried. We don't know!"
"Or maybe we read the map wrong and it's in a different spot?" Claire added.
"No we read the map right." John B said. "If it was there, it would've been found on the metal detector, okay? Somebody beat us to it."
Claire closed her eyes and sighed softly, before walking back inside the cockpit and sitting down as the five friends made their way back to The Cut.
When they got back to the Cut, the group all split off to go about their day with whatever they had planned. Kiara had work, and Pope had to go help out his dad at his shop. John B went home as did JJ. Claire on the other hand, had no plans at all. She had today off work and for the first time in the last few days, she didn't have anything to do. So, the brunette decided to take her time walking home. She wanted to get some fresh air and for once just take in the peacefulness of the island. It wasn't a long walk, but it was what she needed to take her mind off their defeat about the Royal Merchant. It was disappointing to find nothing, especially after all the time they spent and trouble they got into looking for it.
But, she hadn't lost hope yet. It had to be out there somewhere, and Claire had faith that some kind of good luck would be handed out to them and maybe just maybe, they'd be able to get back into finding the gold.
When she approached her house, some fifteen minutes later, she spotted a black car that belonged to neither herself or her mother, parked in the driveway. Furrowing her eyebrows in confusion, she quickened her pace over to the front door and walked inside. Sitting at the kitchen table was her mother and a blonde woman dressed in a navy pantsuit, and the two were flipping through a manilla folder of papers.
