The Layton Prophecy by Tatiana March

Author:Tatiana March [March, Tatiana]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: TM Romantic Suspense
Published: 2012-04-06T05:00:00+00:00

Getting the holiday booked at work turned out to be easier than I’d expected. Before leaving England, I made a hurried trip to Southampton to see my mother. We’d never been close. When I was small, she was always too busy or too tired to spend time with me. I’d left home at eighteen to go to university, and since then I’d only visited once or twice a year, out of duty.

It wasn’t until now that I began to understand how deeply her unhappiness and her bitter relationship with my father had affected my childhood. I hadn’t exactly been a pawn between them, but there had always been a need to decide where my loyalties lay. Instead of taking sides, I’d avoided the issue by giving most of my affection to Aunt Rosemary.

The visit was a failure.

I told my mother about the meeting with the lawyer and the discovery of my true family background. It felt as if the barrier between us suddenly gained another layer. I almost got the impression that she blamed my father’s Layton connection for everything that had gone wrong between them.

Fortunately, I could spend another weekend in Layton Village before I flew out to South Africa. I needed the enthusiasm of Steven and Aunt Rosemary to shake me out of the dreary mood the visit to my mother had thrown me in.

“So,” Steven said as soon as I got through the door on Friday night. “Are you ready for your instructions?”

His cheeks glowed and his eyes sparkled, but as Aunt Rosemary sported tousled hair and smeared lipstick, I assumed his high spirits were not on my account. The closeness between them astonished me. If I hadn’t seen Steven at the Bodleian during the week, I would have assumed that they’d spent every minute of each day getting to know each other, so comfortable they appeared to be in each other’s company.

“We know that Francis Layton visited the diamond fields at Lichtenburg in Northern Transvaal.” Aunt Rosemary brought a map up on her computer screen. “He got provisions from there.”

I tossed my bag on the floor and flopped into an armchair that had been pushed into a corner to make space for their work table. “How do you know?”

Aunt Rosemary pointed at the three diaries on the table. “We’ve combed through all the references to people and locations. The name of the local postmaster and one of the farmhouses matches.”

“But he died in the Kalahari Desert.” I tucked my feet beneath me.

“There were no diamonds left in Lichtenburg,” Steven explained. “Thousands of prospectors took part in a race to stake claims in 1927. The deposits ran dry quickly, and Francis Layton headed west, to the Kalahari Desert. The area near the Namibian border is littered with skeletons of perished prospectors.”

“What do you want me to do?” My gaze shuttled between them. “Go out there and look for the diamonds he discovered?”

“You’re not thinking like a scientist,” Steven said, reproach in his tone. “This isn’t a treasure hunt for an untapped kimberlite pipe carrying diamonds through the crust of the earth.

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