I traded in Ethan’s boots for my slippers, heated up my coffee, and accepted a plate of scrambled eggs with spinach that Ethan had whipped up, sensing I would need food to combat this news and what would surely be a long day. The last time someone who’d visited my cafe had died it became quite the tourist stop. Although we were mostly lacking in tourists these days.
Val declined the plate Ethan slid in front of her. “Can’t. I need to meet Ava-Rose promptly at nine. If I’m late I’ll never hear the end of it. I’ll just have some juice.”
“Hey,” I said before she could go. “Did Grandpa talk to you at all about last night?”
“What about last night?”
“About Leopard Man being here? And how we’re not supposed to mention that to anyone?”
Now they both looked interested. “No,” Val said. “Why?”
“I don’t know, he just asked us not to,” I said.
Val narrowed her eyes. “What’s going on?”
“I said I don’t know. I’m just trying to do what Grandpa asked, and I wouldn’t want anyone like, oh, Sergeant Ellory asking you and you giving a different version than Grandpa.”
“Why would Sergeant Ellory be asking me that?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Because you live here.”
“And why would it be a different version than Grandpa’s?” Her eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“I don’t know what he said to them,” I said. “So just stick with not mentioning it.” I glanced down as JJ came into the room, squeaking the whole way. He must be hungry.
Val opened her mouth again, so I cut her off and tried to change the subject as I got up and took JJ’s food out to spoon into his bowl. He watched me intently to make sure I didn’t shortchange him.
I didn’t want to get too into this, especially since I had no idea how to answer her questions. I just didn’t want Grandpa to get in trouble. “Are you at the yacht club all day?” I asked her, setting the bowl in front of JJ. He attacked it like he hadn’t seen food in days.
“Who knows? Depends on how long Ava-Rose wants to talk about what kind of seasoning she should have for each of the turkeys. This is going to be a pretty spectacular Thanksgiving dinner. I imagine the Royal Wedding planning was comparable.” But she smiled.
“Who are you having cater?” I asked.
“I’m still working on that. She wants to do test runs with her top three choices. Don’t ask,” she said, holding up a hand, when I opened my mouth. “It is kind of fun, though,” she admitted.
“I’m glad you’re loving it,” I said. “Who would’ve thought? I play with cats all day, and you plan parties. And we’re both in charge of our own schedules. Pretty cool, right? We must’ve gotten all this from Mom.” The thought made me smile a little. Our dad was a lot more buttoned up. He had to be, though, as CEO of Daybreak’s only hospital. And his stability had given Mom the freedom to be even more creative.
“That’s true,” Val said thoughtfully. Her phone chimed. “Shoot. Gotta go.” She went over and gave Ethan a kiss, waggled her fingers at me, and hurried out.
I studied my business partner’s back. From where I sat I could see how red his ears were. Pale-skinned as he was, it wasn’t hard. “So things are going well,” I said.
“Hmmm?” He busied himself measuring out flour for some kind of bread he was making. Ethan made food for all of us most days, even when he was stocking the cafe. He loved to cook and bake, and he only trusted his own cooking to be truly healthy. I think he missed working at our juice shop. He’d loved coming up with new vegan, raw, gluten-free, organic, and any other recipes the crowds out on the pier were looking for.
Here he’d had to adjust a bit. While the island was slowly attracting more healthy eaters, a lot of visitors came here for quintessential summer fare—like fried seafood and real ice cream—and didn’t necessarily want to worry about their diets. At least for a week or two.
“You know. With Val.”
“Oh. Yeah. It’s good.”
“Ethan?”
Finally, he turned. “What?”
“You’re in loooove,” I teased.
“Knock it off,” he muttered.
“Why? It’s cute. Lord knows we need to have some fun over the winter here. Trust me. You think the island’s all fun and games, but you haven’t seen anything yet.”
“Just eat your eggs.” Ethan hated public displays, or being the center of attention for that matter. “Are you trying to make me forget to ask you why we’re lying about the Leopard Man?”
“No. I just don’t have anything else to say. I only know that he was here and Grandpa told the cops he wasn’t.”
“And you don’t know why?” Ethan’s tone wasn’t judgmental at all, simply curious.
“I don’t.” I pushed my eggs around on the plate a bit. “I wish I did.” I picked at my eggs and wondered about Grandpa’s early morning. Had he known about Holt? Had that been part of what Ellory told him last night? Had he gone to track down Leopard Man? Did he know where he was?
Maybe I could find out. Or maybe I would see him in town.
I pushed my still half-full plate away. “I’m going to go downtown for a bit. Have a couple things to do.” Ethan was planning to be here all day, so I could get out without feeling like I had to rush back. And it was a big day for the contractors. They were installing a new wall that would break the dining room into two separate rooms. That meant a lot of noise, so the less I was around the better.
“Where are you going?”
“I want to look at a storefront,” I said. It was sort of true. There was a storefront I’d been wanting to see, just to see if maybe it would look good with some green juice and healthy food in it. But first I wanted to talk to Becky. And I needed to go to the market for some fish for JJ.
“And you’re going to do some investigating about our writer?” Ethan winked, happy to take the attention off himself and put it on me.
“No way,” I said, pushing back from the table. “I’m staying out of it.”
“Mmm-hmm.” Ethan preheated the over. “Can you pick up some berries?”
“Berries?” I laughed. “Frozen, right? It’s not summer anymore, friend. And you’re not in Kansas anymore.”
Ethan sighed. “Let’s go with chocolate chips.”
I headed upstairs to shower and met Lucas coming down. He looked freshly showered. “Hey.” I grabbed his arm. “You aren’t going to believe this.”
“Believe what?”
“The guy in the water? It was the famous writer who’d been working in here. And he’s definitely dead.”
Lucas went wide-eyed. “You’re kidding.”
“Nope. It’s splashed all over the front page.”
“What happened?”
“No clue yet. Or at least, it’s not been published yet.”
“Wow.” Lucas took a minute to let that sink in.
“Yeah.” I leaned against him for a moment, sliding an arm around his waist, breathing in his freshly clean scent. “You leaving?”
“I am. I have to open the shop today. Marianne needed the day off since she’s covering all weekend.” Lucas’s other groomer had been on the island for years, doing home visits for people. She’d been delighted when Lucas came to town and opened a real shop, and snatched up the opportunity to work with him. And she’d brought a lot of her customers to the shop, for which Lucas was grateful.
He squeezed my hand. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I guess. I feel awful, Lucas. I wonder what happened?”
“I don’t know, babe. Hopefully the cops are going to be able to figure it out quickly.” He hesitated. “Do you think they were here last night … because of that?”
“I don’t know,” I said, although I was pretty sure the answer was yes. And I hoped the only reason why was because they wanted Grandpa’s expertise. “But I hope they can at least find out what happened to him. I’ll see you tonight?”
“You better.” He pulled me close and kissed me.
“You will. Thanks for staying last night.”
“Of course. Be careful today.”
“Doing what?”
“Whatever you’re doing,” he said with a grin. “Which I hope isn’t trying to find out what happened to the writer.”
He knew me so well. That old saying curiosity killed the cat could definitely apply to me. “No,” I said. “Definitely not that. I’m going to look at a storefront.”
“Ah, yes. Your diabolical plot to take over the whole island. Pretty soon everyone will be eating and drinking all raw green stuff, all the time. It will be like the island of green people who live forever, even after the destruction of the planet,” he teased.
Lucas and my family had been poking fun at me for my fixation on bringing a branch of my and Ethan’s juice bar to the island. I loved the cat cafe, but I was an entrepreneur at heart. I needed a couple of ventures to put my energy and attention into, especially given the slowness of the winter months here. Plus, I loved a challenge, and bringing green juice to an island where people came to eat fried clams and French fries was definitely going to be a challenge.
“With the exception of some pizza every now and then.” I winked. “Call me to say hi between doggie shampoos. And stop in the kitchen and grab some eggs. Ethan needs someone to eat all the stuff he’s making. Our only scheduled guest isn’t coming today.” I let that sink in. It felt bad.
Lucas squeezed my hand and headed into the kitchen. I hurried upstairs, showered, and dressed. When I came back down, Grandpa was just coming in the front door. He looked lost in thought as he unwrapped the blue wooly scarf from around his neck and hung it with extra care on a hook next to the door. I recognized it as a gift from Grandma, that last Christmas she was with us. He didn’t even realize I was standing on the steps.