Josephine Wainwright Hale had organized twenty-five years of grief into color-coded sections with labeled tabs.Letters to the state attorney general.Correspondence with two private investigators, both of whom had taken her money and returned nothing useful.A formal complaint to the medical board that had been acknowledged and never answered.Every document dated, every response filed, every dead end catalogued with the meticulous fury of a woman who refused to let bureaucracy outlast her.
By noon, I’d read every page.By twelve thirty, the walls were closing in.
A few weeks is a long time to be a person with nowhere to be.I’d read four books I couldn’t remember.I’d taken Chowder on so many walks he’d started faking a limp to get out of them.I was, by any reasonable measure, a woman coming apart at the seams from sheer normalcy, and I needed to do something about it before I did something I couldn’t take back— like repainting the kitchen.
“Come on,” I told Chowder.“We’re going out.”
He opened one eye, assessed whether “out” was likely to involve treats, and hauled himself off the floor with the dramatic effort of a creature who wanted full credit for every inch of sacrifice.
I clipped on his leash, grabbed my handbag, and stepped into a July afternoon that wrapped around me like a hot towel.
Chowder and I walked the three blocks to The Perfect Steep because I couldn’t stand another day of not seeing it.It looked exactly as I’d left it—soft blue paint, white trim, the tall windows throwing the afternoon light back at the street like they owned it.A few weeks gone and the building hadn’t missed me at all, which was somehow both insulting and the most comforting thing I’d seen all day.
The back was a different story.Carl Jessup’s truck sat in the alley with the tailgate down and the back door propped open, and I could hear a saw singing inside.
“Mrs.McCoy.”Carl wiped his hands on his jeans and stepped out to meet me.He was a big man with a permanent sunburn and a voice that sounded like he started every morning gargling gravel.“Things are looking good for opening Saturday.We’ll do final touch-ups in the morning.”
“Glory be,” I said, relieved.
“Want a look?”He held the door wider.
The back room had been stripped to the studs and rebuilt.Fresh drywall, new baseboards, new electrical.The floor had been replaced with wide-plank oak that wasn’t the original heart pine but was close enough to honor what had been there before.The whole room smelled like sawdust and fresh paint and second chances.
I ran my hand along the smooth wall.No trace of smoke or gasoline.No trace of the night someone had tried to burn my world down to keep their secrets buried.
“Carl, it’s beautiful.”
“I’d wait to open this room back up until next week to let the floors cure, but you’ll be good to go for the rest of the space.”
“Thank you,” I said.“I’ve missed it.”
“The whole island wants this place back open.My wife’s been trying to make your scones at home and between you and me and the fence post, the results have not been encouraging.”
I chuckled and Chowder gave a soft woof.
“Tell her the first one is on the house.”
Chowder and I continued down Harbor Street, past the row of shops painted in blues and greens and creams.Grimm Island had been built with intention, so the whole town looked like it had grown from the same deep root.Palm trees and black iron lampposts lined the sidewalks, and awnings were a crisp blue.
The sidewalks were thick with summer tourists.Couples with matching sunburns, families with strollers and ice cream cones melting faster than small hands could manage, college kids heading toward the beach with the invincible energy of people who hadn’t yet learned what sunscreen was for.
I passed the bookstore, where Howard was rearranging his window display.He spotted me through the glass and held up a hardcover, pointing at it with both hands and an enthusiastic thumbs-up.I waved and smiled, knowing if I went inside I’d be there at least an hour, and Howard would most likely ruin the end of the book for me.He wasn’t good at keeping secrets.
The farmer’s market was set up behind Town Hall, smaller than the Saturday version but still worth the walk.I bought peaches from Adeline Guthrie and a bunch of blue hydrangeas from the Clarkson boy.
“Did you enjoy the fireworks?”he asked, wrapping the stems in brown paper.He was maybe sixteen and already taller than his father’s produce stand.“My mama said you and the sheriff looked real nice together.”
I pressed my lips together.
“She also said it’s about time.”
I almost choked and disguised it as a cough before handing him his money.“Does your mama have any other opinions she’d like to share?”
He grinned.“She’s got plenty.But I charge extra for those.”
I took the flowers with a smile and hightailed it out of the market before anyone else could comment on my love life.
At the corner of Broad and Driftwood, I ran into Greta Carmichael coming out of her stationery shop.Greta knew everyone’s business because she handled their wedding invitations, funeral programs, and anything in between.If it had been printed on good paper anywhere on Grimm Island in the last twenty years, Greta had her fingerprints on it, and for the fifty years before that it had been her parents who’d been in everyone’s business.
