Page 69 of Beachfront Pages

"It was timing," Bryan called from the grill. "Pure bad timing."

"It was a haunted freezer, is what it was. You'd already gone and named it."

"His name was Larry. He'd earned a name by then."

The whole circle turned toward Bryan. Even Marty, who'd come down the path quietly a minute before and sat on the bench beside Fiona without making a thing of it. He had a beer he wasn't drinking. His shoulder settled warm against hers.

"You named the freezer Larry," Marty said.

"Everybody names the freezer," Bryan said. "You don't name your shelves?"

"I alphabetize my shelves. I don't name them."

"That's sadder. I want it on the record that's sadder."

Fiona laughed into her wine. It came out of her easily with no edge to it. Just natural, enjoying an evening with friends. No part of her standing off to one side keeping watch, taking down everyone's tells for some future book.

"What's the verdict?" she asked Marty, under the noise.

"On the freezer?"

"On all of it. You've avoided these for years. Winnie's been trying to drag you down here since before I showed up."

He considered the fire. "It's loud," he said. "Sally cornered me about a book I don't want to stock on the walk in. Clint's wrong about the grill." He turned his head. The firelight caught the hazel of his eyes and the silver running through his hair. "I'm staying anyway. Don't make me say more than that. I'm out of practice."

"You don't have to say more than that."

"Good."

But his hand found hers on the bench between them, his fingers folding around her own. That said the rest of it.

Emily had been listening with the open delight she never bothered to hide. "Okay. You two are sappy-sweet. I love it. Don't change a thing." She nudged Fiona's arm. "How's the writing? Last time anyone asked, you looked like you wanted to throw your laptop in the Gulf."

"That was last time."

"And now?"

Fiona set her wine down on the stones. The fire popped. For a moment the old reflex rose in her, the one that softened anything she said about her work into a shrug, a nothing. She let it go by.

"Hank's out of the alley," she said.

Emily blinked. "Is that good? It sounds good."

"It's very good. My detective's been standing over a dead body in a rain-soaked alley since February. I left him there. Couldn't write him one step in any direction for six months." She shrugged. "This week he stood up. Walked to the corner to think. He's after the killer now. He's actually moving."

"Fiona." Winnie said it like a small toast.

"It's the most I've written since I got here. Maybe the most in a year." She turned to Marty. "And it's his fault."

Marty raised an eyebrow. "I didn't write a word for you."

"No. You did better." She angled toward him so the others could hear it, because she wanted them to. "I asked him on the beach how he'd end the book. Where Hank goes from the alley. And this one looks me dead in the eye and says, I have no idea, I'm a critic, not a writer."

"I stand by that."

"It broke the whole thing loose." She shook her head, still half amazed at it. "I'd been waiting for somebody to hand me the answer. Rachel, the publisher, Drake. I wanted permission from someone who wasn't coming. Marty just told me flat out nobody was bringing it. So I went and found it myself. Hank started walking the next morning."

"So I helped by being useless," Marty said.