Page 79 of Viking Vengeance Cruise

“It’s probably for the best.” Poppy holds herself tight. “Some secrets are too painful to share. But between you and me? Sienna had every reason to want Astrid gone. I’m not saying she did it, but...” She leaves the sentence dangling in the air.

“But she had motive,” I finish for her.

“Exactly.” Poppy offers me a sad smile. “I just hope whoever did this gets caught. For all our sakes.”

It’s a lovely sentiment. It would be lovelier if I could stop wondering whose sake tops her list.

She drifts away to help an elderly book club member navigate the cobblestones, and I’m left standing there doing the math.

In Gothenburg, Sienna handed me Poppy’s name wrapped in a bow. Today, Poppy returned the favor. These two keep gifting each other to me, and neither one has included a receipt. Either they’re both innocent and terrified, or one of them is very good at regifting.

Both things can be true about the same person. Sienna taught me that an hour ago.

The ferry ride back is quieter. Nettie is exhausted from her cannon adventure and falls asleep upright, gunpowder still dusting her muumuu. Bess reads her book and pointedly ignores her, though I notice she’s draped her cardigan over Nettie’s shoulders. Here’s the thing about those two. The scolding is loud, but the love is louder.

Marina and Wes stand at the railing talking quietly, and I catch the way he looks at her. Protective and concerned and something deeper he hasn’t found the nerve to name yet.

I briefly consider shoving the two of them into a supply closet later and locking it, then decide I’ve got enough felonies penciled in for this cruise.

Ransom finds me at the stern, slides his arms around me from behind, and rests his chin on my shoulder. “Productive day?” he murmurs.

“Nettie got stuck in a cannon, I interrogated a suspect, and I’m more confused than ever about who actually killed Astrid Storm.”

“Sounds about right.”

I spin and wrap my arms around him and laugh. “You could at least pretend to be impressed.”

“I’m conserving it for the next cannon.” He lands a kiss on my lips, and he manages to impress the heck out of me.

We pull back just in time for me to see Magnus appear one last time as Helsinki’s skyline comes into view. The swagger hasn’t fully returned. He looks out over the water the same way Sienna did, and I wonder how long a man can be devoted to a woman before he’s allowed to stop.

“Three women with secrets, little one,” he growls my way. “The teacher, the warrior, the devoted queen. One of them stopped my Astrid’s beating heart. Navigate these murky waters wisely.”

His Astrid. Even now. Even knowing.

Then he up and disappears in a shimmer of silver stars. All that drama, and his best advice was essentially a riddle with three answers for me to choose from.

Ghosts. You can’t get a straight answer out of them, and they vanish before you can argue with them.

I rest my head against Ransom’s chest and watch the city pull closer.

Fortresses are built to keep enemies out.

Nobody ever mentions what to do when the enemy sails in with the rest of the passengers—smiling for the group photos.

And I’m running out of time to figure out which smile belongs to a killer.

CHAPTER 19

After the fortress excursion, and after Nettie’s expulsion from an eighteenth-century cannon, Wes announces he’s taking us to experience authentic Finnish culture.

Authentic Finnish culture turns out to be a traditional sauna on the outskirts of Helsinki, which I suppose beats a second cannon.

The bar for today is low, and Nettie set it there personally.

The drive out of the city takes twenty minutes, and somewhere along the way Helsinki trades its trams and tidy boulevards for a storybook. Birch trees crowd the road in silvery rows, little red cottages with white-trimmed windows peek out from between the pines, and every so often a lake flashes past the window, flat and bright as a mirror.

Finland collects lakes the way Nettie collects regrettable men. There’s always another one glinting nearby, and nobody can explain where it came from. By the time the van rolls to a stop on a gravel drive, the only sounds left in the world are wind in the birches and water lapping somewhere close, and I half expect a woodland creature to walk out and offer us lingonberries.