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You’re fine, October. Fried crullers. Fried crullers. I try to concentrate and make more dough while my cousins discuss Isabella’s crush on the sheriff’s son Liam Carmichael, who works as a firefighter/EMT. They laugh about how many Italians have married Irish around here.
A lot.
Mistpoint Harbor has been settled mostly by immigrants throughout the years. In the 1800s, Irish and French called Mistpoint home. Later in the early 1900s, Italians and Hungarians were attracted to the coastal place. Railroad industry boomed, and so did our little slice of lakeside paradise.
When railroads shut down, many families with railroad workers—including ours—needed to find a way to survive in a decaying town. Mutterings of “curses” already circulated for decades. Strange deaths. Fatal accidents.
But the town only profited off the misery of others when the museum was built. And legends were eventually made.
“I heard that she was a prostitute in Chicago.” Isabella’s voice snatches my attention in a quick snap.
My heartbeat hikes up again. Chicago. They can’t be talking about the famous families anymore. They live in Philadelphia.
Zoey.
Zoey lives in Chicago.
Isabella leans against the freezer door and fixes the sleeves to her black blouse. As the hostess of Fisherman’s Wharf, she spends most of her time gossiping in the kitchen. Not helping prep for the lunch or dinner rush.
“Nah,” Benny says, descaling a pile of walleye. He’s the sous chef. “The prostitution stuff is definitely bullshit that my little brother heard from the high school.” My shoulders begin to relax. And then he says, “I think she was a stripper.”
I drop my whisk and it clanks against the metal bowl.
They all stare at me. Except Angela, who half-shucks clams, half-reads another tabloid.
Isabella winces. “Oh…sorry, October.” She slowly unwraps one of the chocolate mints that servers pass out with checks. “I know you were friends with Zoey.”
Benny stares into me. “I don’t get why. She’s a Durand.”
I skip over that comment and tell Isabella, “She’s not a prostitute or a stripper, so you can stop spreading that around.”
Isabella pops the mint into her mouth. “Yeah, yeah, definitely. Gossip ends here, babe.” Her brown eyes sparkle. “Soooo, do you happen to know what she was really doing in Chicago?”
Yes.
I do.
With the limitations of our rules, talking about our jobs was one of the very few things not off-limits. However, I’d rather take the knife in Benny’s hands and slit my throat before spilling any information about Zoey.
Angela peeks up from the tabloid. Interested in my response, too.
“No clue,” I say in my usual cold, stilted voice.
Isabella bites into her mint. “Bummer.”
Angela returns to the magazine.
Benny places a couple pieces of fresh walleye on parchment lined paper. “She’s not going to last another day here, and I put money on it. Three hundred bucks to be exact.” He nods to me. “You want in, OB? There’s a whole group making bets.”
Anger tries to pinch me, but I feel more resigned than anything. Even if I love them, I’m exhausted by the predictability of my family and the people in this town.
“No,” I say and try to focus on beating the dough.
Isabella asks Benny, “What makes you think she’ll leave tomorrow?”
“She’s staying at the Harbor Inn.” His words send a burst of panic through me.
“What?” I breathe.
Benny frowns. “You don’t know?”
After the lighthouse this morning, I threw myself into prepping dessert for tonight. Zoey has been on my brain, sure, but I made certain that I didn’t seek out information about her whereabouts.
I shake my head.
“Kelly gave her the Poe Room,” Benny explains with a brittle laugh. “That old witch must be trying to force her out of town herself.”
Fuck.
I drop the whisk back into the bowl again and wipe my hands quickly on a mapeen. “I have to go.”
“Wait, what?” Benny scowls. “Who’s going to finish the crullers?”
“Danny can do it.” I mention his brother who happens to be a line cook. I don’t hear Benny’s next words. I’m already ripping off my white chef coat, grabbing a snowy white puffer jacket from the backroom, and booking it into the frigid air.
Why would she go to the Harbor Inn? Out of all places! I hop angrily into my Jeep, heat and fury pumping my cold blood as I haphazardly put the car in reverse.
Crash!
I glance over my shoulder. A metal trashcan is tipped over, garbage littering the cement. Only a few cars are parked here in the back, and clam shells scatter the concrete in front of Benny’s Subaru.
I leave the mess behind and peel onto the street.
My pulse thumps in a heavy, frenzied rhythm all the way to the B&B. Head whirling, I park the car and storm into the Harbor Inn. I expect to see Kelly—and I’m ready to claw her tooth and nail for giving Zoey a room here.
But the front desk is empty.
Fury still in check, I storm up the old wooden stairs and pass the stained-glass windows and the eerie artwork on the peeling paisley wallpapered walls. At the end of the hallway, I bang a fist on the door with the raven wood carving.
