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My throat swells.
Parry squeezes my shoulder, then side-hugs me. “And if OB will explain this to anyone, I’m sure it’s you.”
“Doubtful,” I mutter. “Very fucking doubtful. Weren’t you just saying she’s so willing to put her friends before me?” I spin on him.
He clutches my shoulders. “And weren’t you just reminding me that she has put you first since you’ve been back? I’m cautious and protective, Zo—but maybe I’ve been wrong to be cautious of her. She has been there for you.”
“Then why couldn’t she tell me? Does she think I’d react badly?” My brain is in a blender, and I hear my voice rising. “Why would she be okay with the entire town knowing but leaving me in the dark?”
Parry slowly releases his grip on my shoulders. “I don’t know.”
I’ll have to ask her myself.
I try not to be hurt. What happened to October is awful, and I wasn’t here. I left. She doesn’t owe me an explanation about anything.
I blink hard to wipe October away for a second. “Okay, let’s just reroute our focus.” I turn to the books. “Time to get down to hunting for more Augustine Anders evidence.”
“Otherwise known as a wild goose chase.”
“Yeah, and we’ll be the best goose hunters in town. Take that, Antler Queen Anna.”
Parry laughs hard at the nickname. “Brian would get a kick out of that.”
“You mean Colt?”
“No…” His neck reddens. “I-I-I-I meant Brian.”
So Parry really likes my brother. I shouldn’t keep meeting surprise, but it is shocking. Six years ago, I would’ve never predicted the match. It’s a little like hearing Han Solo has a thing for Anakin Skywalker.
Brian could so easily crush Parry’s heart. Part of me wants to caution Parry, but I can’t pretend to understand what I’ve missed. I haven’t been around enough to offer any advice—let alone good advice.
We both agree to push aside our romantic troubles and concentrate on the mystery girl.
Hours pass in the museum. Flipping each page and looking for one relative. Just one. Even generations ago. My stomach grumbles in hunger by the time I close the next to last book.
“We should break for food,” Parry says.
“And have to pay another thirty-five bucks to reenter?” I make a cringy face. “Not a chance. We only have one more book left.”
He opens the oldest book. Leather worn and title faded along the cover. The first known records of the curses. It’s not the original. The town made a replica so tourists wouldn’t damage the first edition, and they purposefully distressed the book for that “ancient” appearance.
The replica has the same info as the original, so it’ll work. Huddling together, Parry and I turn each page slowly, my stomach sinking with each name.
When we reach the last page, the last second, and the last name, I take a shallow breath. “Well…there’s that. I guess we’re right where we started. A whole lotta nothing.”
“Not really.” Parry shuts the book. “We do know something now.”
October’s curse. My unhelpful thought intrudes.
Parry can’t read my mind, but his expression grows more serious. “Let’s says she does exist,” he grimaces as though it sounds like a fairytale. “If she doesn’t have a relative in these books, it means something, Zo.”
It hits me.
My mouth falls open. “She’s not from Mistpoint Harbor.”
CHAPTER 19
October Brambilla
Aunt Effie is relentless.
“I’m doing your friend a favor, October.” She has pink curlers in her hair and tightens the strap of a purple fuzzy robe. The matching slippers are so Aunt Effie, and I’m shocked she’s not in bed.
It’s midnight.
My muscles ache from my shoulders down to my feet from a grueling shift after our dishwasher didn’t show. Since I’m trying my best to reenter Uncle Milo’s good graces, I filled in.
I would’ve gone straight to the Harbor Inn after work, but I received a text from my aunt that propelled me home.
Aunt Effie: I’ve scheduled a book event for Zoey.
So now I’m here. At a commanding stance in the quaint living room. Surrounded by hundreds of old Harlequin paperbacks of small-town romances that my aunt gobbles up faster than her morning anise toast.
Truly, stacks of books have spilled out of the shelves and found home in various locations.
Three on the coffee table. Two on an end table. One oddly placed on the creaky staircase. Two in the slipper basket at the door. A small white fluffy Pomeranian currently snoozes on a large hardback on the floorboards.
Sometimes I think she’d sell her soul for a good love story.
Aunt Effie even speaks more dreamily about these books than her own romance with the town’s lawyer. Bluntly, she’s said, “Steve doesn’t measure up in the least. There is no comparison because grand, sweeping, eternal love is made for novels, October. It’s fictional. It doesn’t exist in real life.”
I want to believe her. Because if soul-deep love that transcends time and place can’t truly exist, then maybe it’d be easier to just let Zoey leave for a second time.
