THE VICTIM
The festival spreads out before me like a chessboard, and I’m the only player who knows all the pieces.
Easter decorations flutter in the Vermont breeze—pastel streamers, inflatable bunnies, the whole saccharine display of small-town innocence. How quaint. How perfectly naive. The crowd mills around in their ridiculous bunny ears and spring finery, completely oblivious to the fact their little celebration is about to become very, very interesting.
I adjust my tie and check my watch. Timing is everything in business, and today’s business requires precision. The microphone waits on the stage like a loaded weapon, and I can already taste the satisfaction of what’s coming.
My dear wife thinks she’s so clever with her little secrets. Her romance novels, her clandestine meetings, her pathetic attempts at independence. She has no idea I’ve been three steps ahead of her for months. The private investigator’s photos are tucked safely in my jacket pocket—insurance, evidence, ammunition. All those stolen moments with her ex-boyfriend, captured in high definition.
But she’s just the opening act.
My siblings think they’re untouchable, protected by family loyaltyand blood ties. How adorable. They have no concept of what I’ve discovered about their operations, their hypocrisies, their carefully hidden crimes. Bunny with her wellness empire built on lies. The others with their schemes and their secrets.
Soon enough, I’ll be exposing them all.
The chocolate empire didn’t build itself on sentiment, and it won’t be preserved by it either. Some people learn through gentle correction. Others require more dramatic lessons. Today, Honey Hollow gets a master class in consequences.
I smile and wave at a passing family, their children clutching Easter baskets and chocolate bunnies.Enjoy the sugar rush while you can, I think. The real entertainment is about to begin.
By the time this celebration ends, everyone will know exactly who holds the power in this family.
And more importantly, they’ll know what happens to those who cross me.
LOTTIE
My name is Lottie Lemon, and I see dead people. Well, mostly I see dead creatures of the furry variety who have come back from the other side to warn me that their previous owners are about to join them in the great beyond. But right now, the only thing I’m seeing is chaos wrapped in bunny ears and tied up with a coconut cake bow.
It’s Sunday afternoon at Honey Lake, and the Hop ’Til You Drop Easter Eggstravaganza is in full swing. The lake is so crowded it’s clear all of Honey Hollow is here—and probably half of Vermont, too. The air smells like sugar, blooming lilacs, and that particular Vermont spring scent of mud mixed with optimism—and maybe a touch of my sweet treats. Cherry blossoms drift down like confetti while the lake sparkles in the sun, and somewhere in the distance, a brass band is murdering what I think used to be “Here Comes Peter Cottontail”.
Giant inflatable Easter bunnies tower over vendor booths, their plastic grins slightly unnerving in the afternoon light. Pastel streamers flutter from every available surface, and someone has gone absolutely wild with the Easter egg decorations. They’re hanging from trees, scattered across picnic tables, and floating in the lake likecolorful bath toys. This entire festival is going to run for a week straight, right through Easter Sunday, building up to the grand finale egg hunt.
Kids dart between game booths—ring toss with carrot-shaped prizes, a bean bag throw featuring a giant Easter basket, and something called Pin the Tail on the Bunny that’s causing more arguments than a political debate. The dunking booth has been converted to Dunk the Easter Bunny, and judging by the line, people are taking their spring frustrations out on whoever’s brave enough to sit on that platform.
The 5K just finished, which means I’m surrounded by three hundred people in various states of exhaustion and mandatory bunny ears. There’s a forty-something woman in a pink tutu catching her breath next to my cakewalk table, a woman in full Easter Bunny regalia fanning herself with a bouquet of plastic carrots, and approximately seventeen children who’ve discovered that bunny ears make excellent weapons when wielded correctly.
“Round five of the cakewalk!” I announce into a microphone as it drowns me out with a squeal loud enough to be heard on Mars. I arrange my serving supplies on the table—paper plates, plastic forks, and my good serving knife with the pearl handle that once belonged to my Grandma Nell. She always said a proper cake deserves a proper knife, and this one has been cutting celebration cakes in our family for three generations. “Please find your numbered squares and prepare to walk for a scrumptious cake to call your own!”
A cakewalk is basically musical chairs for people who’d rather win one of my delectable delights than a plastic trophy. Participants walk around numbered squares to music, and when it stops, I draw a number and whoever’s standing on it wins their choice of cake. Simple in theory, total chaos when you add dozens of sugar-hyped people in bunny ears.
I wiggle the mic again, and the feedback makes every person within a fifty-foot radius wince, including my twin boys Ozzy and Corbin—officially Essex Everett Baxter and Corbin Noah Baxter, though at just over a month old, they’re more concerned with eatingand sleeping than formal names. They’re strapped into their triple stroller next to my sweet two-year-old baby girl, Lyla Nell, who’s clapping like mad for all the human-sized bunnies while trying to escape her safety harness with the determination of a tiny Houdini.
“Sweet honey on a burnt biscuit, Lot!” Carlotta appears at my side wearing what appears to be an entire spring garden on her head—complete with plastic flowers, ribbon streamers, and what might be a small bird. “This place is crawling with eligible bachelors in bunny ears! It’s like someone threw a singles mixer and decided to call it a sexy 5K. Check out all those hairy thighs in those tiny short shorts!”
“Your mind would go there,” I sigh.
“Of course, it would, Lot. My mind’s already taken a first-class ticket there, checked into the penthouse suite, and ordered room service.”
Carlotta Sawyer, also known as my biological mother, has never met a metaphor she couldn’t make inappropriate, and today is no exception. Her eyes are scanning the post-race crowd with predatory precision, never mind the fact she’s seeing my biological father and happens to be committed to him—mostly.
Both Carlotta and I share the same caramel-colored medium-length locks and hazel eyes, albeit Carlotta has more tinsel in her hair and wrinkles. She’s pretty much a preview of what I’ll look like in twenty years if I let myself go and decide to dabble in a beard. Have I mentioned her moustache? I have zero plans on stopping my waxing régime anytime soon. My bestie Keelie and I have a pact that if either of us becomes incapacitated for any reason, we’ll discreetly shave one another’s faces if need be. Now that’s a real friend.
“That gentleman in the metallic gray shorts, paired with the blue bunny tail and matching tutu, has excellent form,” Carlotta continues, pointing at a man who’s still catching his breath near the refreshment stand. “Both athletic form and fashion-wise. It takes confidence to pull off that look.”
“That’s Mayor Nash,” I point out. “You know, as in your quasi-fiancé.” And my aforementioned father.
“Well, of course, he looks good! I’ve been training him for months.”Carlotta’s gaze drifts to the men standing opposite him. “Check out the quads on that one, Lot. They could crack walnuts. I might be tethered to a man, but that doesn’t mean a girl can’t appreciate the rest of the scenery, does it?”
The fact my biological father is once again dating the woman who gave birth to me, then promptly abandoned me at the fire department, still feels like something out of a soap opera, but I’ve learned to roll with it.
