‘I feel like I need to climb into a convertible and go cruising down the coast,’ said Lara, wrapping a floral scarf around her hair. With her sunglasses and bright-red lips, she looked like a silver-screen seductress. I wished I had half her confidence. My own scarf was looped half-heartedly around my neck, and my sunglasses had none of the pointy kitsch of Lara’s.
‘How about that one,’ I suggested, pointing at a shiny blue Cadillac parked outside the Chocolate Enchantress, a few shops down from Lorraine’s. A pug in a gingham skirt smiled out at us.
Lara nodded enthusiastically. ‘I’m going to sit on the hood until the owner comes back.’
Right on cue, two older gents came striding out, hand in hand. They were exactingly dressed in crisp chinos and pastel shirts. Tasteful hints of gold gleamed from their shoes and their wrists.
‘Nice ride,’ called Lara, who never let a thought go unspoken. It was a trait that had always worked out for her. Meanwhile, I feared letting just about any thought out of my head. No wonder my mind was always buzzing with confusion and anxiety.
‘She’s our baby,’ called one of the men, white teeth flashing against dark skin. ‘Oh hey, aren’t you the girls from the beach-bonfire charades? This one does a great Pink Power Ranger.’
I chuckled. ‘I’m just glad someone got it.’
‘That’s not all you got, by the looks of it. Save some for the rest of us, hon.’
‘Molly is a menace,’ agreed Lara, with a laugh. ‘Broken hearts from here to the city.’
I hid my face behind my scarf. I wasn’t a habitual heartbreaker – that was more Lara’s thing. This situation was … new.
The guy pressed a nostalgic hand to his chest. ‘Oh, I remember those days. Enjoy them, sweets.’
‘I’ll do everything in my power to make sure she does,’ called Lara.
‘Nowthat’sa friend. You hang on to her. And hold her hair when she overdoes it at the next bonfire.’
Lara clapped her hands over her mouth, giggling with mortification.
‘That never happened,’ she promised. ‘Never happened! Well, notthisyear.’
The men gave us a wave and chugged off, honking as they went. We made heart hands at the smiling pug, whose curly tail waggled energetically.
‘Do we want to stop by the bookshop now?’ asked Tiff, momentarily. ‘I’m burning through my beach reads and they have that amazing discount bin.’
‘Sure,’ I said. Maybe I could dig up something about the ring, like Noah had suggested.
The Last Word was a tiny used bookshop just off Oceanspray Drive. Well, it was less tiny than it looked – it was just that its red-brick walls were stacked several feet deep with teetering piles of books, making for such narrow passage that you felt like you were spelunking. I half expected to encounter stalactites.
And yet, thanks to a gentle hex on its contents, you alwaysfound whatever you were looking for. All you had to do was walk around thinking about what you were after, and the shop would miraculously surface something perfect in one of the stacks closest to you. I’d always wished I’d had the same skill with organizational hexes, but alas, my pens were constantly missing lids, and my socks remained mismatched (I pretended this was a matter of style).
‘Trashy beach reads,’ whispered Tiff, crossing her fingers. The floor creaked as she tiptoed through the stacks, then made her way to a particularly promising basket of yellowing paperbacks.
A fluffy cat regarded her with one haughty eye from a stack of leather-bound classics, its tail flopping from side to side like a very inefficient duster. This was Chester, the town’s most well-read cat. And given how much Cleo liked being read to, there was plenty of competition.
‘Yes!’ Tiff whispered as she flipped through the paperbacks, marvelling at the luridly illustrated cover art. ‘Oh, you’re going to have to drag me out of the hammock.’
‘Finding everything you’re after?’ A slender guy with kind eyes and floppy hair appeared from somewhere in the shop. I knew from Rosie’s comments and from Tiff’s slightly starry-eyed chit-chat that this was Leon. Leon didn’t disappoint: he was the epitome of nerd chic, dressed casually in jeans and a faded grey T-shirt that had at some point borne a slogan, and thin-framed glasses that suited him entirely too well.
I raised an eyebrow. Perhaps Tiff had surreptitiously asked the shop to deliver something other than her next beach read. But Tiff would never do that. Not intentionally. She was entirely devoted to Damien. Her constantly dinging phone was proof.
‘Um, yep. Yeah. Uh huh,’ said Tiff. ‘I’ve got … these. Books.’
This was unlike my sister, who ordinarily was the face of well-spoken erudition. She hosted a virtual book club! She’d done Toastmasters! (Upon Mom’s insistence.)
‘Beach reads, right?’ said Leon, who had a gentle, lilting accent. Dutch, perhaps?
‘Just while I’m on vacation,’ Tiff clarified.
‘Usually she reads serious stuff,’ I chimed in. ‘Hefty tomes. Ones with tiny print and forewords.’
