Page 61 of Midnight Waters

Ben rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but only on the ground floor. When I wanted to get some stuff of Tyler’s that Michaela said I could have, George wouldn’t let me go upstairs. He’s hiding something. Will you come with me?”

I scoffed. “You want me to come?” This was a first for Arrowood-Everhart relations in at least a century.

“Don’t flatter yourself.” Ben blew a piece of stray hair out of his eyes. “I need someone to blame if we get caught.”

Ah, there it was.

He was a fool if he thought I wouldn’t drop him in it if we got caught.

“Fine. When are we doing this?” I asked.

Ben rolled his shoulders. “The only time they ever leave the house these days is to go to Temple on Sunday mornings. I know how we can sneak in. If you meet me at the house at seven a.m. Sunday, we’ll have a good three hours to scour that place.”

The front door squeaked as it opened into the front office.

“Maeve? Are you here?” Dad called.

Every fibre in my body turned to stone. Dad was about to find me here with an Everhart on his property.

“Hide!” I seized Ben’s arm and pushed him away from the door.

“Where the hell am I supposed to hide?” Ben hissed as I dashed for the door to the front office.

“Oh please, have you never played a game of hide-and-seek before? Get creative! I’ll get rid of him.”

I shut the door on Ben’s bewildered face and stood against it as Dad came in, twiddling his car keys in one hand. He had a brown paper bag in the other.

My eye twitched when I caught sight of the dolphin logo printed on the front.

“Wilma’s?” I asked. My favourite burger joint since I was six, Wilma’s did the best fries on the island. I hadn’t even found better in London.

“Sandra told me you didn’t pack a lunch,” Dad said. “Thought I’d bring you some.”

All morning, I had contemplated my new mermaid status and the guilt of making my family think I was dead. Lunch hadn’t crossed my mind.

It was nice to know he wasn’t so mad that he was avoiding me. In fact, talking about last night might just buy Ben enough time to hide.

“Thanks, Dad. Listen, could we talk about?—?”

“Not now, sweetheart.” Dad waved a hand at me. “We’ll talk about it later. I need to pick up some more oxygen enchantments for the afternoon dives.”

Oxygen enchantments. From in the back room.

“I’ll get them. You sit down and relax for a bit.” I gestured to the desk chair, then slipped back into the employee area and purposefully closed the door behind me.

At first glance, Ben had disappeared. But on my second look, the tablecloth of the employee lunch table had ridden up on one side. A spotless designer sneaker poked out the bottom.

Idiot. Maybe he hadn’t played hide-and-seek before.

I yanked the tablecloth back into place as I passed it on my way to the enchantment cabinet.

I just had to get the oxygen enchantments as quickly as I could and get Dad out of there before he noticed anything.

“Actually, this morning’s group had some awful kids.” Dad stepped into the room just as I opened the cabinet doors.

I jumped so hard, I nearly pulled the whole cabinet down on me.

“Yeah?” I tried to keep my voice level as I searched the cabinet for a pack of enchantments.

---