Page 8 of Tourist Season
“What kind of birds?”
The man shrugs, his expression still a little teasing, but something about it has a glint of a dark edge to it, like a blade that catches the light. It’s as though his bird-watching is more like a hunt, the thrill of finding something elusive in the shadows of remote and desolate forests. Some distant alarm rings in the back of my head, but his expression softens and I smother my paranoia. “All kinds, I guess. Bald eagles. Osprey. But I’m not fussy. Anything from falcons to starlings interest me.”
We slow to a stop in front of the window of one of Cape Carnage’s weirder shops. My heart jumps into my throat as I deliberate on my next words. I can’t remember the last time I felt these feelings. Desire. Attraction. I don’t want to ask my next question. But I’m desperate to know. “By yourself?”
But he doesn’t hear me, not when my voice is so quiet and his own question is so much louder as he says, “Craft-A-Corpse? Is this place for real?”
I clear my throat, trying to dislodge the sensation of shrinking into myself. “Yeah,” I say, my tone too bright and breezy for the way I feel inside. “It’s new this year. Kind of like Build-A-Bear. Except … not.” I point to one of the displays, a row of fake hands in different stages of decay, some of them holding silk flowers, others clutching plastic weapons, others frozen in variousgestures. I catch my companion’s eye in the reflection on the window, a phantom over the body parts on the other side of the glass.
“They’re for the Carnival of Carnage Gravity Race. Putting together a good corpse companion for your soapbox racer is pretty critical for style points. Going the fastest down the course is one thing, but sometimes the quality of the corpse is what clinches the win, you know? And it’s easier to build a corpse here than to travel in with fake body parts in your suitcase, I guess.”
“Huh. That’s kind of a genius business idea,” my new friend says. The shop’s owner, Henry, waves to us with a severed hand as patrons paint various body parts with fake blood. And though there are lifelike entrails and eyeballs and severed limbs strewn throughout the window display, my companion doesn’t seem fazed by the gruesome scene. He finishes his sandwich as he surveys the body parts with an appreciative nod. “I like it,” he says, though I’m not sure if he’s referring to the sandwich, or the shop, or both.
“Yeah, it’s cool. Definitely very ‘Carnage,’” I reply with air quotes. With a final wave to Henry, we turn and resume our walk.
“It is,” he says. “And I am.” When I look up at him with a question written across my face, he’s already waiting, a teasing warmth brightening the green hues in his eyes as they catch the sun. In this light I can see the wedge of walnut brown in his left iris more clearly, a slice of shadow among the green that feels like a familiar comfort. “I am here by myself.”
My cheeks warm. I can’t hide the blush with my coffee cup, but I try anyway, keeping my eyes latched to his as I take a sip of my drink. And he doesn’t let me get away with an escape. He smilesas though he’s caught me, and even though part of me wants to, I don’t look away.
At least, not until my phone rings.
“Sorry, excuse me.” I dig into my bag, trying to shove my disappointment aside that the moment between us has been interrupted. When I withdraw the phone, it’s Arthur’s name on the screen. I accept the call and hold it to my ear, casting an apologetic glance toward my companion. “Hello?”
“Harper.”
“That’s me.”
“Where are you?”
“In town. Not far from the Bean.”
“Where’s my black bag?”
My step falters, and I can sense my companion’s concern next to me. Though I dart him an untroubled smile, I don’t think it’s very convincing for either of us. Knowing what’s in Arthur’s infamous black bag, there’s no way my sudden burst of anxiety can be hidden completely. “Your bag?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Why do you need it?”
“Maria Flores’s Airbnb. The tourists staying there are awful. The man used my driveway to turn around yesterday and cut across the edge of the grass. And today, he allowed his hideous little dog to relieve itself among the rose bushes and he didn’t pick it up. Why Maria made such a grand house into an Airbnb, I will never know. It attracts the most horribly entitled windbags every summer.”
“Okay … well … I’m not sure those missteps fit the criteria for what you seem to have planned—”
“They do today. Where’s my black bag?”
My hopes for spending a little more time with the mysterious stranger next to me are quickly slipping through my fingers. Though I hid Arthur’s bag of drugs and weapons and his precious “grim-noire” in my cottage a month ago in a place I knew he’d be reluctant to look, I still wouldn’t put it past him to get into his golf cart and make his way to my house so he can have a rummage around for it. And the next stop would then be the neighboring house, where Arthur would charm his way inside only to murder the occupants. That was fine when they deserved it and he had a better memory for what he did with the bodies, but these days, he’s not such a great judge of what qualifies as a murderable offense.
I sigh and steal a glimpse at my watch. Hopefully, by the time I make it back to the manor, he’ll have forgotten his plan to kill our temporary neighbors, and if not, I’ll have to find a way to distract him until he does. “I’ll be home in twenty minutes, and I’ll help you look for it, okay?”
“Bring me a double-shot chai latte with soy milk and a sprinkle of cinnamon, would you?”
I roll my eyes. “Fine.”
“Extra hot.”
“Yes, I know.”
“With cinnamon, Harper. Not nutmeg.”
