Page 24 of Enemies in Earnest

The weathermen in the Keys loved to shake their hands and cry wolf. It happened all throughout hurricane season. Every single storm cell had the potential to become a hurricane. And then everyone would panic, batten down the hatches, and the weathermen would be likemy badand shrug it off.

“When?” I asked. Though I couldn’t care less. Summer in the Keys meant thunderstorms and rain. It was the tradeoff for a year of sunshine and blue skies.

“Late tomorrow the first bands might hit. Sometime around low tide.”

As long as it didn’t mess with my plans for the day.

“Boat parade still happening?” I asked.

“Far as I know.”

“Then I’m not worried. The town loves that boat parade, and we draw so many people to the island because of it. I’d hate for it to get canceled because the weathermen want to be chicken littles.”

As if sensing someone was watching her, Acacia looked up from where she’d been setting out binders and smiled at me. It had to be a first. Or at least the first time in a very long while that a genuine smile was directed at me.

AJ droned on about winds from the southwest. Those winds were apparently pushing the storm closer to us, but they still held out hope it would stay its current course. If it did it would skirt far enough east to miss the Keys completely.

He said more, but the moment I saw Acacia jogging toward me every other one of my senses shut down entirely. I couldn’t think of another time I’d ever seen her look at me with excitement. It was a moment I intended to savor.

“Hey!” she called while she was still about ten paces away. “What are you doing here?”

Her head tilted to accept a kiss from me, without any regard to the prying eyes of the volunteers inside Temperance or AJ standing directly next to me.

“Thought I’d come and see if you needed any help to get things wrapped up before the big day.”

Seeing the stress around her eyes dissolve and relief melt across her face made me want to pick up my phone and call every single resident of Candy Cane Key and tell them to kindly get their asses down to Temperance and help.

But I knew the whole town was busy getting the boat parade together for the evening’s festivities and in the grand scale of importance, my little bookworm’s Hemingway Day celebration ranked fairly low.

“What still needs to be done?” I asked, nodding my goodbye to AJ as I wrapped my arm around her and led her back toward the bar.

“Well, here’s the thing. A woman, who is a friend of Felicity’s, incidentally, came into the bar and kind of dropped a bombshell on Asher. Apparently, he had a love child he knew nothing about and this woman—her name is Marley—is his daughter. He kind of abandoned ship and is off with Marley and her husband. I’m trying to keep my head above water while attempting to figure out what his vision was based on his half assed chicken scratched notes.”

Temperance was organized chaos. People flit in every direction carrying boxes, shifting tables and chairs around, setting out signs, and calling out orders to one another. It looked like a typical party set up: warming trays were being set out along the back wall with labels for each dish that would be served. I noticed all of the dishes' names.The Old Manicotti and the Seafood.A Moveable Feast of Charred Summer Vegetables.For Whom The Buttered Rolls.And aDeath (by chocolate)in the Afternoonfondue fountain for dessert.

An entire meal of puns. Literary people. I didn’t understand it. But if eating a menu that tickled one’s intellect while also one’s palate turned their crank, who was I to judge?

“I’m at your service,” I announced into the melee. “Just start shouting orders at me, and we’ll get it all done.”

And that’s what we did. Slowly but surely the boxes were unpacked, glasses were set, decorations hung, and all of the pre-prepared food was organized back in their storage freezers and fridges. The team knocked everything out despite the ever-increasing humidity and the resulting stuffy air from needing to close the storm windows.

Acacia stood at those floor to ceiling panes of glass surveying the choppy water.

“It’s going to blow over,” I assured Acacia, wrapping my arms around her shoulders from behind and pressing a kiss to her head. “And even if there’s a little rain tomorrow, we can just call it Hemingway sending us a literary device from beyond. Everyone will eat that shit up. I’m sure he had some short story about rain and sorrow. We throw that into the mix, and it will look like we planned for it to rain.”

Rather than acknowledge the plan, she simply squeezed my arms and relaxed back into my chest. The pair of us stood there reveling in the brief quiet.

“I’m so sorry, Edwin.” She turned to look up at me. “It was wrong on so many levels to act like such a snob to you. You didn’t deserve it.”

“All of those demons were exorcised yesterday. Today is a new day, right? One where Acacia and Edwin are no longer enemies.”

I wanted to say that we were lovers. The phrase was on the tip of my tongue, but I didn’t want to lose the magic we had. I still had no idea if we were just friends with benefits, if the prior evening had truly been a one-night stand, or if it was the beginning of something. That was what the picnic was for. My date…our date. A fun and relaxed way to figure out exactly what we were.

“Think I could steal you away for a few hours?” I asked, surveying the last of the details that were getting wrapped up.

Acacia turned and looked at her transformed space as well. Seeing it through her eyes brought a newfound respect and admiration for her pub. She created that space against the advice of her parents and some guy named Mason that my mom had told me wasbad news. Though she didn’t give me anything more than that. Except when I asked if he’d hurt or hit her, she insisted that no, he hadn’t. He’d ruined her academic reputation though, somehow. But she didn’t have the finer details on that. Maybe Acacia would eventually trust me enough to give me the whole story.

“Has anyone seen Dr. Krane? It’s been hours.”

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