Page 25 of New Day at the Beach House

Trina laughed. “No, I do. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Roxie showed up with Ethan just as Miguel was adding rum to their sodas. Roxie sat next to Trina and Ethan beside her.

Willie leaned to see him better. “How did you end up with a seat next to us? Don’t tell me that’s the seat you already had?”

He shook his head and smiled. “I know people.” Then he laughed. “I found out the seat next to her was empty, so I swapped my ticket.”

Trina looked around. “Where’s Margo?”

Willie looked around, too. Margo had ended up getting her own ticket, so she would have had to pick it up herself.

“I’m right here,” a voice came from nearby. Margo was inching through the row of seats ahead of them. “This is my friend, Conrad. Conrad, this is Miguel, Willie, Trina, Roxie, and…” She shook her head. “I’m sorry, I don’t know you.”

“Ethan.” He stood and shook Conrad’s hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“You, too,” Conrad said. He waved at the rest of them. “Nice to meet all of you.”

The lights dimmed once, silently announcing the show was about to begin. Everyone took their seats and the lights dimmed again, but this time they stayed dark.

Miguel handed Willie her drink back. She could smell the subtle sweetness of the rum. She took the cup, then lifted it. “Here’s to murder and mayhem.”

He touched his cup to hers, grinning like a schoolboy who’d just gotten away with something. “And rum.”

Claire packed up a container with a selection of the three kinds of popcorn cookies, but still had a lot left over. She’d made too many and she certainly wasn’t going to eat them. She was doing her best to cut back on carbs. Maybe Cash would help. That boy had a metabolism to be envied.

She put the remaining cookies into two of the aluminum tins she had left over, then went to get ready for her evening with Danny.

Doing so only reminded her that her wardrobe was sad and colorless. Once again, she thought about how much she wanted to change it. Well, the insurance money was on its way. She could use some of that to buy some new clothes. It had been a long time. And she was in desperate need of an update. Especially now that Trina had given her such great new hair.

She went with a simple black flowered sundress and sandals, but grabbed a little sweater, because she knew even if they sat by the fire, the evening might still be a little cool.

She did her makeup, fluffed up her hair a bit, then made sure she had everything she needed in her purse.

Her phone buzzed with a text from Danny. Ten minutes or so before I’m home.

Perfect, she responded.

She went to check on Kat, knocking softly on her daughter’s door. “Honey? You okay?”

There was no answer. Claire knocked louder. “Kat? You in there?”

“Hang on.” Kat came to the door wrapped in a towel. “Sorry, I was in the shower.”

“Oh. Are you going out?”

She nodded. “Yeah, over to see Alex at the fire station.”

Claire was glad about that. “You seemed upset when you got home. What happened? Did the interview not go well?”

“I don’t really know. I thought it did, but then it sort of didn’t. I don’t know what happened, except I asked what the salary would be.”

Claire hoped that was just Kat being overly critical of herself. “Well, maybe it’s not as bad as you think. They probably have a lot of other people to interview.”

“Mom, they wouldn’t even tell me what the job was. It could have been the janitor for all I know.”

“Really?” That was odd. “Then maybe you don’t want to work there.”

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