Total pages in book: 101
Estimated words: 96284 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96284 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
What about a murder mystery wedding?
I’d go to that.
After cramming our paperwork down into my backpack again, I left the truck and got ready to carry in gear. Shit, it was cold in Washington. I’d been too hot to bother with a windbreaker at the airport in Seattle, but now I needed it.
“What theme will our wedding have?”
He shot me a cute smirk and hauled out his case of tripods. “Definitely not Lady in Red.”
Ohhh, good one. For one, he’d played along, which meant he wasn’t repulsed by the idea. For two, he still found Sandra’s wedding theme ridiculous. I barely remembered it. That whole day was a blur.
We grabbed as much as we could carry and locked up, then trekked up the stone path toward the inn. Jake’s gardener eyes catalogued everything and seemed to like what he was seeing.
“Do you wanna get married at some point?” he asked curiously.
The wedding itself meant nothing to me, but… “Yeah. Yeah, I wanna be married to you. What about you?”
He smiled to himself, as if he was entertaining the idea, and climbed up on the porch. “Just say when, and I’ll get the rings.”
Fuck me, we could just wrap up our day here, ’cause it wasn’t gonna get any better.
Holy shit.
Just as Jake opened the door, we heard a guy yell, “Mom! I’m gonna go get our dinner! Call me when Jake and Roe arrive—I wanna subtly ask for their autographs!”
Jake and I exchanged a quick grin and stepped inside, at which point a bell rang above us, and the guy at the reception desk spun toward us with his eyes wide. He couldn’t be more than eighteen or something.
“Shit,” he cursed.
Upstairs, his mother—I presumed—responded. “How do you ask for autographs subtly? I’ll be down in two minutes. Hold on.”
Aw, poor guy. He looked so embarrassed. But he was evidently quick to recover. He cleared his throat and ran a hand through his hair. “So let’s just ignore that I made a complete fool of myself—and welcome to Cedar Inn. My name is Gray, and I’d be happy to get you checked in and settled.”
“Thank you,” I chuckled. “Don’t worry, we can subtly sign something for you.”
“Suh-weet.” Gray smiled triumphantly. “My buddy Abel and I always listen to your podcast when he’s in town. You’ll probably meet him tomorrow. His dad is Lincoln Hayes. He may have told me that’s why you’re in town. I’ll just stop rambling now. Right.”
Right.
Welcome to Camassia Cove.
I yawned and stretched out my legs. Fucking frigid. I shuddered at a harsh wind and was mildly annoyed with all the sea gulls screaming overhead. And here we’d been—I checked my watch—for five fucking hours.
Jake sat next to me on the bench, with his dumbass-looking drone goggles, while he maneuvered the drone around the marina. And beyond. It had good range, I couldn’t deny that. But I could’ve stayed in bed.
We’d arrived at the marina right before the sun rose. Jake had filmed the fishing boats coming in, some going out, local restaurant owners stopping by to buy the catch of the day…
The boardwalk was lined with restaurants, and I had my eyes set on Quinn’s Fish Camp for lunch. I’d been so bored the last couple of hours that I’d studied all their menus.
“Five more minutes,” Jake said absently.
I yawned again. “No problem. What’s the layout from up there?”
“Residential area west of the boardwalk, forest east of the marina… So the Downtown district has its own town center a bit north of where we’re sitting right now, and I just wanna see if the drone can cover it from here.”
“Got it.”
Five minutes turned into ten, because we filmmakers couldn’t tell time, but after that, we were totally itching for food. And to escape the cold winds. It would be a working lunch since we were heading to Lincoln Hayes’s house right after. I had notes to run through one last time.
We were the first to enter the seafood restaurant, and it looked exactly how I wanted it to look. With fishnets and sea glass in the ceiling, a boat’s steering wheel behind the bar, and tables made out of old wooden barrels. Fucking perfect. We decided to eat at the bar, and I didn’t need to look at the menu first.
Been there, done that. Twenty times. Even the bartender fit right in, with his flannel shirt and well-worn jeans as he…did whatever he did. Something with the register and a notebook. A server came up behind the bar too, dressed more for his profession with a logo tee and nice pants. He poured us ice water and recommended the seafood linguini.
“That sounds good. I’m just gonna take a quick look at the menu first,” Jake said.
I checked my phone in the meantime, and I found a text from Haley.