Evil by the Sea. Kathleen Bridge

I am totally against the whole idea. It’s too much exposure.”

      Reining in what she really wanted to say, something along the line of You’re a pompous ass, Dorian deserves better, she said, “Aunt Amelia’s my great-aunt. I’m pretty sure the tent was Dorian’s idea, not Auntie’s. One of the reasons Dorian planned your wedding at our hotel was because it was the same weekend as this fabulous festival.” She spread her arms to encompass the parking lot. She didn’t see one unhappy face in the boisterous crowd.

      “That’s not what Dorian told me. She said it was your auntie’s idea. I’ll be sure to have a talk with her. It’s time people stopped trying to take advantage of her because of her advanced age.”

      Who did he think he was marrying? His grandmother? His words, “poor woman” and “advanced age” didn’t fit the dynamic Dorian Starwood Liz knew. “I assure you, Mr. Rhodes, no one at the Indialantic, including Aunt Amelia, would ever take advantage of Dorian. Our family has known her for years.” She wanted to ask how long he’d known his fiancée, but she kept quiet for Dorian’s sake.

      “Bring the food to her circus tent and we’ll lunch together. That way I can keep an eye on her.”

      Heard you the first time. She wanted to give him a military salute and click her sandals together. Instead, she bit the inside of her cheek and chirped, “Will do, Mr. Rhodes.”

      He didn’t respond but his ice-blue gaze showed triumph. Then he turned and walked away.

      After she picked up the abandoned plate that Blackbeard left behind, she realized she had to place another order of food for Dorian. Not in the mood to get in line behind Garrett, she ran up to Aunt Amelia’s boyfriend, Ziggy and enlisted his help in getting two more orders of food, then she found a table in the open dining tent and sat. Even though she’d already shared an order of sea scallop kabobs with Ryan, she had no problem cleaning the remaining plate of food in about the same time as Ryan’s dog. Even cold, the sandwich and the sweet potato fries were delicious. Wiping her mouth with a napkin, she glanced toward the Indian River Lagoon. Rosie, the Indialantic’s mascot rosette tern, was on her favorite piling. Calm and unbothered by all the commotion around her. Liz wished she could say she was unbothered after the little fracas she’d just witnessed between Dorian’s fiancé and financial advisor. She pondered what business it was of hers. None. Dorian was a mature adult with a good head on her shoulders. Then she remembered how Dorian had carried on about her nightmare, and the fact she’d mentioned something cryptic when she’d said, “After what happened…” What had happened? Then there was the subservient way Dorian had acted last night at dinner.

      Gathering her plate, fork and napkin, she headed for the nearest trash receptacle, wishing she had some of Pierre’s thirst quenching lemon-limeade before she met Ziggy for the hand off of Dorian and Julian’s food. As she took a step toward her and Ziggy’s designated meeting place, a piece of paper flitted toward her like a moth to a flame and flattened itself to her right leg. She bent and picked it up, then quickly glanced at it. It wasn’t a prenup. Instead, it was the folded piece of paper Julian had just handed Garrett—a four-hundred-thousand-dollar invoice for a water filtration system.

      She knew from reading the label on the Sunshine Wiccan Society’s water yesterday that the water was bottled at the source of the SWS’s grounds in Jacksonville. The invoice for the filtration system had a delivery address in Ocala. Maybe the society planned on moving? She stowed the invoice away, thinking how she would get it to Garrett without him knowing she’d been listening to his and Julian’s conversation. She wished the Indialantic’s resident teenage mystery writer, Betty, were here as a sounding board. Ryan would listen, but he would tell her that not everything was a conundrum to be sorted out, or some Machiavellian plot.

      One thing was for sure; there were a lot of interesting dynamics going on with the players in the Starwood-Rhodes wedding weekend.

      After Ziggy passed her the two hot plates, he went in search of Aunt Amelia. Liz headed in the direction of Dorian’s tent. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Garrett next to Rosie’s flower truck talking to a man wearing a black baseball cap. As soon as Garrett noticed her, he waved in her direction. He said something to the man and he disappeared into a throng of festival goers. Was that the figure she’d seen last night on the boardwalk? The same person Susannah spied in the Indialantic’s garden? Or just someone wearing a black baseball cap? If this was the mystery person, she knew one thing for sure, he was male.