Chapter 14
Chapter 14
Concealed on three sides by a vinyl booth, Daphne leaned over her coffee at the Sunrise Diner and met her grandmother’s gaze. Greta sat to Daphne’s left, and Harry was beside Grandma Mabel. The three older ladies considered Daphne’s announcement, but they said nothing.
“So when you said nothing was going on between you and the sheriff ...” Grandma Mabel’s brows lifted.
“I may have overstated the case,” Daphne admitted.
She’d thought about this long and hard last night, and decided that she’d tell her grandmother her plan to get the pot back. She’d hemmed and hawed with herself about how to explain the chain reaction that had led to Flint inviting her to his mother’s event, and she decided that partial truths were the way forward.
The three dragons sitting with her would gobble up any hint of gossip about the arrangement with Flint being fake. If they were going to survive the next month without anyone finding out—and keeping Daphne’s plan alive to retrieve the Dutch oven—she’d have to lie at least a little.
If she told her family the whole truth, there was no telling how they’d spin the story when they inevitably let it spill. She’d been telling Flint the truth on the phone; the simplest solution was for Daphne to admit that the rumors were true. Denial would only fuel them further. Besides, she really did want an easy out. Being back on the island made her feel twitchy.
“He asked me to go with him to his mother’s vow renewal,” she explained, “but nothing serious is going on between us. We’re, um ... you know. Taking things slow.”
Flint’s words played on a loop in her mind. Banging each other’s brains out. Banging each other’s brains out. Banging each other’s brains out.
Judging by the interested gleam in the three old ladies’ gazes, that same loop was playing in their minds too.
Keeping her cringe contained, Daphne dipped her chin. No going back now.
“So you’ve secretly been dating for weeks?” Greta asked, frowning. Across from her, Harry leaned forward to listen.
Daphne shook her head. “No. When he stopped me on my way back from the party at my parents’ place, we reconnected.”
“I bet you did,” Grandma Mabel cut in, and Daphne shot her a glare.
“Nothing exciting is going on,” Daphne clarified.
“Did you see the way they were looking at each other?” Harry scoffed, looking at Mabel. “There’s a lot of something going on.”
“Amen,” Greta put in.
It was time to get this conversation back on track. “Anyway. I think this vow renewal might give me a chance to get your pot back, Grandma. I haven’t told Flint about it, obviously. But if the pot still exists, it’ll probably be at his mother’s house.”
The words hung between them. Grandma Mabel’s brows furrowed deeply as she studied Daphne.
Certainty settled over Daphne. Her grandmother was going to tell her that she shouldn’t do something so stupid. She would remind Daphne that she was the good, responsible daughter, and she ought to know better than to come up with some harebrained scheme about getting an old cast-iron pot back. It was a silly idea that would almost certainly end in her humiliation.
She wasn’t brash the way Ellie was. She wasn’t the type of person who could pull this off.
A heavy weight sat in the pit of Daphne’s stomach as she waited for her grandmother to speak.
Of course it was a stupid idea. Of course she should know better. She needed to keep her head down, focus on work, and get her life back on track. So what if her engagement had ended in the most mortifying way possible? It didn’t mean she had to change her entire personality. She’d already been punched in the face and tackled, and she’d only just moved back to Fernley. Daphne needed to return to herself. The safe, responsible woman who went to work, meal prepped, and checked her retirement projections on a weekly basis.
That Daphne hadn’t needed to prove herself to anyone.
Then again, that Daphne had been told she was boring and worthless and not wife material. She’d been laid off and kicked out of her home. What did that Daphne actually know, other than the wonders of compound interest?
Something had changed. She’d felt it the moment Calvin Flint had pulled her over the night of her parents’ party. Daphne was so sick of making herself small, of living her life between the lines.
She wanted more.
Was this a silly way of achieving it? Probably. But it felt right. She could do something for her family, prove to them—and herself—that she wasn’t just a boring, studious accountant. She wasn’t just Good Girl Daphne. She was a Davis.
As if Grandma Mabel could hear her thoughts, the older woman gave Daphne a decisive nod. “If we’ve learned one thing from your sister’s escapades,” she proclaimed, “it’s that you need a getaway driver. Greta?”
“I’m in,” the other woman said, lifting her white ceramic mug.
“I guess that means I need to RSVP yes to this vow renewal,” Harry grumbled, then raised her own mug to meet Daphne’s gaze. “You’ll need an inside woman.”
“You’re invited?”
“Archie Yarrow—the happy husband celebrating a decade of married bliss, that is, not the twerp calling himself our mayor—was my late husband’s son-in-law,” Harry explained. “We send each other invitations to events, knowing the other will refuse.”
“Until today,” Grandma Mabel cut in, cackling. “I’ll be your second-in-command.” She nodded to Daphne’s cup; then the four of them clinked their mugs to seal their pact.
“This is going to be fun,” Greta announced. “The accident the other day gave me such a buzz. Wrenching the wheel. The crash of the corner store windows behind us. That turkey running at Daphne and tackling her to the ground.” The old woman shivered, a dreamy smile on her lips. “I haven’t felt that good since my wedding night.”
“Thrilling,” Mabel agreed.
“Makes me feel like I’m sixty again,” Greta added.
Daphne had no idea what she’d just unleashed. This might have been her worst idea yet. Actually, she could almost guarantee it.
And for the first time in her life, the fact that it was impulsive and silly and likely to end in disaster actually made her want to do it more.
“We need a plan,” Mabel said, digging through her purse for a pen as Greta pushed a napkin toward her. “Does anyone know the layout of the house?”
“No. But we could break in under the cover of darkness and case the joint,” Harry suggested.
Daphne jerked, gaze snapping to the silver-haired ball of fury across from her. This was getting out of hand, and it’d only been a few minutes. Daphne cleared her throat. “Grandma, we don’t even know if that old pot still exists. Eileen would have moved houses at least a few times in the past thirty-odd years, and who’s to say she kept it when her mother passed? Maybe we should confirm the pot’s there in the first place.”
“Brenda used to gloat about that pot every time we got together,” Harry said, lips curling into a snarl. “Eileen would join in. I bet she kept it as a trophy.”
This was sounding less and less like a good idea the longer Daphne sat there. Her big self-affirming plan to Do Something Stupid might actually be really, really stupid. Maybe she was still buzzed from last night. “A trophy? Like a serial killer?”
“It really did make the best, crustiest bread,” Greta added. “I think it’s worth the risk. Besides, Mabel, it’s your mother’s pot. It should be in your family.”
“It’s an heirloom,” Harry agreed, putting her mug of coffee down with a decisive clink.
Most families had valuable jewels and precious wedding dresses as heirlooms. Daphne’s family had a pot. She rubbed her temples.
“We’ll work on the assumption that the pot still exists, and that it’s in the Yarrows’ kitchen,” Grandma Mabel said, and the other ladies nodded.
“Let’s drive over there now,” Greta suggested. “Maybe we can get the lay of the land and come up with a preliminary plan.”
“Wait—”
Daphne’s protest was lost in the shuffle of the three women gathering their things, leaving cash on the table, and then shuffling out of the booth. She had no choice but to follow. The alternative was letting three insane women loose on Eileen Yarrow’s house without supervision.
Despite her hesitations, as she slid into the back seat behind Greta in the driver’s seat, a little bud of excitement was blooming in the pit of her stomach. She felt the same way she had when she’d gathered the documents to go talk to Jerry Barela. As if finally, for the first time in her life, Daphne was making a decision that hadn’t been set out before her based on what she should do. She was doing something because she wanted to, because she was capable. Because she was brave, or stupid, or both.
And that felt good.
Greta drove them out to the southeastern point of the island. Fernley National Park took up most of the eastern shore, and abutting it was one of the wealthier neighborhoods on the island. Ellie’s ex-fiancé had lived there before he went to jail. Lionel did as well, but not because he was wealthy. He’d refused every offer to sell his place by developers and wealthy buyers, no matter how much the elite grumbled about his rickety marina and tiny overgrown property.
The houses got bigger and farther apart from each other as they drove through the area, with stone fences and wrought iron gates encircling manicured yards. Tall, mature trees lined the roads, with patches of forest still surviving between the streets and developments.
“Archie bought the old brick place on Seaview,” Harry said, pointing right when they came to a four-way stop. Greta nodded and took the turn. “He tore it down and built a monstrous home. I’m sure that vow renewal is a way for him to show off his new mansion.”
They drove down a road that curved along the coastline, with long drives leading to big houses on either side. The hillside was steep here, with the big homes nestled in the trees to overlook the Salish Sea and the mainland coastline in the distance.
Harry pointed to a house on the high side of the street that had an A-frame front with massive windows. The roof was clad in cedar shingles, the front siding a beautiful dark green. It didn’t look monstrous to Daphne. It looked beautiful.
“That’s it,” Harry said. “Park here.”
Greta wrenched the steering wheel, jumping the curb as she parked. Daphne pinched her lips and decided it wasn’t the right time to make comments about her suitability as a getaway driver.
They sat in the car and looked at the big house.
“Now what?” Daphne asked.
“Now we wait,” Harry said.
“Wait for what?”
Grandma Mabel, who was in the back seat with Daphne, glanced over. “We’re casing the place, honey. We wait to see whatever we can see. Who goes in and out. How many staff members they have. What cars they drive. Who’s visiting. That kind of thing.”
Daphne blinked. “Do you ... do this often?”
“Not often ,” Greta said, wiping her glasses on her shirt before sliding them back on, which answered precisely nothing.
Daphne had just opened her mouth to prod the ladies once more about their extracurricular activities when the gates to the Yarrow mansion swung open, and a familiar truck drove out and turned onto the street.
A breath gasped out of Daphne’s lips. She tried to slouch down in her seat and choked herself on her seat belt. The three older ladies, oblivious to her panic, stared at Flint’s truck while making no attempt to conceal themselves.
“Go!” Daphne choked out. “Go!”
“Go where, honey?” Mabel asked, leaning over to get a better look at the truck.
“Go somewhere! Away! Not here!”
The truck approached their position. Was it Daphne’s imagination, or did it slow down?
No. Not her imagination.
The truck stopped.
“Uh-oh,” said Harry.
The driver’s door opened, and a booted foot landed on the pavement.
“Might be time to skedaddle,” Mabel pointed out.
“You know, I think I agree with you,” Greta said, and reached for the ignition.
Calvin Flint took a step toward them, his gaze flicking from the damaged front bumper of Greta’s car to the windows, where he could definitely see the four of them staring at him with wide eyes.
“Hang on, ladies,” Greta said, and she slammed on the accelerator. The smell of burnt rubber filled the air as their wheels spun on the pavement; then Greta’s old beige Honda was off like a shot down the quiet residential street.