Chapter Nine #2
Candy leaned in, her eyes soft and lethal. “Never have I ever sent a text and deleted it before anyone saw.”
Tosh drank.
Candy drank.
Torie didn’t. Her jaw tightened dangerously.
Zach’s turn. “Never have I ever followed someone home when I knew it was a bad idea.”
Torie’s head snapped toward him. “Who?”
“It’s a game,” Lorenzo said lightly. “Not an affidavit.”
Torie’s hands shook. “Never have I ever pretended I was doing the right thing while breaking someone on purpose.”
“Specific,” Janie noted.
“True,” Harmony said.
Lorenzo topped Torie’s glass. She ignored it.
Janie traced a finger along Zach’s shoulder. “I was bored, and he was convenient.”
“Never have I ever,” Mary cut in, voice a clean slice, “let a girl drown and called it fate.”
“Mary,” Lorenzo warned, velvet over steel.
She smiled—all teeth. “We’re confessing. Why stop when the truth gets sticky?”
“Because knives cut,” Zach said.
“They’re meant to,” Mary replied, but she took the water Lorenzo pressed into her hand and drank it like obedience cost her nothing.
Something moved in Mary then, a small shift, like a blade sliding free.
Janie kissed Zach’s cheek, leaving a lipstick stain, then brushed her hand over Tosh’s shoulder as if she owned that too. She pivoted with a dancer’s ease and sauntered to the door.
“Same time tomorrow,” she called.
No one replied.
Silence settled for a moment, thick and waiting.
“Never have I ever,” Harmony said, “imagined killing someone.”
No one spoke. Even the waves outside seemed to hold their breath.
Torie recoiled. “That’s disgusting.”
“It’s hypothetical,” Harmony said. “Like most stories.”
Zach broke the moment with a chuckle. “Writers. They live in their own world.”
“We listen too well,” Harmony said. “And we remember what everyone else forgets.”
Torie’s gaze sharpened. Fear? Accusation?
Harmony wasn’t sure.
She wasn’t certain she wanted to be.
Torie, who was past drunk and into dangerous, turned to Candy. “Do you think this is all fun? Sleeping with him, teasing him, throwing it in my face?”
Candy’s smile said yes and no at the same time. “I think this is Catalina. We all play to win.”
“Play with your own toys,” Torie insisted.
“Then stop leaving yours out,” Candy said.
“Go home,” Tosh told Torie, calm as a locked door.
“You’ll want me to stay when she’s done with you,” Torie said, voice shaking. “You always do.”
He didn’t rise to it. He just looked at Lorenzo, and Lorenzo, who’d been stirring the soup all night with expert heat, turned off the burner with a nod.
“Last round,” he announced, sliding shots that looked like amber warnings. “Never have I ever wanted someone else’s ending.”
Nobody drank.
Which meant everybody did.
Lorenzo smiled, satisfied and a little sorry. “Church is over.”
They drifted in different directions—Torie out the door, Candy to the jukebox, Mary to the shadowed end of the bar where grief could sit without eye contact. Cass exhaled like she’d been holding her lungs hostage. Harmony felt the island take notice.
Zach stood, tossed a bill on the table, and wiped the lipstick from his cheek with the back of his hand. His gaze found Harmony’s for the smallest second—cool, assessing, layered with questions he didn’t say aloud.
“Be careful,” he said.
“Of the dark?” Harmony asked.
“Of people,” Zach answered, and then slipped away.
Harmony let out a slow breath. The door chimed, and two people walked in, laughing as they headed to the bar.
Harmony smiled as they took the stools beside her.
Ziad, the pilot who flew in and out weekly and kept his cards close.
Aurora, who’d been on the island longer than most, and knew more secrets than she’d ever spend.
“How long are you staying?” Ziad asked as Lorenzo set a drink in front of him.
“Not too long,” Harmony said. “Just enough time to stir up trouble.”
“That sounds about right,” Aurora said with a smile.
“It gets boring if there’s not a little drama,” Harmony added.
“I prefer to stay out of any and all drama,” Ziad said.
“That’s probably the smart move,” Harmony told him.
Aurora tipped her glass toward the front windows. “Smart is staying off the deputies’ radar for a while. They’re twitchy.”
“Evans?” Harmony asked.
“Evans plays good cop,” Aurora said. “Duong plays bad cop. Ciscel just . . . watches.” She shrugged. “He’s been in here more this week than I’ve seen in months. Makes notes he doesn’t share.”
Harmony’s pencil stilled for a heartbeat. “Maybe he’s thorough.”
“Maybe,” Aurora said. “Or maybe he’s looking for something the rest of us don’t see yet.”
Harmony let that settle, then chose to shift the air. “How are your adventures going, Aurora?”
Aurora sighed. “Work keeps me busy, and life keeps spinning. I’m still searching for Prince Charming and can only find toads with big warts.”
“That’s true for most of us,” Harmony said.
They kept talking while people drifted in like the tide. At the far end of the bar, Harmony watched Candy approach Tosh, who was next to Lorenzo.
“The island takes what you offer,” Lorenzo said mildly. “So offer wisely.”
“Pour me mercy,” Candy said.
“I’m all out,” he replied, handing her water instead.
She drank it, then turned to Tosh. “Take me home.”
“Ask,” he said.
“Please,” Candy whispered.
Tosh stood. Something flinty passed over his features—control settling over him like armor. He left the bar first. Candy sat down, clearly unsure if he wanted her to join him or not.
“Ready to go?” Harmony asked Cass.
“I’m right behind you,” she promised.
Harmony stepped outside. Only the sea murmured as she moved along Crescent Avenue, her sandals quiet on the cobblestone. The air tasted of rum and regret. Ahead, she saw Zach leaning against the wall.
“She’s angry,” he said without turning.
“Torie?” Harmony asked.
He nodded. “Angry people make mistakes.”
“So do calm ones,” she said. “Goodnight, Zach.”
As she turned away, a patrol SUV idled at the corner, engine low, lights dark.
For a moment, the glow from the bar caught the outline of a deputy behind the wheel—broad shoulders, hand resting loosely on the steering wheel like he had all the time in the world.
The same patient stillness she kept catching on hillsides and bluffs.
The vehicle didn’t move when she passed. It was simply a quiet reminder that someone with a badge was counting who went home and who didn’t. Harmony kept walking, resisting the urge to glance back and see if the driver’s gaze followed her.
Zach’s presence unsettled and steadied her at the same time.
He listened without trying to fix her, watched without making her feel pinned, and yet there were gaps—little pockets of silence he didn’t explain.
He knew more than he said. She could feel it.
It made her want to trust him and interrogate him in equal measure, and she wasn’t sure which urge scared her more.
It didn’t take long to make it to the cottage. Harmony sat cross-legged on the bed, journal open, the stub of a pencil smudging the side of her hand.
Never have I ever:
Used a confession to build a character.
Watched a kiss and wondered who the violence was for.
Mistook silence for safety.
Written a friend into a corner to see how they would climb out.
Envied the lives of others.
Wanted freedom more than my next breath.
She tried to put the plot together, to slot people into categories the way she outlined suspects in her books.
Motive. Opportunity. Capacity. The exercise didn’t make her feel safer.
It did the opposite. Because no matter how she rearranged the mental list, one truth stayed fixed .
. . if Lisa’s killer was here, it wasn’t a stranger in the dark.
It was someone whose voice she knew and whose smile she’d already memorized.
The door clicked, and Cass’s head appeared, hair a little wild, eyes bright with leftover bar light. “You’re hard at work.”
“Always,” Harmony said.
Cass stepped inside and looked down at the open pages. Names. Arrows. Bits of dialogue. Observations that read like verdicts. “This is the first time I’ve seen you have such a difficult time putting a story together. Why?”
“Because I don’t understand how the story ends yet.”
“You understand more than you want to admit,” Cass said softly. “You just like it too much to let it end.”
Harmony didn’t deny it. “Did you see Janie?”
“Couldn’t miss when she sat on Zach like he was furniture and kissed him like she wanted Torie to burst into flames.” Cass shuddered. “And I noticed he didn’t react.”
“Not reacting is a reaction,” Harmony said.
“And Lorenzo?” Cass asked. “I can’t tell if he’s helping or if he’s the match.”
“Both,” Harmony said, and wrote it down.
Cass sat on the edge of the bed, watching the pencil move. “This place is changing.”
“This place changes everything and everyone,” Harmony said. “I’m just . . . taking notes.”
“You scare me sometimes.”
Harmony closed the journal, not defensive, not ashamed. “We all need a little fear. It’s what keeps us alive.”
“It’s a good thing you love me, and I love you,” Cass said with a laugh.
Harmony laughed too, softer. “Go to bed. Tomorrow’s a new adventure.”
“You first,” Cass said, kissing Harmony’s cheek before leaving.
When Harmony was alone, the noise of the day thinned, and the island slipped into its softer, nighttime version of itself. Emptiness pressed in. Loss stacked on loss—her marriage, her friend, now Lisa. Too many ghosts for one person.
She leaned her forehead against the cool glass and studied her warped reflection in the dark window. On the mainland, she’d felt like she was disappearing. In Avalon, she was terrified of being seen too clearly.
She turned away, blew out the candle, and then lay in the dark, listening. Somewhere, far off, a door shut. A laugh cut short. Lives shifted.
***
Not far away, Tosh stood at his window, watching the tide drag silver across the sand. He hadn’t turned on a single light. The dark suited him; it hid the parts of himself he didn’t care to examine.
Candy stepped through the doorway, barefoot, her dress clinging to her skin. She paused like someone entering a sanctuary—or a cage.
“She’s gone,” she whispered. “Torie left.”
“Yep,” Tosh said, unmoved.
“I don’t want you to get lonely.”
He studied her for a long moment—long enough that she almost stepped back. “Do you think I need saving?”
“I think you need control,” she said quietly. “And I need . . . to feel something that doesn’t hurt.”
Something in him shifted. A decision.
Tosh reached out and took her wrist—not rough, not gentle, just claiming. Candy exhaled shakily, like she’d been waiting for that exact touch.
“Tell me what you want,” he demanded.
She looked over her shoulder, mouth soft. “To stop feeling like a toy I have to wind myself to feel alive.”
He stepped behind her and took both wrists. She let him. The tremor in her fingers gave away the bravado. He stilled them with patience rather than tenderness, and he felt the moment she exhaled—the precise second chaos agreed to be arranged.
“No games,” he murmured. “No pretending.”
“I don’t want to pretend,” she whispered. “I want clear and precise.”
“On your knees,” he demanded. She dropped before him.
He smiled. “Good.”
He leaned against the wall as she reached for his belt. He gazed down, control holding him in place. Candy shook before him. She liked where she was. It grounded her. When he commanded, she obeyed.
It didn’t take long for Tosh’s careful control to be ripped from him as she made him burn. He didn’t like the loss of control, didn’t like that it made him feel weak. He grabbed her hair and pulled her to her feet, then pushed her onto the bed.
Clothes slipped away.
So did noise.
They collided like weather—heated, desperate, grateful.
Candy clung to him like he was the only solid place in the room. Tosh steadied her like she was the only thing keeping him from coming apart. When she faltered, he guided. When he asked, she answered. And both of them found a fleeting peace in the ruin of each other.
He secured her wrists with binds already attached to the post. What followed wasn’t tender, but it wasn’t cruel.
It was two broken edges trying to meet in the middle for a while—his need for order, her need for surrender.
His steadiness, her shaking breath. His voice grounding her, her answering him without hesitation as the dark folded in around them.
By the time their bodies quieted, the storm inside them had eased—not gone, but muted, soothed by something fierce enough to match it. She curled against his chest.
“Do you like me?” she asked.
Tosh didn’t answer at first. His gaze slid toward the window, where the curtain breathed in and out with the wind.
“I like knowing who’s on the other side of the glass,” he finally said. “I like order.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one you’ll get.”
Candy smiled—small but real. “Do you ever feel watched?”
“Always.”
They lay in silence, listening to the sea beat itself against the shore.
Outside, on the bluff above Tosh’s house, someone stood at the perfect vantage point—close enough to watch shadows move behind curtains, far enough to remain unseen. Feet planted shoulder-width apart, hands loose at their sides, posture patient rather than eager.
Every few minutes, a small beam of light flashed against the ground, then vanished again—a phone screen waking, a note being written and tucked away. No cigarette, no muttered commentary. Just a quiet recording.
If anyone had happened to look up from the shoreline, they would’ve seen only a silhouette against the sky. Broad shoulders. Straight spine. The kind of stance people learned from wearing a badge for too long.
The wind rose.
The palms hissed.
Catalina inhaled and, somewhere inside that breath, two stories aligned.