Chapter 3
Chapter Three
CASSIAN
Griffin pouted like a little boy all the way out to the crossroad intersection, and he looked silly acting so petulant at his age.
“Big smile, Griffin!” I said, placing two fingers at the corners of my mouth.
He did not smile. “I don’t need to smile at people to convince them to take advantage of us.”
“But it helps!” I said. He meant it negatively, but taking advantage of something wasn’t always bad.
Only a few minutes passed before a lone woman trudged up the snowy trail. She barely glanced at us until I called out about free rooms, and when she marched up to me, she said, “Free rooms? At Fibbersnap Inn?”
“That’s right!”
“I thought the inn had closed.”
“Why did you think that?” I asked. Maybe there was a rumor spreading.
She adjusted her heavy pack. “I’m not really sure… It’s open? And free?”
“Open as ever!” I said, gesturing to my side, where the snowy trail led to the inn’s front door.
“That’s great news. I’m exhausted,” she said with a sigh. Her body slumped like it had already decided to stop.
“No better place to rest,” I said.
The woman walked up the trail to the inn, and Griffin sighed heavily beside me.
“Griffin—”
“We don’t have to chat, Cassian. I have nothing to say to you,” Griffin said.
I stood in silence, digesting his words for a few uncomfortable minutes while we continued waiting for passing travelers. It was early morning, so it was still slow and freezing out.
“Please don’t interrupt me,” I started again.
Griffin didn’t acknowledge me, but I knew he was listening.
“I’m trying really hard. It must be difficult to be managed by someone you once watched toddle around and chew candlesticks, but this is hard for me too.
I didn’t know Grandpa would leave me the inn.
Frankly, I told him when I left for Ladiall that I never wanted to be an innkeeper, so I’m just as confused as you.
” Griffin watched me now, but with no more sympathy than before.
“You didn’t ask for this to happen, but neither did I.
We both have to make the best of the situation. ”
He kept his eyes on me for a while before he spoke.
“It bothers me how much I can tell you don’t want to be here, Cassian.
People keep saying you’re just like your grandfather, but you’re not.
He loved this place like his own child, and you tiptoe around it like it’ll burst into flames if you say the wrong thing. ”
His words sting, but he’s not wrong. “That’s because it will, Griffin. I do have that much power over the inn, and it scares me.”
“Don’t say those words, then,” Griffin said.
I didn’t know how to explain to him I didn’t even know what those words were. The responsibility of filling my grandfather’s shoes was too much to wrap my head around. “Please just show me some grace. I’m doing all I can.”
“That’s the problem, Cassian. ‘All you can’ is not enough,” Griffin said.
I turned my head away and exhaled through my nose. “No, I’m done begging you. You hate that I own the inn, but it doesn’t change that I do. You can’t speak to me the way you do. Telling me to step down in front of everyone is inappropriate. It makes us both look bad,” I said.
Griffin looked at me from beneath one elevated bushy black brow.
“Don’t do it again,” I added.
Griffin crossed his arms over his wide chest and gave a short laugh. “This is the most I’ve respected you since you came back, Cassian.”
I frowned at him. I wouldn’t congratulate him for respecting me, but I would take a win where I could. Clearly, it would be an ongoing battle to get him to stop patronizing me. “It’s cold out here. A sign could do this job just as well as we could,” I said.
“Then why did we waste our time with this?” he asked, following me up the path.
“This wasn’t really about the customers,” I said. Normally, I wouldn’t have shared that, but I didn’t need him thinking I couldn’t manage my time or my staff.
A beat of silence passed, and then he said, “Ah. Maybe you’re more like ol’ Boris than I thought.”
“Maybe so.”
Jasmine and I spent the rest of the morning working on making and painting a picket sign that we hammered into the ground beside the Fibbersnap Inn sign along the path. It read:
FREE ROOMS!
(YES, REALLY)
By the end of the night, we had already filled the first floor. Sterling had been right. Most people did pay. Some paid more than we would’ve asked, which made up for the people who didn’t.
Jasmine and I celebrated the success by sharing a glass of wine in the office. “Sterling is a genius!” Jasmine said, kicking her feet up on the other side of the desk. “Thank the gods he’s here.”
“Yes, we’re very fortunate,” I said, trying to sound impartial before sipping at my glass of wine.
Jasmine watched me with a knowing smile. Damn her. “I saw you flirting with each other. You want that city boy, and he wants you.”
I grabbed the nearest item to throw at her, which was a crumpled paper. She laughed as she batted it away. “He’s an officer of the Force, and he’s only here to help us. Besides, he’s probably straight. And I bet he has a girlfriend.”
Jasmine took a long drink from her glass, eyeing me the entire time before she said anything. “Sleeping with patrons never ends well for you, anyway.”
“He’s not a patron. And I won’t sleep with him.”
“We’ll see,” Jasmine said in a sing-song voice. Gods, she was so annoying sometimes. I imagined my relationship with her was what having a sister would have been like.
Someone knocked at the door, and I panicked at the thought of facing a customer in this tipsy state. I snapped to my feet and straightened my shirt out. “Do I look sober?” I hissed.
Jasmine only shook her head, taking another drink.
“You’re the worst,” I said as I walked to the door, Jasmine snickering behind me.
It was Sterling. Maybe the wine was getting to my head, but he was more handsome than the day before. His drawstring shirt hung loosely open, revealing a section of bare brown skin that made me flush further.
“Hey!” I said, holding the door open and stepping aside. “Come in!”
“Oh—thank you.” Sterling took a hesitant step inside. He folded his arms stiffly behind his back and threw a smile at Jasmine.
“Hey, handsome!” Jasmine said. “We were just talking about you.”
“You were?” Sterling asked with raised eyebrows.
“You’re surprised? It was your brilliant idea that saved us all,” I said, shutting the door behind him.
“Oh, that. Right,” he said. “I’m just glad it’s working. It’ll buy us some time in the investigation.”
“You got any leads?” I asked, hovering my hand beside his arm to guide him into the chair beside Jasmine. I grabbed a third glass from the liquor cabinet against the wall and poured him a glass of wine, pushing it into his hands.
“Um—thanks. I’m not sure. I spoke to Olive this morning. She really seems to love this place, and you, Cassian. She spoke fondly of you,” Sterling said, setting his wine on the desk.
“It wasn’t Olive,” I immediately said. “Wait, she spoke fondly of me? I thought she and Griffin both hated me.”
“I wanted to talk to you about that, actually,” Sterling said. “You didn’t tell me you knew them before you inherited the inn.”
“Well… yeah. Sorry, I guess that’s not so obvious. I used to visit my grandfather almost every weekend, and they’ve both worked here for years,” I said.
“She said you and Griffin got along until you started here,” Sterling said.
“Yeah,” I said. I didn’t know what more I could add, because I didn’t know why he suddenly disliked me except that I wasn’t my grandfather.
Sterling leaned forward, glancing from me to Jasmine and back. “Cassian, do you think it could have been him? Do you know of any motive he might have for shutting down the inn?”
“Griffin wouldn’t have done that to the inn. I don’t think anyone here would,” I said.
Sterling tilted his head, and I saw pity in his eyes.
“Things aren’t always what they seem. Good people sometimes do bad things, especially when money or death is involved, and this case has both.
If it wasn’t your customers from the night it happened and it wasn’t someone who works here, who else could it be? ”
“S-someone else,” I stammered.
Sterling smiled, which felt a lot better than pity.
“It probably wasn’t Griffin, but I want to be thorough.
Let’s list out the facts so far.” He began counting on his fingers as he made his statements.
“Griffin was a family friend with whom you got along until you inherited the inn, and now he doesn’t like you.
Griffin wants you to step down and give or sell it to somebody else.
He did not like the idea of offering free rooms and did not want to let us try.
As an outsider, these things are suspicious to me.
Do you know if Griffin has easy access to magic, or if there is a witch in the area who he might have hired? ”
My blood went cold at the question. Jasmine and I exchanged a look, and I knew she was thinking the same. I didn’t want to tell him I was a witch. How could I do that to someone else?
Sterling watched us both, clearly picking up on the look. “What is this? What am I missing?”
Jasmine’s lips parted, and I subtly shook my head at her, but her brows knitted, telling me to shut up and let the officer do his job. “Griffin’s wife is a witch,” she said.
My mouth went dry. My wide eyes fixed on Sterling, scared of how he would react. I didn’t want to get Griffin’s wife in trouble, and I didn’t want to know if Sterling hated magic as much as the Force’s reputation predicted.
“That’s significant,” Sterling said, rubbing his chin while he eyed the wood grain of the desk.
His eyes found the dark burnt spot from where I had attempted my teleportation enchantment.
Telekinetic magic had always been my weakest area, and I should’ve known better than to practice indoors. “What happened here?”