Chapter 27
We find Silas stepping out onto the private deck outside the Golden Era Ballroom, seeking refuge from the chaos inside.
The sky is a deep shade of purple bleeding into pink, the kind of sunset that feels like a curtain coming down—fitting, considering I’m about to end somebody’s final act.
Stars glitter overhead as though someone spilled diamonds across black velvet.
The air smells like salt and champagne and the particular brand of cold that comes from being surrounded by the ocean.
A shower of pink stars appears beside Silas, sparkling and swirling, and Celeste materializes from thin air.
“Oh, this is going to be good,” she purrs, settling in to watch as her body glows like a flame.
Silas stands at the railing with both hands wrapped around the metal, knuckles pale, as if he’s bracing for a storm only he can see coming.
His charcoal suit looks expensive even in the dim light, his salt-and-pepper hair perfectly styled, his posture that of a man who’s spent decades projecting confidence he may or may not actually feel.
“Hello, Silas,” I say.
He turns, and his expression shifts through surprise, wariness, and finally lands on a polite party face. “Well, if it isn’t the birthday girls. Having a good evening?”
“It’s been enlightening,” Marina says, moving to stand beside me like a united front. “How about you? Did you enjoy the cruise?”
Silas’s smile doesn’t feel genuine. “It’s been eventful. But I’ll be glad to get back home. You don’t know how much you can miss something until you’re half a world away from it.”
I nod slowly. “Like your son?”
Silas goes white, so white his tan looks spray-painted on.
“Excuse me?” He tilts his ear toward me. “I’m afraid the wind distorted your words.”
Marina shakes her head. “I heard them just fine. She asked about your son.”
Silas inches back, his hand gripping the railing. “Why, yes, I have two grown children. A son and a daughter.” He gives a nervous laugh that sounds like breaking glass. “Both are in their twenties now. Time flies, right Trixie?”
“That’s not the one we’re asking about.” I take a step closer. “You miss Griffin, don’t you?”
His face crumbles for half a second before he reconstructs it. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“That’s what Gideon had on you, isn’t it?” I press. “Griffin. He’s your son. The one you’ve been hiding from the world.”
“I said I don’t—”
Marina cuts him off, her voice sharp. “I bet Holland doesn’t know, does she?”
Silas grows rigid, his face turns every shade of purple and red.
“You can’t tell her!” The words explode out of him. “It will end our careers. Everything we’ve built. The Second Act Society. Nordic Hearth. All of it. Gone.”
Marina gasps. “Is that all you care about? Money? You men are all the same.”
I look at her. “Not all men. Ransom isn’t like that. Neither is Wes.”
“Oh, I love a good man debate during a murder confession,” Celeste trills while floating closer to the immanent disaster. “This is better than my soaps.”
Silas tries to move past us, heading for the door, and I step sideways to block him.
“You strangled Gideon Vale because he was going to expose you,” I say, trying my best to keep my voice steady. “And no amount of money would make him stop.”
Silas’s face twists with rage and desperation. “Yes! I had to do it. He forced my hand! I offered him everything short of my soul and that man laughed in my face!”
Celeste laughs as if it were the funniest thing in the world.
I grab Marina’s hand, and she startles as the sound of Celeste’s laughter suddenly becomes audible to her once again.
“Now hearing all about the naughty things Gideon did just gets my engines going,” Celeste purrs. “Gideon really knew how to stick it to people. How I miss that man.”
Marina and I share a wry look.
Silas paces before us, his hands running through his hair, destroying that perfect styling. “You don’t understand. I’d lose everything. Holland would leave me. The business would collapse. Griffin’s mother would take him away completely. I’d have nothing.”
“You’d have your integrity,” Marina says coldly.
Silas laughs, and it’s bitter and sharp. “Integrity doesn’t pay for private schools. It doesn’t fund a company. It doesn’t keep your wife from discovering you had an affair that produced a child.”
“So you killed Gideon,” I say.
“I had no choice!” Silas stops pacing and turns to face us. “Look, I can make this worth your while. Every product Nordic Hearth makes—furniture, home goods, all of it—yours, free, for life. Both of you. Just don’t tell anyone.”
“We’re not interested in your blood goods,” I say.
His eyes enliven with rage. “Then you leave me no choice.”
He moves faster than I expect, lunging for one of the heavy deck chairs and swinging it as though it were a baseball bat. Marina tries to dodge it, but the chair catches her shoulder, sending her stumbling backward.
“Marina!” I shout.
Silas raises the chair again, this time aimed at me, and Celeste roars to life, or at least so to speak, and she dives for the weaponized furniture.
The chair flies out of Silas’s hands, arcing through the air and splashing into the ocean below.
“Did I do that?” Celeste examines her ghostly hands with delight. “I did! Oh, this is fantastic!”
Silas stares at the water where his weapon disappeared, then turns his rage on me. He dives, tackling me to the deck and landing on top of my body.
The pressure is immediate, painful, and terrifying.
His face hovers above mine, twisted with desperation and fury, and I can’t breathe, can’t think, can’t—
The door bursts open.
“EVERYBODY FREEZE!” Ransom’s voice thunders across the deck with his weapon drawn.
Wes and Quinn are right behind him, moving with a coordination that one might assume they rehearsed. Heaven knows they’ve had enough practice.
Ransom moves straight for me, closing the distance in three strides, but Silas is faster. He’s on his feet before Ransom can reach me, yanking Quinn toward him instead and getting her in a chokehold, one arm locked around her neck.
Ransom stops cold. So does everyone else.
“Nobody moves or I break her neck!” Silas shouts as his voice cracks with panic.
Quinn’s eyes are wide with terror, her hands clawing at his arm.
“Put down your weapon,” Silas orders, his voice shaking. “Now!”
Ransom hesitates, his gun still trained on Silas. “Let her go.”
“I said put it down!” Silas tightens his grip, and Quinn makes a choking sound that stops my heart. “Put it down or she dies!”
Ransom slowly lowers his weapon and places it on the deck with a dull thud.
“Now kick it to me,” Silas roars.
Ransom hesitates, his jaw set tight. I can tell he’s got murder on his mind, all right.
“I SAID NOW!”
Ransom’s foot moves out slowly, nudging the gun across the deck toward Silas. And while Silas’s eyes are trained on the weapon, watching it slide ever so close, Marina and I share a look.
We both move at once.
Each of us grabs one of his ankles and pulls hard, yanking his legs apart as though he were a wishbone.
Silas goes down with a yelp. Quinn breaks free. And Ransom is on him in seconds, flipping him onto his stomach, yanking his arms behind his back, snapping handcuffs into place with the efficiency of a trained professional.
“He did it,” I pant. “Silas admitted to killing Gideon Vale.”
Marina nods, climbing to her feet. “He confessed. We both heard it.”
Quinn shouts into her phone for backup to the Golden Era Ballroom, immediately.
Within minutes, the deck is crawling with security officers who haul Silas away. He’s not fighting anymore. He’s just defeated and broken. Silas Rowen is a man who killed to protect his secrets and lost everything anyway.
Quinn turns to us, her hand touching her throat where Silas’s arm was wrapped. “Thank you. If it wasn’t for you both, I don’t know if I’d be alive right now.”
She nods to Marina and me with genuine gratitude in her eyes. “If you’ll excuse me, I have some phone calls to make.”
She disappears back inside, already pulling out her phone.
“Marina.” Wes is at her side immediately, his hands on her shoulders. “Are you okay?”
I shake my head. “He hit her with a deck chair.”
“And I’m fine,” Marina assures us all, though she’s rubbing her shoulder.
“We’ll have a medic see about that,” Ransom says, then looks my way. “And you?”
“I’m really fine. But the ship lost a deck chair. I’m afraid Celeste sent it out to sea.”
Wes’s eyes enlarge as he looks at me, then glances at Marina. “Did you just—”
“I may have let my supernatural quirk slip.” I shrug. “She knows.”
Marina nods. “And your secret is safe with me.”
I press my lips tight. “Thank you. And just for the record, if you ever feel like sharing anything with me, I’d keep your secrets safe, too.”
Marina’s expression softens. “I know you would.”
Wes clears his throat. “Come on, let’s get you both medical clearance before we cut the cake. Can’t have the birthday girls missing their own party.”
He offers Marina his arm and she takes it, and they head back inside where music and laughter still pour out into the night.
Ransom pulls me close, his arms wrapping around me as though he’s afraid to let go. “You scared the heck out of me.”
“I scared the heck out of myself.”
“You caught a killer on your fiftieth birthday.” He presses a kiss on my forehead. “Most people just get cake.”
“Hey, I’m getting cake, too.” I tickle his ribs. “It’s not an either-or situation, is it?”
“Never.” He lands another kiss on my forehead. “Happy birthday, Detective Troublefield Baxter. I love you more than I can possibly express with words.”
“Then show me,” I say, tilting my face up toward his.
And he does.
Right there on the deck under the stars and the purple-pink sky, with the ocean stretching out forever and the party raging inside and a ghost somewhere nearby probably making commentary about our kissing technique.
Fifty might be terrifying, but steamy moments like this? These make it worth every single year.