11. Flame
ELEVEN
Flame
SETTING A DRINK ON FIRE BEFORE SERVING. USUALLY SEEN IN SHOTS
“Let me tell you, until you’ve had to empty three gallons of urine out of a shop vac at the end of the Lieutenant John J. McCorkle fishing pier at three a.m. on a Sunday morning, you just haven’t lived .” Darby shot the rest of her whiskey and set her glass down with a satisfying thunk that punctuated the end of yet another killer story, this one about stage-managing Boston’s annual Bondage Ball.
Maggie held a hand to her aching stomach with one hand, dabbing her eyes with the corner of her apron with the other. “How on earth did we never run into each other in Boston?”
“You know those Kelly boys,” Darby said, swiping a knuckle at the corners of her thick lashes. “Notoriously territorial. They don’t like to share, even with each other.”
A smile tugged at the corner of Maggie’s lips. “Especially with each other.”
At the bail bonds office where they’d met, a friendship with the notoriously OCD and frequently demanding Mark Kelly would have been the last thing she have predicted. Especially since he’d tried to get her fired so frequently.
But that had been before they’d bonded over a shared love of Love Island .
“Another?” Maggie asked, lifting the bottle of bourbon.
“Why not?” Darby asked, her dark eyebrow lifting toward her crown of cotton-candy-pink hair. “I’m not driving.”
“That’s a relief,” Kurt, who’d been oh-so-inconspicuously hovering near the garnish tray, muttered.
“Someone tie a tire iron to your testicles, or just being extra salty today for fun?” Darby asked, shooting him a pointed look.
“As delighted as I am that you’ve found someone who seems to share your penchant for stories involving mafiosi and bodily fluids, do you think you might be able to take a break from the hot goss to make the drink order I put in about a fucking year ago?”
Under normal circumstances, this would be about the time when Maggie considered the merits of braining Kurt with a swizzle stick.
But for some reason she didn’t quite understand, she felt…calm? Relaxed? No. Serene.
Hell, even the eardrum-bloodying cacophony of voices, silverware scraping on ceramic, and the goddamn accordion player who’d set up shop on the beach below the restaurant’s third-floor balcony and begun working his way through Weird Al’s catalog hadn’t managed to ruin her mood.
And that was even after a seagull had mayo-bombed the most perfect martini she’d made yet.
“And what are you thinking about that’s got you smiling like the cat who deep-throated the canary?” Darby asked, a sly grin twisting her hot-pink pout.
“Oh my God,” Kurt sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I literally cannot with you two.”
“Easy there,” Maggie said. “Don’t get your man-panties in a twist. I’ll make your drinks now.”
And to Maggie’s great delight and Kurt’s utter shock, she did just that. Quickly, and without even having to look up the recipes.
Kurt eyed them like they might sprout arms and pull a switchblade on him. “You’ve been practicing?” he asked.
“Something like that,” she said.
And oh, how fucking delicious that something had been.
Flashes returned to her in lurid detail. Gasped breaths and hot words. Teeth, and tongues, and?—
“So you and McGarvey, huh?” Darby waggled her eyebrows suggestively.
Maggie blinked at her, feeling heat bake the surface of her cheeks.
“And before you ask, Judy in dispatch is already putting the word out that you two are an item. And by item, I mean informing anyone who happens to call in to the station that Sherriff Forrester busted you two doing it in the basement of this very building.”
“How did she— I mean… Where the hell would she get that idea?” Maggie sputtered, turning to the bar under the guise of returning the bourbon to its rightful slot.
Darby waited her out, her expression patient and amused when Maggie turned back around.
“Listen,” she said, stretching a hand across the bar’s scarred surface. “As a fairly recent transplant who’s also been on the receiving end of Townsend Harbor’s rumor mill where a certain former sheriff is concerned, there’s a couple things you really ought to know.” Lifting the glass, Darby let the amber liquid kiss her lips.
“Such as?” Maggie asked, picking up a damp bar mop and swiping away a small flurry of margarita salt.
Darby thumbed a salt flake she’d missed and flicked it over her shoulder. “Such as, being seen talking in public for more than ten seconds is tantamount to foreplay.”
“Uh huh,” Maggie said, mentally reviewing every run-in she and McGarvey had had since she arrived.
“Also, if you’re seen entering a building together, someone is definitely going to assume it’s to fuck.”
Had Darby delivered her second pronouncement a moment sooner, she’d be wearing the watery Sprite Maggie had been nursing. “I see,” she said.
“And if you ever want to keep something a secret, under no circumstances are you to involve Myrtle Le Grande. I love the woman, but freight trains are subtler.”
Fucking now she told her. Because if everything had gone according to the plan they’d worked out, Myrtle would have been a significant part of McGarvey’s afternoon.
Maggie cleared her throat. “Gabe certainly seemed to think she was capable of keeping a secret.”
“Please.” Darby snorted. “Gabe’s idea of a secret is something that you have to threaten people with bodily violence not to disclose.”
Maggie’s shoulders suddenly felt heavy, the heart beneath them equally leaden. At least she’d elected to make her earlier sojourn back to the Palace Hotel with Vee instead of Myrtle.
“Speaking of secrets, please thank Ethan for me,” she said, eager to change the subject. “Those letters he had you bring me from the Townsend family’s personal archive were more helpful than you know.”
Darby’s eyes brightened. “So the note he sent with them made sense to you?”
“No, his note was fucking vague and obtuse.” Maggie laughed. “But I was able to do a lot of interpreting based on context.”
“He’s a subtle bastard,” Darby said dreamily, staring into her glass as if the ruggedly handsome sheriff’s face may be haunting the bottom of it. “So…did you find anything?”
“Did I find anything?” Maggie echoed, giving Darby a sly grin. “I found everything. ”
Darby raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Do tell.”
Maggie took a deep breath, her mind racing as she recalled the moment everything clicked into place. She remembered sitting at her kitchen table, the worn parchment spread out before her, the faint scent of aged ink filling her nostrils. Her body buzzing as her eyes moved over the looping, elaborate script.
She had read the letter, written in overblown Victorian English by none other than Ethan’s great-great-great-grandfather, Everett Townsend. The recipient? One Reginald Stewart.
The body…exceedingly odd.
At first.
My Most Esteemed Compatriot,
It is with heavy heart that I’m afraid I must write to you of a matter which I fear you might find upsetting. You will recall our previous arrangement, wherein I found myself in need of an agile and dedicated mouser to address the rat infestation which the Midnight Mariner was beset with. At such a time as I did confide in you, you were kind enough to give into my keeping a certain Scottish Fold you’d adopted from a shipyard in Glasgow. Well, I regret to inform you that, far from the agile and enterprising creature you presented her to be, she proved to be a significant nuisance to both the ship and its passengers. Not only was she utterly uninterested in reducing the number of rats onboard, but myself and several other members of the crew began to suspect that this willful creature was actually assisting the diseased rodents in their escape. It was for this reason that I found it necessary to bind the beast and fling it overboard in a burlap sack, where I could be assured she would not bedevil either of us any further. As our fortunes are so intimately linked in this respect, I know I may be assured of your gratitude for resolving so noisome an impediment to our combined venture. Pray, good sir, if I may be so bold, a financial contribution to our enterprise would be a most welcome demonstration of your continued faith in our shared endeavor. Though I doubt if any significant resources will be willingly allocated to recovering one missing pussy, all things considered.
Sincerely and entirely yours,
Timmothy Scott Stewart
P.S. Should you be searching for the means by which your late pussy so stealthily provided her intended prey a means of escape, I’d recommend you conduct a thorough search of her typical haunts. It seems she was somewhat more resourceful than either of us realized.
Darby nodded, listening intently.
“I mean, subtle, Great-Grandaddy Townsend was not,” Maggie said, coming to the end of her summary.
“Fucking right?” Darby asked, shaking her head. “So you think it was really the old Mayor Stewart and Grandaddy Townsend who were into the human trafficking?”
“Certainly seems that way to me. And if Madame Katz somehow found out and was using the tunnels to the Palace Hotel to help them escape, that would be more than enough motive for those two to want to make her disappear.”
Darby heaved a disgusted sigh. “Fucking men.”
“Tell me about it,” Maggie agreed. “This town has more drama than a telenovela.”
And now she was part of it. Really, she had tried to resist becoming involved.
Sort of.
A little.
But if McGarvey somehow found out about her involvement in today’s little stunt… Well, things were going to get significantly more complicated.
Complicated. Like the man whose voice lived in her brain. The man whose touch lingered on her skin. The man who?—
—was standing in the doorway of Sirens looking like he was about to take away someone’s birthday.
And maybe beat them with it.
Which shouldn’t even be a thing, but with the way his—well, everything—was flexing, he probably could.
It was in the process of noticing the everything that additional concerning details began to reveal themselves to Maggie’s keen investigative eye.
His clothing, for one. The tight black t-shirt and jeans fit him just as well as every exquisitely assembled ensemble she’d ever seen him wear, but it was somehow…wrong.
“Jeans!” she said, not realizing she’d spoken aloud until Darby raised an eyebrow at her.
“What was that?”
Past the pink crown of Darby’s head, Maggie saw McGarvey’s narrow-eyed gaze begin its eventual swivel in her direction, and she dropped it like it was hot down below the bar faster than fucking Frodo at the Black Gate.
“Nothing,” Maggie said, pretending to be engrossed in examining the glassware dishwasher racks. “Just… Um, remembering I left my…jeans at home. And they’re my favorite pair!”
“Ooookay,” Darby drawled, head cocked at a curious angle as she peered past the collection of mermaid-shaped draft beer tap levers.
Meanwhile, Maggie’s mind was Tokyo-drifting straight into some very unwelcome realizations. If McGarvey was here, wearing non-work attire, and appeared to be freshly showered, then…
Oh.
Sweet.
Mother.
Of.
Fuck.
What had Myrtle done ?
Scrunching down over her shoes, Maggie crouch-walked toward the bar’s waist-swinging door that allowed a narrow slice of vantage through which she could track McGarvey’s movements without being seen. Perhaps the one time in her life that being vertically challenged proved to be an asset.
Only, just as she had the absolute mouth-watering perfection of McGarvey’s body perfectly lined up in the gap, a black-apron-veiled crotch shoved itself into view.
“Ugh, where is she now ?” Kurt huffed dramatically, setting his tray on the bar’s hinged fold-open segment above her head with a hollow slap.
“She’s right here, you dick!” Maggie whispered and poked the exposed knob of his hairy ankle with the tip of her nail, feeling a vicious stab of satisfaction when Kurt nearly leapt back a full foot.
“Mag— Ow! Jesus.” The tips of his manicured fingers brushed into view as he bent at the waist to massage the part of his shin Maggie had shoved the swinging door into.
“You want to kindly get the fuck out of the way?”
“But what are you?—”
“I think she wants you to move,” Darby helpfully translated. “Shove off. Make like a tree and get outta here. Take a flying fuck at a rolling donut. Got it?”
“But what about my drin— Oof! Hey!”
Maggie watched as Kurt’s annoyingly pristine, sockless loafers—which, ew—executed an impressively graceful spin of the kind used to recalibrate body weight after it’d been abruptly and/or violently shoved off its axis.
“I think that table over there needed some water really bad ,” she heard Darby say, followed by an overly bright “Trent! Hey!”
The golf ball that had lodged itself in Maggie’s throat morphed into a hedgehog.
Made of lava.
“Darby.”
Maggie wasn’t sure what annoyed her more. That the deep, throaty rumble of McGarvey’s voice had the power to make her panties wet even when she was actively hiding from him, or that her gnome-like waddle had wedged said—now-damp—panties firmly against Maggie’s crotch in a way that made her equal parts irritated and aroused.
“I thought you were on duty this afternoon. You playing hooky?” Darby asked in a teasing purr meant to pre-offer collusion. Beneath the slice of door, the slim stems of her vintage, red stiletto peep-toe pumps lifted and pivoted toward the bar.
Darby had turned to face him, offering Maggie cover. Despite the strangeness of her circumstances, she felt a rush of gratitude. That was ride or die shit right there.
Hopefully the former, but?—
“Where is she?” McGarvey’s nearly growled question made gooseflesh rise on Maggie’s forearms, rippling outward like the tide.
“Chris?” Darby asked. “She actually stepped out to go get more Swiss chard from the co-op because they’re already almost sold out of the faux-fish tacos, if you can believe it.”
“I don’t.”
“I know, right?” Darby’s infectious laugh tolled out over the convivial din like a bell. “Why in God’s name would you sell out of bitter leaves pretending to be chicken when battered fries exist? Speaking of, what are you doing for dinner? Ethan’s just got a new smoker, and if I don’t bring home something that used to ambulate, I’m liable to find him looking for the smoke ring on my last pack of part-skim mozzarella sticks. Come to think of it, that doesn’t sound half bad. Five o’clock sound okay to you? I’ll be damned. It’s four forty-five right now. Can we take your car? I biked here and Ethan’s likely to choke me if he has to replace the heels on these vintage Louboutins again .”
“Darby.” McGarvey’s voice was low and tense, cutting through her avalanche of words like a hot knife through butter. “I’ll ask again. Where is Maggie?”
Maggie’s heart pounded at the mention of her name, a wild rhythm against the silence that followed. She pressed a hand over her chest, willing it to quiet down.
Darby let out an exaggerated sigh. “Did you not hear a word I just said?”
“Unfortunately,” McGarvey said. “And you know damn well I’m not asking about Chris.”
“Well, you are dead wrong there.” Darby giggled. “I haven’t the faintest idea who else you might have business with in this fine establishment.”
“Margaret fucking Michaels-Wiggins.” Each word was accompanied with a flat slap of a palm on the bar that made Maggie tingle in places that made no damn sense for someone crouched under a counter like a troll beneath a bridge.
And a troll who’d apparently earned back her married name.
“Haven’t seen her.” Maggie heard the shrug in Darby’s voice and found herself holding her breath as she examined the odd patterns in the wood grain.
“I know she’s here,” McGarvey rumbled.
“How’s that?” Darby said breezily.
“I can smell her.”
A jolt of electricity shot straight from Maggie’s toes to the crown of her head.
She quickly lowered her chin to sniff the armpit of her work shirt, but only smelled the earthy fug of the fried food that always clung to her hair and clothes after a shift. Underneath, she detected the faint trace of her own musk, a mix of vanilla-scented body lotion and sweat. Had he really picked up on that?
No sooner had she asked herself the question when it was answered by a deluge of sensory memory. His soft lips and rough stubble against her skin as he dragged his face along her every curve and hollow, breathing her in. His hot breath mingling with hers as he’d whispered filthy words to her in the dark…
“Um, okay, creeper,” Darby drawled, the smokiness in her voice suggesting she’d taken a sip of her bourbon. “But I wouldn’t go around announcing that to people. It’s a little off-putting, if you catch my drift.”
“On the topic of animals with heightened senses,” McGarvey said, his voice dropping low as Maggie watched the soles of his court shoes inch closer to Darby’s heels. “I know she’s here, and you can either tell me where , or I can tell Ethan about the deposit a certain fuchsia-haired coffee proprietress put down on a certain pair of Irish wolfhound pups being fostered by a certain sheriff despite also being in possession of the knowledge that a certain brewery owner has expressly forbidden even the consideration of adoption of any canine companions before he’s had chance to finish the dog run on a certain house.”
Maggie’s heart dropped into her guts at the sound of Darby’s sharp inhale. Now that McGarvey tasted blood in the water, it was all over but the handcuffs.
“Wolfhounds?” Darby’s voice broke in an octave that might have been amusing under different circumstances. “I mean, in this economy?”
Resigned, Maggie braced herself against the side of the cupboard to crawl out from under the counter, but paused when she noticed a raised knot in the wood that sank under the pressure of her palm. Leaning in closer, she examined the darker border of the cabinet’s trim.
Running her fingertip over the wood, Maggie stopped at the knothole and lightly pressed it again. Though stiff, she felt the definite resistance of some sort of pneumatic mechanism behind it. When it reached the limit of whatever mechanism controlled it, she heard a discreet but distinct click.
Which was when she noticed that what she was seeing wasn’t a decorative inlay at all.
It was a door .
A door that might, perhaps, connect with a crawlspace that in some way connected with a passage that led to Sirens’ basement?
“For the last time,” McGarvey began, the dark thrill of cornered prey honing his words to a fine edge. “Where. Is. She?”
With a heady rush of adrenaline, Maggie placed her full palm against the wooden door panel and gave a ginger push. To her amazement, it swung smoothly and silently inward, revealing a dust-laden tunnel crawlspace that extended at least the length of the bar before it snaked away into gloomy darkness.
“Is this new?” Darby asked, giving the bar’s pass-through door the tiniest tap with the back of her heel.
That was her cue.
Quickly crossing herself before pushing the trapdoor inward with one hand, Maggie planted the other inside the passage and wriggled through. She eased the panel shut behind her just in time to hear Darby’s startled squawk followed by the line cook’s outraged exclamation as McGarvey apparently pushed his way behind the bar.
Fumbling in her pocket for her phone, Maggie switched on the flashlight app and aimed the beam down the tunnel. The light shone weakly, illuminating a faint trail in the thick layer of dust.
Once again, chills rose on her arms and climbed her neck.
Someone else had been in here.
Recently.
She gulped down a breath and began to crawl, her skirt catching on rough splinters of wood as she moved deeper into darkness. Grit crunched beneath her knees as the air grew cool and damp. She reached out her hands, touching the damp dirt walls of the passage until she came to a split in the tunnel.
Playing her phone’s pale beam over the walls, she sucked in a little gasp.
There, on one side of the split, was a mermaid. On the other was an anchor.
Ariadne’s Anchor.
Vee’s words returned to echo in her head like a haunting invitation.
So if Ariadne’s myth truly had been an apt metaphor for the most expensive item on Madame Katz’s menu, then who had been the monster in the maze? Townsend? Stewart?
Maggie sat back on her heels and peered down each tunnel, contemplating which path to take.
Aiming her phone down at the passage’s floor, she noticed the trail broke toward the anchor side.
So would she.
Adrenaline electrifying her veins, she’d braced against the base of the wall to get a picture of both motifs when her fingers brushed across something…warm.
And furry.
Maggie sucked in a gasp that came with a lungful of moldy air and dust that promptly sent her into a coughing/sneezing fit with exorcism-quality racking retches.
She yelped and jerked her hand back, dropping her phone in the process. The light flickered uncertainly for a moment before stabilizing, casting eerie shadows on the walls of the tunnel before the something moved.
And she shrieked. The echo of her terrified wail bounced off the dank tunnel walls, startling something overhead. With a flapping sound, a bat—or maybe several bats—took to panicked flight around the darkness.
“Oh my God, oh my God!” Maggie yelped, slapping at herself as the creatures whizzed by and shot out into the tunnel beyond her. Panting hard, she turned back to her phone and scrambled backward on all fours.
Her impact on the wall behind her wasn’t as hard as she’d expected.
Partly because the wall seemed to fall away the second she hit it.
Her confusion was intense, but brief, as she tumbled blinking into daylight.
In the hallway outside Sirens.
Directly at McGarvey’s feet.