Chapter 5
Suddenly Hitched—What a Trip!
Hello, Trixie!
My husband and I are celebrating our twenty-fifth anniversary with a Valentine’s Day cruise, and honestly, I’m terrified we’ll be the most boring couple on the ship!
Everyone talks about cruise ship romance, but after two and a half decades together, our idea of spicing things up is ordering room service instead of hitting the buffet.
Any tips for rekindling the magic without embarrassing ourselves in front of passengers half our age? Romantically Rusty in the Caribbean
Dear Romantically Rusty,
Twenty-five years together? You’re not boring—you’re couple GOALS!
Here’s my advice: skip the couples’ yoga (trust me on this) and try stargazing on deck with champagne. Book that fancy restaurant you’ve been eyeing—calories don’t count at sea. I hear it’s maritime law! Dance badly to the live music and laugh about it.
The real romance? Surviving twenty-five years together and still choosing each other every day. That’s sexier than any entertainment gimmick, believe me!
XOXO Trixie
P.S. Room service breakfast in bed is absolutely the height of sophistication. Own it!
Day 2: At Sea
The delicate clink of fine china mingles with the soft murmur of refined conversation while the scent of Earl Grey and cucumber sandwiches drifts through the Seahorse Lounge like an olfactory love letter to British civilization—which is ironic, considering we’re about to discuss murder over crumpets.
It’s the middle of the afternoon, less than twenty-four hours since Dr. Lavender Voss face-planted into a vat of chocolate and met her untimely demise.
I’ve already had what can only be described as a spectacularly gluttonous day, starting with first breakfast at the buffet where I demolished Belgian waffles drowning in maple syrup, eggs Benedict that could make an angel’s mouth water, crispy bacon that crackled like tiny applause, fresh strawberries and cream, buttery croissants, smoked salmon that melted on my tongue, and hash browns so perfectly golden you’d think they were kissed by the sun.
All washed down with a lavender honey latte that tastes as if it were harvested by unicorns in the French countryside.
Then I taught my first art class—watercolors of the sea and sky—which was surprisingly packed, considering we were outdoors and the sky looked like a dark shade of umber ready to crack open and dump biblical amounts of rain on us.
Nothing says artistic inspiration quite like potential hypothermia and soggy paintbrushes, but apparently, my students are made of sterner stuff than I gave them credit for.
After that educational adventure, I met up with Bess and Nettie in the formal dining room for what I like to call second breakfast—because one meal is never enough when you’re floating on an all-inclusive paradise and your metabolism has apparently decided to take a vacation, too.
We devoured crab cake Benedict that should probably be featured on every culinary show and magazine, lox and bagels where the salmon had been spun into glorious orange roses (because apparently, even fish needs to look romantic—and it did!), enough cream cheese to spackle a small apartment, and red velvet waffles the size of my head, topped with raspberry and honey syrup. It was bliss, bliss, bliss.
I paired this feast with a rose petal and vanilla bean latte that was so fancy it practically came with its own tiara.
Then I updated my blog—Suddenly Hitched—What a Trip!—because someone has to document this floating carnival of romance and homicide for posterity and possibly as evidence in future legal proceedings.
After that, I taught another art class, this time with acrylics and a pictorial scene of the Eiffel Tower, which I can’t wait to see live and in person with Ransom by my side.
Hopefully, Nettie won’t try to climb it from the outside and get us kicked out of France before we’ve even had proper French pastries.
But then, I know Nettie Butterworth well enough to realize the odds.
And now here we are at afternoon tea service, seated at a table in the Seahorse Lounge, which has to be the most civilized way to gather intelligence while consuming obscene amounts of refined sugar and carbohydrates.
The Seahorse Lounge feels like stepping into the world’s most elegant aquarium, designed by someone who considers restraint a four-letter word.
Floor-to-ceiling windows offer panoramic views of the churning gray Atlantic, where whitecaps dance like angry wedding guests in a hurricane.
The storm clouds we’ve been flirting with all day have finally decided to commit to their relationship with drama, turning the seascape into something that belongs in a gothic romance novel.
Inside, delicate towers of finger sandwiches rise like edible architecture—cucumber and cream cheese cut into perfect triangles, smoked salmon with dill, egg salad with watercress, and tiny roast beef numbers that look perfectly scrumptious.
And then there are the sweet treats. Macarons in every shade of Valentine colors create rainbow bridges between tiers of miniature desserts ranging from chocolate-dipped strawberries, rose-flavored petit fours, lemon tarts no bigger than buttons, raspberry éclairs that look like jeweled torpedoes, and cream puffs dusted with powdered sugar like tiny snow globes.
Classical music hums overhead as hordes of women chatter away while noshing on dainty delicacies.
And honestly, the fine china is absolutely gorgeous and deserves its own dissertation—delicate floral patterns in soft pastels with gold trim that catches the afternoon light filtering through the storm clouds.
Each cup and saucer looks as if it was painted by fairy godmothers with serious artistic training and unlimited appetites for precious metals.
“So,” I say, plucking up a few cucumber sandwiches and putting them on my plate, “are we going to discuss Bess’s new romance, or are we pretending that silver fox didn’t practically sweep her off her feet the minute he boarded the ship?”
Bess nearly chokes on her Earl Grey. “There is no romance. The man was simply being polite.”
“Polite?” Nettie snorts, adjusting her heart-shaped reading glasses to get a better look at her friend’s flushed cheeks.
“Honey, if that was polite, I’d hate to see what he considers flirtatious.
The man was one smooth move away from asking for your cabin number and your social security information. ”
And raising her blood pressure in the very best way, but I leave that out of the conversation for now.
“He was not,” Bess protests, but she’s fidgeting with her napkin as if she might stuff it in her mouth to prevent her from telling the truth.
“Oh please.” I laugh, reaching for a lemon tart that looks too perfect to eat but too delicious to resist. “You two were practically generating your own romantic soundtrack. I kept waiting for violins to start playing or for Cupid to show up with a mariachi band.”
“The only thing I was generating was a polite hello,” Bess insists as if she’s trying to convince herself more than us.
“Right,” Nettie says, selecting a chocolate-dipped strawberry. “And I suppose when he complimented your ‘stunning crimson ensemble’, he was just commenting on fabric quality?”
“Exactly!” Bess says, then catches herself. “I mean, he’s clearly a man who appreciates fine clothing craftsmanship.”
“Is that what we’re calling it now?” I grin. “Because I’ve never seen anyone appreciate craftsmanship that intensely while staring into someone’s eyes.”
Nettie leans forward, her brows already waggling. “Speaking of intense staring, what about that ghost you saw? The handsome one with the sad eyes who looked like he belonged in a cologne commercial for the recently deceased?”
I nod her way because she’s not wrong about that.
After we left what I’m pretty sure was a crime scene last night, I filled Bess and Nettie in on my new transparent companion.
I glance around the lounge, making sure we’re not being overheard by anyone who might question my sanity, my supernatural credentials, or my fitness for polite society.
The last thing I need is rumors spreading that the woman who finds dead bodies also talks to them.
Not that those rumors haven’t started before.
“You mean the cozy sweater guy?” I lower my voice to match hers.
Only a few people know about my supernatural quirk, and I plan on keeping it that way. Bess, Nettie, Wes, and Ransom comprise the entirety of my ghost-seeing support group on this ship, and that’s already four people too many for my comfort level and my sanity.
It turns out, I’m something called transmundane, further classified as supersensual, which means I can see the dead.
Apparently, there’s an entire umbrella of supernatural talents, or curses as I like to think of them, ranging from reading minds to seeing straight into tomorrow.
Somehow, I seem to have contracted the worst of it.
I didn’t always have this ghostly gig. In fact, it’s mostly Bess and Nettie’s fault that I have it at all.
The day we met, these two women accidentally bonked me over the head with a vodka bottle they were warring over, and it’s been nothing but poltergeists and wraiths ever since.
Well, technically, I only see the dead around the time a murder takes place, which is both a blessing and a curse depending on your perspective and your tolerance for supernatural drama.
And for reasons beyond my understanding, the rules state that the one who comes back from the other side to help me solve the case is the one the deceased loved most.
So whoever that tall, handsome specter is haunting this ship, Dr. Lavender Voss loved him the most.