by Fiona Grace
Ali froze on the spot, halting mid-run with shock. “What the heck is going on?” she cried.
At the sound of her voice, the atmosphere in the room instantly changed. The anger drained from Teddy’s face, and Piper’s trembling fear disappeared into the ether. It happened so quickly that Ali was left reeling with confusion.
“Hey Ali,” Teddy said, brightly. “We’re just running lines.”
“L—lines?” Ali stammered, her voice stop-starting just like her heartbeat.
“For Teddy’s film,” Piper added, grinning. “I’m helping him out by playing Street Walker.”
“That was acting?” Ali said, her words coming out with a relieved exhalation. She pressed a hand to her pounding chest.
Teddy looked proud. “You didn’t think I was actually accusing Piper of murder, did you?”
“Yes!” Ali cried.
“Hey,” Piper said, frowning. “Then that means you actually thought I was confessing to murder?”
“Yes, well consider that retribution,” Ali replied, “for your question on the phone the other night.”
Piper blushed. “Touché.”
Teddy picked up the thick script that Ali could now see lying open on the table, the corners dog-eared from the amount of times Teddy had already read through it. “Do you want to take over from Piper?” he said, offering it out to her.
“I can’t,” Ali said, shaking her head. “I just came back from town hall. Let’s just say, I have some very interesting leads.”
“Oh?” Piper asked with intrigue, taking a seat and staring expectantly at Ali with her green eyes.
Ali sat opposite her, Teddy taking the final chair. She leaned in on her elbows.
“This whole Marvin Chessley thing is way bigger than any of us thought. He and Sullivan have a whole frickin’ dossier’s worth of plans for this town. Not just with the eateries on the boardwalk, but the entertainment establishments. We were just step one.”
Teddy’s eyes widened with understanding. “Does that mean anyone with a business on the boardwalk could be a suspect.”
Ali nodded. “Yeah. That’s exactly what it means.”
“Man,” Piper said, sitting back in her seat and puffing air through her lips. “That’s crazy. We’re gonna have to do a whole bunch of interviews.”
“We?” Ali question.
“Yeah, Teddy and me. We’ll help. There’s no way you can speak to every business on the boardwalk on your own. And besides, there’s literally no customers coming in right now. Something about a bright green urderer graffitied on the side of the building is scaring them off...”
The Sweet sibling’s sarcasm was rubbing off on Piper now, and Ali grimaced as she was reminded of yet another problem she needed to solve.
“Thanks,” she said, rubbing the place between her eyes where another headache was threatening to burst into being. “I appreciate your help.”
She took her notes from her bag, and the three of them added all the names of the new vendors they would have to question.
As they worked, Ali spotted someone through the window, marching purposefully toward the store. It was Detective Callihan. Her stomach dropped to her toes. She did not like the look on his face one bit. Was he here to arrest her?
“Oh crap,” she said, standing up so quickly her chair squeaked against the tiles.
Piper and Teddy’s heads darted to the window, looking out to see what she had seen. They both stood in response, the look of worry on their faces revealing they were thinking the exact same thing she was.
Ali swallowed the lump in her throat. The bell tinkled, and Detective Callihan entered.
“Miss Sweet,” he said, fixing serious eyes on her. “We need to talk. In private.”
Ali’s anxiety lodged painfully in her throat. She nodded, accepting her fate. Piper and Teddy squeezed an arm each, before they scurried away, leaving her to face her doom alone.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
The bakery had never felt so silent as it did now. Ali stood staring at Detective Callihan, frozen to the spot with fear. Detective Callihan’s gaze darted to the ground in a way that filled Ali with dread.
He cleared his throat. “I understand you’ve been the victim of vandalism.”
“What?” Ali said, frowning with confusion. She had not expected him to say that.
“The graffiti,” Detective Callihan said, using his little paper notebook to point through the window.
Ali felt her frown deepening. “And?”
“And… I’m here to investigate it,” Detective Callihan replied, looking confused himself now.
Ali’s head spun. She couldn’t quite wrap her mind around it, thinking one second she was about to be arrested, only for the next to be thrown this curveball.
“Why?” came her next demanding question. “Isn’t that the job of a local cop? Besides, I didn’t even call it in.”
A deep red blush raced up Detective Callihan’s neck and into his cheeks, and in a sudden moment of clarity, Ali realized what was going on. He was using the graffiti as an excuse to see her. That crackling, electric, romantic tension that had started to spark between them had driven him here.
“Skateboarders!” Ali blurted, before the awkward silence could swallow her whole.
“Excuse me?” Detective Callihan replied.
“I think it was skateboarders. They hang around to look at Piper, and I see them in the art store a lot too.” She smiled, meekly. “Only place in town that sells spray paint, right?”
Detective Callihan licked his lips, looking suddenly irritated. “I came here for a statement, not a theory,” he said, closing his notepad with a huff. “I’m the one who investigates the suspects, not you.”
Ali blinked with surprise. He wasn’t just referring to the graffiti situation, she suspected, but the murder case. Detective Callihan had told her before, in no uncertain terms, to butt out of his investigations and let him do his job.
“I’m not investigating,” Ali said quickly.
Detective Callihan narrowed his eyes and picked up the notes from the table, with the list of all the vendors that needed to be questioned. Piper and Teddy had accidentally left them behind in full view. Ali’s stomach plummeted.
“Okay, you got me,” she said, rapidly.
Detective Callihan shook his head with exasperation. “Why can't you leave it alone?” he cried, waving the notepad in the air.
“It’s just a list!” Ali cried, praying her little white lie would get her out of this situation.
“It better be, Ali. Because if Detective Elton gets even so much as a whiff of you doing something about the murder case, she will take it as a sign of guilt. She is keeping an extremely close eye on you.” He held his fingers up to her an inch apart. “You’re this close, Ali, from getting arrested.”
Ali’s heart pounded in her chest. Not just from Detective Callihan’s dire warning, but from his proximity to her. From the look in his eyes. From the intensity of his concern for her, which made his breath ragged and his pupils dilate. It made something spark in her, something so physical and powerful it was impossible to comprehend. It was the same way she’d felt when he’d rescued her from a killer in the back alley, and it sent her mind and body into chaos.
“Ali!” came the squawking voice of Georgia Sweet. “What on earth is going on?”
Ali leaped away from Detective Callihan like a coiled spring snapping. She whirled to face her mother, standing in the doorway, looking horrified.
“Who is that man?” Georgia Sweet demanded.
Detective Callihan lowered his gaze. “Goodbye, Miss Sweet,” he said, hurried, before beelining for the door.
But it was too late. Georgia Sweet had eyes like a hawk, and she spotted his detective’s badge right away.
“Wait!” she demanded. “You’re a detective. What are you doing here? Are you harassing my daughter?”
Ail felt mortified, like she wanted the ground to swallow her up.
“I�
��m Detective Callihan,” Sebastian finally replied. “I was here taking Miss Sweet’s statement about the graffiti.”
‘Not gonna fly,’ Ali thought. Her mom was way too sharp for that.
True to form, Georgia Sweet promptly put her hands on her hips and glowered at the detective. “You must think I was born yesterday. A detective wouldn’t waste his time on vandalism. Why are you here, really? It’s because of the murder, isn’t it? What’s that got to do with my daughter?”
Detective Callihan looked like he was caught in a rock and a hard place and squirmed under the scrutinizing glare of Georgia Sweet. “Just taking a statement,” he said. “As the first to find the deceased, Miss Sweet—”
But he didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence.
“WHAT?” Georgia Sweet roared, her focus shifting in an instance from the detective to Ali, literally brushing him aside as she marched toward her. Detective Callihan, realizing he was now no longer the focus of her attention, quietly slipped out the door with a sheepish look, flashing a silent apology to Ali with his eyes.
But there was no time to worry about Detective Callihan’s cowardly retreat. Georgia Sweet was advancing on Ali like a bull to a matador, and every muscle in Ali’s body clenched.
“You saw the body?” her mother demanded. “And didn’t tell me? Why? What else are you hiding?”
Ali shrank back. Her mother had completely flown off the handle when she’d learned of the murder, and it had left Ali with no breathing room to actually explain the circumstances: that she’d been there, that she was likely the number one suspect.
“I didn’t want to worry you,” Ali said. “Any more than you already were.”
“So you lied?” Georgia demanded.
“I omitted the truth,” Ali said. She felt about as sheepish as Detective Callihan had looked five seconds earlier.
Georgia’s eyes narrowed. “Ever since you came to Willow Bay, you’ve become a completely different person. And I’m sad to admit it, but it’s not a person I like all that much. You’re keeping secrets from me? From your own mother?”
“I was just trying to protect you!” Ali exclaimed, hurt by the sting of her mother’s words.
Georgia shook her head, disappointed. “I don’t need you to protect me, Allison. I need you to tell me the truth.” Her voice dropped, the anger now spent. “I came here to give you this. Details of all the local removal firms in the area.” She handed Ali a piece of paper. “I think you know what to do.”
And with that, she turned on her heels and marched out the way she’d come.
Ali slumped, exhausted and hurt, into a seat, and let her head drop into her arms.
She needed time to process everything. To think. But instead, she heard the sound of the bell over the door tinkling and jolted back up to a sitting position to see Nate rushing toward her.
“Ali? Are you okay? Are you hurt? What’s happened?”
“I’m fine,” Ali said, brushing away his concern. “Just frazzled.” She tried a smile, but even she could sense it wasn’t very convincing. “What are you doing here?”
Nate took the seat opposite. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but his attention was instead drawn to the notepad on the table. “What is this?” he asked. “A list of vendors?”
“Suspects,” Ali told him.
He frowned. “But these aren’t food stores. I mean, Delaney’s on there. And me! Ali, why am I on your list?” He sounded panicked, and he pinned her to her chair with his frightened, green-eyed stare.
“Marvin’s bill was just the start,” Ali said, almost tripping over her words in her haste to explain what was really going on. “After the food vendors, it was going to spread to the entertainment stores. Then everyone else. Which meant everyone with a business on the boardwalk needs to be questioned now and struck off the list. That’s all. You and Delaney are there as formalities. Piper and Teddy are questioning people as we speak.”
Nate didn’t look satisfied with her explanation, and Ali couldn’t really blame him. It was insulting enough to her every time Detective Elton cast the eye of suspicion her way, so she knew all too well how it felt.
He scratched his neck. “So, Ali. Look. I think—” Then he paused mid-sentence, his eyes traveling to something out the window. He frowned deeply. “Is that Marco? He looks awful. Like he’s seen a ghost.”
Ali followed his gaze out of the window. It was indeed Marco. He was striding hastily past her store window, looking very disheveled, like he hadn’t slept in days. His long hair was a mess. His eyes looked red from sleep-deprivation.
“Oh, poor Marco,” Ali said, pressing a hand to her heart.
“Maybe you should go and speak to him,” Nate suggested. “He looks like he’s about to have a nervous breakdown.”
“But our talk—”
He cut her off with a hand “It can wait. I can see you have other priorities.”
Ali hesitated. She thought she’d heard an edge to Nate’s comment, almost an accusation. But there wasn’t time to analyze it now.
“Don’t go anywhere,” she told Nate. “I’ll be right back once I can be sure he’s not about to dive off the end of the pier...”
She jumped up from her seat and went running out of the bakery. “Marco!” she called after the fast-walking Italian.
He halted at the sound of his name and turned. His dark hair wild and straggly, his eyes bloodshot. He looked like a mess, like he hadn’t slept in days.
Filled with worry, Ali trotted up to him. “Marco? Are you okay? Is it the lawsuit? I know I’ve dropped the ball with my fundraising and I’m really sorry. A million things have come up.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway,” he replied with an air of abject doom. “No one wants to donate anymore; they’re all too worried that the bill will pass tonight. The last thing they want to do is donate money to save my ass when they might need it to save their own later.” He shook his head, sadly. “May as well admit defeat.”
He marched off to his pizzeria, without even waiting to hear any words of comfort from Ali. She knew nothing she could say would be adequate anyway.
With a sigh of grief for Marco, Ali turned back to the bakery, just in time to see Nate walk out the door.
“Nate, where are you going?” she called after him. “I’m done now. We can talk.”
He turned angrily to face her. “No we can’t. And that’s the problem, Ali! There’s always something in the way.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, reeling back from his sudden turn.
“There is always something more important going on. I laid it all on the line, Ali. I told you when I go in, I go all in. It’s all or nothing with me. I can’t be an afterthought. Something you squeeze in when you have time. I just…” He sighed, deeply, heavily, sadly. “I’m out, okay? I’m sorry. I am. But that’s it. I’m out.”
And with that, he walked away.
CHAPTER TWENTY THREE
The sound of the wet sponge scrubbing against the surface of the wall was like white noise in Ali’s head. She scrubbed at the green graffiti, putting every ounce of strength she had into it, trying her hardest to scrub away the pain in her heart.
She couldn’t recall a time in her life when she’d felt quite so low. She’d been dumped by Nate. Had received the sharpest, most devastating dressing-down from her mother. Had failed Marco in his time of need. And she now carried the terrible weight of the whole future of the boardwalk on her shoulders. Oh, and she was still no closer to solving the murder!
After Nate had stormed out of the bakery—and her life—she’d considered joining Piper and Teddy in their alibi-gathering for every business owner on the boardwalk, but the thought of attempting to find that one crumb of a clue again plunged her even further into despair. And since there were no customers, there was no baking to distract herself with. So she’d set about doing the only practical thing she could think of to do, and that was to remove the offensive insult off the front of her store.
Her arms ached from the effort, and she sweated under the hot sun, but she was single-minded on the task. Bright green paint, watered down with soapy water, snaked down her arms, staining her as she worked. But Ali didn’t care. Until she hit that spot of fatigued numbness, she would continue on.
As last, it came, and she could scrub no longer, her muscles completely spent. Taking a deep breath, Ali stepped down off the ladder and tossed the green-dyed sponge into the bucket of sudsy water and looked at her handiwork.
Despite all that effort, there were still streams of green paint streaking down the front of her store, and each one of the letters was visible, faded but still legible. It was as if the lurid green paint the vandals had used was designed to be impervious to scrubbing. She’d need to paint over it if she stood any chance of erasing that terrible word from her life.
With a frustrated sigh, Ali glanced along the boardwalk to the art store. It was the only one in town, and presumably the place that had sold the vandal the green spray paint in the first place. If there was a product that could cover up the letters defacing her bakery, she was most likely to find it there.
As she began to head in that direction, her gaze drifted to the group of skater kids doing tricks outside. They were the very same kids she suspected of doing the graffity at the bakery in the first place, and a sudden urge to march up to them and give them a piece of her mind overwhelmed her. She couldn’t think of anyone more deserving of her pent-up fury than a silly bunch of kids whose stupid actions was the cherry on the top of her terrible day.
‘The sour cherry on top,’ she thought.
But as she drew closer to the group outside the storefront, something in her mind changed, turning her thoughts in a new direction. Because the kids were significantly younger than she’d realized—thirteen, if that—and shorter to boot. When she’d noticed the graffiti was done by someone with a significantly longer arm-span than herself, she’d pictured some lanky six-footer using his skateboard to add a couple extra inches. But now she saw that the taller of the kids was actually a similar height as her. For the first time, she began to consider the possibility that the graffiti wasn’t a stupid prank played by some childish punks looking for laughs…but a targeted attack on her personally.