Sandcastle Beach (Matchmaker Bay #3) - Jenny Holiday Page 0,14

knew how she felt about him being “snobby,” which was pretty rich coming from her. He wasn’t the one staging Greek tragedy, experimental theater, and “the classics, except gender swapped.”

She leaned forward over the bar, closer to him, her stare unwavering. He bent down and rummaged in the fridge for another White Claw, but he held her gaze the whole time, as awkward as it was. Despite the fact that he could identify the White Claw by feel, he couldn’t tell which flavor he’d retrieved.

“That’s a lovely corsage you have there.” The woman pointed to Maya’s wrist.

Maya had to look away or risk coming off like a weirdo in front of her new friend. So she did, but she gave Law one of her little eye rolls as a parting gift. Quick, subtle, almost undetectable.

But detectable by him.

Ha! He smirked, triumphant, as he held up the canned abomination. “Thought you might want to try black cherry this time.” He said it with the merest hint of snark in his tone, enough that Maya would hear it but the tourist wouldn’t.

The woman made a happy noise, and Law cracked open the new can for her before turning his attention to Maya. She was extra bloody today, and she had a “wound” on her forehead—that hadn’t been there last night.

It was interesting how she looked “bad”—she was a murder victim, after all—yet simultaneously amazing. It was confusing. But not any more confusing than being attracted to someone you didn’t like, and he was accustomed to living with that contradiction. So he turned his attention to playing his role. “I don’t understand why you don’t change at the theater before you come in here and scare my customers. Or, hell, even just wash your face.”

“You know there’s no shower in the theater. Anyway, I wasn’t at the theater. It was Murder at the Mermaid tonight.” She pointed in the direction of the Mermaid Inn, the site of her annual murder mystery play.

“Yeah, but you live right across the street. Why don’t you go home and change before you come here?”

She pressed her palms on the bar and leaned forward. “Benjamin. Has it ever occurred to you that maybe I come here dressed like this because I’m trying to scare your customers?”

That had actually not occurred to him. Even though their ongoing battle of wits raged as strongly as ever—they had experienced a détente of sorts last winter, but it had not lasted beyond the end of the soccer season—he didn’t think they truly wished each other ill on the business front. Hell, he was passing his wholesale discount on wine along to her.

“Eve and Nora are meeting me in a bit,” she said, “but I need to talk to you about the parking situation first.”

“I thought we came to a compromise on the parking situation.”

“We did. So why are there cars in my spots?”

“Murder mystery is at the Mermaid,” he said. “There’s nothing happening at the actual theater tonight.” Which was why he’d gone out and covered her signs, as he always did on nights when there were no plays. As per the agreement they had finally come to a couple months ago. Which one would think was a case in point on not truly wishing each other’s business ill.

“Those are my spots.”

“In front of your empty theater.”

“Benjamin. I told Holden Hampshire he could park there, and when he arrived, the spots were full. So he was late to the show, and he missed the big dramatic lights-out moment.”

The lights-out moments of Maya’s murder plays were pretty dramatic. The story would reach a fever pitch, and suddenly the whole place would go dark—which was when the “murder” happened. The audience always loved it, gasping in a mixture of fear and delight. “Who is Holden Hampshire?”

“Two Squared? Babble Town?”

“I have no idea what those words mean.”

She sighed, like he was an ancient fuddy-duddy ignorant of the ways of the modern world. “Holden Hampshire is a Toronto-based actor who used to be in a boy band called Two Squared. They sang that song ‘Petal Power,’ you remember? It was supposed to be about flowers, but the video was them goofing around on tandem bikes? Get it? Flower petal, bike pedal? I’m sure you’ve seen it.”

“Nope.”

“He was the token Canadian in the band, so everyone was obsessed with him? Then he was on Babble Town? That talk show on MuchMusic? He would interview musicians? Anything ringing a bell here?”

“Still nope.”

Cue the eye roll. “Probably due to

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