“What’s she doing here?” Clare asks.
“She goes where Charlotte goes,” Austin says. “She’s been crashing here too. And after last night, she needed a soft landing.”
“Whoever said chivalry was dead?” Clare waves grandly at the space, the ocean out the window. “This is some pad for a freelance journalist.”
Austin smiles. “Like I told you. My brother. Extremely rich.”
“I googled your rich brother,” Clare says. “I couldn’t find much about him. I couldn’t find him at all, actually.”
“He’s my half-brother, detective. We have different last names. His father is from Brazil. We look nothing alike. Hey, I’ll give you his business card. You can call him directly and set up a time to interrogate him.” Austin pulls his phone from his pocket and calls up a photograph to show her. “See?”
Clare leans to examine the photo. Austin and his brother stand arm in arm on a beach, both in wet suits, surfboards propped next to them, his brother taller, olive-skinned, more filled out. Far better-looking, Clare thinks. When Austin stands and moves past her, Clare hangs back.
“I’m going to say hi to Kavita,” she calls to him. “Is that okay?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” he hollers back before disappearing into the kitchen.
Clare strains to pull the sliding door open. Kavita doesn’t move, doesn’t acknowledge her at all. Only when Clare takes a seat in the lounger next to hers does Kavita glance over and lift the wineglass she holds in cheers. Beyond the deck is a rocky shore. The ocean is calm tonight, the waves lapping instead of crashing, the moon a perfect crescent over the water.
“Are you okay?” Clare asks.
“Fine. You?”
“I’m fine. It’s been a long day. Where’s Charlotte?”
“Downstairs. Sleeping.”
“Are you safe here?”
Kavita rolls her eyes. “Austin is totally harmless. He’s an idiot, but he wouldn’t hurt me.”
They sit in silence for a moment. Clare stands and moves to the railing. About a quarter mile to the south, a glass house appears cantilevered over the water. The main floor lights are on. It glows yellow against the cliff it hangs from. Clare points to it.
“Is that Zoe and Malcolm’s house?”
“Yep,” Kavita says.
“The lights are on.”
“Charlotte has them on timers. They come on about seven and go off at midnight.”
Clare leans over the railing and studies the house. There is no movement inside it, no sign of life, but from this vantage you could watch entire scenes play out should anyone be home. Malcolm and Zoe’s lives unfolding for you like a film.
“Why don’t you and Charlotte stay there?” Clare asks.
“She refuses,” Kavita says. “I don’t blame her.”
Clare returns to the lounger and sits again, drawing in a deep breath. There is something different about the ocean air. It’s fuller, heavier, easier to inhale. Next to her, Kavita’s eyes are closed, wisps of her dark hair lifted by the breeze.
“Did you know that guy from last night?” Clare asks. “He said he knew you.”
“Yeah. Kind of. He’s a cop. I’ve seen him around a few times.”
“Around?”
Kavita adjusts her position on the lounger and wraps the blanket tighter.
“He was a minor fixture when I worked at Roland’s. One of the regulars. Loved to harass the waitresses.”
“Roland allowed that?”
“Let’s just say that Roland benefited from having some of Lune Bay’s finest on his side.” Kavita sips her wine again. “Do you want a drink?”
“No thanks,” Clare says. “I was at Roland’s just now, actually. I saw a picture of you on the wall. With Austin. And Kendall Bentley and Stacey Norton too. You knew them?”
“I’m not really in the mood for an inquisition, Clare. I’ve had a rough day.”
“Fair enough.” Clare swings her legs so she too is laid out on her lounger. “But listen to me, Kavita. I’m trying to get to the bottom of things here. Of the Westman family’s dealings. I know you’re trying to move on, and you may not want to talk about it. But I think you can help me. And I’d like to think that helping me might ultimately help you. Charlotte too. If we found some real answers, I think it could help Charlotte.”
Kavita chews on her lip, considering.
“Zoe Westman, for example,” Clare continues. “She took over her father’s business after he died. And I don’t think it was all aboveboard. Do you know anything about that?”
“I don’t want to talk to the cops about this,” Kavita says. “Germain or anyone else.”
“Okay.”
Why no cops? Clare wants to ask. But she thinks of the scene last night, Kavita incapacitated and passed around by that circle of men. He’s a cop. Kavita doesn’t want to speak to the police. Of course she doesn’t. Clare bends her knees and hugs them to her chest to ward off a chill from the cool air.
“Zoe came to me once,” Kavita says. “Maybe a year after her dad died. I was still working at Roland’s. I was a mess. Could barely drag myself out of bed. I’d dropped out of school by then, and Zoe knew it. She told me there was a politician coming to town. This environmentalist senator whose big passion was preserving oceanfront land. Roland owned the plot next to the restaurant. It was ripe for development, and the Westman group was right in there, but then there was some debate about whether it should be turned into protected parkland instead. And this senator was coming to town to survey the scene. He was this wool sweater, family-man grandfather type, but rumor had it, he had a thing for younger women. Zoe asked me if I’d be interested in showing him around Lune Bay. Playing the friendly hostess.” Kavita laughs. “Hostess is an interesting euphemism. I knew exactly what she meant.”
“What did she mean?” Clare asks.
“Everyone at Roland’s knew. Zoe would befriend waitresses, and after a while, they’d quit. Stacey and Kendall were two such examples. I ran into Stacey once, about six months after she
