Jared studied her strong profile. “You didn’t like her.”
“No.”
“Do you feel guilty about that?”
“I don’t think so. I mean ... I always want to help the dead, people who have been trapped on this side, but she doesn’t have a lot of rooting value in my book. When she talks about her daughter, it’s not with love. It’s like a responsibility or something.”
“And you don’t understand that,” he mused.
“If we ever have a daughter, I think we’re the sort of people who will cherish her. Holly isn’t that way. It was a job. She did her job. She found no joy in it, though.”
“Oh, if we ever have a daughter, I’m going to spoil the crap out of her,” Jared enthused, causing Harper to laugh. “I hope she has blonde hair and blue eyes like her mommy. I’m going to get her a dog ... and take her camping ... and teach her how to ride a bike ... and explain how her Uncle Zander is full of crap.”
That had Harper laughing. “I see you’ve given this some thought.”
“I have,” Jared agreed. “I’ve given it a lot of thought. We’re going to make constant fun of Uncle Zander.”
“Well, that’s something to focus on later,” Harper said. “For now, we need to find Holly. I can’t shake the feeling that she’s the key to this case.”
“Then we’ll find her.” Jared was matter-of-fact. “Just remember, you’re sticking with me like glue today. I don’t want any murderous surprises. If we could go a few months without your life being in danger, I would greatly appreciate it.”
Harper couldn’t help but agree with the sentiment. “Word.” She held out her fist to bump his and got a huge grin. “What?”
“The big kids seal it with a kiss.”
“Well, I guess I need to accept my position as one of the big kids, huh?”
“That’s exactly what I was thinking.”
SHAWN AND ZANDER MET HARPER AND JARED in front of the pavilion an hour later. Harper hadn’t bothered with her hair, instead pulling it back in a loose bun while still wet. It would look ridiculous once it dried, but she was beyond caring.
“We were starting to think you guys were going to sleep the entire day away,” Shawn teased as they hopped into the food line. “I was trying to convince Zander to do the same thing, but he insisted you guys would eventually show up.”
“Turns out Zander was right,” Jared noted. “It had to happen eventually.”
“Hey, it happens all the time,” Zander shot back. “In fact, I’m right more often than the rest of you combined.”
“And here I thought you were going to say that you were right more often than you were wrong,” Jared offered. “I had a comeback planned and everything.”
“I’m too smart for you.” Zander lightly tapped Jared’s temple. “Eventually you’ll come to realize that I’m the brains of this operation.”
“Does that make me the looks?” Jared queried dryly.
“No, I’m the brains and the looks.”
Jared snorted. “Well, at least nobody can say you have an overinflated ego.”
“Exactly.” Zander’s grin was wide. “So, what’s the plan for the day?” He turned serious as he started dishing scrambled eggs onto his plate. “I mean ... do we have a plan yet?”
“We do,” Jared confirmed, forcing a smile when Becky slid past him. The young woman made a point to press her hands to his back and offer an apologetic smile, as if invading his territory was some sort of accident. Jared knew better. “Let’s wait until we sit down, though.”
Becky hovered close to the head of the line as the foursome filled up their plates. Jared was hopeful she would buy a hint and join another table, but instead she was all smiles as they pointed themselves toward a picnic table at the outskirts of the pavilion.
“Is everybody ready to solve a murder?” she asked brightly, holding back long enough to see where Jared would sit before claiming her seat, which was directly on his left. “It’s a beautiful day, huh?”
Harper risked a glance at Jared and found a muscle working in his jaw. He was clearly close to careening over the edge of his patience and exploding. Harper wanted to head that off if at all possible.
“It is a beautiful day,” she enthused, hoping to take the onus of the conversation off her fiancé. “In fact, we were just talking about that.”
“About what?” Becky asked blankly.
“The weather.”
“We were talking about the weather?” Zander made a face that would’ve been humorous under different circumstances. “Were we saying anything good?”
Harper shot him a quelling look. She was in no mood to put up with his shenanigans. “We were talking about the logistics of you guys running a business up here.” Since they had to put up with Becky for the duration of their meal, Harper decided she might as well mine more information out of the girl. “My understanding is that the summer season is short on this side of the bridge.”
“Technically I think the summer season is the same everywhere,” Becky argued. “It starts in June and ends in September.”
Harper blinked several times in rapid succession, internally debating if Becky was messing with her. Ultimately, she decided the girl was simply slow on the uptake ... at least this morning. “No, what I meant was — weather-wise — the summer season is likely to be short. It probably won’t really start in earnest until mid-June and it will end in early September.”
“Harris says the diehards will be willing to put up with colder nights,” Becky explained. “That means the tickets we sell in May will be a little cheaper than the ones in the dead of summer, but the ones in the fall will be just as expensive because we’ll be able to tie the camp to Halloween.”
“Right.” Harper nodded in understanding. “That actually makes sense.”
“Harris says he even wants to put together a Friday the 13th-themed weekend
