Page 43 of In Case You Didn't Know

ASHER:

Francie’s coming to Liberty?

AUTUMN:

Yes, Please don’t ruin it for her.

HUDSON:

Of course we’ll take care of her. Let me know her travel details. It’ll be nice to see her.

EDEN:

Well as fun as this has been, I need to go. I need to see a man about a Llama. Stay cool, fam. And remember – love not war. And nobody beat Autumn’s husband up.

I turn off the phone, already feeling exhausted by my family. Damn, I love them, but they’re a lot.

And then I turn it on again, just to re-read Autumn’s words.

Francie is going to be staying on Liberty.

Because I have a few pieces of unfinished business where she’s concerned.

FRANCIE

“You’ll get bored within a week,” Charlie’s voice echoes down my phone as I haul my suitcases up the steps to Brewed Awakenings, Liberty’s resident caffeine dealer. The sun is shining in the sky, the ocean is sparkling like a thousand diamonds, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen the island looking prettier.

“Good,” I say as I push open the door, the aroma of coffee and sugar cookies washing over me. “I came here to work, not party.”

Charlie lets out a huff. “What am I supposed to do without you to annoy?” he whines. “Manhattan’s boring without my favorite auntie sneaking into sex clubs.”

“First of all, we don’t call it a sex club.” I lower my voice on that one, because the coffee shop doesn’t need to know about that particular snafu. “Second, don’t call me your auntie. Third, there’s this magical thing called a phone. You can still annoy me remotely.”

“Hah,” he says, not even trying to laugh. “Speaking of phones, I downloaded you an app.”

I frown. “What app?”

Charlie’s always been a pest. In high school, he messaged every guy in my contacts claiming I had a crush on them. He even swapped my yearbook headshot for a rat in a sparkly crown – and the yearbook committee just went with it. Sometimes I wonder how he made it past twenty.

“Just check your screen,” he says, sounding smug as hell.

I pull the phone away and scroll through the chaos of apps until I find it. And groan.

“You downloaded a dating app on my phone?”

“Remotely,” he confirms. “Open it. You’ll love the profile.”

I brace myself and tap. It’s a photo of me at Misty Lakes, sitting on the dock in a pink bikini, legs dangling in the water. I’m sticking my tongue out at the camera like a six-year-old.

“How old are you?” I mutter. “If you ever get a girlfriend who sticks around, I’m telling her about the time you pooped the bed.”

“I was five!”

“Doesn’t matter. Your love life is over.”

I hang up on his wheezing laughter and step further inside the coffee shop, hoping for caffeine and a little peace before Simon – the island’s one and only cab driver – shows up to take me to the lighthouse.

It could take him ten minutes, or ten hours. Simon runs on chaos.