Page 24 of Off Plan

I dropped my hand. “Your concern is touching. Truly. Could we drive in silence for a minute, please?”

“More walls, Loafers?” He shot me a wink out of his good eye—a flash of blue-green like Gulf water in his tan face—and dropped an arm between us like a curtain. “Have it your way. I’d rather listen to this anyhow.”

He cranked up the radio and started singing the world’s most deliberately off-key version of “Hey, Jude.”

I scrubbed two hands through my hair. “Silence means different things to different people, apparently,” I said mournfully.

Fenn was too busy singing theNah nah nahsto hear.

And, okay, maybe Iwasdumb, because I found myself wanting to laugh. Possibly hysterically.

“Turn itdown,” I insisted, reaching for the dial.

Fenn wrapped his hand around mine in a firm grip. “Don’t touch another man’s knob, Loafers.”

“I didn’t… I wasn’t…” I felt my face go hot, and I couldn’t say why, exactly. “You’re disgusting. As if I’d touch your…knob.”

“I’mdisgusting? Loafers, you’re the one who’s getting double entendres from innocent conversation! First the cooters, now this?”

I pulled my shoulder away, furious. “My name is Mason. Ma-son. Two syllables. It shouldn’t be hard to remember, even for you.”

“Even for me.” Fenn whistled through his teeth. “Call me crazy, but I feel our friendship withering before it ever got a chance to truly blossom. Ah, well. Easy come, easy go.” He paused. “So, Mason, huh? An appropriate name for a guy with a fondness for walls. Your mom must’ve been predicting the future when she named you.”

I rolled my eyes. “Meanwhile, your name is, what?Fenn? Like a marshy swampland? Perfectly appropriate for a guy who’s—” I floundered for a second, trying to think up a word insulting enough “—you.Were you always going to be dense and foul, I wonder? Is it nature or nurture?”

Fenn laughed a rumbly laugh, and for a second his blue-green eyes crinkled at the corners in a way that was… objectively not unattractive. Like, for a guy.

And… wow. When had I started noticing shit like that about people?

Fenn hissed in pain and cupped a protective hand over his bruise.

“Fuck. It’s Fenn with twon’s, not one, Loafers. Though, honestly, the guy I’m named for was a treasure hunter my dad idolized, so I’ll take the swampland.”

Interest caught despite myself, I frowned. “Why? What’s wrong with treasure hunt—?”

The car gave a loudbumpas the tires left the paved road and hit a patch of concrete liberally covered with pebbles and scrub grass. We were in a barren parking lot in front of a two-story yellow stucco structure that reminded me a lot of the building where my dentist’s office was located back home, right down to the dark-tinted windows and the long outdoor corridor running along the front and sides.

“What are we doing?” I demanded, leaning over the dashboard to peer up at the building through the windshield. “Is this Mr. Goodman’s office?”

Fenn snorted. “This, Loafers, is my home. Andyours,I guess. For as long as you stick around.”

“My—” I looked at the building again. Despite all I’d seen of Whispering Key already, I hadn’t expected…this. Even the Bates Motel had looked decent enough from theoutside. “There’s been a mistake.”

Fenn hooted. “There have been several. Most recently, the one where you decided you weren’t leaving.” He shut off the engine and popped open his door, standing and stretching in a way that made his thin T-shirt ride up over a set of abdominal muscles that would have made a useful teaching tool for medical students. Then he bent down and looked into the car, where I was still buckled firmly into my seat. “Ya comin’?”

His tone was exactly halfway between laughter and commiseration, and it was enough to have me reaching for my own belt and getting out of the car. I’d be damned if I was the source of his humororthe object of his pity.

Of course, I found as soon as I stood that my pants were stuck to my legs like cling film. I stuffed the sweat-damp tails of my shirt back into my waistband and glared at Fenn over the top of the car. “You live here, too?”

“Yep. We’re neighbors! Isn’t that great? I’d organize the others to bring you some casseroles, except I hate casseroles… and thereareno others.”

“No others.” I pushed a hand through my hair. “Meaning…”

“Did you go toremedialmedical school, Loafers? No tourists means no one is using the motel,” he said impatiently. “We have the place to ourselves, such as it is.”

He nodded behind me, to a sign atop a peeling white pole that cast an enormous shadow on the ground like a harbinger of doom.

The Five Star Resort.