Page 5 of Tourist Season

Instead, I pretend to observe the people around me who chat about potholes and shipwrecks and gossip from town, or museums and ghost tours and plays at the Carnage theater.

But really, I’m stealing glances at him.

I notice details, because that’s what I’ve trained myself to do.

Like the wear on his hiking boots, the leather scuffed, the soles caked with a thin layer of dried mud as though he spends most of his time on his feet.

I catalog the lighter streaks in his hair.

The tattoo that wraps around one forearm, an ouroboros.

The scar that follows the curve of his elbow, disappearing beneath his rolled-up sleeve.

I notice the way he tilts his head from side to side, loosening some hidden tension lodged between his bones.

I especially notice the way he scans the other patrons with a cold and clinical detachment, but his focus always returns to me.

And every time it does, he smiles. He seems observant, but remote.

It’s as though his charm is a well he can draw from when he chooses.

But the rest of the time? He’s stoic, like that well is hidden in a faraway landscape. A place he keeps carefully guarded.

Maybe that should scare me. But it only adds to the gravitational force that beckons me closer.

When he has his sandwich and drink in hand, he joins me to add a splash of milk to his tea. With a sweep of his gaze around the small café, he looks at me with a crease between his brows. “Busy place. There’s nowhere to sit.”

I shrug, though my nonchalance feels forced. “Typical for the Bean, even early in the tourist season. But we can walk, if you like?”

I’m not sure why those words just exited my mouth.

I barely manage to stop short of offering to show this guy around downtown.

I’m not that kind of person anymore, one who puts herself out there to strangers so easily.

I used to be. And then, one beautiful, innocuous August day, it cost me more than I ever thought possible.

But there’s something about this man that seems so different from the other tourists who pass through Carnage, people I only pay attention to long enough to assess as a threat to my town.

Something about him is almost familiar. Maybe it’s in the way he seems removed from the rest of the busy café as he gives the room one last assessing look.

Maybe it’s the way he appraises the coffee shop as though searching for threats that gives me reassurance.

Or maybe it’s in the way his expression clears when his attention returns to me and he smiles.

“I’d like that,” he says, and for a blink of time, a single heartbeat, the world around us disappears.

I clear my throat. Give a faint nod. Then I turn and lead the way to the door, but he reaches past me before I can touch it, pushing it open for me to pass through. And I can’t stop the flutter of excitement that dances behind my ribs.

“So, how does a person wind up in a town with a name like Cape Carnage? Is it a ‘come for the name, stay for the ballmeat’ kind of situation?” the man asks, taking a bite of his sandwich as we amble down the street toward the quaint downtown, filled with independent shops and quirky restaurants.

I chance a glance up at him and I’m met with his teasing grin, and even though I expected its pull, I still feel unprepared for the magnetic force of it.

“The ballmeat is a big draw, for sure. Premium ballmeat in Carnage.” I smirk into the lid of my coffee before taking a sip.

“Not eating?”

“No, saving it for later,” I say as I pat my bag where the foil-wrapped bone is hidden. I meet his eyes only briefly, hoping my smile comes off less forced than it feels in my skin. “Is that what brought you here? The premium ballmeat?”

“Honestly, no. It was the tea bagging.” I huff a laugh and I can feel the warmth of his amusement next to me. “I’m here on vacation.”

“I never would have guessed.”

“What gave me away?”

I shrug. “I know every face in town. And I don’t know yours.”

“How many people live in Carnage?”

“Four thousand, two hundred and ten.”

“And you know every person here.”

I look up to find him scrutinizing me with narrowed eyes, the warmth in them still there, though it’s veiled by a thin layer of suspicion. “Yeah. I do.”

“Born and raised here?”

“No,” I say, flicking a wave to Diane Montgomery, the owner of the Starlight Boutique across the street.

She waves back before entering the clothing store.

“Just had time and motivation, I guess.” I lift a shoulder and look up at my companion, and though the suspicion still lingers in the crease between his brows, it softens.

“What about you? Why are you here, of all places?”

“Bird-watching.”

I pause, staring him down with a furrowed brow. “Bird-watching.”

His eyes dance in a way that makes me think he enjoys my disbelief. “You heard me, Meatball.”

“Don’t you dare. You’ll be wearing this coffee,” I say on the heels of a groan. He smiles at my threat, taking a sip of his tea.

“What kind of birds?”

The man shrugs, his expression still a little teasing, but something about it has a glint of a dark edge to it, like a blade that catches the light.

It’s as though his bird-watching is more like a hunt, the thrill of finding something elusive in the shadows of remote and desolate forests.

Some distant alarm rings in the back of my head, but his expression softens and I smother my paranoia.

“All kinds, I guess. Bald eagles. Osprey. But I’m not fussy.

Anything from falcons to starlings interest me. ”

We slow to a stop in front of the window of one of Cape Carnage’s weirder shops. My heart jumps into my throat as I deliberate on my next words. I can’t remember the last time I felt these feelings. Desire. Attraction. I don’t want to ask my next question. But I’m desperate to know. “By yourself?”

But he doesn’t hear me, not when my voice is so quiet and his own question is so much louder as he says, “Craft-A-Corpse? Is this place for real?”

I clear my throat, trying to dislodge the sensation of shrinking into myself.

“Yeah,” I say, my tone too bright and breezy for the way I feel inside.

“It’s new this year. Kind of like Build-A-Bear.

Except … not.” I point to one of the displays, a row of fake hands in different stages of decay, some of them holding silk flowers, others clutching plastic weapons, others frozen in various gestures.

I catch my companion’s eye in the reflection on the window, a phantom over the body parts on the other side of the glass.

“They’re for the Carnival of Carnage Gravity Race.

Putting together a good corpse companion for your soapbox racer is pretty critical for style points.

Going the fastest down the course is one thing, but sometimes the quality of the corpse is what clinches the win, you know?

And it’s easier to build a corpse here than to travel in with fake body parts in your suitcase, I guess. ”

“Huh. That’s kind of a genius business idea,” my new friend says.

The shop’s owner, Henry, waves to us with a severed hand as patrons paint various body parts with fake blood.

And though there are lifelike entrails and eyeballs and severed limbs strewn throughout the window display, my companion doesn’t seem fazed by the gruesome scene.

He finishes his sandwich as he surveys the body parts with an appreciative nod.

“I like it,” he says, though I’m not sure if he’s referring to the sandwich, or the shop, or both.

“Yeah, it’s cool. Definitely very ‘Carnage,’” I reply with air quotes. With a final wave to Henry, we turn and resume our walk.

“It is,” he says. “And I am.” When I look up at him with a question written across my face, he’s already waiting, a teasing warmth brightening the green hues in his eyes as they catch the sun.

In this light I can see the wedge of walnut brown in his left iris more clearly, a slice of shadow among the green that feels like a familiar comfort. “I am here by myself.”

My cheeks warm. I can’t hide the blush with my coffee cup, but I try anyway, keeping my eyes latched to his as I take a sip of my drink. And he doesn’t let me get away with an escape. He smiles as though he’s caught me, and even though part of me wants to, I don’t look away.

At least, not until my phone rings.

“Sorry, excuse me.” I dig into my bag, trying to shove my disappointment aside that the moment between us has been interrupted. When I withdraw the phone, it’s Arthur’s name on the screen. I accept the call and hold it to my ear, casting an apologetic glance toward my companion. “Hello?”

“Harper.”

“That’s me.”

“Where are you?”

“In town. Not far from the Bean.”

“Where’s my black bag?”

My step falters, and I can sense my companion’s concern next to me. Though I dart him an untroubled smile, I don’t think it’s very convincing for either of us. Knowing what’s in Arthur’s infamous black bag, there’s no way my sudden burst of anxiety can be hidden completely. “Your bag?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Why do you need it?”

“Maria Flores’s Airbnb. The tourists staying there are awful.

The man used my driveway to turn around yesterday and cut across the edge of the grass.

And today, he allowed his hideous little dog to relieve itself among the rose bushes and he didn’t pick it up.

Why Maria made such a grand house into an Airbnb, I will never know.

It attracts the most horribly entitled windbags every summer. ”

“Okay … well … I’m not sure those missteps fit the criteria for what you seem to have planned—”

“They do today. Where’s my black bag?”