Page 41 of Between the Lines

Blaise: That was fast.

Essie: What did you find?

There was a pause while Cece typed. I checked with someone in the admin office about the Community Hall reservation. It wasn’t booked under Darcy’s name.

Paige felt something that might have been relief, but she waited.

Althea’s text appeared next. Then who?

Maude added a squinty-eyed emoji. That figures.

Get this, Cece added. The name on the reservation is Gigi DeLuca.

Paige let out a soft snort. Might as well have been Darcy, now that the two had teamed up.

Blaise seemed to agree. Well. That answers that.

Essie was next. So not a coincidence then, because we know they’re friends now.

Althea sent an eyerolling emoji. That woman does enjoy a spotlight.

Paige typed her reply. So Darcy stays in the background and Gigi puts her name on the paperwork. I bet she thinks making Gigi the face of things means she can stay hidden.

Yep, Maude texted. That’s exactly how it reads to me.

Cece added, Same here. Gigi’s visible. Darcy’s insulated. Or would be if we weren’t smarter than she is.

Thanks for doing that research, Cece. Paige exhaled slowly and gripped her phone a little tighter. The pieces lined up too neatly to ignore. The beach walk. The timing. The choice of night. The choice of venue. This all felt like it was being carefully orchestrated.

She sent another text. Okay. That tells us a lot. Still no reacting yet. We watch. We gather information. We don’t give them anything to react to. No hint that we know what’s going on.

Maude sent a thumbs-up. So you don’t want any of us to go to that meeting in disguise? She added a laughing emoji to show she was teasing.

No, Paige texted. We let them do their thing and we do ours. Maybe that’s how this all plays out. Maybe that’s how we get them to leave us in peace.

Cece: Sounds good to me.

Blaise: I’m in.

Essie: Same here.

Althea: Fine with me, but it’ll be interesting to see what comes of their meeting.

Paige smiled at that. She was interested to find out, too, but there was a part of her that was glad they were doing their own thing. It would give them something else to pay attention to. Something that wasn’t the Queen Bees.

She stood and carried her phone into the kitchen. Whatever Gigi and Darcy thought they were doing, good luck to them. Paige didn’t care, so long as it didn’t involve her.

Paige set her phone on the counter and put the kettle on to heat up. She’d been meaning to make a pitcher of iced tea for a while now. But as the kettle heated, she picked her phone up again. She didn’t intend to dwell on things, but questions didn’t go away just because you ignored them.

She opened a new message thread and typed a note to Cece alone. Hey, just curious. Any word from Darcy about the interview?

It didn’t take long for Cece’s reply to come through. No. Nothing yet. Starting to wonder if I’m being ignored.

Paige stared at the screen for a second, then typed again. Okay. I figured as much, but I wanted to be sure.

A second passed, then another text from Cece arrived. On the slim chance she does say yes, is there anything specific you’d want me to ask? Or avoid?

Paige leaned back against the counter and considered that. The kettle was just beginning to steam. There were a dozen things she could suggest. Angles she’d like explored. Questions that might provoke Darcy. But that wasn’t how Cece worked, and Paige knew it.