Page 22 of Fire and Ice Cruise

“No, I didn’t. But I’ve got it anyway, and I don’t know why I keep finding these bodies. I must have really upset someone Upstairs, and now they’re making me work off some cosmic debt one murder at a time.” I look up at him, and I can feel the tears threatening. “What if this never stops? What if I’m just doomed to stumble over corpses for the rest of my life?”

“Then you’ll solve murders for the rest of your life,” he says simply. “And you’ll have people who love you helping every step of the way.”

“That’s a terrible retirement plan.”

“It could be worse. You could be stuck doing it alone.”

I sigh at the thought. “You’ve got a point.”

The bridge door opens with a soft whoosh, and Marina stumbles in mid-sentence. “—thank you so much for the directions—” she says to someone before turning our way and stops dead—unfortunate choice of words—her eyes going wide as she takes in the scene: Wes and me, tangled in each other’s arms, our faces inches apart, looking for all the world like we’re about to share a steamy kiss.

Her expression shifts from eager to shocked to something that looks suspiciously like hurt, all in the span of two seconds.

“Sorry.” She gasps, her hand flying to her mouth. “I didn’t realize I was interrupting something.”

“Marina, wait—” I try to step back, to explain, but she’s already spinning on her heel.

“No, it’s fine. I should’ve knocked. I just thought—never mind what I thought.” Her cheeks flush bright red, and she’s backing toward the door as if we might chase her. “I’ll just—I’ll come back later. Or never. Never is good, too.”

And just like that, she bolts.

“Marina, wait!” Wes releases me and takes off after her, but she’s surprisingly fast for someone in ankle boots. “It’s not what it looks like!”

Which is exactly what guilty people say, when it’s exactly what it looks like.

Except in our case. And in our defense, we had a ghost at the helm of that comedown session.

Their footsteps fade down the corridor, and I’m left standing alone on the bridge, surrounded by expensive navigation equipment, blinking screens, and the lingering scent of Wes’s cologne mixing with the salt air coming through the door.

I walk over to the captain’s chair and drop into it, letting my head fall back against the leather. Through the windows, the North Atlantic stretches out in every direction—endless gray water meeting endless gray sky, and somewhere out there, Iceland is waiting with its volcanoes and glaciers and hopefully fewer dead bodies.

My phone buzzes in my pocket and I fish it out.

It’s a text from Ransom.

Ransom: Where are you? Bess said you took off after breakfast like your hair was on fire.

I type back.

Trixie: On the bridge. Long story. Involves a flirtatious ghost and a misunderstanding that’s definitely going to come back to haunt me.

Ransom: The Second Act Society just called an emergency meeting in the Meridian Lounge. Quinn is allowing it, but security will be present. Thought you’d want to know.

Trixie: I’ll be right down.

I stand up and take one last look around the bridge—this nerve center where Wes makes all his important captain decisions and apparently creates enough misunderstandings to sink a smaller, redheaded vessel.

The killer thinks they’re safe. They think they’ve gotten away with murder while the rest of us are too busy sorting out romantic entanglements and flirtatious ghosts to notice.

They’re dead wrong.

CHAPTER 8

The Meridian Lounge is what happens when a cruise ship decides function matters more than glitz and glamour, which, on the Emerald Queen of the Seas, is a rare event in and of itself.

No crystal chandeliers here, no mother-of-pearl accents—just practical blue carpeting that hides stains, stackable chairs in tidy rows, and a small stage up front usually reserved for trivia nights and particularly enthusiastic bingo callers. Gray water churns past the starboard windows, and the whole space smells like industrial-strength coffee and the faint vanilla of whatever air freshener the cleaning crew favors. But what it lacks in glitz and glamour, it more than makes up for in floor-to-ceiling windows. Who needs shiny things to dazzle the masses when you have the most dazzling sight of all in front of you—the sea in all her glory.

The Second Act Society has assembled in force, filling maybe three-quarters of the available seating. They cluster together in nervous groups, voices low and worried, and the energy in the room feels brittle—as if one wrong word could shatter whatever composure they’re maintaining.