Read Dare to Die for Free Online Page B

unreadable.
    â€œNice time of year to be here.” Billy reached for the sack of groceries. “Here, better get your stuff in the refrigerator.” He lifted out a quart of milk, a box of Ritz crackers, and a small jar of peanut butter.
    Iris took the milk and turned toward the small refrigerator.
    Billy fished out a receipt, slipped it in a pocket.
    When Iris faced him again, he offered the sack.
    â€œThanks. I don’t need it.”
    Billy crumpled the sack and tossed it into the wastebasket. “Be seeing you.”
    Annie was behind him as they stepped outside. He paused to look down at the bike, number 16. Annie recognized the distinctive light green from Ben Parotti’s bike rental shed near the ferry terminal. She waited to speak until she heard the click of the cabin door shutting. “Billy, there’s something you should know.” She gestured toward the office with a quick glance behind to be certain the door to the cabin was closed.
    Billy gave her a sharp look, then nodded and walked with her.
    Ingrid’s office was understated, but welcoming. Red and yellow cushions looked inviting in rattan chairs. White pine paneled the walls. Hanging on one wall was Duane’s photograph of a great blue heron feeding in the marsh, his reflection crystal clear in the water, beauty twice captured. Potted ferns glistened in sunlight spilling through a sliding glass door that opened onto a deck. Marsh grasses wavered in the onshore breeze. The tide was out. In the distance, dolphins arched in their daily aquatic ballet.
    Annie gestured toward the largest of the chairs.
    Billy shook his head, stood with his feet apart, waiting.
    Annie remained standing, too. There was no good way to start. “I think Emma was searching Cabin Six.” Was that breaking and entering? Emma hadn’t broken in. She’d used a key. But still…Billy was a stickler about following the law.
    Billy’s broad face rarely revealed emotion. For an instant, his eyes widened, then he gave a short nod. “Emma was searching Iris’s cabin. Why?”
    â€œEmma’s depressed.” Annie heard the plea in her voice, but Billy looked stolid. “She’s convinced she can’t start a new book. She hasn’t been eating. Ingrid and I thought it would help her, get her back on track, if she solved a mystery of some sort. Then we got word about Ingrid’s sister being sick. On the way out Duane asked me to keep an eye on the girl in Cabin Six. He said she came last evening to rent a cabin. In the rain. Alone. On a bicycle. Emma was fascinated. She kept talking about it. She hurried out while I was on the phone. When I got here, Emma was waiting. She said she was going to stay in the next cabin to keep an eye on the girl. I needed to clean some cabins so I told Emma to check herself in. I guess she filched a key to Six.”
    Billy frowned, folded his arms.
    Annie talked fast and heard the pleading note in her voice. “Emma didn’t mean any harm. She was curious. You have to admit there is something odd about arriving on a bicycle in the rain. Alone.”
    Billy looked pensive. “Not odd. Sad. I’d guess Iris just got out of treatment.”
    â€œOh.” The skeletal frame, the smudged darkness beneath Iris’s eyes, now they made sense. “If she found Emma searching her room…”
    Billy slowly shook his head. “I don’t see Iris striking out at anyone. She was a gentle kid. She grew up down the street from me. My mom and hers were good friends. Her mom died when she was in middle school. Her grandma did her best, but Iris got into drugs. There are always a few. Everybody tells them, but they don’t hear. She ran away just before she would have graduated from high school. I can check on it. Maybe she wasn’t going to graduate. Maybe that was part of it. That was a bad year. Another kid died from an overdose. His sister drowned off Fish Haul pier a