Lock, Stock, and Feral by Addison Moore (free e novels .txt) 📕

to come to the shore with me. I take that back. Sherlock wanted to come, but Clyde told him he’d be staying in with her, away from any curly-haired poodles who might want to lure him into a bush.

The warm evening breeze ticks up a notch as we sit under the twinkle lights out on the patio behind the Country Cottage Café enjoying a sampling of the new menu, the lobster pie to be exact. It’s just buttery lobster mixed with heavy cream, sitting in a decadent piecrust with bread crumbles on top. It’s rich, creamy, and dreamy to the point of no return.

I moan through a bite as I point my fork over at my sister. “None of what happened this afternoon was good. And all of you have to swear you won’t say a word to Jasper about it.” I’m not too thrilled Georgie shared the details of his loss to begin with, but I suppose she needed to quantify all that screaming about Jasper not cheating on me once we arrived.

Juni went to close up Two Old Broads and Mom ran out of there like a bat in heat, so I offered her dinner and she took me up on it. Macy and Hux were already here, so we thought we’d stage an impromptu intervention concerning that international boy toy she met on that dicey app geared for seniors, Dating Not Waiting.

As soon as Jasper dropped me off, he went straight back to Seaview. He’s going to track down Devan Abner to have a chat with her, along with seeing about getting a warrant to search her mushroom farm.

A poisonous mushroom.

I can’t believe someone cooked down enough fungi to create a toxin and slipped it to Patterson Higgins that night. Jasper said toxicology was able to pinpoint that it came from a specific mushroom called a death cap.

Funny, I didn’t hear Devan rattling off that name in the roll call of fungi she gave me earlier. It’s probably a part of her private reserve. At least we were able to narrow down the killer relatively quickly this time. And that gets Jordy off the hook. Although I will admit, it all feels anti-climatic at this point. Usually there’s a bit more fanfare when it comes to catching a killer. But that doesn’t mean James Foreman is off the hook. I still need to conduct my due diligence and ask him a few questions.

Behind us the crowd of tourists has steadily grown and so has the line at the outdoor grill. As thrilled as I am to see the café churning out the extra revenue, it pains me to see people waiting in long lines for their dinners. I think I’m going to double my chefs for tomorrow night.

“Go ahead, Huxley.” Mom frowns over at my brother as he fiddles with her phone. “You’re not going to find anything fishy.”

Hux shakes his head. “I said he could be phishing you. Catfishing. It means he’s misrepresenting who he is because he wants something—most likely money.”

Macy bumps her elbow to my mother. “You haven’t given him any money, have you?”

Mom’s eyes widen a notch, and that tells us everything we need know.

The rest of the table groans her way.

“I need more ice chips.” Mackenzie rattles her glass and Emmie is quick to comply. “And why is there so much seafood here tonight?” She covers her mouth with her hand and Emmie helps her to the next table over where Mackenzie sinks her head between her legs.

With the naked eye you can hardly tell that Mackenzie is knocked up, but her never-ending nausea serves as a reminder to all, especially her.

“I’m never sleeping with you again,” Mackenzie shouts at my brother as she groans hard. “You stay away from me with that power stick.”

“Power stick?” Georgie barks out a laugh. “Hear that, Ree? That’s what the kids are calling it these days.”

Macy leans toward my mother. “As much as I very much look forward to driving a stick shift tonight, let’s get back to that whole money thing. Mom, you didn’t hand this guy my inheritance, did you?”

Mom balks at the thought. “You kids really think I have the word gullible printed on my forehead, don’t you?”

“Nah.” Georgie sinks her fork back into her lobster pie. “They just think you’re randy and anxious to give it all away to the first good-looking set of abs that comes along.”

Mom bounces with a silent laugh. “Worse yet, they don’t even think he exists!”

“How much did you give him?” Hux asks, wagging her pink glitzy phone case over at her.

“None of your beeswax,” she’s quick to counter. “And give me that.” She starts to swipe her phone and he pulls it out of her reach.

“Come on, Mom,” Hux says. “Just give me your password into the dating app so I can read these exchanges you claim are innocent and we’ll all go away.”

Mom glowers over at her only son. “I’m certainly not letting my children read the private conversations I’ve had with my boyfriend. Don’t the three of you have love lives? You wouldn’t want me nosying around in your text messages, would you?”

“You could read mine with Jasper,” I volunteer.

Georgie rolls her eyes. “Ree, let the kid into your account. It’s clear you need to do a little modeling. The girl is having G-rated conversations with her husband.”

Mom scoffs with a laugh. “Hand over your own phone, Toots. Mine is off-limits.” She takes a breath as she surveys us all. “And if you must know, I simply loaned him six hundred dollars. It was all done on the up and up on that Venmo, or Bevmo app you kids use. His wallet was stolen while he was at the beach, and he needed the money for food and incidentals. And before you start—he didn’t ask for the money, I insisted.”

We give another collective moan, although with a little more oomph this time.

Hux shakes his head. “Mom, you’re a conman’s dream. I forbid you