Page 167 of Smoke and Fire
Her face tightened a bit, making the smile seem a bit contrived. Was there something lurking behind that statement? I couldn’t help but feel a dark vibe. It quickly disappeared as she rushed happily into her order.
“Can we replay what I bought last time? I’d love another strawberry frap with a cake pop, please.”
“Of course.”
Frap and a cake pop at six in the morning? Definitely the sort of sugary, spontaneous kind of thing that Lolo would do. Had done, now that I thought about it. The frap and the cake pop werein the book.
“I’m just going to park myself in the corner for a while, if that’s okay,” she continued, glancing around. The empty shop soon lost her interest. “I just finished my fourth read-through of book twenty in anticipation of the launch! My friends are flying in today to prep for our party. I'm excited to see other people after days of just filming by myself.”
My blood turned cold.
Um, what?
“Filming?” My voice lifted in question. “What are you filming?”
“Oh, just a few things.” She waved an errant hand. “You know, the mountain views and some documentary-like stuff.”
Inner Me squeaked,confirmed! This woman must be Katrina!
I silenced her with a short,that could be a coincidence. We must confirm it first.I forced a bright smile. “Documentaries? Sounds so fun.”
“Hope so,” she chirped.
“Well, help yourself to the shop. WiFi password is on the board. Should be a quiet day. What name should I put on the order?”
"Kat is fine."
"With a K?" I managed to ask without choking.
"Perfect."
My mind tumbled over all she'd just revealed. Kat was close enough to Katrina that I dropped thepresumedand mentally thought of her as Katrina. If that hadn’t been enough,filmmakinganddocumentaryall but confirmed it. Katrina settled into a chair near the wall that gave her a sweeping view of the entire shop as well as outside.
By sheer willpower, I managed to avoid looking at her every other second, but it wasn't easy.Park myself in the corner for nowturned into an hour.
Then two.
Then three.
By ten o’clock she hadn’t budged from her spot. I couldn’t even snoop on her computer screen because of the angle of where she sat. Every now and then, I thought I saw a glimpse of a familiar social media site in the reflection of the window, but I couldn't be sure. She spent most of her time staring outside, deep lines between her eyebrows.
Whenever I could, I snuck a glance at my phone to check Jess’s social media group. Of no great surprise was the fact that Katrina had activated and posted several times in the main Jess group. Mostly excitement for the launch, nothing that would give her away as being here, unfortunately.
Also nothing of concern.
I doubted she wanted to sniff out the Jess mystery alone, anyway, with all her girlfriends coming tonight. She didn’t seem all that rushed, either. Instead, I pegged her as . . . watchful. Maybe hopeful. Nothing rabid, at least.
Somehow, I had to figure this out. The mystery of it would slay me if nothing else. But there was no way to really suss out the truth unless I cut her a super straightforward question.
Are you stalking Jess?
That seemed even more awkward. Plus, too high-risk. It might make it seem like I knew Jess. Questions and attention would follow. I had to either be more subtle, or not engage at all.
The implications of this woman being Katrina spread out. How long would she stay? Why was it worth it to her to figure out Jess in real life? There had to be some other motive behind it aside from sheer curiosity.
There could be a lot more people in on this, too. What if she had a separate conversation with other people that I couldn’t see? She could be planning said documentary right now. She'd mentioned filming. Had she been haunting different neighborhoods or talking to other people to try to find Jess? I pictured her walking down the street, camera in hand, using a creepy voice to narrate her thoughts out loud.
Nowyouare getting creepy,Inner Me said.
