Chapter 2In the guest room, the room that’d once been his, Cade set down bacon and cheese on the writing-desk. The open window billowed white linen and sea breezes; he leaned elbows on the sill, eyes closed, breathing nearby ocean and bracing air. His parents had left him both the inn and its thriving profits; they were a waystation for every Rus’ trader and exploring expedition, as well as the village gossip center. Leigh and Marian Bell had loved the place; they’d built it.
His pocket felt strangely heavy. He touched fingers to it. A pearl. Out of the ordinary, far from home.
He curled up atop the bed—a guest bed, because he’d said he wouldn’t come home and his father had finally rented out the room two years ago—and reread Felix’s flamboyant scrawl. He tried to think of operetta lyric
