“Oh, no.” Violet gasped. “Look what you did.”
Sam rolled his eyes. “I’m hardly the one responsible for this predicament.”
He reached for the button a third time, but so did Violet. Again the doors slid open and closed as the matching Dalmatians swiveled their spotted heads back and forth in time with the movement.
“Would you stop?” Violet groaned.
“I was just trying to help.” He held up his hands. “Be my guest.”
The dogs aimed their soft brown gazes at Sam, then at Violet, back at Sam, and finally came to rest on the teetering cupcakes. Sam caught a glimpse of their matching pink tongues as they panted in unison, fogging up the glass.
Violet slammed the button again, and this time, Sam had to reach out and prop up one end of her tray to keep the cupcakes from sliding to the ground. He probably should have let them fall, but good manners plus the strange shot of adrenaline that seized him every time she was in the vicinity prevented him from doing so.
Mostly the adrenaline thing.
Violet flashed him a tight smile. “Thanks, but I’ve got everything under control.”
The doors slid open a fraction of an inch and then froze in place.
Sam arched a brow. “Completely under control. Roger that.”
“You’re impossible.” Every polka dot on Violet’s flirty little apron trembled with fury as she pressed the button repeatedly, to no avail.
Three cupcakes hit the pavement—plop, plop, plop.
Violet’s face crumpled. Sam had never known anyone in his entire life who wore their heart on their sleeve the way she did. It would have been adorable if it wasn’t so completely maddening.
She spun to face him head-on. Another cupcake flew off the edge of the tray to meet its doom on the pavement. “What are you doing here, anyway? Do you even like bingo?”
Sam frowned. “Does anyone?”
Violet’s mouth fell open, her cherry-red lips forming a perfectly horrified O.
“I’m not here to play bingo.” He couldn’t think of anything he’d rather do less, except maybe argue with the nutty cupcake queen of Turtle Beach while two Dalmatians and the sum total of the town’s elderly population watched from behind a pair of malfunctioning glass double doors. “I’m on duty.”
“How so, exactly?” she asked.
“Tuesday night bingo is advertised all over town. For reasons I can’t begin to contemplate, it seems to be quite popular, so I’m here to make sure it’s safe.”
“Safe?” She let out a laugh. “It’s a bunch of senior citizens hosting a game night. How dangerous could it possibly be?”
Mercifully, the doors chose that moment to finally slide open, so Sam was spared the unpleasant task of providing Violet with examples.
Now he could finally get inside, count the bingo enthusiasts to make sure the size of the crowd didn’t exceed capacity, and get back to avoiding any and all Dalmatian altercations.
“Thank goodness.” Violet swished past him, carrying the surviving cupcakes as Sprinkles pounced on the dropped ones. Seconds later, the naughty Dalmatian followed hot on Violet’s heels, heart-shaped nose twitching at the frosting-scented air.
Cinder let out a tiny whine as the other Dalmatian trotted away. The crowd of retirees who’d gathered by the entrance to watch the ensuing fireworks between Sam and Violet slowly dissipated. Walkers clattered against the tile floor, headed toward the group of long tables stretching from one end of the lobby to the other. The bingo caller—a white-haired man dressed in a loud Hawaiian shirt, shorts, and athletic tube socks paired with Birkenstock sandals—sat at a smaller table at the front of the room. An area just to the right of the entrance had been set up for purchasing bingo sheets and daubers, manned by other residents of the senior center.
Other than the official bingo hosts, the crowd was a much more diverse bunch than Sam had anticipated. Couples, families with small children, teens, and tweens tucked themselves in and among the senior citizens. Sam spotted a few locals he’d come across since moving to the island, but a good number of the bingo enthusiasts were tourists, fresh from the beach with sunburned noses, damp hair, and sand in their flip-flops.
Sam had never seen anything like it, certainly not in Chicago. Wholesome was the word that sprang to mind, and Sam’s bruised and battered heart gave an undeniable tug as he stood there taking it all in.
What he was about to do wasn’t going to go over well.
“We’re so happy to have you join us, Marshal Nash.” One of the ladies at the sales table waved a newsprint bingo sheet at him. A minuscule Chihuahua sat in the wire basket of her walker and gave Cinder some serious side-eye as Sam approached. “It’s only five dollars to play.”
He held up a hand. “No, thank you. But please call me Sam.”
“Okay, we will.” She glanced at the two gray-haired ladies on either side of her, and they all beamed at him.
Another member of the trio cleared her throat and shot a loaded glance at Violet, who was setting up shop at a long counter adjacent to the bingo caller. “So you’re here just for the cupcakes, then?”
Sam snorted before he could stop himself. “Hardly.”
The Chihuahua growled, either at Cinder or at Sam’s apparent disinterest in Violet’s sugary offerings. He wasn’t sure which.
“Actually, I need to have a quick chat with whoever is in charge here.” Sam glanced around the room but couldn’t make much sense of the bingo hierarchy. “Could you point me in the direction of a responsible party?”
One of the women peered at him over the top of her purple eyeglasses. “Sure, our activity director is—”
The Chihuahua mom cut her off with a sharp elbow jab. “Actually, the person you need to speak with is Violet March.”
“Really. Are you certain?” Sam angled his head.
“What? Violet’s not—” Her friend with the glasses frowned and gave a start. “Oh right! Violet’s the one in charge. You should definitely go talk to her.”
Sam regarded the three women, longing for a single ordinary encounter with someone in this town. Just one. He’d take anything.
“All right.” He took a deep breath. “I’ll go have a word with Violet.”
“Excellent,” the Chihuahua-mom said, and they all grinned at him again, ear to ear.
Sam snaked his way through the ever-growing crowd with Cinder glued to his side. A few people reached out to pet her as they passed, but she politely ignored them and focused on the task at hand, just as Sam had trained her to do. The set of his shoulders relaxed a little when only two or three people mistook her for Sprinkles.