Not so this morning. He waved to the group of fishermen crowded around the entrance to the pier, and not one of them returned the gesture. They all seemed to look right through him. When he walked past the Turtle Beach post office—which for some reason doubled as an old-fashioned roller skating rink in the evenings—every person inside cast him icy stares.
“Is it my imagination, or are we on the receiving end of some serious side-eye this morning?” Sam muttered.
Cinder kept her head held high, clearly unbothered by the drama. Sam envied her nonchalance.
Why should he care if everyone on the island suddenly seemed to hate him, though? A quiet, solitary life was exactly what he’d been looking for when he’d come to the Carolina coast.
Wasn’t it?
“I don’t know what you did, but it must have been bad,” Griff said, shaking his head as he leaned against the shiny red fire truck parked just outside the apparatus bay when Sam and Cinder arrived at the firehouse.
Sam felt himself frown. He’d been doing a lot of that lately. Frowning. When exactly was the relaxing part of his new stress-free life supposed to kick in? “What are you talking about?”
“Chief Murray is on a tear. He said he wanted to see you the second you got here.” Griff gave Sam’s right arm a poke.
Sam frowned yet again. “What was that for?”
“Just checking. I thought maybe you injured your swinging arm.” Griff shrugged. “It seemed like the only thing that would make Murray so freaking mad.”
“My arm is fine.” Unfortunately. Sam would have welcomed a torn rotator cuff if it meant he could get out of Guns and Hoses, but he was pretty sure even that wouldn’t do the trick. Murray would probably make him bat left-handed. Or with his feet.
Griff jerked his head in the direction of the firehouse. “Well, you’d better get in there. He’s waiting for you in his office.”
Sam nodded. “Thanks for the warning.”
Surely all of this drama wasn’t about bingo. He’d only been doing his job. That crowded lobby had been an accident waiting to happen.
That couldn’t be it. Why would the general public, and especially the fire chief, care this much about game night at a retirement home? It just wasn’t possible.
“Nash.” Chief Murray’s nostrils flared and his eyes went flinty when Sam walked into his office. “Do you want to tell me what the hell happened last night at bingo?”
Okay, so maybe it was possible for the greater population of Turtle Beach to be emotionally invested in bingo. Go figure.
“The crowd was too large for the space.” Sam shrugged. “So I followed procedure and shut down the event.”
“Tell me you didn’t.” Chief Murray sighed.
“I did.” Sam moved to sit down in one of the chairs facing the chief’s desk but decided against it when Murray pounded his fist on the disheveled stack of papers in front of him.
Sam would stand. Standing was good. It would also allow him to make a faster getaway if one was needed, which was starting to seem like a very real possibility.
“Bingo night has been a Turtle Beach tradition for more than twenty-five years, and we’ve never closed it down. Ever. What procedure were you following, exactly?” Chief Murray narrowed his eyes at Sam.
Was he joking? The answer to his question seemed too obvious for Sam to answer. “Well, sir, I followed fire code procedure.”
Murray rolled his eyes.
“Tradition or not, it wasn’t safe. People were packed into that lobby, and at least half of them were seniors with mobility issues. If there’d been a fire or a bomb threat, people would have been trampled,” Sam said.
“A bomb threat?” Murray let out a bark of laughter. “Son, do I need to remind you that you’re not in Chicago anymore? We don’t have bomb threats in Turtle Beach. We barely even have fires.”
“With all due respect, sir, a tragedy can happen anywhere. Any time. Any place.” Sam’s gut churned. He shouldn’t have to spell things out like this for a fire chief, for crying out loud.
He wondered if Murray had ever been on a call like the one that had ended Sam’s career in Chicago. Obviously not, or they’d never be having this conversation.
“You were out of line.” Murray threw his hands in the air. “Did you consider giving them a warning, or perhaps asking for a few volunteers to leave and come back next week?”
No, actually. Sam hadn’t considered anything of the sort—probably because he’d been too busy exchanging verbal hand grenades with Violet.
“My phone has been ringing off the hook all morning with complaints.” Chief Murray pointed a beefy finger at Sam. “About you.”
Right on cue, the red rotary telephone on the chief’s desk let out a piercing jingle. Murray closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. Cinder cocked her head at the ringing sound.
Murray picked up the phone. “TBFD, Chief Murray speaking.”
Sam shifted his weight from one foot to the other.
“Yes, I’m aware that bingo was shut down,” the chief said. “It was a mistake, and I apologize. As you know, Marshal Nash is new in town, and he just got a little overeager. We’ll make it up to you.”
The chief paused, then glanced up at Sam. “Actually, Nash himself will make it up to you. You have my word.”
Sam’s chest felt weighted down all of a sudden, as if he was being crushed by an elephant…or perhaps the antiquated expectations of a tiny beach town.
“Tomorrow at ten o’clock. He’ll be there. I promise.” Chief Murray slammed the phone back down on the receiver.
“Who was that?” Sam asked.
Anyone but her. Please.
If Sam’s boss was going to make him grovel to every bingo-loving elderly resident of Turtle Beach, he would. But he drew the line at apologizing to Violet.
Not that she would let him, anyway. He’d tried to help her get inside the senior center with her giant tray of cupcakes and look how that had turned out. They’d practically short-circuited the automatic doors.
“That was the director of the Turtle Beach Senior Living Center. She wanted to remind me that the proceeds from bingo night go toward the Turtle Beach Preservation Society. The residents are very upset. They’ve been saving up to donate more park benches up and down the dog beach.” Murray cast a pointed glance at Cinder. “I would think that would be a project you could get on board with.”
“It is.” Sam nodded, even though he still couldn’t quite work out how the lack of seating at the dog beach was his fault when he’d only been doing his job.