She got it—sort of. She remembered Lucille’s frustration when guests would steal the mugs, for example, or the hand towels, which Lucille had personally embroidered. So she supposed that if you were going to exist in a universe that contained mermaid figurines on every last surface, those mermaid figurines needed to be glued down.

The only mermaids not glued down were the giant fiberglass ones that stood like sentries outside the guest room doorways, probably because they were too big and/or too ugly to steal.

The figurines were one thing. They could be chiseled off their surfaces and thrown away. But the inn itself was falling apart. What had once been charmingly vintage wallpaper was now a peeling mess. The floors needed refinishing. The ceilings were spiderwebs of water stains.

But, she reminded herself, those things didn’t matter. They were problems to be solved by the new owner. She would have to deal with the indoor rain, but she could do that in the week she’d taken off work. She would fix the Mermaid’s roof and sell it, and her money problems would be over.

She smiled. She and Lucille had always shared a love of fairy tales, and now it seemed that Lucille was Eve’s fairy godmother, waving her wand from beyond the grave and making Eve’s pile of student debt disappear. She might even be able to get a less crappy apartment.

She rubbed the bump on her head as she surveyed the room she’d chosen. It was the only room without a mermaid guardian. Or a pile of mermaid shards. Though the first-floor back room did not contain a life-size mermaid, it did have a ledge above the dresser lined with keepsakes. Including a figurine of a little girl mermaid that Eve had hit when she swung her suitcase over her head to stash on a shelf in the closet. Unlike the rest of the inn, the figurines in here were not glued down, and the girl had fallen and bonked her on the temple.

It was possible she’d been slamming her suitcase around a little too vehemently.

That was Sawyer’s fault.

She picked up the statuette and inspected it. The girl looked sad. She sat with her tail tucked under herself as she stared wistfully into the distance.

Hmm. Eve spun in place, looking more closely at the room. On the far wall was a print of the Little Mermaid, but not the Disney version. The mermaid was floating in moonlit water gazing at a prince, who was standing at a stone balustrade.

This print used to hang in Lucille’s bedroom, and the sight was a jolt. Suddenly Eve was eight years old, curled up in Lucille’s bed, holding back tears as Lucille read the story of the mermaid who gave up everything for the prince she loved, only to watch him marry another.