“I’m sorry, what?” She shifted her grocery bags to one arm so she could fish the inn keys out of her purse.

“Sawyer,” Pearl said, “take her bags.”

Sawyer? What? She looked around, and there he was, leaning against the edge of the inn’s deck watching the scene with amusement.

But Pearl’s command made him snap to attention. “Yes, ma’am.” He was by Eve’s side in two seconds, trying to pull the bags out of her grasp. She resisted—she didn’t want Sawyer carrying her stuff—which resulted in a tug-of-war.

“Give him the bags,” Pearl ordered.

Pearl had a way of making people do what she wanted—she always had. Underneath all that pastry flour was a spine of steel.

And what she was currently trying to do was get Eve to agree to participate in something called the “Auntie Festival” that was scheduled for the first weekend in October? And they seemed to need the inn for a town sleepover?

Town. Sleepover. What was this? Had she teleported into an episode of Gilmore Girls? Or maybe The Twilight Zone?

“Everyone sleeps at the inn? How would that even work?” There were only ten rooms—eleven if you counted the Pink Room of Pain.

She wasn’t doing it. And she wasn’t giving Sawyer her bags. They’d paused their tug-of-war while she spoke to Pearl, but with a swift, sharp tug, she succeeded in wrenching them from his grasp.

“Well, not everyone,” Art said. “It tends to be younger folks. Last year, Lucille designated the main floor for teenagers—and tucked the adults away in the upper rooms.”

“So you’re saying my aunt turned the upper floors of this place into hookup central?”

“That is not at all what he’s saying.” Pearl sniffed like she was offended. “People bring sleeping bags.” But then she grinned. “Though that is an interesting idea.”

“I keep telling you that Dennis Bates is ready and waiting for me to fix you two up,” Art said.

“The only reason to date Dennis Bates is that I might be able to sit in the bridge and have my revenge on people I don’t like by raising it when they drive up.”

Eve had to laugh at that. Dennis Bates, she remembered, operated the little lift bridge that traversed the river near where it emptied into the bay. There was a marina a ways up the river, and when taller boats came and went, the bridge had to be raised.

“However,” Pearl continued, “as tempting as that is, it would require me to actually date Dennis Bates, so that’s a hard no.”

“If you would just—”