Coastal Cottage Calamity (A Logan Dickerson Cozy Mystery Book 2) by Abby L. Vandiver

her
head to the side. “Or kind words.”
    “No shooting
either,” Bay said. “I’m sure it says somewhere on there,” Bay pointed to the wad
of paper in her hand. “No snake-gun-toting old ladies allowed.”

 
    Chapter Ten
     
    I’d finally got
something to eat and was alone in my room. I sat in the middle of my four
poster bed, legs crossed Indian style and fired up my laptop. I took a bite of the
lasagna cupcake – all the ingredients layered in a phyllo dough shell and
cooked in a muffin tin – that I’d swiped from the kitchen and took a gander at
the pictures I’d taken.
    It was a good thing
that I’d stayed so busy all day (not a good thing about Oliver, I didn’t mean
that). It was best I didn’t talk about the fish until I found out more about
it. And knowing me, if things hadn’t been so chaotic all day, I would have
mentioned the fish to someone.
    After looking at
them on my phone, I emailed the pictures of the fish to myself. Pulling up my
AOL account I went in and downloaded them.
    “Okay, Mr. Fishy.
Let’s see who you are,” I said to the fish that was staring at me from my
computer screen.
    I typed “fish of
the Savannah River” into a Google search screen. Oh good, I thought
after reading one of the links. There are twelve hundred miles of streams in
Georgia.
    This is not going
to be easy.
    I found a list that
appeared to be pretty exhaustive of the fish in the area. Some I knew right off
what they looked like and could rule them out. Bass, rainbow trout, catfish
. . . Some I didn’t know, so I looked up pictures of them. Chain
pickerel, bream, crappies . . .
    I searched for two
hours, even finding other fish classified in the same family of fish I did know
to try and identify it. But I couldn’t find it, or anything similar to it, anywhere.
I fell back the pillow and kicked the laptop away with one foot and the plate
back with the other.
    How is it so hard
to find a fish?
    I put my pillow
over my face and let out a muffled growl.
    What the hey . . .
    I sat up. I needed
help. I looked at the clock. Midnight. My mother was in the bed. She’d be
groggy this time of night and wouldn’t be any help at this time of the night.
And I didn’t think she knew anything much about my fish anyway. But it made me
think. What would my mother do?
    I smiled. I knew
exactly what she’d do.
    I opened up my
contact list on my computer and found the name I was searching for. I had decided
to email a colleague. It was what my mother did whenever she couldn’t figure
out something. And she had told me it was good to network with people in other
disciplines – may come a time when you’ll need their expertise. “You never
know,” she had said.
    This was exactly
one of those times.
    I clicked on the “Email”
icon and typed in the email address from the contact I’d found. He was a
zoologist. And I remembered once that he’d told me that he wanted to
concentrate in ichthyology – the study of fish. Didn’t know if he followed
through, but I figure it couldn’t hurt to give it a shot.
    I wrote him a
quick message and attached a few of the pictures. I pressed send and closed the
lid of my laptop. I tossed and turned through the waves of my covers the rest
of the night, dreaming of Oliver, fish smoking e-cigarettes, and blonde-haired
mannequins.
    No more lasagna at
midnight.
    By the time
morning light fell on my room, it seemed as if I hadn’t gotten any rest at all.
I felt restless and still drowsy.
    Maybe a shower
will help ,
I thought sleepily.  
    Oh! I shot up. The
fish.
    So before I even
bothered to wipe the crust from my eyes or even brushed my teeth, I turned on
my side and pulled my computer close.
    Maybe he emailed
me back. A slight smile emerged subconsciously and I felt my heart pick up its
beat. Looking at my email I saw I had one message. It was from [email protected] .
    That was quick.
    I opened it up and
it was ten words long. All caps with a string of exclamation and