The Magic Library Mysteries Collection: The Complete Series, Books 1-3

by Hillary Avis

  Dear Baby Emily,

  My grandfather gave me a cake plate for my first birthday. Every year since then, I use it for my birthday cake. This year’s cake will be number seventy-one. I hope you enjoy a long and happy life and eat many cakes, too. I’ll bake them for you in whatever flavor you want.

  I love you.

  Grandpa Aaron

  She’d cried a good half-hour over that card with an infant Emily in her lap. It was so moving, especially coming from Aaron. Her father-in-law had been a stoic man who never complained about keeping bakery hours or the inevitable backache he felt from decades of hard work. But he doted on Emily and baked a birthday cake to her specifications every year, even when the flavor requests were wacky things like “maraschino gumball” or “maple syrup and marshmallow.” Usually unsentimental about these kinds of things, Emily had taken her special cake stand with her when she went to college. She was probably the only freshman on campus with a cake stand in her dorm room.

  Now Allison gave cake plates to new babies, too, and passed along the story of Aaron Rye to those who would appreciate it. Crystal and Myra would, she was sure.

  She pulled into the driveway and spotted Myra in the back yard with the kids, so she walked around to the back of the house with the giftwrapped box instead of knocking on the front door. When Nia saw her, she ran pell-mell toward her and wrapped her little arms around Allison’s knees.

  “Hey, sweetheart. Let me put this down so I can hug you.” She set the box next to the back steps and leaned down to pick up the little girl. “How is it being a big sister?”

  Nia leaned to look down at the box and its shiny, bottle-and-bib-print paper. “Birthday party?” she asked. “Birthday for me?”

  “Birthday for baby Isaac,” Myra corrected gently.

  “Well, it’s kind of for you, too. Big sisters and big brothers are a special part of birthdays. Hold on a second.” Allison set Nia down and jogged back to the car for the cupcakes. When she returned with the foil-covered box—her DIY version of a bakery box—and lifted the lid, Nia and Jaden’s eyes went wide. Jaden made a grab for a fistful of frosting, but Myra caught his chubby little arm just in time.

  Allison grinned. “Should we wake up Crystal before we let them dig in?”

  Myra shook her head. “She needs her sleep. I’ll put a couple in the fridge for her to eat later.” While Myra squirreled away the leftovers in the kitchen for safekeeping, Allison supervised a crumb-and-frosting fest in the back yard. Jaden even had cupcake stuck in his eyebrows when he was finished.

  “More?” he asked hopefully, when Myra returned with a roll of paper towels and a couple sippy cups of goat milk. She giggled and wiped the frosting off his face before handing him his cup.

  Allison finished her own cupcake and brushed the crumbs off her hands. “So when do I get to meet that baby?”

  Myra dimpled. “I’ll sneak in and steal him for a second.” She returned a minute later with a tiny, green burrito in her arms. Little Isaac yawned and squirmed when the sunlight hit his face, his eyes squeezed tightly shut. Myra shaded his face with one hand as she gently transferred him to Allison’s waiting arms.

  Allison stared down at him, taking in the perfection of his miniature features. “I forgot how tiny they are! He really looks like Crystal, doesn’t he?”

  Myra leaned over the baby, beaming with pride as she smoothed the tiny, fluffy curls plastered to his head. “Nia and Jaden came out looking like their dad, but this one’s pure Mitchell. I see Al’s face every time I look at him. Just wait until Zack and Emily give you grandbabies. It’s love like you’ve never experienced, seeing echoes of your husband, your children, your parents, yourself—all mixed together in those new people.”

  Allison’s stomach clenched at the thought. Could she love a baby whose face was evidence of the destruction of her family—Paul and Elaine, Emily and Zack? She hoped that wouldn’t come to pass. Emily’s feelings toward Zack would change once she knew who he really was. But the longer Allison waited to tell her, the more pain she’d feel when she learned the truth.

  “Your arms getting tired already?” Myra teased, sensing Allison’s change in mood.

  She pushed aside her dark thoughts and grinned at her friend as she passed back the sleeping bundle. “This baby isn’t as small as he looks!”

  As she drove home, Allison arms felt scorched where the weight of the baby had rested. It was one thing to think about Emily and Zack getting married. Marriages could end. But a baby was forever. She would have to love it. And the thought was so sharply painful that it made her dizzy.

  Steering the car to the widest part of the shoulder, she braked to a stop next to a hayfield and rested her head on the steering wheel. Then, a wave of claustrophobia pushed her out of the driver’s seat and into the light. She paced the edge of the highway, counting the cracks in the asphalt while she took deep breaths that opened her lungs and chased away her nausea.

  A baby was years away. The wedding was still twelve months off at the earliest. Emily wouldn’t want a child until she was done with her internship and residency. And if they were still married by then, it was too late for Allison, anyway. Her memories of the library, of the Founders Tree magic, of Elaine’s wrongdoing—all of it would be gone.

  She’d love her grandchild. She probably would love Zack, too, as long as Emily was safe and happy, because she’d never suspect he murdered someone. That was the worst-case scenario. The best case was that she’d find a way to get Zack’s memories into the library before she lost her guardianship, so she could learn once and for all what his role had been in the murder. Maybe she was wrong and he’d had nothing to do with it. Maybe his strange fascination with snakes was just a coincidence.

  Her panic settled and she was finally able to look up from the ground without getting dizzy. She’d parked next to a recently mown hayfield, the cut grass laid out on the ground in rows as it dried out before being baled. A lonely mailbox stood by the side of the road. Mailboxes usually marked the end of a driveway, but this one was just out in the middle of nowhere. Behind it, about ten yards into the field, a crude, spray-painted piece of plywood was propped up into a crude billboard. Acreage for Sale. Contact Owner. A local phone number was painted underneath.

  She paused, staring at the mailbox. The field had an address. And it was for sale. Not that she had much money to spare for casual real estate purchases, but a field cost a whole lot less than a house. If she could borrow some of the bakery proceeds that were earmarked for Paul’s care, use it to buy the field, and then gift the property to Zack and Emily...

  She strode to the mailbox and popped open the metal door. Inside, a few pieces of junk mail crowded the space. She slid out the top piece and checked the name. Her eyes nearly popped out of her head when she saw who the field belonged to.

  Laverne Gauss. That had to be Leroy’s mother.

  She dialed the number on the plywood sign, crossing her fingers and mentally practicing her first few lines. Hello, Mrs. Gauss. I’m a friend of Myra Mitchell. You might remember me—my husband and I owned the Ryes & Shine in town? I just saw your property for sale out by Myra’s place and—

  “Yes?” The voice on the line was gruff and distinctly masculine, not at all the quavery old lady voice that Allison had anticipated.

  “Hello. Um. I was calling for Laverne Gauss? About the hayfield on Route 247 for sale?”

  A grunt. “Call me Leroy.”

  Allison suppressed a giggle. Leroy’s given name was Laverne? No wonder he was such a crab. “I might be interested in purchasing it. What’s your asking price?”

  “Depends on how much land you want. Come on by the police station in Remembrance and we can talk turkey. I’ll be here all afternoon.” He hung up.

  She squinted against the glare on her phone’s screen to check the time. She still had an hour before Taylor expected her back. Just enough time to make hay while the sun shone.

  Chapter 14

  Kara’s desk at t
he police station was empty.

  “On patrol,” Leroy grunted, noticing the direction of Allison’s gaze. “Told her not to sit around here moping all day.”

  She dragged her eyes back to him where he sat in front of the metal door that led to the holding cells. “What’s the smallest amount you can partition?”

  He shifted his toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other. “Ten acres, I guess.”

  “You guess?”

  “Yup. Any less than that and you won’t have creek rights.”

  “I don’t need them,” she said quickly.

  He stared at her. “Sure you do. Why pay for prime silt loam if you’re not going to irrigate? That cuts your value per acre in half.”

  “Don’t worry about my finances. How much for one acre, near the road?” Allison held her breath and crossed her fingers.

  “OK, Miss Moneybags.” Leroy leaned back in the desk chair and put his hands behind his head. “One acre, one hundred K.”

  Allison choked. “That’s highway robbery,” she croaked. “A hundred thousand dollars for an acre of hayfield?”

  “Fair price for a home site.”

  “No water rights. No utilities. No pad, no septic, no driveway.” Allison ticked off the property’s flaws on her fingers. “It’s not a home site and you know it.”

  Leroy shrugged. He spun in his chair and used the heel of his cowboy boot to push off from the door, sending the chair rolling across the room until it slowed to a stop next to Kara’s desk. He peeled a sheet of yellow paper from the top of a Post-It pad, crumpled it up, and tossed it in the trash can like it was a basketball goal.

  “I’m serious,” Allison said desperately. She worried her lip, doing some mental calculations. “I can do fifty.”

  He burst out laughing so hard that his toothpick fell on the floor. “Good luck finding what you’re looking for, then. But I’ll tell you, there’s nothing else out there. No lots of any size at that price unless you go over to Eastern Oregon. You haven’t got a prayer. Call me back when you wake up and smell the cow patty. ’Course, the price might be higher then.” He winked as he slid another toothpick out of his shirt pocket, leaving the one he dropped to dry on the floor.

  Allison picked up her purse and stormed downstairs. She stood outside on the sidewalk in front of City Hall, steaming. Leroy thought he ran the town because he had a gun on his hip and a badge on his chest. Well, he had another thing coming. He might own the land, but she owned something more valuable. She owned his memories.

  SHE CAREFULLY ADDED the last period and set the pen down next to the pages she’d torn out from a book titled Real Estate Deals. Flicking back a few pages to the beginning of the handwritten section, she reread what she’d added to the book.

  “He studied Mrs. Rye’s face. Her eyes were tired, and he felt for the woman. Her husband ill, her business gone...” The words bloomed into reality in front of Allison’s eyes, and she sank into Leroy’s memory, feeling the weight of the sheriff’s badge pulling slightly at her shirtfront as she leaned forward in her chair, considering whether or not she should take the woman’s offer.

  She wasn’t doing much with that land, anyway. She didn’t even need that much hay—that’s why she was getting rid of the parcel. It was just a pain in her hindquarters to seed it and mow it and bale it and keep the fences in good repair.

  “Ten acres for ten K,” she finally said. “That’s the best I can do for you. That way you’ll have water rights in case you want to sell it down the road.”

  “Perfect. You’ve got a deal.” The woman standing in front of her stuck out her hand and smiled.

  Allison shook it, glad to give her some consolation. It made her feel like a good person. She was happy her mother was there to witness it.

  “I’m proud of you, son,” Mother chirped from her perch on the seat of her walker. “It’s the right thing to do.”

  “I’ll draw up the paperwork and arrange for the notary, and you can drop off a check tomorrow and sign the paperwork,” Allison said, warmed by her mom’s praise. “Might want to stop by the bank today and get the check—they’re closed tomorrow.”

  Mrs. Rye gave him a grateful smile. “I’ll do that. Let’s all meet at your mom’s place around nine to sign the papers. I’ll bring you some of my muffins, Mrs. Gauss—I remember how much you enjoyed them when you stopped by the Ryes & Shine back in the day.”

  Mother beamed, probably enjoying the thought of telling everyone at church what a wonderful son she had, and Allison felt a tug of emotion as the memory dissolved into thin gray wisps and faded altogether.

  She snapped the book closed, satisfied. The memory was in Leroy’s head. Now all she had to do was write in a matching memory for Mrs. Gauss, get a check from the bank, and watch Leroy squirm when he tried to get out of the handshake deal under the watchful eye of his dear Mother.

  Taylor knocked on one of the glass panes of the back door, a puppy under each arm, jolting Allison out of her satisfied reverie. She quickly stood up from the table, moving the books to obscure the pen and torn pages before going to the French doors to let him in.

  “They all went,” he announced as he put the dogs back in their pen and retraced his steps to retrieve the other two. The green puppy, Wilson, whined against the wire until Taylor remembered to go get his tennis ball, too. Serena promptly stole it from him, batting it around the pen as she tried to fit the ball in her tiny mouth. Taylor cracked up and dug the second ball out of the bedding to give to her. “I swear, they do that every time.”

  “Have you picked a name for Mr. Red, here?” Allison watched the biggest puppy attempt to scale the wire and then, before he reached the top and tumbled out, gently unhooked his paws and placed him back down by the food bowl.

  “I think it should be Everest.”

  “Like the mountain?”

  Taylor nodded solemnly. “He likes to climb, and he’s not afraid of anything. Plus, he’s the biggest.”

  “I thought you were going to pick a tennis name!” Allison teased.

  “If you don’t want it to be Everest, then choose a name yourself!” he snapped, his cheeks blazing red. “The new family will probably change it anyway, so it doesn’t even matter.”

  Allison blinked, surprised by the heat in his voice. “It’s a good name, Taylor. It fits. He’s an adventurer, like you.”

  He stared stubbornly at the floor until she reached out an arm around his shoulders and gave him a gentle squeeze. He melted into her suddenly, grabbing her around the waist in a tight hug as a sob rippled through his narrow frame.

  She patted his back, bewildered. “What’s wrong, sweetheart? You want to talk about it?”

  He shook his head, pulling away as he scrubbed his eyes with his fists. “Can you just pay me, please?”

  “What’re you going to do with the money?” she asked, trying to lighten the mood as she located some cash in her purse. She held it out to him and he took it, eyeing her warily.

  “If I tell you, are you going to tell my grandma?”

  She sighed. She couldn’t lie to him. “I might. If it’s something I think might be dangerous to you, then I’d have to tell her.”

  His face hardened, his jaw working under his skin before he turned and stormed out the front door.

  Maybe she should tell Michelle. Taylor was obviously up to something. But then again, Allison was up to something, too, and she didn’t have time to waste. She needed to get Mrs. Gauss’s memories into the book and then make it to the bank before it closed. Taylor hadn’t earned enough money to buy anything truly dangerous, anyway. At least, not yet. She’d give Michelle a heads up before he got into too much trouble...and after she had Zack’s memories in the library.

  She shifted the books on the dining table aside and located the pen where she’d hurriedly stashed it and sat down to write.

  Chapter 15

  Saturday

  “Thank you very much!” Allison handed over the check and tugged her copy of the
signed paperwork out of Leroy’s stunned hands. He stared at the check and then back at her, his mouth half open.

  “Well, that’s my cue!” The traveling notary packed up her laptop and gathered up the detritus of the transaction, stuffing it all into a leather satchel. After a round of brisk handshakes, she left to drop the paperwork at the escrow office in Elkhorn.

  Mrs. Gauss beamed at her son from her plush, overstuffed armchair and gleefully stabbed her enormous blueberry muffin with a fork, sending crumbs of the streusel topping tumbling onto her lap. “Get her a cup of coffee or tea, Leroy. Do you take cream?” This last question was directed at Allison.

  Allison shook her head and rose from the plastic-covered sofa. “I’m afraid I need to get to work. Thank you anyway, Mrs. Gauss. Enjoy the muffins.”

  “Come to church with me tomorrow?” Mrs. Gauss singsonged the question. Before Allison could give a polite, noncommittal answer, she added, “Leroy will be there if he has any sense. A woman who can bake like this is one in a million. You two make a darling couple.”

  “I’m afraid I’m taken.” Allison gave her a mortified smile and flashed her wedding ring, as if that were the only reason she didn’t jump Leroy’s bones.

  “All the good ones are.” Mrs. Gauss gave a small, disappointed sigh and took another bite of muffin.

  “I’ll walk you out,” Leroy said gruffly.

  Conscious of his glowering presence behind her, Allison made her way along the fence that divided the front yard from the back yard until she reached her car, which was parked next to Leroy’s SUV in the wide grassy area that served as Mrs. Gauss’s driveway. She ignored him as she unlocked the driver’s side.

  “Witchcraft,” he said in her ear, his breath hot against her neck. She jumped, scratching the paint as her keyring clanked against the door. She turned to face him, her back against the car.

  “Pardon?”

  He smiled, but there was no kindness behind it. “That’s all I can figure. How else did you talk me into parting with ten acres for this figure? The town’s going to have a field day with this. No pun intended.”