Welcome to Nevermore Bookshop

by Steffanie Holmes

  Here I am, talking about our first kiss as though it’s inevitable.

  “Quoth,” I breathed. Even his name is poetry.

  “Yes?”

  “Don’t tell the others about this yet. Please.”

  “Mina—”

  “I just… I need time to process it, okay? Promise me you won’t tell.”

  “I promise. But you should tell them.”

  “I will.” I squeezed his hand, and my heart squeezed and tightened, too. I was supposed to have years left, but it might only be months before I went blind and so many pleasures were no longer open to me. Quoth’s warm hand in mine steadied me about the darkness on the edges of my eyes and the darkness inside me that threatened to take over.

  He was right, of course. I would mourn. I would mourn my motherfucking arse off. But now was not the time, not while I still had eyes to see. It was time I stopped giving a fuck about what other people thought of me and my life and my relationships. Maybe I needed to live to excess and indulge all my senses while I still had the use of them.

  Maybe it was time I took Morrie’s challenge to the next level.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “… I think the KT Strange werewolf rock band romance would be a great read for your Amalfi Coast holiday, and this book will make a lovely gift for your six-year-old niece,” I finished, holding out a beautifully-illustrated story about an elephant and his balloon to the customer. “Just don’t mix them up.”

  “Yes,” she beamed. “That’s perfect. You’ve been very helpful!”

  Warmth flushed my cheeks from her praise. There was something satisfying for the soul about helping a customer find the perfect book. “I’m so glad you’re pleased. I’ll just ring these up for you, and—”

  “Oh, no, no.” She whipped out her phone and tapped the screen. “I’m buying them online. They’re always so much cheaper. Thank you for the recommendations!”

  Rage flared inside me as I watched her meander into the hallway, tapping her way merrily through The-Store-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named. Thanks for wasting half an hour of my time. Heathcliff’s customer-ire was starting to make sense to me.

  “Croak?” Quoth landed on the desk in front of me, tapping his beak against the till. He’d stayed with me all night last night, perched on the end of my bed while I slept, his superior avian vision scanning the darkness for danger. I told him again and again to go back to the flat, that I didn’t need protecting, but he remained my solitary watchtower all night. We didn’t do anything more than hug goodnight before he shifted into his raven form, but I’d never been more intimate with a person before. We’d both laid a piece of ourselves bare for each other.

  “Go for it,” I muttered.

  Quoth fluttered out of the room and a moment later, a high-pitched squeal reverberated through the shop. I rushed to the archway and peered around in time to see the woman storm out, frantically dabbing at a stain on her shoulder with a lace handkerchief.

  Gotcha.

  The woman was so busy dealing with Quoth’s present, she crashed into Mrs. Ellis coming up the steps.

  “Where’s the fire?” Mrs. Ellis called gaily after the woman, who sobbed in reply.

  “Hello, Mrs. Ellis,” I held the door open for her. Quoth fluttered down and landed on my shoulder, his talons digging into my collarbone. “Are you doing okay?”

  “Oh, I’m surviving.” Mrs. Ellis took off her gloves, her hands shaking. Her usual rosy-cheeked complexion was pallid and sallow. “Mina, I wanted to ask you something. We’re having a little fete at the church after Gladys’ funeral on Saturday. She was important to so many people and I know she’d want to bring the community together even in death. There will be no tears, just good old fashioned fun. We wondered if you’d like a book stall, maybe even some of your book artwork? Perhaps your friend with the beautiful black hair might like to paint a commemorative picture—”

  “No.” Heathcliff said without looking up.

  Mrs. Ellis’ lip quivered. “Oh, that’s fine. I understand, of course. You’re very busy, you must be run off your feet. I just thought I’d ask…”

  “Ignore Heathcliff. We’d love to,” I beamed.

  “Oh, that’s wonderful.” Mrs. Ellis took an envelope out of her carpet bag and handed it to me. “Gladys would be so pleased. There’s all the information you need in there. You’re stall number twenty-three. We’ll see you at nine thirty a.m. tomorrow.”

  “Great! I can’t wait.”

  Mrs. Ellis leaned over and stage-whispered. “Have you made any progress on poor Gladys’ case? The police have taken Cynthia and her husband in for questioning. She tells me they’ve applied for a warrant to search their house!”

  If they’re closing in on the Lachlans, then they probably know something I don’t. And yet… “I don’t want to get your hopes up, but I did find something yesterday.” I explained about Mrs. Scarlett’s article defending Miss Blume.

  “Oh, yes, I remember something from many years ago… Dorothy hadn’t been very friendly with Gladys since. It doesn’t help that Gladys was always stirring the pot with the church committee. She attended service, of course, but she didn’t abide all that fire and brimstone claptrap Dorothy’s so fond of. She believed, as do I, that as long as it’s not hurting people, what’s the harm in a few astrology charts and a cream doughnut and a naughty magazine?”

  “Did Dorothy say anything when Gladys started the Banned Book Club? She kicked Mrs. Winstone from the youth group just for being a member.”

  “Oh, she bent the vicar’s ear, and we had to sit through a whole Sunday service dedicated to it!” Mrs. Ellis rolled her eyes, and I couldn’t help but giggle. “Dorothy’s a bible thumper if ever I met one, and without a good man in her life she spends far too much energy sticking her nose in where it isn’t wanted. I have half a mind to believe she ran that digger through the town hall in an attempt to shut us down! Why… but you don’t believe she could kill Gladys over the book club?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just a hunch. Besides, I wouldn’t know where she’d get the arsenic from, or how she’d administer it.”

  “Oh, Mina, I think you’ve cracked it! Dorothy works at the village pharmacy. Of course she’d know all about administering arsenic. I need to go to the police right now—”

  “Hold on.” I grabbed her arm. “We’ve got no evidence, only an old newspaper article and some wild ideas. If you go to the police now, they’ll just think you’re trying to draw their attention away from the Lachlans, and it’ll make them look harder. They might even take you in for being in cahoots with them.”

  Mrs. Ellis paled. “You’re right,” she whispered. “What do we do?”

  “Will Dorothy be at the funeral tomorrow?”

  “Of course! She wouldn’t miss the chance to lord it over the congregation, and gloating over Gladys’ coffin will bring her added joy.”

  “Then I’ll see if I can find out something while I’m there.”

  “Oh thank you, Mina. You’re an angel.” Mrs. Ellis kissed my cheek and shuffled off. My heart went out to her, losing a friend to poison, and being confronted with the fact it might’ve been another friend who did it. I still wasn’t certain about my Dorothy Ingram theory, especially not with the police investigating the Lachlans, but it was worth checking up on for my favorite teacher.

  Deep in thought, I turned to face a glowering Heathcliff.

  “Why are you trying to ruin my life?” he growled.

  I smiled sweetly. “I thought we were trying to sell books? Sometimes that means bringing the books to the people.”

  “We don’t do church fetes or writers festival stalls or football club fundraisers.” Heathcliff jabbed a finger at his desk. “We don’t do anything that involves me having to leave this chair.”

  “Look, Duke of Grumpingham, I’m trying to figure out who poisoned Mrs. Scarlett. Maybe you don’t care, but Mrs. Ellis was the best teacher I ever had. She wants me to help, and I care. I think this Dorothy Ingram mi
ght’ve had something to do with it – she definitely had a grudge against Mrs. Scarlett. The funeral is the perfect time to observe Dorothy, as well as Mrs. Scarlett’s other friends and relatives, and see who might be acting suspiciously.”

  Heathcliff studied me for a long moment, not saying anything. That intense look passed through his eyes, the same look he’d had when he kissed me – a wild turmoil of hunger and yearning and rage. The storm passed over, and he rested a hand on my shoulder. “You should take stock from the Theology and Children’s Book sections, as well as your book artwork.”

  “You’ll come help me run the stall?”

  “No. That old bint’s funeral is the perfect time to get a little bloody peace and quiet in this shop.”

  I stuck out my lip. “You’re no fun. I’m going to talk to Morrie. Are we still on for dinner tonight?”

  “Unless you changed your mind?” The words came out in a rush, as though Heathcliff feared my answer.

  “Hell no.” I smiled. “I’ve already made plans. And don’t worry, no fancy clothes are required. Where we’re going, even trousers are optional.”

  I hadn’t meant that line to be flirtatious, but Heathcliff’s eyes burned into mine, and heat crept up my neck.

  I raced upstairs. “Morrie, want to help me run a stall at the church fete on Saturday—”

  Morrie stood in the hall, staring into the open door of the master suite.

  “Morrie.” I stepped toward him, my hand raised, not sure what to do.

  “Fascinating,” was his only reply.

  I peered around him and into the room. My eyes could only make out a few dark shapes, but it was enough for me to tell that I wasn’t staring at either of the rooms I’d seen earlier.

  Dark bookshelves lined every wall. Instead of the spines of books, they held niches where rolled scrolls of parchment and paper sat in leather and silver holders. A large, rough oak desk stood in the center of the room. On top of the desk, an enormous book lay open, with tiny columns of text and ornate illuminated illustrations glittering in the dim candle-light. Behind the desk, the door to the pentagonal room was firmly shut. Curtains fluttered at the windows and the scent of wet ink stained the air, as if the room’s occupant had just ducked out and would return at any moment.

  I stepped toward the room and grabbed the handle to pull it open all the way. As I did, a white shape streaked between my legs and skidded into the room. The mouse dived under the desk and disappeared. I moved to go after it, but the door jerked from my fingers and slammed shut.

  I jiggled the lock, but it was stuck tight, with the Terror of Argleton locked inside!

  Chapter Fourteen

  “What the hell are you doing?” Morrie’s fingers dug into my arm. “You were trying to go in there. I thought we agreed none of us should enter that room.”

  “I was going to chase the mouse out. Now it’s trapped in a wormhole in space and time. It’s you who doesn’t remember that conversation,” I shot back. “You’re the one who opened the door.”

  He made a face. “Do you believe I would disobey a direct order from Sir Angus McSurlybritches? I came out of the bathroom and here it was, door open, contents laid bare. As for the mouse, let him rot in the void between dimensions. The village will probably give you a medal in addition to that reward.”

  “What’s going on?” Quoth appeared at the end of the hall, his naked body pale against the gloom.

  “The door was open again.” Morrie jiggled the lock and tapped the frame. “It slammed shut as soon as Mina tried to go in—”

  Quoth’s eyes widened. “You didn’t go inside, did you?”

  “It wouldn’t let me!”

  “What did you see?”

  “It looked a bit like a printer’s office or something. There were all these parchments in niches on the walls.”

  “Not a printer,” Morrie said. “A book-binder and copier. I think we might’ve just seen Mr. Herman Strepel’s 9th-century establishment.”

  My mind raced. It’s impossible. No way did we just open a doorway and see into a building that existed a thousand years ago.

  But then, it wasn’t any more impossible than anything else that happened in this shop, like the fact that I was having a casual conversation about a wormhole into space-time with James Moriarty and Poe’s raven.

  “Say you’re right.” I faced the guys. “What does it mean? Have you ever seen that particular room before?”

  Morrie shook his head. His eye sparkled with mischief, which, in his case, was a very bad sign. “Did you glimpse that enormous book on the desk?”

  “It was hard to miss, even with my eyes.”

  “It looked to be a catalogue of all the texts for sale, and the different scripts, illuminations, and decorations available to order. That’s exactly what you asked me to find for you. If we could get hold of it, we could see—”

  I folded my arms. “No. You’re not going in there and taking that book. You already took that empty book downstairs. For all we know, that’s made the shop’s magic more unstable.”

  “We don’t have to take it. We could just sneak in, peek through, and run out before anything happens. You went into the Victorian bedroom and nothing bad happened.”

  I hesitated. Morrie was technically correct. I’d spent a good five minutes looking around the room and nothing bad happened.

  “Mina,” Quoth’s silky voice warned. “Don’t let Morrie tempt you. He’s good at that.”

  I bit my lip. Yes. Yes, he is.

  Heathcliff chose that moment to barrel up the stairs. “What’s going on? There are customers downstairs asking questions and I need at least one of you to act as a buffer.”

  “Morrie wants to do something dangerous,” Quoth said.

  “And you’ve dissuaded him?”

  “Not in the slightest.”

  I explained to Heathcliff what just happened. “This feels important, like it means something. Doesn’t it seem odd that we learn books have been sold here ever since Herman Strepel’s day, and then the room offers us a glimpse into his office? I think Morrie’s right in that we should investigate—”

  Wordlessly, Heathcliff shoved past Morrie. He drew a key from his pocket and shoved it into the lock. When he flung the door open, we all crowded around to see.

  No candlelight shone to illuminate the gloom. From the square of light the hallway bulb and windows cast across the bare wood floor, I glimpsed a thick layer of dust, but nothing else.

  “I can’t see,” I cried.

  “Maybe you should move some ugly junk shop lamps up here too,” Heathcliff grumbled.

  “You wanker, how long have you known?”

  “Since that weird one with the fringe appeared beside the Crime Fiction shelf. Suddenly I can see how dirty the shop is. Now I have to clean up all the dust and grime,” he growled. “And it’s all your fault.”

  “The room’s empty, Mina,” Quoth said, stretching his neck to peer inside. “There’s nothing here.”

  Heathcliff slammed the door. “Are we all happy?”

  “I’m happy that the Terror of Argleton has been blasted into the past,” Morrie said. “But I’m not happy we lost our chance to peruse that book. Do you think if we open the door again, Master Strepel’s office will return?”

  “I think that standing around here isn’t getting the rent paid or the dinner cooked.” Heathcliff turned to me. “You’re not being paid to investigate magical occurrences. Go downstairs and mind the shop.”

  “Why can’t you do it?”

  He threw me a withering look. “Because I’ve got to get in the shower before Morrie uses all the hot water. I need to look presentable for a bloody date tonight.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  After closing the shop, I went over to Jo’s apartment to use her shower and collect the date supplies I left there. Back at Nevermore, I paced along the hallway, heart pattering like a teen girl waiting for the football player to pick her up for the school formal. Above my head, foo
tsteps thumped across the flat, and the sounds of swearing filtered down the stairs.

  Why am I so nervous? I see Heathcliff every day.

  Because I don’t go on a date with my book crush and try to convince him to be part of a polyamorous relationship with his best friend every day, that’s why.

  Footsteps thundered down the stairs. I spun around, and my breath caught in my throat.

  Heathcliff moved under the string of fairy lights I’d hung over the staircase, and his body revealed itself to me in glittering shafts of light. He wore a black shirt shot with golden threads that pulled across his broad shoulders in a way that made my mouth water. He’d rolled up the sleeves, revealing his tattoo of a gnarled tree and cursive script I’d never got close enough to read along one muscular forearm. He’d combed his hair back from his face, collecting it in a tie at the nape of his neck. Several recalcitrant curls had already worked their way free to spill over his face. Under the glow of the fairy lights his dark features softened, and his eyes sparkled with something that might have been excitement, if Heathcliff was capable of such a thing.

  “Right. Let’s get this over with,” he grumbled, although his voice had none of its usual edge.

  I’m going on a date with Heathcliff. The Heathcliff.

  A big, stupid grin spread across my face. The corners of Heathcliff’s mouth tugged upward. It wasn’t quite a smile, but it was his and it was special.

  “You look nice,” he said.

  I’d better. I followed Morrie’s advice and worn my red jersey dress over a pair of black leggings. This dress hugged what little curves I possessed in all the right places. I teased out my hair with spiky fringe and applied a little smoky eyeliner. Combined with my wedge-heeled boots and a string of blood-red rosary beads I’d borrowed from Jo, I knew I looked fierce.

  We pulled on our coats and scarves to ward against the winter chill. I held out my hand, and Heathcliff looped his arm around mine. “Where are we going?” he asked. “I hope it’s not a movie. I hate all the people crunching popcorn and talking, and the music is always too loud—”