Kate Carlisle - One Book In The Grave

I stared at him in surprise. “Jeez, Max, it’s not like she threw the book away. She was planning to keep it forever. She didn’t even want me to restore it.”

“Maybe not, but as far as she knows, I’ve been dead for three years. She might’ve sold it by now, anyway.”

I slapped his arm lightly. “Dude, it was stolen. You need to have a little faith.”

“I gave up on faith a long time ago, Brooklyn.”

I stared heavenward. “Where’s my violin?”

“Brooklyn,” Derek said in a warning tone.

“Max knows I love him,” I said to Derek, then smacked Max’s arm again. “That’s a love tap and my little way of telling you to lose the doom-and-gloom attitude. We’ve all had a long day, and your whimpering is starting to bug me.”

He frowned back at me and we had a brief standoff. Finally he said, “I’m a soulful artist, Brooks. Doom and gloom is my stock-in-trade.”

“Oh, please.” I made a scoffing sound. “You make goat cheese.”

He flinched, then choked out a laugh. “Come here.” He grabbed me in a choke hold and gave my head a noogie.

“Stop it,” I cried, laughing as I slapped at him like a little girl. “I’m too old for this.”

He let me go and we both collapsed on the couch. We really were like brother and sister. It was amazing that we’d fallen back into the same old behavior patterns so quickly.

After a minute, I pushed myself off the couch. “I’ve got something to show you.” I found my bag, pulled out Beauty and the Beast and handed it to him.

Max unwrapped the tissue paper and stared at the book for a long time. Opening it, he ran his fingers over the dedication he’d written to Emily a little more than three years ago.

“I’m just going to say this once,” I murmured, standing next to the couch. “You should’ve had more faith in her.”

He looked up at me and smiled crookedly. “You said it once already, so that makes twice.”

“Okay, smart-ass,” I said, smiling. “That’s the last time I’ll say it.”

He studied the book, his slow breaths in and out the only sounds he made. A minute later, the smile was gone as he gazed at me again. “I lost faith in everyone, Brooklyn. I was thirty-two years old, but in a lot of ways, I was still a kid and scared to death. I couldn’t deal with the insanity, so I ran. Maybe that was a mistake, but I couldn’t see any other way out. And I’d do the same thing again in a heartbeat to keep Emily safe.”

“Oh, Max.” I sat and wrapped him up in a bear hug, then used his shirt to wipe the sappy tears from my eyes.

Derek and I drove back to my parents’ house later that night and managed to get a good night’s sleep in my luxuriously decorated bedroom.

When I woke up the next morning, I had a plan fully formed in my mind. I knew how we could find the answers to our biggest questions from last night.

The plan was simple. The Art Institute was close to Dharma, barely eight miles away in nearby Sonoma. The students and professors all lived in the area. Some were in my own family. Why not enlist their help?

“It’s not only simple and easy, it’s also subtle,” I announced, as Mom placed a platter of eggs, bacon, potatoes, and fruit in front of me. She’d insisted on waiting on all of us this morning. There was a smaller plate of toast, butter, and several different jams. Enough to feed a medium-sized country, as usual. “Are we expecting company?”

“Are we?” Mom said cryptically.

“Okay,” I said, letting that go. People had b‹?een coming and going through our house since I was a little kid. “Anyway, I’ll need you and China to help me.”

Mom’s ears perked up. “I can be subtle. What’s the plan?”

Derek walked into the dining room just then and shot me a look of incredulity. No, Mom wasn’t known for her subtlety and Derek knew it, but I figured we could work on it. Derek’s eyes narrowed on me. “What plan is she referring to?”

I took a good, long gander at Derek and had to smile. The man looked way too dapper for someone who had awakened in a strange house at the crack of seven o’clock in the morning. How does he do it? I wondered. He appeared ready to sit down at a baccarat table in Monaco and ante up two million dollars or so, then parachute over a cliff into shark-infested waters to rescue an errant nuclear device.

And he wasn’t even wearing a tuxedo, just jeans with a thick, forest green flannel shirt. So it had to be the British vibe. He’d been born dapper. He’d probably worn dapper diapers. Now, that was a weird image.

I chuckled at the direction of my reverie, then realized he was still watching me as he poured his coffee. He took a sip, then shook his head. “What goes on in that mind of yours?”

His voice was still a bit gravelly, so maybe he did have a tiny chink in his all-too-perfect armor. Good to know.

“You don’t want to know,” I murmured, taking a bite of toast.

“You’re probably right.” He sat down next to me, caught my chin, and angled my face so he could kiss me soundly. “Good morning, love.”

“Good morning,” I whispered.

Mom walked back into the room and set another plate in front of Derek.

“You don’t have to cook for us, Rebecca,” he said.

“Don’t be silly. I love cooking for you.” She sat down across from us and sipped from a cup of tea. “Let’s hear the plan.”

“Yes, let’s do hear all about it,” Derek said with a touch of sarcasm.

Flipping him a supercilious look, I said, “The thing is, Dharma’s a small town. Small-town people pay attention to things going on around them. They see things. They worry. They talk. This is the perfect place to ask questions.”

He shook his head but said nothing, so I continued. “I figured I’d walk around town, talk to people. My sisters might know something. They both took classes at the institute. We’ll noodle around, ask a few questions, and find out what’s going on with Solomon and Angelica.”

Derek leaned his elbow on the table-a very un-British thing to do-and stared at me.

“What?” I asked finally.

He rubbed his jaw in frustration. “You do realize these are the sorts of conversation that scare the hell out of me?”

“But this isn’t dangerous,” I said, grabbing my mug and taking a long sip of coffee. “It’s going to be easy. And we need to find out who was shooting at us yesterday.”

“Somebody was shooting at you?” Mom cried.

I clamped my mouth shut. Crap! I am a loose-lipped nincompoop! Glancing sideways at Derek, I could see he agreed.

“Nobody, Mom,” I said quickly. “It was a hunter who was in the wrong…um…”

“Oh, stop trying to lie,” she said. “You’ve got to be the worst liar in the world.”

“I get that a lot,” I muttered.

“This is why I don’t want you asking questions around town,” Derek said. “It’s dangerous, and now you’ve upset your mother.”

“Darn tootin’, I’m upset,” Mom said. She pressed her hands together in a yoga mudra, closed her eyes, and began to breathe deeply.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” I said. “Okay, yes, someone did take a shot at us out at Max’s farm. Derek’s right. It’s too dangerous to have you asking questions around town. You could get hurt, and I would never forgive myself.”

She popped one eye open. “What kinds of questions are you talking about?”

“Um, well, I was thinking we could ask if there’s anyone in the area who reloads their own ammunition. I’ll pretend I want to learn how.”

“But that’s a lie,” Mom said, opening both eyes and reaching for her teacup.

“Of course it is.”

“You’re no good at lying, remember?”

“I’m working on it, Mom.”