Smile Beach Murder, page 2
“My high-school helper quit high and dry last week when she realized lifeguarding was more lucrative than slinging books,” Antoinette said. “That gives you an idea of my pay scale.”
Shading my eyes, I peered straight into her face. “I’m prepared.”
“What do you know about working in a bookshop?”
About as much as I knew about quantum mechanics. Newspaper work was my true vocation.
And it was a dying vocation. As was working in a bookshop.
Temporary measure, I reminded myself. My plan, hatched during my post-run shower thirty minutes earlier, was to keep publishing independent articles on my online portfolio in the hopes of attracting a daily newspaper job. I was going to get back to being a reporter ASAP. If not in Charlotte, then in any other city that would have me. “I promise to make myself useful for as long as I’m on-island,” I said.
“You know your way around a coffeepot?”
“Like a pro.”
“Wheels?”
I gestured to a Honda Civic, my trusty two-door steed, parked in one of the coveted spots along Queen Street. The front and rear tires had caught the curb.
Whoops.
“My on-island delivery service is a big hit,” Antoinette said. “Locals put a high value on face-to-face interaction. You can drive, or walk, if you have the time and inclination. I don’t care, as long as people get their books.”
“I’m hired? Just like that?”
She glanced at the bookshop’s front bay window, where Tin Man was sitting, swishing his tail and training his amber eyes on the seagull that had descended upon the abandoned taco. “You earned this job, as far as I’m concerned,” she said. “Work whenever you want. My hours of operation are somewhat sporadic, as you probably remember. But we’ll figure it out. Just don’t rack up more than twenty-five hours a week.”
Something like relief washed through me. Was this the job I really wanted? No. Was it better than no job? Yes. “Thank you,” I said.
“Tin Man isn’t the only new thing around the MotherVine since you were home for Christmas. I’ve made a big change. Did your uncle tell you?”
“You know how he is.”
She spread her arms before the red door. “Come on in and see for yourself.”
3
The shop’s front corner still hosted a reading area, though the magnolia-patterned armchair where my mother spent so much time had been replaced by two microfiber papasan chairs. Many afternoons growing up, I’d walked straight from school to here, to find Mom taking a break from work. Sometimes thimbles still adorned her fingertips as she turned the pages of the latest book by Mary Higgins Clark. If I had a nickel for every time I’d heard Antoinette laughingly say, “This is a bookshop, Teri. Not a library,” or every time my mother declared, “Good old MHC never lets you down.”
I turned down the main aisle, aware of Antoinette watching me. The floor creaked as sunlight slanted and dust motes hovered. I inhaled the aromas of coffee and paper and ink. As far as layout went, the MotherVine hadn’t changed. The cookbooks faced the coffee station. The children’s titles were still in the vicinity of the off-limits staircase, which led to second-floor storage. Pots of lavender graced every windowsill.
“What’s different?” I asked. That was when I noticed the fruit-scented breeze, and the back door, flung wide. “You opened the mother vine to the public?”
She grinned.
Out back, a sun-bleached pergola shaded wrought-iron tables and chairs. A few tourists—their too-pink cheeks and fanny packs were dead giveaways—sat quietly, sipping beverages and browsing through books they had selected from the shop. Beyond the tables, stone pavers transitioned into soft dirt, and the pergola became a living ceiling: the tendrils of the mother vine, which gnarled up from the rear of the yard. Serrated leaves and bunches of bronze grapes twisted over the trellises, stretching all the way to the surrounding privacy fence, slatted to allow the breeze.
Each table featured a copper platter full of grapes and a placard that read:
The world’s oldest known progenitor of Tinnakeet grapes grows here, in this small patch of land. Five centuries ago, Native Americans and the earliest European visitors might have plucked grapes from this very spot. The vine has survived countless hurricanes as well as permanent settlement. Like books, with proper care, the vine will survive long after we are gone. Thank you for not picking the grapes or disturbing the vine in any way.
—The Mgmt.
Antoinette had never allowed customers out back, for fear they’d tamper with the vine. So it was always a special treat come August, when she asked my mother and me to help with the main harvest. The rest of the year, the most we saw of the vine was whatever we glimpsed through the back window.
“Nowadays, people want more than books,” Antoinette said as we stepped outside. “For one thing, they want selfies with Tin Man. He’s sort of internet famous.”
“A social media sensation?”
“He’s got Instagram flair. Good thing, since it’s the only advertising I can afford these days. So far, I’ve been able to avoid selling puzzles and games and a lot of other novelties because I have this little piece of natural history to offer.”
“It’s beautiful,” I said. “Like an oasis.”
“The grapes are free, y’all,” she announced to her customers. “The books are not.” We’d reached the vine. From it, she plucked a perfect orb and popped it between my lips. Flavors crashed over my tongue. Wine and jam and spindrift. “Welcome home,” she said.
* * *
• • •
Back inside, before a seashell-bordered mirror, Antoinette fluffed her curls. Then, reaching behind the checkout counter, she grabbed her phone and wristlet-style wallet. “Now that your little orientation’s over, I’ve got to run some errands.”
“But I don’t know how to do anything,” I said. “I can’t even open the register. Let me run errands for you.”
“What’s the point of hiring an assistant if I don’t get to soak up the sun every now and then? I’ll be back in ten. Maybe fifteen. Possibly twenty.”
“But—”
“If anyone comes in, greet them. They’ll browse without encouragement, believe me.”
“What if they want to buy something?”
“Stall. Turn on that Callie Padget charm.”
“Charm?”
“What’s the worst that could happen?” My new boss was out the door like a blur.
4
Tin Man, sitting nearby, looked up at me and meowed. “Guess this makes us coworkers,” I said.
He turned and strutted away, tail high.
The spinnable tower of new releases stood in the same old spot. I gave it a twirl, admiring the variety of book covers. Sweeping gowns, soaring vistas, a dog brimming with humanity. The typography enchanted me too, romantic cursives and cold-edged sans serifs and everything in between.
I hadn’t read a new release in quite some time. In fact, I couldn’t remember the last book I’d read. I suddenly wanted to remedy that, to read every book in sight.
I was devouring the first page of Cottage by the Sea by Debbie Macomber when a woman barreled into the shop, gauzy blond hair flying. She bolted for the far wall, the Local Interest section. Scanning the shelves, she collapsed onto the floor and started picking off the lowest books one by one. “No,” she muttered, stacking them beside her. “No, no, no . . .”
Eva Meeks. Older sister of Georgia Meeks, the only friend from high school I’d bothered keeping up with. I’d kept up with Eva too, by extension. She wore a lightweight Meeks Hardware sweatshirt, cutoff denim shorts, and low-top magenta Chuck Taylors that looked so old, I wondered if they were the same pair she’d rocked back in 1995.
I stepped closer. Eva’s head whipped up, and a thousand-watt smile lit her face. “Callie Padget! Come on over. I’m on to something.”
I knelt beside her. “What’s up?”
“The historical society wasn’t much help, and neither was the library, so I came here. Figured the MotherVine might point me in the right direction.” She paused to catch her breath. “Of course, I’ve already studied most of these books. And the ones I haven’t read don’t seem relevant.”
“Relevant to what, exactly?” I asked.
She glanced around, then leaned closer. “A treasure hunt.”
“Ah. Of course.”
Eva was the island’s foremost treasure hunt junkie. Blackbeard, the notorious pirate, was rumored to have hidden from authorities here in Cattail back in the day, and was definitely beheaded by them a couple of islands south. Many enthusiasts like Eva believed in his buried treasure—actual chests long-ago forgotten on the Outer Banks, waiting to be recovered.
I slipped a volume from the shelf. The cover showed a pirate ship pitching against an ominous sky.
“That’s a new one to me,” she said.
Opening to the index, I scanned until I reached the Ts. “Nothing about a treasure hunt, per se, but lots of references to treasure. See?”
“I’ll take it.” She snatched the book from my hands, then gave a self-aware laugh. “Wait—what are you doing here? You know how I get with stuff like this. I didn’t even ask about you! Last time I checked you were killing it in Charlotte. Miss Bigtime Reporter.”
“Taking a short break from the rat race.”
“Good for you.” As she got to her feet, she seemed weaker than I’d known her to be, as if the burst of activity had exhausted her. Maybe she’d had a rough night of sleep, tossing and turning as her mind waltzed with visions of rubies and sapphires the size of babies’ fists.
“Hey,” I said. “You okay?”
“I’ll call you. Girls’ night out at Salty Edward’s? Beers for you and me, chardonnay for my sister.”
“Definitely.”
Winking, she slid a twenty-dollar bill from her back pocket and tossed it onto the checkout counter. “In the meantime, I’m gearing up for adventure.”
* * *
• • •
Later that night, I had just fallen asleep in my old Murphy bed in Hudson’s loft. The humidity combined with the running and job begging had pounded me into an exhausted lump. But I’d forgotten to silence my phone, and it rang.
It was Eva, spewing words with the ferocity of a tornado. “Want to meet me? I know it’s last-minute. But I just had a big break. And it seemed like you could use some fun.”
“What?” I rubbed my eyes. “Meet you where?”
“The lighthouse.” There was a short, stabbing silence. “Oh my God,” she blurted. “I’m such an idiot. I’m so excited I just—”
“Don’t sweat it,” I said.
“I’m sorry.”
I sat up. Hudson’s little terrier, Scupper, was curled next to me. I massaged his neck. “I’m over it,” I told Eva.
“You sure you don’t want to join me?”
“Rain check. Tell me all about it tomorrow, okay?”
5
The next morning, Antoinette gave me the task of sorting books that had been dropped off in the MotherVine’s donation bin. The shop sold mostly new books, but to customers who didn’t mind stooping and riffling, wooden crates on the floor offered deeply discounted used books.
She set me up out back, where the scent of grapes wafted on the gentle breeze. The donation bin—an outsize plastic storage container—took up most of the table. Extra-musty or dog-eared books went into a box labeled free! while books in better condition were set aside for resale. I worked with a cup of coffee steaming at my elbow. Tin Man used the edges of the bin and box to scratch his chin, alternating between them.
Antoinette was strolling under the grapevine’s tendrils. She was just short enough to fit. Red half-moon reading glasses perched on her nose as she scrolled on her phone. “Listen to this review that just popped up. ‘Decent book selection, crap coffee. Their tea isn’t all that great either.’ Three stars. It’s like, excuse me, the MotherVine is a bookshop. And what about the free grapes? Doesn’t that count for anything?” She tossed her head, curls glinting in the sunlight that peeked through the grape leaves.
“I think the coffee here’s decent,” I said. “But maybe we could up our hot beverage game.”
“That didn’t take long.”
I tossed an abused copy of Death on the Nile into the free box. “What didn’t take long?”
“You said we.” Antoinette nodded at the bin. Tin Man had jumped inside, and his tail was flicking to and fro. “Watch him,” she said. “He’s prone to the munchies.”
I looked in. The cat was nibbling the corner of a like-new paperback. Grunting at his heft, I set him on the pavers. Then I reached back in to rescue the book he’d been chewing—and my jaw hung open. The cover showed a far-off woman huddled underneath an umbrella, pushing against a rainstorm. It was a copy of my mom’s favorite book, While My Pretty One Sleeps, by Mary Higgins Clark.
“Wow,” Antoinette said, wandering over. The scent of grapes clung to her. “That’s one of MHC’s lesser-known books. But your mother sure did love it. Did you ever read it?”
“Once.” Right after Mom had died. Up until that point I’d pretty much stuck to murder mysteries, the cozier the better. I’d refused to wear the sundresses my mother sewed for me, and I’d refused to read her books.
It took her death to make me curious: Why did she love this particular tale?
I soon found out. The main character was a fashion designer in New York City, Neeve Kearny, whose life of snacking on caviar and gliding through city streets in the back of a Lincoln Town Car was about as far away from my mother’s as I could imagine. Mom never complained about hemming housedresses or patching the occasional hole in a boat sail. But had she secretly dreamed of running her own Madison Avenue boutique, like Neeve in While My Pretty One Sleeps?
I examined the paperback, which would have been in great used condition if it weren’t for Tin Man’s teeth marks. “Do you still have . . .”
“The Mary Higgins Clark shelf? Didn’t you notice it yesterday? Let’s pay a visit.”
Just inside the back door was the MotherVine’s large selection of mysteries. Agatha Christie’s detective novels got prime, eye-level placement. Antoinette had a soft spot for Agatha because she was reportedly the first European woman to stand on a surfboard. In the shark-infested waters off South Africa, no less.
The classic mysteries gave way to hard-edged moderns starring down-and-out private eyes or unreliable narrators. On the other side of a tall window were the softies—mysteries that involved knitting and antiques and teashops and every other sweet theme you could think of. The cozies had been my favorites—but when my mother died, I’d picked up the book on her nightstand, and my adoration of Mary Higgins Clark began. Just like in the cozies, MHC’s heroines were professional, independent, and nervy. But they occupied a darker world, which mine had suddenly become.
Opposite the cozies was a shelf devoted entirely to MHC’s books. Antoinette stocked them partly because they were perennial sellers, but also as a tribute to my mother. The shelf was painted bright foliage green like all the other shelves in the MotherVine, but a small sign set this one apart.
Good old MHC never lets you down.
—Teri Padget
I ran my fingers along the spines. Where Are the Children?, A Stranger Is Watching, A Cry in the Night.
“Did I mention the employee discount here is a hundred percent?” Antoinette asked.
I looked up. “Are you serious?”
“Not at all. But just this one time, why don’t you take that copy of Pretty One home. On the house. Tin Man picked it out for you, after all.”
Maybe she was right. Perhaps a little Neeve Kearny would do me some good.
* * *
• • •
An hour later I was behind the counter, about to learn the MotherVine computer system. For all the after-school time I’d spent in this bookshop, I’d never seen it from this perspective. And I had to admit, I liked it. I liked watching customers stroll in, blink away the sun, and sigh as the cool—but not too cool—air-conditioning embraced them. Then they’d look around at all the books, each one offering them a chance to lose themselves, find themselves, or both.
It was also fun to discover what Antoinette had tucked away behind the counter: a bowl of peppermint candies, a felted mouse stuffed with catnip, and random supplies such as glitter, construction paper, and chalk.
I’d freshened our coffees, and she was giving an encouraging speech. “Remember. The many quirks of the computer system are part and parcel of the MotherVine’s charm. Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be,” I said.
And then a man rushed in. He was in his fifties, and his face was sunburnt except for the white shape of sunglasses around his eyes. He scurried over to a woman of similar age who was perusing the Local Interest titles, right where Eva had been kneeling a little more than twelve hours earlier. “Honey,” the man said, placing a hand on her shoulder. “I thought I’d find you here. Guess what I just heard? You aren’t going believe it.”
Antoinette and I exchanged a surprised glance. Then we both leaned forward ever so slightly, trying to be discreet about our eavesdropping.
“A woman jumped off Cattail Lighthouse last night,” he said. “They say it’s been almost twenty-six years to the day since this other woman jumped.”
With a sharp intake of breath, the woman clutched the book she’d been holding. “How horrible.”
“I know,” he said. “I didn’t think things like that happened here.”
Everything seemed to tilt and tip. Like all the books were about to slide right off the shelves.
