Chapter 16
It has not been in the pursuit of pleasure that I have periled life and reputation and reason. It has been the desperate attempt to escape from torturing memories, from a sense of insupportable loneliness and a dread of some strange impending doom
—Edgar Allan Poe
The fire station was close by, so it wasn’t long before the wail of sirens echoed through the night.
McCabe pointed at the garage. “I need to check on Clem.”
Nora followed him to the back of the structure and listened to him bang on the door. As he called Clem’s name, Nora turned to watch the smoke from the burning trees rise above the roof of Wynter House and drift toward the cemetery. The same wind pushing the smoke to the east whispered against the scarred skin of Nora’s neck. Her entire right side felt hot. The scars swimming across her skin from wrist to shoulder itched so badly that Nora wanted to tear off her shirt and rake her fingernails up and down her arm.
It was as if her body remembered being burned. It remembered how Nora had deliberately reached into the flames to pull a mother and toddler to safety. She’d been responsible for that fire. She’d been drunk. She’d forced another car off the road and had almost killed two innocent people.
Tonight’s fire was different. It was no accident. It wasn’t the result of rage fueled by alcohol. It was a targeted attack. Just like the fire at Nora’s house was a targeted attack.
This realization hit Nora on a cellular level. Heat rose through her layers of tissue and flamed her skin. Every scar itched while the healthy skin tingled with a pins-and-needles intensity. She felt like she’d swallowed the fire. Sweat dampened her clothes and pearled her forehead. Her throat was chalk dry.
“Clem! I’m coming in!”
McCabe’s voice broke through the smoke clouds in Nora’s head. When he pushed Clem’s door open, adrenaline swept through her body, obliterating all traces of numbness.
She was right behind McCabe as he entered the apartment. The only light came from a floor lamp in the corner of the living room, but Nora had no trouble seeing a torn and sagging leather sofa, a coffee table, and a TV sitting on a makeshift stand of plywood and plastic crates.
More crates rose up along the length of the wall. Each one was filled with books.
McCabe moved toward the kitchen, which was divided from the living room by a half wall. He flicked on a ceiling light, took a quick glance around, and headed for the bedroom.
Nora had been distracted by the books, so she was still in the living room when she heard McCabe swear.
From his tone, she knew that Clem was either dead or injured. She entered the room to find McCabe leaning over Clem’s body, his fingers pressed to Clem’s neck.
“Is he . . . ?”
“Yeah. He’s gone.”
Clem was on his back, his face turned toward the wall. His arms and legs were loosely splayed. His feet were bare. The lava lamp on the nightstand bathed him in blue-green light, and Nora could imagine him floating in a clear, calm pool of water.
As if he had the same thought, McCabe murmured, “He just went under and never surfaced again.”
Nora saw the band of rubber tied around Clem’s left arm, just above the elbow, and the syringe on the floor next to the bed. There was a piece of paper on the nightstand, resting on top of a short stack of books.
Noticing the direction of her stare, McCabe held up a finger. “Stay where you are and don’t touch anything.” Leaning over the piece of paper, he said, “The note says, ‘I killed my mom. The wolves were coming for me, so I asked her for money. Or for something to sell. But she said the treasure wasn’t for me. She’d let me die to keep her secrets safe. She made me so mad that I lost control. If there’s a hell, it’ll feel just like home.’ ”
Nora looked down at Clem’s silhouette. The blue light smoothed the lines of his face and she could see shades of the boy he used to be. A boy whose mom suffered from a mental illness. He’d lived with her addiction until he’d developed one of his own. After his siblings moved away, it had been just the two of them. Lucille had hidden inside Wynter House, while Clem was cloistered in the garage. They were simultaneously a few hundred feet and a world apart, each trying to escape the demons that refused to cease their relentless haunting.
“I wish he hadn’t been alone,” Nora whispered.
From the moment she’d first seen him in the backyard, Clem had unnerved her. She hadn’t liked the idea of him watching her. His proximity to Lucille and his involvement with the Red Wolves convinced Nora that he’d had a hand in Lucille’s death. Now that she knew this was true, she felt no relief. Just sorrow.
The sirens were close. Firefighters and other first responders would be there in less than a minute. They’d douse the trees and stray sparks with water. They’d save Wynter House.
Does it even matter? Nora wondered bleakly.
Lucille was gone. Clem was gone. Beck and Harper would sell, then up and leave. There would be no Wynters left in Miracle Springs. And what of Wynter House? Would it be torn down? Replaced by another three-story apartment complex or strip mall?
Maybe it would’ve been better to let it burn. The spirits in its walls would finally be set free.
While she’d been lost in her dark ruminations, McCabe had been snapping photos with his phone.
“Let’s go,” he said, taking Nora’s hand on his way out of the room.
“Did he set the fires?”
McCabe kept walking. “No. He’s been dead for hours.”
“What he said about Lucille—about them both going to hell—do you think he’s talking about the body in the bathtub? Like, he knew that his mom killed his dad?”
They exited the apartment and were immediately engulfed by a cacophony of sirens and flashing lights.
“Maybe he knew, or he was condemning her for being a bad mom,” McCabe shouted over the din. “Maybe it was both. He knew what she’d done and hated her for it. I’m sure he hated how he had to rely on her, just as she had to rely on him, to survive.”
Though Nora had never been able to picture Lucille as a murderer, her resolve was beginning to weaken. Lucille was an addict. If her addiction had corrupted her relationship with her children, it had probably tainted her marriage as well.
What if her husband threatened to get rid of her stuff? Maybe Lucille lashed out. Had she killed him in a fit of rage and then suffered the same fate at the hands of her son?
In the street, firefighters shouted to one another. Doors slammed as other first responders exited their vehicles. Red lights whirled through the darkness, boomeranging off the asphalt and the dense line of trees on the other side of the road.
Nora stood off to the side as McCabe conferred with the fire chief. She couldn’t hear what they were saying, but when McCabe pointed at the attic window and used his hands to mime an explosion, her gaze traveled from the burning trees to the peaked roof of Wynter House.
If the house caught fire, no one would ever see what was inside the locked chest, and the answer to that riddle might die with Lucille.
The fire chief moved off to supervise his team, and McCabe beckoned for Deputy Andrews and a team of paramedics to follow him into Clem’s apartment.
There was nothing Nora could do to help, so she sat on the curb in front of the cemetery and watched the firefighters turn the flaming trees into smoldering black sticks. Her eyes smarted from the smoke, so she put her head down, pressing her face to her knees.
Curled up like an egg, she suddenly realized how tired she was. Her bones were so leaden that she could probably fall asleep in the middle of all the chaos.
“There you are.”
Hearing McCabe’s voice, she raised her head.
He handed her a bottle of water and told her to drink. When she was done, he helped her to her feet and swept her hair out of her face.
“Andrews will run you home. We’ve got a long night ahead of us and I’m not going to have you falling asleep on the grass.”
“He doesn’t need to do that. I can drive myself.”
McCabe pointed at the cluster of vehicles blocking the driveway. “You won’t get out for hours, and you’ve been through two fires in two nights. You need a shower and a good night’s sleep. And cat snuggles.”
“You need rest as much as I do, but I know you won’t get it.”
He gestured around at the other first responders. “This is what we signed up for. Adrenaline will see us through, and when that wears off, there’s coffee.” His hand slid down her arm and closed around her wrist. “Andrews will drop you off on his way to pick up the ME. The doc’s car is in the shop and she’s right around the corner from my place. Our place.”
Nora felt the warmth of his smile as he opened the door to Andrews’s cruiser.
“Sheriff!” One of the firefighters waved at McCabe. “You need to see this.”
Nora glanced through the open door and saw columns of smoke rising from the blackened trees. The firefighters had extinguished the flames and were now using chain saws to cut the charred branches stretching toward Wynter House.
Other than smudges left behind by the smoke, which darkened the peeling paint in places, the house appeared undamaged.
One of the firefighters held a rake, and something was caught in its metal teeth. He walked to the edge of the driveway and stopped to show his discovery to his chief.
McCabe shut the car door and slapped a palm against the roof, signaling for Andrews to leave. Andrews put the car in gear, but hesitated for several seconds before crawling forward. As they moved past the circle of men studying the object in the rake, both Andrews and Nora craned their necks to see what it was.
With the strobing lights, Nora caught a glimpse of black fabric.
“Looks like a balled-up sock,” she muttered.
As the lights hit the rake again, she saw a glint of red and white. She felt like she’d seen the color combination before, but before she could sift through her memory, Andrews hit the gas.
Nora sagged against the back of the seat and closed her eyes.
Andrews drove in silence until he paused at a stop sign on a quiet residential street. “I’m sorry about your house, Nora. I know it isn’t much consolation, but we’re going to nail the guys who threw that bottle bomb.”
Suddenly the red-and-white threads stitched themselves together in Nora’s memory. “The Red Wolves,” she said in an icy voice. “Their logo was on that thing in the rake. A hat or something.”
“Yeah.”
“Why would they set fire to Wynter House? Clem couldn’t pay them whatever he owed if he was dead.”
Andrews darted a glance at her in the rearview mirror. “It was a threat. Their way of telling him he was out of time. That’s why they went for the trees and not the garage.”
“They’re not going to get a dime from him now.” Nora gazed out the window. “But they’re still out there, wanting someone to pay up. Does that mean Beck and Harper are in danger?”
“Don’t worry, we’re going to get whoever threw that Molotov cocktail because we have them on camera. We set up cameras all around the property, which is why we knew about the fire before the sheriff called it in.”
The unspoken question hung between them. When the silence stretched on long enough to become uncomfortable, Nora said, “I’ve been searching Wynter House for clues based on a book Lucille gave me.”
“Something about a lost library, right? Was it in that bag I gave you the day she died?”
“It was. The clues are hidden around the house.” She shook her head. “Actually, more like in the house. So far each clue has been a piece of dollhouse furniture and a miniature book. We were about to find the clue in the attic, when the fire started.”
Andrews turned onto McCabe’s street and reduced his speed. “Why didn’t you tell Lucille’s kids about the book?”
“Because she left it to me. There’s a reason she sent me on that wild-goose chase, and I wanted to get to the end and see what that reason was before I told anyone else about it.”
“Except the sheriff, that is.”
Nora made a chuffing noise. “Only after those Red Wolves bastards tried to burn my house down. Tonight was the last time he was going to let me look for clues. He was hoping they’d explain the bones in the bathtub. Or why Lucille was killed. But I guess we know what happened to her now.”
Andrews pulled into McCabe’s driveway and kept the engine running while he opened the back door for Nora.
“Will Grant tell Beck and Harper about their brother tonight?”
“He’ll go to the Inn of Mist and Roses as soon as I get back with the ME,” he said as he walked Nora to the front door. “They’ve lost half their family in the same week, and I know this sounds weird, but maybe, after some time goes by, they can finally let go of the past. All the memories. All the grief and guilt.”
Nora wondered if Andrews was talking about the Wynter siblings or himself.
A moth bumped against the porch light, its wings beating furiously as it searched for a way to get closer to the small sun inside the glass.
She didn’t think Beck and Harper would ever be free of their memories. They were as much a part of them as their blood type or eye color. They were like tattoos inked on the inside of the skin and could never be completely removed.
“I just hope all of this will bring them closer together.” Nora gave Andrews a weary smile. “Thanks for the ride.”
Andrews hesitated as if he had more to say, but seemed to change his mind. He touched the brim of his hat, wished Nora a good night, and jogged back to his idling car.
Nora had barely closed the front door behind her when McCabe’s cats came running. They meowed and purred, weaving around her ankles and dragging their tails across her shins.
After giving them some kibble, she took a quick shower and fell into bed. The cats hopped up too. Magnum, who had an uncanny way of sensing when people needed comfort, pressed his face to Nora’s cheek. She stroked the fur on the back of his neck while he nuzzled her, his purrs rumbling into her ear. Finally he curled up next to her and began to lick his front paws. Every now and then, his rough tongue would move over her hand as if saying, “There, there.”
Nora had never had a pet, and when she and McCabe first got together, she wasn’t sure if his cats would accept her. They’d always been happy for her to feed them and would sit on her lap from time to time, but they rarely cuddled with her the way Magnum did now.
Usually, when McCabe worked late, the cats spread themselves across his side of the bed. Tonight, however, they gravitated toward Nora, lying so close that she felt the weight of their warm bodies. They purred until her breathing slowed and she drifted into sleep. Even then, they didn’t leave her. They orbited around her slumbering form, their eyes probing the darkness for threats. Bookended by her feline sentinels, Nora slept without stirring until McCabe woke her with a kiss.
* * *
Though he’d only grabbed four hours of sleep, McCabe dropped Nora off at the Gingerbread House before heading back to the station.
Gus ushered her into the bakery and insisted on making her a cup of tea. “I’ve been experimenting again, so if you’d try my peanut-butter, chocolate-chip bread, I’d be real grateful.”
Nora had finished her tea and was on her second slice of bread when Hester entered the kitchen. Despite the flour and scraps of dough, she dropped her purse and keys on the butcher block and put her arms around Nora.
“Gus told me about the fire at Wynter House,” she said. “The chief was here a little while ago getting treats for his team. Are you okay?”
“I’m better now. I’m pretty sure this bread has healing powers. ”
Hester moved her purse and selected one of a dozen aprons hanging from a row of hooks near the sink. She tied the strings of a vintage-style apron decorated with pumpkins and fall leaves and smoothed the pleated skirt. “I’m so ready for fall. I know it’s still apple everything season, so I made two dozen apple spice muffins for the shop, but I’m itching to skip ahead to pumpkin season.”
Gus laid a hand on Hester’s arm. “Don’t wish your time away, darlin’. It goes fast enough, all on its own.”
“Can I wish for a cup of tea, instead?”
“I think I can manage that before I go.” He filled a mug for Hester and put it on the butcher block. “I’ll man the counter for a spell so you two can chat.”
Hester thanked him and turned an expectant gaze on Nora. “So, what happened last night?”
Nora told her everything. While she talked, Hester listened attentively, taking the occasional sip of tea. When Nora was done, Hester stared at her in astonishment.
“Are you safe? First your house and now this?”
“The sheriff’s department set up cameras around Wynter House, so they’ve got the make and model of the bottle bomber’s car on camera. The license plate was covered, but there can only be so many cars like that in town.”
Hester frowned. “If these guys are drug traffickers trying to scare Clem, then why go after you?”
“Maybe they knew he sold books to fund his habit and figured I might be able to influence him. I really don’t know.”
“And Grant is sure it’s a suicide?”
Nora tried to recall if McCabe had ever said as much, but couldn’t. “He hardly got any sleep last night, so I didn’t ask about the ME’s findings or anything like that. There was a note next to Clem’s bed. I assume he wrote it.”
“How sad.” Hester gazed down at her tea. “People always said Wynter House was haunted. Maybe that wasn’t the right word. Maybe it’s cursed.”
Nora thought about the bones in the bathtub. “People filled that house with secrets, and I don’t think all of them have been uncovered yet.”
“I feel sorry for Beck and Harper. I know Harper’s been awful to you, but she must be in a world of pain today.” Hester carried their empty mugs to the sink and hung her purse on the hook neck to the supply shelves. “Do you think you’ll see either of them again?”
“Only if they want to confront me for keeping The Little Lost Library to myself.”
Hester put on a clean apron covered with cheerful yellow lemons. “And after all this, you didn’t get to finish the scavenger hunt. It’s not fair. I know I’m a terrible person for saying this, but I want to know what was inside the trunk in the attic. And what about the library? You never even got a peek!”
Gus poked his head into the kitchen and said, “Sorry to interrupt, but Mrs. Lowry wants to order a gravity-defying birthday cake for her son, and I have no clue what that is.”
“Tell her I’ll be right there.”
Hester loaded Nora’s arms with bakery boxes and walked her to the door. “I know you don’t mind books with ambiguous endings, but it’s not always entertaining in real life. I hope you see Beck and Harper before they leave. Even if they blast you for snooping around their house, I hope they tell you the secret of the lost library. If not, that house might haunt you too.”
It already does, Nora thought.
Aloud she said, “I don’t think I’ll see the Wynters or their house again. And that’s okay with me. Now go find out what Mrs. Lowry wants. If a gravity-defying cake requires a magic touch, then she’s come to the right place.”
* * *
Nora was wrong about the Wynter siblings. She would see both of them again, starting with Beck.
The shop had been teeming with customers all day long. Not only were early-weekend visitors flooding the town, but locals kept pouring in, eager to hear the story of Nora’s house fire and to offer her sympathy and support. By three, she was completely out of candles and had only a handful of shelf enhancers left in the entire store.
After bagging a stack of expensive cookbooks for the general manager of the grocery store, Nora hurried back to the ticket agent’s booth to see if Sheldon was still alive.
“I can’t feel my hands or feet, but I’m here,” he said when she asked how he was doing. “We ran out of food before noon and we’re almost out of milk again.”
“Again?”
“Yeah. I bribed one of the Monday Moms to do a milk run for me. I told her she could have free drinks all next week, but she said she wanted to help you out and refused to let me pay her for the milk. Even though she stocked the fridge, we’re on our last cartons of whole and skim.” He gestured at the coffee urns. “They’re getting low too. Can you refill them and then go out and buy us a cow?”
Knowing she couldn’t leave Sheldon alone, Nora said, “We just need to make it until the high school kids show up. I can think of several who’d be happy to get us milk in exchange for a free paperback.”
Sheldon gasped. “¡Dios mío! It was so crazy when I got here this morning that I didn’t have the chance to tell you about the book thief. I know who it is!”
“Who?”
“A boy. A small, skinny kid with Harry Potter glasses. He looks so much like HP that I wouldn’t be surprised if he lived in a closet under the stairs.”
Nora paused in the act of scooping grounds into the filter basket. “Did you catch him on camera?”
“Yep. He helped himself to a Leigh Bardugo paperback. Guess the kid has a thing for feisty fantasy heroines.”
“I’ll deal with him later. Right now, I need to help you with this line and then shut down service for the day. You need to go home and I need to concentrate on selling books.”
Sheldon jerked his head toward the Readers’ Circle. “I don’t think he’s here for coffee or books.”
Nora followed his gaze. Beck Wynter sat in the mustard-colored chair, an unopened book in his lap. His skin was gray with fatigue and his silver-streaked red hair was uncombed.
“He looks like a tired hedgehog,” Sheldon muttered. “Give that man a coffee.”
Taking Sheldon’s advice, Nora filled a take-out cup and carried it to Beck. “This is a lame peace offering,” she began.
Beck stood up and accepted the cup. “You’re slammed and, from what I can see, shorthanded, but Harper and I need your help.”
A woman rounded the fiction shelves and waved at Nora. “Sorry, but can you ring me up?”
“Do you mind coming behind the checkout counter with me?” Nora asked Beck. “We can talk as soon as I whittle down the line.”
Not only was Beck willing to accompany her, but he volunteered to bag books. With his help, Nora served six customers in under ten minutes.
“You’re good with people,” she told him as the sleigh bells jangled for what seemed like the thousandth time that day.
“I have to be. My patients trust me to crack their necks.” He mustered a small smile that instantly faded. “Part of me understands why my mom gave you The Little Lost Library. You were the one person she could talk to about books. The other part of me resents her choice. Her dad wrote that book and gave each of his daughters a copy. Mom should’ve left it for one of us. It’s about our house. She kept secrets from all three of us. That book was a chance for us to discover things we’ve always wondered about.”
Nora lowered her gaze in contrition. “I’m sorry. I got swept up in the mystery. I thought I’d understand Lucille better if I found the lost library. If there is one. Is there?”
“Yes. I remember Mom showing me a bunch of tiny books. I was really young, but I remember. Sheriff McCabe showed us the clues you found. There was another piece of dollhouse furniture in the attic trunk. It was a bed and a tiny book called The Two Sisters.” He raked his hands through his hair. “Harper and I have no idea what these things mean.”
Two sisters. Lucille and Lynette. Two copies of The Little Lost Library. A collection of miniature books. A dollhouse. Whispers of stolen money, of some kind of treasure, hidden inside Wynter House.
“What about the mirror in your mom’s room? When the sheriff and I searched for the clue, it was missing. Did you find it?”
Beck shook his head. “I think Clem found it a long time ago, but I don’t know what it was or what he did with it. Sorry.”
“How can I help?”
“The answer to the whole mystery must be in the library. It was Mom’s favorite room. We weren’t allowed to enter unless she let us in. She kept the door locked at all times and wore the key like a necklace.”
Nora had never seen the key, but Lucille tended to wear high-necked blouses and thick cardigans, even during the summer.
“Forgive me for asking, but was she wearing the key when she died?”
His face tightened with grief. “Whoever killed her took the key. They opened the library, but I don’t think they found what they were looking for. There were so many books. And paper. Boxes and boxes of paper from the mill. The Junk Hunks have cleared all of that away, which took forever because the sheriff’s department had to document and examine every item first, but we still can’t find the last clue.”
One of Nora’s regulars entered the shop and smiled at her. She smiled back, but didn’t ask the woman if she needed help. Now was not the time to interrupt Beck.
“Harper doesn’t want to look anymore,” he continued. “Losing Clem—it was too much. She totally shut down. But I’m fired up.” He balled his fists and struck the countertop. “I’m furious! I had no control over my life when I lived in that house. I still have no control. I want to understand why this happened. All of it. Can you come back to the house tonight? Mom wanted you to find these clues. Will you finish what you started?”
The air above Nora’s pinkie finger tingled. The phantom sensation was a warning. A bad omen. She knew this to be true, but it didn’t matter. She had to go. She couldn’t walk away without knowing the whole story.
And so, she placed her hand on Beck’s hand and said, “Yes. I’ll come back to Wynter House.”