"You what!" I gaped at her.
Tom and Clara drew closer.
Bonnie shoved her glasses up. "I've never taken a Lamaze class."
"Then what was all that puff puff puff business?"
"I saw a couple of films on TV, and the married women in the office used to talk about their childbirth experiences all the time. I tuned them out, but some of it stuck."
"Are you telling me you don't know any more than I do about birthing babies?"
She flushed. "I do now."
Clara covered her mouth with her hand. Tom gave a snort that might have been laughter.
I was not amused.
Neither was Bonnie. She frowned as if she had a bad headache. "I just thought, women have been having babies since the dawn of time, and Melanie had already had two. She was scared because of the circumstances, but she probably knew what to do. With luck, all she would need was a little confidence."
"But--"
"But what if something had gone wrong?" Her chin went up. "Melanie wouldn't have been worse off with me there to hold her hand than if she'd been alone with that...that dominant baboon."
I remembered my own dithering, my own fright. "At least you were capable of thinking."
Bonnie's frown eased. "There you were, Lark, Miss Honesty, explaining to a man with a gun that you couldn't do what he was ordering you to do. If somebody points a gun at me and tells me I'm President of Mexico, I start talking Spanish fast. I thought if we were useless to Kevin he wouldn't have any reason to let us live. So I lied."
The cheerful shouts of the paramedics packing their gear punctuated our silence.
I said, "You had me convinced you were midwife of the year."
Tom smiled. "Me too."
Clara said, "You deserve a medal."
Bonnie shook her head. "Melanie deserves a medal. And I meant what I said to Kevin. He is not going to get hold of that little boy and turn him into a monster. I won't let it happen."
Tom's eyebrows rose. "Won't Melanie have something to say about that?"
Clara lit a cigarette. "Some women are damned fools."
I said, "I think she'll listen to Bonnie."
The senior Fire Department medic strode up. "You folks ready to leave?"
Tom picked up the waders. "I'll help you haul your gear to the raft, Myron." They were using a rubber dinghy to ferry things to the launch. "The ladies can ride with you. I'm going to retrieve my boat from the oyster bed."
"We can buzz you around the point," the man offered.
Tom shook his head. "I want to walk."
"Okey-dokey. Tide's almost in, though. What's that?"
"Clams," Bonnie said. "We're taking them with us."
"Put them in clean water overnight with a little cornmeal." Clara was ready to tell us how to clean them, too, but that was more than I wanted to know about clams.
I drove Bonnie and the clams home from the dock. Clara had driven her own car.
Bonnie said she wanted a shower and a nap. That was about all she said. I had turned inward too. I pulled into our driveway and popped the trunk.
"Call me if Jay finds out anything interesting." Bonnie took her bucket of clams and trudged across the street.
Anything about the murder, she meant. I gave an assenting wave and hauled my own bucket out of the trunk. I left it in the garage.
I stood in the steaming water of the shower until I turned bright pink, and I barely had the energy to towel dry. I yanked a long T shirt over my damp hair and fell into bed. I slept without dreaming for almost two hours.
"Lark--"
I came awake with my heart hammering.
"Sweetheart, you have got to come down and take charge of the kitchen."
"You're back." I opened one eye. "I refuse to cook."
Jay sat on the bed and gave me a bear hug. "Believe me, that's not the problem."
The problem was that the local radio station had broken the story. Our neighbors, most of whom Jay had never met, were bringing food. That was their response, once their sympathies had been engaged, to death, sickness, unemployment, flood, hurricane, earthquake, and, apparently, to amateur midwifery while being held hostage on an uninhabited island. They couldn't reach Melanie, so they were showering Bonnie and me with home cooking.
I got up, groaning because my shoulders had begun to stiffen, and dressed.
Bonnie had taken refuge in the breakfast nook. Her tiny house was under siege. She swore she had two tuna casseroles, a salmon loaf, a Jell-O salad with grated carrots and raisins, and a peach pie sitting in her refrigerator. She had showered and slept a mere half hour before the doorbell started ringing.
I said soothing words and tried to sort out the pie tins and casserole dishes on my counter. One nine by five dish contained something brown topped with very orange cheese, possibly Velveeta. I wished Freddy was home to test it.
Bonnie was worrying over the problem of Melanie and the baby. Something had to be done. I agreed. The back door banged and Tom came in, still in his boots and rain jacket. He'd lost the Band Aid and the cut had scabbed. He was carrying a pie. He thrust it at me.
"Ruth Adams gave me this as I was walking up from the house. She says it's for Bonnie. Oh, hi, Bonnie. I didn't see you."
"Hi."
"Huckleberry?" I asked.
He grinned. "Looks like it."
Jay said, "I'm sorry, Bonnie, you can't have that pie."
She smiled absently. "Why do they do it? All that energy. They should be feeding starving children in Africa. Do you have any idea how long it will take me to eat a whole tuna casserole?"
Jay laughed. "Feed it to Gibson."
"I will--" Bonnie's eyes narrowed behind the mended glasses. The bruise stood out in bold relief on her cheek. "All that energy...hey, you guys, why don't I take up a collection?"
"For Melanie?" Tom had returned from his bedroom sans jacket. He sat on the stool by the door and yanked off his boots, tossing them into the back hall. He was wearing gray wool socks. He padded to the counter and poured himself a cup of coffee. "I expect the Fire Department has already set up a fund. Let's hope it doesn't all go for Kevin's defense."
Bonnie was fumbling for the telephone pad. "I want to collect enough to send her to Arizona."
Jay handed her a pencil. "Why Arizona?"
"My parents live there. Melanie should take the children as far away from Kevin as she can. Mom could help her find an apartment, maybe even a job." She began scribbling. "New clothes for job hunting, clothes for the kids, a decent car, and a deposit for the apartment--"
"Daycare," I chimed in.
"A divorce," Tom said.
Bonnie looked at him. "That's number one. All of that will take money. I'm going to hit up all these nice people--"
"Be sure to return the pie tins when you do." Tom sipped his coffee.
"The pie tins are my passport. I'll take them back and make my pitch face to face." Bonnie beamed. "I feel much better. Now all I have to do is persuade Melanie that her future lies in sunny Arizona."
The doorbell rang.
Jay answered it this time and returned after a few minutes with Clara and a covered stoneware casserole. Clara was carrying a loaf of her bread.
"Dinner!" she announced. "I came to rescue you from the tuna brigade. Tom, poke it in the microwave. That is my special emergency dinner. Cassoulet, every morsel a gourmet triumph. I am going to feed you, and Jay is going to tell us all about Kevin's confession."
We looked at Jay.
He tugged at his mustache. "I suppose the sheriff made an announcement."
"'An arrest is imminent--'" Clara quoted.
Jay said, "Nelson had already arrested a guy named Wally Baldock before Johnson started talking."
Tom sipped his coffee. "There goes the plea bargain."
"Johnson will do time," Jay agreed.
I scrunched forward on the couch. "Both men confessed? Tell us what they said."
"Yeah, well, let me call Dale first."
Clara gave him a push in the direction of the telephone. "So call. Lark, Bonnie, we need plates and flatware. Tom, a salad. Dinner in fifteen minutes."
It took Jay that long to get through to the sheriff's office. The doorbell rang once--something with marshmallows. We organized a buffet while Jay talked, and Clara made Tom start a fire in the living room. She also unearthed a bottle of chardonnay that had survived Labor Day. We brought our steaming bowls of the stew in by the fire.
"Right." Clara took a gulp of wine. Jay sidled in with his bowl, looking wary. "Tell us who hired Kevin Johnson."
"Bob McKay." Bonnie tore off a hunk of bread and dipped it in the cassoulet, which was worthy of the bread.
Jay propped his shoulders against the mantel and tested the stew. The doorbell rang.
"No," I heard him say as I jumped up. "It was Annie."
I raced to the door and yanked it open.
Bob McKay and his son stood on the porch.
I blinked at them. "What--"
Bob cleared his throat. "May I speak to your husband? It's urgent."
I hesitated. "We have company."
"Please."
I flashed on Donald Hagen. "You're not armed, are you?" The evidence of Hagen's foray still decorated the hall ceiling.
Bob turned redder, and Rob said, "Gosh, no. We just need to talk to Mr. Dodge. It's about Mom."
I stood back, and they entered.
I realized I could well be ushering a murderer into my living room. Was Bob going to confess to Jay? I wasn't afraid of Bob, not with his son beside him, but the situation was, oddly enough, embarrassing.
As we reached the archway into the living room, everyone looked at us. Jay set his bowl on the mantel and took a step forward.
Bob said, "You've got to help me. She's going to say I killed Cleo, and I didn't. I swear it."
Clara pulled her feet out of the way hastily as Jay skirted the coffee table. Her eyes were bright with curiosity. I felt a little curious myself.
Jay said, "You shouldn't be talking in front of witnesses, Colonel McKay. You need a lawyer."
"Goddamn." Bob's voice broke. "I don't want a lawyer. And I want witnesses." He seemed to take in the others' presence. "Clara. Tom. Ms. Er."
"Bell," Bonnie supplied. She goggled at him through the mended glasses.
"You've got to tell us what to do." Rob McKay's voice rose. "Please, tell me what to do."
Tell me who to believe? I think that was what he meant, yet there he stood beside his father.
"I did not kill Cleo," Bob repeated. "I loved Cleo," He began to weep. "God, I'm so confused."
When a woman cries she can forgive herself. When a man weeps, by golly, people go into emergency mode. We had Bob sitting on the couch with a cup of hot coffee and a box of Kleenex from the kitchen before you could say Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Clara, Tom, and Bonnie stayed behind in the kitchen--to give Bob privacy, I suppose. I had no such delicate scruples. I took him the coffee and the Kleenex and planted myself on Granny's rocker.
Rob was sitting beside his father, patting Bob's shoulder and saying "There, there".
I avoided Jay's eyes. I thought he'd want me to leave and I had no intention of leaving.
Bob blew his nose. "I'm sorry. It's been a hellish two weeks. You have to tell me what to do, Dodge. Dale Nelson arrested Annie for hiring those thugs to burn Tom's house. I called our lawyers right away, of course, but Nelson took her in anyway and booked her. Then I got to thinking."
"About your alibi?" Jay sat on the edge of the coffee table. Fortunately, it was solid teak and bore up under his weight. He was looking Bob right in the face.
I leaned forward, and the chair creaked.
Bob mopped his eyes. "I left them on the beach, you know."
"Cleo and Annie?" Jay sounded cautious.
Bob nodded. "I remember that much. I walked back to the construction site and drove the Mercedes home. Then I started to drink. I don't remember anything more until the next morning. Annie had already left for the Gazette office by the time I got up. When I heard about Cleo's death on the radio that afternoon, I called Annie. She wouldn't talk over the telephone. I was having a hard time taking it in. Cleo's death, I mean."
Jay said, with care, "You were in love with Cleo Hagen?"
"I was going to propose to her. That was why we went down to the beach. We were walking along, and I was explaining that I'd ask Annie for a divorce."
Rob McKay drew a sharp breath.
Bob looked at him. "Try to understand. Your mother and I, we have...had an agreement. We wouldn't interfere with each other."
"She wouldn't interfere with you, you mean." Rob's voice was cold and his face stony. He wasn't going to break down. And he hadn't decided whose side he was on yet, either.
Bob's eyes dropped. He twisted the damp Kleenex. "Annie isn't very interested in sex. I don't think she enjoys it much, never did after Rob was born. So I took my satisfaction elsewhere. She didn't want a divorce and neither did I--then. Too complicated."
I stared at the man. Between the McKays and the Hagens, I was getting an education about the institution of marriage.
Bob drew a breath. "But Cleo was different. She was so beautiful, so much fun. I felt alive when I was with her. Her marriage was just an arrangement. I knew that. She needed a real marriage to a real man."
Real man. As far as I was concerned, Donald Hagen was a little too real.
Jay said, "When did you tell her all that, the night of the murder?"
Bob nodded. "The night she died." He blew his nose again. "She was laughing, teasing me, and we walked along the beach, almost to the Mollie McKay. We were holding hands. I felt about sixteen, and I wanted her so bad I hurt. I remember that. I had a real hard-on." He glanced at me and, I swear it, blushed. "That was when Annie drove up in the Blazer."
Jay frowned as if he were trying to visualize the scene. "Didn't you see her lights?"
Bob shook his head. "No lights. She drove right up beside us with the lights off. She jumped out. You have to understand, Annie and I had an agreement."
"Not to interfere with each other's affairs. I see. So you were surprised."
"It knocked me for a loop. I didn't know what to say."
"What happened then?"
He took a distracted sip of the coffee and set the cup back on the end table. His hands trembled. "They started talking. Cleo thought it was funny. Annie said terrible things, how she'd never give me a divorce, and so on, but she never raised her voice. Not once. Cleo got bored, I guess. Maybe she was cold. It was a cool evening. She said something like what's the big deal, it's just an affair.
"That got to me. I said I was serious. I wanted a divorce, wanted to marry her, Cleo, I mean. Then she looked at me and laughed. She said she was already married and intended to stay married."
I said, "What did you do?"
He flushed. "I got mad. I wanted to hit Cleo, hit Annie. I wanted to kill them both."
I moved, and the chair creaked again.
He looked at me, pleading. "Just for a moment. I didn't, though. You've got to believe me. I wasn't brought up that way, to raise my hand to a woman. So I walked off. I was pretty steamed. That's why I drank so much when I got home."
Jay stood up and went to the fireplace. He poked the log and it flared into brightness. "I think you ought to be telling this to your lawyer, McKay." He restored the poker to its place.
I said, "The problem is that his lawyer is Annie's lawyer."
Bob heaved a huge sigh. "That's it. You got it. I'm going to need a lawyer, but right now I want to talk this out with somebody neutral."
Rob said, "Maybe Mr. Dodge is right, Dad. I know this guy in the public defender's office. He could suggest a criminal lawyer."
"I called Quentin," Bob snapped. "He'll find somebody. Right now, I need to talk. I trust you, Dodge."
Jay rubbed one shoulder on the mantel. "I'm not taking sides, Mr. McKay, and anything you tell me goes straight to Dale Nelson."
"Good, that's what I want." Bob slammed his left hand on the arm of the couch. The coffee cup rattled. "Annie's my wife. She'll have the best lawyer money can buy, but I'm not going to let her shove the blame onto me."
"For Cleo Hagen's death?" Jay ruffled his mustache with one finger.
"For C1eo's death. I loved Cleo," Bob repeated, face red and earnest.
"Are you saying your alibi won't hold water?"
"My alibi is Annie's alibi."
Jay nodded. We were both nodding like Buddhas, looking wise. In fact, it hadn't occurred to me to turn the alibi around. I didn't particularly like Annie, but she had substance and respectability. Bob didn't. I had assumed she was covering for him.
Bob leaned forward, hands on his knees. "See, it was like this. Annie said I'd better have an alibi, in case somebody talked about the date I had with Cleo. Annie said it was just like Cleo to get herself killed on a night everybody knew I was going to be with her."
"Everybody didn't know," Jay said.
"It came out." Bob ducked his head. "Just the way Annie said it would. She told me she'd say we spent the evening together at home, so we were ready when Nelson questioned us. We stuck to the story, even when he found one of Cleo's hairs in the Blazer. That started me wondering, though. I usually drive the Blazer, but Cleo didn't like it, hadn't ridden in it for months."
"Still, she had ridden in it."
"Yeah, but our handyman vacuums the cars every week."
"Even so--" Jay kept his eyes on Bob and his tone skeptical.
"I started worrying," Bob said doggedly. "When I left Cleo and Annie together, Annie was mad, but I didn't want to believe she'd killed Cleo. I thought Tom had killed Cleo. I was sure of it." He sounded aggrieved, as if Tom should have cooperated and confessed to the murder. "Annie said the police thought so, too. She has her sources at the courthouse. The alibi would keep us out of the investigation. She said she didn't want a scandal. Neither did I, and my brother Quentin sure as hell didn't."
"So you wanted to believe Tom killed Cleo, but you'd begun to have doubts."
"Yeah. And I kept racking my brain, trying to remember what time Annie came home that night. I asked Robbie."
Rob cleared his throat. "Both cars were in the garage by the time I got in."
"Davis--that's the handyman--he may know when she came in," Bob said, "but Annie sent him away."
Jay walked over and sat on the occasional chair. "You interest me. Where?"
"He's in Hawaii for another week. I told the police."
"Then Nelson will call Honolulu. He's thorough."
"Davis is on Molokai. Camping."
"Even so."
I shivered. I hoped the handyman was in Hawaii.
Jay said, "When did you and Annie decide to alibi each other?"
"Right away. I heard the news story, that Cleo was dead. I called Annie. She wouldn't talk then, but she drove straight home. She said not to tell anybody, not even our lawyers, that I'd seen Cleo that night. She said she'd back me up. She did, too. I kept reminding myself she was being generous."
Jay sighed. "Tell me something, McKay. What would you have done if they'd arrested your cousin?"
Bob blinked. "Tom?"
"He is your cousin, isn't he?"
He shifted. "Distant cousin."
"Well?"
He held out a hand, as if in supplication. "I thought he was guilty. I thought he'd done it."
"What made you change your mind?"
Bob leaned back. He looked baffled. "It was more like creeping doubts. I kept drinking. I drank a lot but I drank at home, and I couldn't stop thinking about the hair they found in the Blazer. That and the fact that Annie didn't raise her voice when she called Cleo all those names. Annie always goes real quiet when she's angry."
Jay said, "That's no kind of proof, Bob."
"I know it." He drew a long breath. "I think Annie killed Cleo on the beach. How I don't know, but Annie could have done it. Maybe she used the jack handle, something like that."
Jay had said earlier that Cleo was killed with a piece of driftwood. I opened my mouth to speak and closed it.
Bob went on, "She and Cleo were pretty much the same size, and Annie's strong. She plays killer tennis. She could have murdered Cleo and driven the body up onto the dunes near Tom's house. The tide would have washed some of the tread marks away, and Annie could have brushed away the rest. The Blazer's a four-wheeler, you know."
"I used to own one," Jay interrupted. "Then what?"
"Then she could have driven home and cleaned the Blazer. And phoned that jerk, Johnson. I'd passed out before midnight, and I don't remember much after I got home."
"Well, all of this is interesting speculation." Jay kept his eyes on Bob's face. "Let's say Annie could have killed Cleo Hagen. That doesn't mean she did."
"I keep telling him that," Rob said.
Bob was shaking his head. "She's going to confess to the arson charge and offer to testify against me if they'll do a deal. I can see it coming."
A silence followed. I was trying to imagine Annie killing Cleo. It had been easier to visualize Bob smashing heads, but his earnestness was impressive in the flesh. And the fact that young Rob was sitting there beside him, even if Rob didn't believe his mother was a murderer, said something about the father's character. And maybe about Annie's.
I looked at the kid. He was pale and taut-faced. "What do you think, Rob?"
"She didn't do it. I mean I don't think she did it, but Dad deserves a fair hearing. I think everybody should be fair." He sounded plaintive, almost childish.
Jay stood up. "There is a witness."
This was news to me. I stared at him.
"Unfortunately he's in a confused mental state right now."
Matt! My lips formed the name.
Jay shot me a warning glance.
I bit the name back.
He went on, "I don't think he saw the killing itself, though he may have. I think he did witness the disposal of the body."
Bob leaned back and let out a long breath. "God, that's a relief. Who did you say it was?"
"I didn't say." Jay shot me another glance. "And I'm not going to. I need to call Dale Nelson."
Bob rose. "Will you tell him I'll be at home? I'll wait up until he contacts me."
Rob and I stood up, too. Bob held his hand out. After visible hesitation, Jay shook it. The McKays left almost at once.
The door had barely closed on them when Clara burst from the kitchen, followed by Bonnie and Tom.
"What happened?" Clara demanded. "Did he confess?"
Jay held up a restraining hand. "Not to the murder. I have to call Dale. I'm going upstairs. I suppose you may as well fill them in, Lark."
They carried me off to the kitchen and plied me with microwaved cassoulet while I recounted Bob's story. Clara and Tom were inclined to believe Bob, but Bonnie held out. It was, she suggested darkly, an obvious attempt to cover his ass.
He was trying to do that, all right. I wasn't sure what to believe.
Clara was being reasonable, though her eyes glinted with excitement. "I say Annie did it."
Tom had kept silent as I talked. He rubbed his forehead. "If Bob killed Cleo, it was a simple crime of passion. What's Annie's motive?"
"Bumping off the competition?" Bonnie swung her coffee mug. "Naw, it was Bob."
Clara said, "I told you folks on Labor Day that Annie needs the prestige she gets as editor of the Gazette." She looked from Bonnie to me. "And you saw the house in the Enclave. If Bob was serious about Cleo, if he wanted a divorce, Annie would lose the paper and the house."
Bonnie gave a skeptical snort. "What are divorce lawyers for?"
"Bob would give Annie a settlement. Of course he would. But the house doesn't belong to Bob, and neither does the paper. They're McKay family property. Annie would lose both. I think she did it."
I cocked my head, listening. Jay was coming down the stairs.
When he entered, he gave a general smile and rubbed his hands. "How about a nice piece of pie?"
I said, "You're insane," but I got up and cut into Ruth Adams's pie. That took a while, with the others tossing off questions and Jay eluding them in his bland, infuriating way.
I served everyone else then held the last piece of pie out of his reach. "Talk or it goes into the garbage grinder."
Jay grinned. "Okay, okay. Give me the pie."
I handed him the plate. "Did they arrest Annie?"
"For hiring Johnson and Baldock to commit arson? Yes. Naturally, she clammed up and called in the lawyers. Dale tells me she's trying a plea bargain. If they drop the arson charge or grant her immunity, she'll testify against her husband in the murder of Cleo Hagen."
A silence followed. Tom cut a judicious bite of huckleberry pie. "So Bob was telling the truth?"
"I think so." Jay waved his fork. "But I'm damned glad I'm not on the investigating team. Annie is saying she was just trying to create a diversion. She admits she picked on you, Tom, because you'd been married to Cleo and because of the book. She says she tried to called attention to you, and that she wanted to protect Bob with a false alibi. Bob was unfaithful to her, but he was her man, and she was going to stand by him."
Bonnie groaned.
"Dale," Jay said, cutting a neat bite of pie, "is waffling. He wants to believe Annie. I shook him up. He agreed to go out to the Enclave and interrogate Bob."
Another long pause. I said, "What about Matt?"
Jay said, "He's coming along. I think he's going to admit he saw Annie place the body in the dunes near Tom's house, and that he lied to protect Annie because he hated what Cleo represented. Matt isn't crazy. He's just a little muddled."
Tom said abruptly, "So Cleo made me an honest offer for the house? I don't know why that makes me feel better, but it does."
"Maybe you should console Donald Hagen with your reinterpretation of Cleo's character." Bonnie spooned huckleberry syrup from her plate.
I stood up and headed for the coffee pot. "Donald Hagen, what will happen to him?"
"A suspended sentence." Jay didn't look blissful at the thought. "Hagen has good lawyers."
I started to say I was really wondering whether Hagen's father would force him into another marriage, but the others hadn't heard Nancy's gossip. If Jay could be discreet so could I. I poured another round of coffee by way of distraction.
Eventually Clara and Bonnie left, and Tom headed for his room. We heard the computer making its warm-up noises. Tom was going to be all right. I wasn't so sure about Bonnie. She wanted Bob guilty. He could certainly be obnoxious, but I thought he was innocent of murder. The corollary of that was Annie's guilt.
Jay and I stayed in the living room, comfortably entwined and staring at the dying fire.
I rubbed up against him. "What happens now?"
He smoothed my hair. "Now it's up to the lawyers."
"Wonderful. I suppose Darla will follow the case syllable by syllable."
"It'll be an education for her."
I ran a hand over his chin. Only slightly raspy. "It bothers me, not to know for sure who's guilty."
He said, "Annie McKay is guilty. But it'll be interesting to see what her lawyers plead. If she hadn't hired Johnson, she could make a case for manslaughter--or second-degree homicide. She got a little too clever." He nibbled my earlobe. "I hope Melanie's experience didn't put you off maternity."
"It was pretty gory, and she suffered a lot, but I thought the baby was interesting. He was tiny but opinionated." I snuggled closer. "Actually, the situation just put me off guns."
Jay is not the kind of cop who keeps caressing his .38. He knew my opinion of firearms. "More than ever, huh?"
An ember flared and crumbled.
"Definitely. What if he'd had one of those assault rifles instead of an old-fashioned thirty ought six?" I shuddered.
"Cold?"
"Just thinking."
"I did some thinking, too. You may or may not need a baby, Lark, but you definitely need a bookstore."
I sat up. "What? Here?"
"Wherever. Why not here if I take the job?"
I stared at him. He smiled in the sneaky way he has that always disarms logic. "Why a bookstore?"
"If you were running a bookstore, I'd know where you were and what you were doing eight to twelve hours a day while it was open. You scared me again, lady. I had a couple of very bad hours imagining horrors. Besides, you miss Larkspur Books."
"I don't create disasters--"
He pulled me closer and gave me a disarming kiss. "So you say. A bookstore in Kayport, right near the History Museum."
"Why not at the mall? There's a great location next to the bakery. Jay, you fiend. I want to get pregnant!"
"Go ahead. You still need a bookstore." Jay smiled at me.
"Hmmm."
"Bonnie would enjoy helping you set it up--"
"And Tom could do a signing." I felt a rush of pure exuberance. A bookstore and a baby, why not?