A Dead and Stormy Night

by Steffanie Holmes

  Quoth bobbed his head, and flew off toward the house with Morrie’s phone dangling beneath him.

  “See? Sometimes the little fiend comes in handy,” Morrie grinned.

  My chest ached for Quoth. Morrie was right – he couldn’t get in trouble because he technically didn’t exist, which made him awfully handy for this particular outing. But I hated that Quoth didn’t get to do normal human things because he had to hide. Didn’t he want to learn how to drive or go travelling or eat out at a nice restaurant?

  “I estimate it will take him fifteen minutes to get inside the vault, provided he isn’t caught.” Morrie rested his hand on my thigh, sliding his fingers between my legs. “However shall we pass the time?”

  My body snapped to attention, my skin prickling with desire as his fingers danced closer… closer… I closed my eyes, dredging up every ounce of self-control I possessed, and drew away, shaking my head. Morrie froze, his hand poised in midair.

  “You regret yesterday,” he said. It wasn’t a question.

  My cheeks flushed. “That’s not true. It’s very much not true. I just… I need to think about some things.”

  “What things?” Morrie perked up. “I’m an excellent thinker. Perhaps I can assist?”

  “Things like that fact that you’re a criminal mastermind who’s committed acts of great evil – not exactly the sort of suitor I had in mind.”

  “Only in a book. Since I got out I’ve reformed, somewhat. I’ve only ever stolen from the rich to give to the poor. Well, the poor and the moderately-wealthy-by-western-standards. I do need to keep Heathcliff in fresh toilet paper and adequate wine.” Morrie patted himself on the shoulder. “I’m basically Mother Teresa.”

  “In that case, you’re definitely out. I don’t date Catholics.”

  “Who said anything about dating?” Morrie leaned closer and growled against my ear. His voice rumbled through my body, and it took all my self control not to melt against him. “I’m talking about two beautiful people, coming together in a rage of lust, swapping bodily fluids in mutual ecstasy, and then going about their business while one of them secretly pines for the tortured bookstore owner.”

  “Hah, I knew you had a thing for Heathcliff,” I cried triumphantly.

  “Not me, gorgeous, although I admit he is a fine specimen of a man. I’m talking about you.”

  Heat flushed my cheeks, confirming Morrie’s claim. “Wait, how did you—”

  Quoth chose that moment to swoop down and drop the phone into Morrie’s hand.

  “Excellent.” Morrie sat back in the hedge and flipped through the photographs. “You found evidence Cox was the blackmailer?”

  Quoth transformed. He crouched on one knee, his impressive cock swinging between his legs. “Nope. It’s not him.”

  “So he’s not blackmailing?”

  “Oh, no, he’s blackmailing Ribald, all right. But I doubt he killed Ashley. Look.” Quoth flicked through the photo album on the phone. I peered over his shoulder, and gasped at what I saw.

  Inside the vault were hundreds of outfits packed into racks and displayed on mannequins. I recognized pieces from some of the world’s top designers. Rick Owens, Elsa Schiaparelli, Guo Pei, even my dear Vivienne Westwood. If these were real, they were worth thousands. Maybe even millions. But that wasn’t what drew my attention.

  At the end of the room was a wall displaying glamorous shots of Roger Cox, bedecked in sparkling makeup and dressed in an array of glittering evening dresses, his balding head covered with fabulous wigs. Quoth flipped past image after image of Cox’s round, wrinkling figure spilling out of couture dresses. Another photograph showed a corner of the vault set up as a makeshift photography studio, complete with red carpet and fashion-week backdrop.

  “Wheeee, okay.” I rubbed my eyes and handed the phone back to Quoth. “It proves Cox has something to hide, but not that he was a blackmailer or that he didn’t kill Ashley.”

  “I found his book of secrets.” Quoth zoomed in on a large ledger book resting on a pedestal. “It’s filled with stories of incest and ill-gotten gains. There’s a file on every major designer in the industry. It looks like he’s been getting free gowns off them for years in exchange for keeping secrets about their affairs, backroom deals, crooked contracts, and drug habits.”

  “Like Charles Augustus Milverton, the blackmailer,” I said. “It was one of Sherlock Holmes’ most famous cases.”

  “Based, I believe, on the real-life master blackmailer Charles Augustus Howell,” Quoth supplied. “An art dealer and infamous blackmailer who persuaded Dante Rossetti to dig up the poems he buried with his wife.”

  “Ah, now Howell I remember. He was found in a Chelsea public house with his throat slit and a half-sovereign coin shoved in his mouth. Such a tragic death for one so talented.” Morrie frowned at the images. “Unfortunately, Quoth’s correct. I think we have to discount Mr. Cox from our inquiries.”

  “What? Why?” I glanced over Morrie’s shoulder at the images, but nothing obvious jumped out at me.

  “Cox is running a lucrative operation here. I don’t think he’d risk its future, nor his secret coming out, by murdering anyone. He wasn’t even blackmailing Ribald for his drawings.”

  “What was it about, then?”

  “According to Cox’s ledger, Ribald had affairs with several interns.” Quoth pushed his legs into the Holly Santiago jeans I’d brought along for him. “One of them could have been Ashley. The timing matches up.”

  “Gross.” I wrinkled my face. That didn’t seem like Ashley, but then, I’d discovered all sorts of things about her I didn’t like recently. I remembered that note from Marcus in her suitcase. Yup, definitely possible. “Does that mean Ribald’s our next suspect?”

  “It would seem weird for him to go after Ashley instead of Cox. But I think we can definitely discount Cox.” Quoth pointed to one of the photographs as he buttoned his shirt. “This little number is time-stamped for the night of the murder. He’s alibi’ed himself.”

  “So we’re back to square one,” I groaned, my head in my hands. “We have no idea who killed Ashley, and the police are going to arrest me and throw me in jail and I’ll never eat a slice of pizza or get keratin treatment ever again.”

  “Not necessarily,” Morrie helped me out of the bushes. I picked thorns out of my hair as we made our way back down the road to the bus stop. “We’re back to our original theory – the person buying Ribald’s designs is the killer. We find that person, we clear your name.”

  On the bus back to Argleton, I sat next to Quoth. “Thank you for breaking and entering to help me.”

  He shrugged. “It’s hard to break the law when the law doesn’t know you exist.”

  “Do you want to exist?”

  Quoth stared out the window. “It doesn’t matter what I want.”

  “It does to me. You did amazingly well yesterday in London, and today. You have more control than you think. What it—”

  “Please,” he glared at me with all the seeming of a demon that was dreaming. “Don’t talk about this. If I transform on this bus, I’ll be taken away to a laboratory for study.”

  “I won’t. I promise.” Quoth turned away from me, burying his head into his shoulder. I touched his arm, but he shrunk back, and my chest constricted to think that I’d upset him. In the seat in front of us, Morrie stared at his phone, completely oblivious.

  I slumped in my seat, emotions tearing through me. The trip had been a complete disappointment. We’d hit a dead end with the case, which meant I was still the chief suspect. The rain had soaked through my suede jacket, and my teeth chattered together as I inspected the cuts on my hand from the hedgerow. Worst of all, I’d upset Quoth and I was no closer to figuring out the tangled web of desires that assailed me whenever one of the guys was in the room.

  I liked them all. They were all completely wrong for me on so many levels, not least of all because they were fictional characters. But my body cried out for one of them, for all of them
. But that was ridiculous. I couldn’t keep on with the flirting and the panty-melting smiles and the touches that sent fire through my skin. Why couldn’t I make a definitive choice so we could all get on with our lives?

  Why did I secretly wish for something I could never have?

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Darling, you won’t believe it!” Mum beamed at me across the dinner table as she spooned canned soup into two bowls. “I sold two power-plate machines today.”

  “Actually, I don’t believe it.” Real, living people paid money for those things?

  “I can feel my luck changing, honey. This is my calling. It’s the thing I was meant to do with my life.”

  “Sure, Mum. Your calling is selling pointless weight-loss machines that don’t even work to con innocent pensioners out of their benefit money.”

  “Don’t be such a downer,” she pouted. “This is not like the smoothies or the Disney clothes.”

  I groaned. “I’d forgotten about the Disney clothes.”

  One of Mum’s earliest schemes was to sell clothes and costumes featuring Disney characters. She did not seek permission from the Disney corporation before doing this, rather preferring to draw her own versions of characters and sell them from a surprisingly-professional website. She sold quite well in the beginning – her designs were actually really cool. We had real food in the kitchen cupboards for the first time ever. Unfortunately, a national paper profiled the growing business, which alerted a horde of lawyers who came swooping. We didn’t have Christmas that year because she had to pay a huge fine for copyright infringement.

  “Can’t you be more encouraging, darling? My success coach says that in order for my business to thrive, I need a support network who will nourish my creative spirit—”

  “Your success coach needs to get a real job,” I muttered into my soup.

  “Wilhelmina,” Mum huffed.

  “Sorry,” I muttered, wishing I was back at the shop, having dinner with the guys and trying to figure out who the murderer was. I rubbed my temple. “I’m still a little messed up about Ashley.”

  “Of course you are,” Mum cooed. “It’s such a terrible business. But Mina, that girl didn’t half boss you around.”

  “Mum, please, don’t say things like that.”

  “But she did, honey. You were so desperate for a friend that when she came along you let her walk all over you with her ridiculous shoes. If Ashley told you to jump off a cliff, you would have done it. And then of course you followed her to America.”

  “I wanted to go to New York! Ashley copied me.”

  “Yes, and while there she coasted off your hard work and stole that job from underneath you.” Mum fixed me with a stare. “Don’t you think I can’t read between the lines, Mina. You told me you decided to come home because of your eyesight, but that’s not true, is it?”

  “No!” I yelled, slamming my spoon on the table. “It’s not true. Ashley told Marcus about my eyes, and he said I’d never be able to work in fashion. They both went and blabbed it all over the industry, so I couldn’t get a job anywhere. What would be the point of hiring me? What’s the point? I worked my whole life to get that job, and they thought I couldn’t do it. And it’s true, it’s true. This condition is just going to get worse, and I won’t be able to see. Everything I’ve done in my whole life is pointless. Is that what you want to hear, Mum? Does that make you happy?”

  “Of course it doesn’t. Oh, honey.” Mum pushed her chair out and came around my side of the table. She wrapped her arms around me. I sank against her, my muscles sagging from the force of my outburst. “I wish you’d told me how you felt sooner instead of bottling it all up. I’ll take you to my success coach. She’ll help you see that if fashion is your dream, and you believe in yourself, then nothing will stop you achieving it.”

  “What’s the point of fashion if I can’t even see? You and your success coach can spout that ‘don’t give up’ crap they teach you at those scammy seminars all you want, but it doesn’t change that fact that I won’t even be able to match an outfit.” I pushed my bowl away. “I’m not hungry.”

  “You can’t just give up like that. We Wilde women don’t give up!”

  “You’ve given up on a hundred careers, Mum. A thousand. The line of beauty products for babies, the bejeweled Chinese finger traps, the pet snail farms—”

  “Yes, yes, fine, but I never gave up on my dream of being a successful entrepreneur,” she said. “Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something, Mina. You’re so bright and young and clever and you’re going to do more with your life than work at a dusty old bookshop. You’ll see.”

  That was just it. I’d spent my whole life watching my mother latch on to scammy companies hawking stupid products no one wanted in the belief they’d solve all her problems. All the while, pity and shame churned in my stomach. I couldn’t believe Mum’s pep talk because I’d seen her give it to herself too many times.

  I couldn’t be that person – the pity intern who was stuck with admin work while all the other interns laughed at me behind my back as they got to work on the shows. But I didn’t know who I was without fashion. I just couldn’t explain that to Mum.

  “You’re right, I’m sorry. I just…” I sucked in a breath. “My doctor said I’d go through a grieving stage. That’s why I’m here, to collect myself and figure out what to do next. I just didn’t realize it would be this hard.”

  Mum beamed and let me go. All through dessert (tinned peaches) and a couple of shows on the telly she kept up a steady stream of conversation about her wobbling business. I nodded in all the right places, but my mind was a million miles away.

  That night I lay in bed, staring at the cracks radiating across the ceiling, wondering how long I had until the details of the plasterboard and the chipped cornice were only memories, and the light above my head would disappear forever.

  How can I be me if I can’t see?

  And I thought of Heathcliff, who had left behind a love so great it had torn his soul in half. Of Morrie, who had lost the only arch-nemesis who could match his intellect. Of Quoth, who was a mystery even to himself. I’d intruded on their world, but they’d welcomed me like an equal and shared their secrets with me. And I thought, maybe it was no accident we four found each other. Maybe they needed me as much as I was growing to need them.

  We were so different, but we were the same – four lost souls trying to figure out who we were now.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  When I returned from the bakery for our breakfast order, Mrs. Ellis was holding court outside, delighting her audience with tales of the sordid goings on within the bookshop of ill-repute. I’d have thought it hilarious if her words didn’t hit so close to home.

  If I wasn’t secretly lusting after three guys.

  I snuck around the back to avoid Mrs. Ellis’ gleeful tales. Heathcliff let me in. He presented me with a tiny black key.

  “I got it cut for you yesterday,” he said. “You can use it whenever you want. Even if… even if it’s not work hours.”

  “Thanks.” The gesture touched me, partly because I knew how hard it was for him to let someone new into his life. Heathcliff’s black eyes looked right through me, like he could read all the thoughts running around in my head. Which would be bad, on account of how little clothing he wore in most of them.

  “Just don’t go snooping through my stuff when I’m not here,” he added.

  I smiled. “You’re never not here.”

  Heathcliff stepped back to let me in. Quoth swooped down from a dark corner and zoomed between us, making a beeline for the oak tree in the center of the village green.

  “Where’s he going?” I asked.

  “Only the wind knows,” Heathcliff replied. “He’s been all weird and silent all night.”

  “He’s always weird and silent.”

  “Not like this. He asked me if he could put some of his paintings up in the shop. With price tags.” Heathcliff’s savage f
eatures winced at the idea.

  “That’s a good thing. Quoth’s an amazing artist. I bet people will buy his work.”

  “Of course you’d say that,” Heathcliff glowered. “You’re the one giving him dangerous ideas. I bet you won’t be the one consoling him when nothing sells.”

  “Right, as if you know how to console someone.”

  “I know how to hand them a bottle of wine. Don’t sit with him in public again. You’re a bad influence.”

  Grinning, I followed Heathcliff into the shop. We sat down at his desk and I spread out my bakery purchases. “No Morrie today?”

  “He’s following a lead. Apparently, that ring is from Debenhams, so he’s gone to the nearest store to see if he can find out who purchased it.”

  “Oh, interesting. That means it probably wasn’t part of a fashion show goody bag. Did he say if he thought it was relevant?”

  Heathcliff sipped his coffee and opened his ledger. “Honestly, I wasn’t listening. Morrie talks a lot, and most of it is self-congratulatory bullshit.”

  “You’re not wrong about that. What’s on the agenda today?”

  “We’re opening. We can’t afford not to. You okay with that?”

  “I’m the one who’s been telling you to open!”

  “Keep talking lip and I’ll make you give tours of the murder site,” Heathcliff growled, leaning back in his chair and opening a book.

  My jaw dropped. Did he really just say that?

  “Um, if that was a joke, it was a bloody horrible one.” I folded my arms. A tense silence descended between us.

  I waited for an apology. When one wasn’t forthcoming, I finished my coffee and flipped the CLOSED sign to OPEN seven minutes early and threw the door open. “Welcome to Nevermore Books,” I yelled into the street. “Come in, come in, everyone is welcome!”

  “We haven’t opened yet,” Heathcliff boomed from the main room.