Kissing Books

by Cat Johnson

  Maybe he was being sweet and trying to keep his promise rather than attempting to get out of doing work. One thing Stone Morgan was not, was lazy.

  “I know. And thank you. But Stone, seriously. You have to help out here. This sounds like a huge deal for the farm. Besides, I’ll be fine going through the journals alone. Or, you know what? I can ask Red and Bethany if they want to come over. Red’s been dying to go through that stuff.”

  “You sure?” he asked.

  “I’m sure. Really. Stay here. Well, I mean you have to drive me home but then come back here and help your brothers. It’s not fair for them to do it all because you’re helping me.”

  “Listen to her, Stone. She sounds like a smart one.” Cash winked at me.

  Stone sighed. “All right. One of you two has to drive us to my truck. It’s parked at the fishing access.”

  Boone’s eyes widened excitedly. “You took her on a tire float?”

  “Damn, girl.” Cash pressed his lips together, nodding. “I’m impressed. Floating down the Muddy River in an old tire . . . You know that makes you a local, right?”

  I laughed. “Not quite. I think I’ll be considered a city girl by half this town no matter what, but I do feel a little bit more like a local every day.”

  “I’ll run you two over to your truck, Stone,” Boone offered.

  “So I can stay here and listen to Dad bitch things aren’t done yet?” Cash’s brows shot high. “Oh, hell no. We’ll both run them over to the fishing access.”

  Boone rolled his eyes and I smiled.

  I didn’t have siblings. Watching the dynamic between these three, so alike in some ways and so very different in others, was fascinating.

  There was definitely a book series with three brothers as the heroes in my future. I had to admit, I’d hoped Mudville would be a good place to keep my head down and write undisturbed, but I’d never imagined it would provide so much inspiration for my creativity.

  The whole town was a gold mine of ideas. Plots. Characters. In fact, I loved everything about this town.

  It was horrible to even think it, but I hoped Agnes took a good long time to recover. I wouldn’t mind having an excuse to stay here for a while.

  What would Christmas be like in this magical little town?

  Fingers crossed I’d still be here at least for the first snow. I envisioned sitting in front of a roaring fire in the wood paneled living room in Agnes’s grand old Victorian, watching the townspeople and their dogs dashing down the sidewalk along Main Street, dodging the falling snow flakes.

  Yup. Magical. There was no other word for it . . .

  Could I squeeze a quick Christmas novella into my writing schedule? I’d have to check but God, I truly hoped so.

  Though I did have to devote at least another couple of days to going through Rose’s massive amount of stuff. I’d promised Joe. His mother deserved at least a few days of my time.

  I was so in my own head, Stone’s touch on my arm startled me.

  As the two brothers stalked ahead of us toward where a row of identical Morgan Farm trucks were parked, Stone leaned close. “Is there really a corn farmer in your story?”

  I smiled. “Why? You worried?”

  He lifted one brow. “No . . . Maybe. A little.”

  I smiled broader. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”

  It was good to keep a man guessing once in a while. It kept them on their toes. Kept them interested. And I definitely wanted to keep this man interested.

  From the Journal of Rose Van de Berg

  MUDVILLE INQUISITOR

  1972

  Anti-war demonstrations are heating up. A focal point was a sit-in on Dietz Street in front of the military recruiting office, blocking traffic for two days.

  TWENTY-SIX

  Harper

  Stone dropped me off at the house and only got out of the truck long enough to show me where he’d hung the spare key. He said he was heading straight back to the farm to help his brothers because they were going to whine like little bitches if he didn’t.

  I didn’t mind he’d left. I understood the reason and I had gotten two orgasms out of him already today. A girl shouldn’t be too greedy.

  But still, I didn’t even get a goodbye kiss before he left. It was late afternoon on a Sunday and judging by the cars in the driveways, the neighbors were home. I guess we were both concerned they might have seen.

  Whatever Stone and I were to each other—boyfriend and girlfriend, friends with benefits—we were a secret.

  We definitely weren’t up to the stage where we acted like a couple in front of others. No public displays of affection. At least not yet. Maybe we never would reach that stage. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

  I unlocked the door of the house and returned the key to the nail in the carriage house where Stone had hidden it. While I was there, I fed the animals their evening meal.

  With everyone fed, I came inside and that’s when I heard it—the sound of someone running up the back staircase.

  What the fuck? Someone had broken in and was in the attic?

  Oh hell, no! Not again. Not on my watch.

  I was still exhausted from the last time and that made me cranky.

  Last time had been frightening. This time I was more pissed than scared. It was broad daylight and the neighbors were just a shout away.

  I was feeling bulletproof and confident as I crept into the kitchen and eased closed the door to the back staircase.

  Determined to catch the intruder—and it had better not be Joe again—I propped a wooden kitchen chair beneath the doorknob.

  With the intruder blocked on the staircase and unable to escape that way, I sprinted to the front hall and up the grand staircase.

  On the second floor I detoured to the master bedroom and grabbed from the gun case the shotgun I knew was still loaded from the last time someone was in the attic.

  I ran down the hallway, past the doors to two of the other bedrooms, heading toward the back of the house and the second floor entrance to the back staircase.

  Just as I reached the back hall and had the staircase door in sight it swung open.

  An older woman froze in the doorway, wide-eyed.

  I raised the gun and yelled, “Freeze! Don’t move or I’ll shoot.”

  She was eighty if she was a day. I wasn’t really going to shoot her but she didn’t know that, judging by the shell-shocked expression.

  Meanwhile I wasn’t sure if the most astonishing part of this scenario was that my intruder was a little old lady, or that she was capable of running up and down the staircase that I got winded just walking up at a normal pace.

  “Please. Don’t shoot. I’ll leave peacefully.”

  Oh no. She wasn’t going anywhere without an explanation. I knew this wasn’t Joe’s mother since I’d met her this morning. Was this one of Rose’s relatives looking for the same missing will Joe had been searching for?

  “Tell me what you’re doing here.”

  “I—I heard you had Rose’s journals.”

  I drew in a breath. News definitely traveled fast in this small town. In fact, why there was an official newspaper, I didn’t know. They certainly didn’t need one. There was quite a news distribution network set up without it.

  “Why? What’s in them you want?” I asked.

  Part of me was thinking this whole journal storyline was going to make a hell of a great book. Anything that could make this many people in this town act so insanely out of character had to be a plot goldmine.

  She swallowed hard and looked reluctant to speak but I stood my ground. Me and Agnes’s double barrel, which was starting to get kind of heavy.

  Since the little old lady didn’t look armed with anything and her raised hands were empty, I lowered the barrel and gave my tired arm muscles a break.

  She slowly lowered her hands but still didn’t answer. But the more I looked at her, the more familiar she became. Finally, I figured it out. She was always ou
t walking. Like every day.

  Rain or shine, there she was, motoring down the sidewalk, fists up, arms pumping, powerwalking in her bright white sneakers like it was the nineteen-nineties.

  No wonder she could take the stairs at a sprint.

  And here I was still trying to catch my own breath. Maybe I should take a clue from her and start walking too. Something to think about. Later, when I finally had an intruder-free day.

  Would I ever get one of those now the news of Rose’s diaries was out? I had to wonder.

  “Come on. Tell me and I might not call the sheriff.” I should just program the direct number to the sheriff’s department into my phone. It seemed like I’d be using it a lot.

  Her eyes widened at my threat. “No. Please, don’t.”

  “Then tell me what you wanted in those diaries,” I demanded.

  She pressed her lips together and finally said, “Rose hated me. And I know she used to write about me in those diaries of hers.”

  “What could she have written all those years ago that would make you break into this house to try to find it?” I asked.

  “She was always jealous of me. She accused me of stealing her boyfriend in high school. I didn’t but she never forgave me. And she hated that I was happily married. She was widowed young, you know.”

  I hadn’t known. I just knew she’d died with no relatives in town. That no husband and no children had survived her. Now that made sense. I wondered if he died in one of the wars.

  That still didn’t explain this woman’s need to break in.

  “And?” I prompted.

  Again, the woman looked like she’d rather do anything than tell me.

  I pulled my cell phone out of my back pocket. At this point I thought my calling someone to report her break-in was more of a threat than the gun. Though I was starting to feel like a monster interrogating a little old lady, even if she were clearly in the wrong here.

  “There were rumors,” she said. “Years ago. Decades ago actually, back when I was newly married. Talk around town that I was cheating on my husband. I wasn’t, of course. But that didn’t stop the gossips. Rose used to tell people she had proof. Some letter or something that I supposedly wrote to my lover.”

  “If it wasn’t true, then what are you worried about? Why break in to find it?” I asked.

  “Because rumors don’t have to be true to hurt people. And I was curious if she really did have some kind of evidence.” She shrugged.

  “How could she have proof if it wasn’t true?” I asked.

  “I have enemies. People who hate me, for no good reason, mind you. I wouldn’t put it past some people to make up something to hurt me or my husband.”

  Joe’s story had a ring of truth to it. But this woman’s story seemed a bit one sided. Oh, I believed there might be a letter, but I wasn’t so sure it was forged by a long past enemy to make her look bad.

  How I’d become a one woman jury determining who had cause and who didn’t to break in and steal evidence from Rose’s diaries I wasn’t sure. But I did know one thing. Where there was smoke, there was fire.

  Something was in those journals, or at least this woman believed there was. Enough to break in to find it.

  “I’m sorry, but what’s your name?” I asked.

  She looked reluctant to answer.

  “I’m not going to call the sheriff. I just thought this whole thing would seem a little more civil—and a little less like a misdemeanor—if I knew your name,” I explained.

  Her gaze dropped guiltily to the floor before she brought it back up to meet mine. “Margaret. Margaret Trout.”

  “I’m Harper. Agnes’s great niece.”

  “I know. We all know who you are. And that you’re already dating the oldest Morgan boy.”

  Jesus, this really was a small town. The bigger problem was even I didn’t know if I was dating Stone or not so I really didn’t need Margaret Trout spreading it around Mudville.

  I decided to save that concern for later. One problem at a time.

  “How did you get in, Margaret?” I asked since apparently it didn’t matter that Stone had moved the spare key to a new hiding place.

  “I have a key.” Margaret reached into the pocket of her elastic waist cotton pants and pulled out a key tied to a piece of faded red ribbon. “Agnes gave it to me years ago so I could bring in her mail and water her plants. It was that time she crossed the Atlantic on the Queen Mary.”

  Again Agnes had managed to surprise me. I wanted to be her when I grew up.

  My one regret was I hadn’t gotten to know her long before now. She sounded like an amazing woman. Or at least, all evidence pointed to the fact that she’d lived an amazing life and was still going.

  “Okay, Margaret. Well, here’s the thing. I think what no one realizes is that these diaries were a bit of a life long obsession for Rose. There are dozens of them. I haven’t counted but I’d guess there could be probably close to a hundred books, all stuffed full.”

  That number was an estimate but it would make sense actually. Rose had lived to the ripe old age of ninety-nine and all indications pointed to her starting her journaling young. If she averaged filling one journal per year, that would make almost a hundred.

  One book I’d found this morning had a newspaper clipping from nineteen-sixteen.

  It was all fascinating to look through, but I was finding it wasn’t easy to locate one specific thing. There was just too much. And there was no order to the books shoved in the trunk.

  If I found the will for Joe it would be a miracle. Finding this purportedly forged love letter that might or might not exist sounded impossible.

  Margaret looked absolutely crestfallen. “Oh.”

  “Hey, but that’s good news, right? With so much stuff, one little letter will never be found.”

  “I guess.”

  I didn’t know if Margaret was as innocent as she proclaimed to be or not. But she certainly looked concerned about that letter.

  “Look, Margaret. You have nothing to worry about. From what I can tell no one has touched those journals for twenty years. Not until I moved in last week. And I promise you I have no intentions of using them to dig up dirt and ruin the lives of the people of Mudville.”

  I might spin some of the tidbits I found in these journals into a completely fictional romance series, but of course all the names would be changed to protect the innocent . . . and the guilty.

  Finally, she nodded. “All right. Thank you for not calling the sheriff.”

  “No problem.” Once already this week had been enough for me. “Come on. I’ll walk you out.”

  She turned toward the back stairs and I remembered my chair barricade in the kitchen.

  “Oh. No. Let’s go down this way. The main stairs are much easier.”

  I let my little old perpetrator out the front door and had my cell phone out before her Keds-covered feet had even hit the sidewalk.

  When Red answered I said, “How quick can you get away from the shop and over to my house?”

  “The girl I hired is here and knows how to close up. I could leave now if I want. Why?”

  “Can you call Bethany too and see if she wants to come over? It’s too much to tell now over the phone but I’ll explain it all when you get here. Long story short, I’m going to go through every one of Rose’s diaries page by page tonight and I need help. I think these things are full of more shit than we ever imagined.”

  “Yes! I’m there. I’ll text Bethany.”

  “Perfect. We can order Chinese to be delivered and I’ve got wine. I’m going upstairs to dive in now. I’ll leave the front door unlocked for you two.”

  I might as well leave the doors unlocked. It seemed Agnes’s house was open to the public, no matter how many precautions I took or locks I locked. And it was all because of these journals. I wasn’t going to rest until every last one of those pages had been turned.

  Tonight, my Mudville girl gang and I were going to unearth all of this to
wn’s secrets. I couldn’t wait.

  From the Journal of Rose Van de Berg

  MUDVILLE INQUISITOR

  1979

  On June 23, the local New York Telephone switchboard was closed for the final time at the offices on Elm Street, ending the era of live operators dating back to 1882.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Stone

  “You heading to the Zoning Board Meeting?” Cash asked.

  Fuck. I’d forgotten that was tonight. I glanced around the mess of tools and sawdust.

  We were building a wooden scaffold to display a couple of hundred jack-o-lanterns—the newest brainstorm from the Rotary. Apparently it would be Instagrammable, which now seemed to be our goal for everything we did.

  “I don’t know. We’ve got so much to do still.” I shook my head and glanced at the time on my phone. It was just going on six.

  Yup. That meeting was about to start.

  I could make it before anything important happened if I left right now.

  Boone watched me as I waffled. “I think you should go.”

  “Why?” I frowned.

  “Because you love those damn meetings,” Boone said.

  “They always get me pissed off.”

  “Yup.” He nodded. “Then you come home and work like a demon because you’re mad.”

  “Boone’s right.” Cash put down his hammer to run the back of his hand over his forehead. “I say you go, get good and angry, and then come back and finish this damn pumpkin scaffold so Boone and I can go eat dinner.”

  I considered going, not because I cared all that much if Boone and Cash were hungry, but more because I hated the idea of missing a meeting where something important might happen. “All right. I’m going. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  The two idiots grinned as if they were getting away with something. I shook my head. My leaving just meant nothing more was going to get done for hours and Dad would be even more annoyed, but whatever. Not my problem. I wouldn’t be at that dinner table to hear it.