Wordless (Pink Sofa Secrets Book 1)

by Mel Sterling

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Summary

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Excerpt: Shots in the Dark

  About Mel Sterling

  Book One of Pink Sofa Secrets

  Wordless Copyright © 2016 Mel Sterling

  First Edition October 2016.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Publisher's Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author's imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

  Cover design by Skyla Dawn Cameron at Indigo Chick Designs.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-9971391-5-0 (trade paperback)

  ISBN-13: 978-0-9971391-8-1 (ebook)

  About Wordless, book one of the Pink Sofa Secrets series…

  Disaster reporter and internet celebrity Jack Tucker is disillusioned after a stint embedded in Iraq. The IED that destroyed his team's Humvee brought him tragedy and regret, robbing him of the joy he took in his job—or anything else. He spends his days in a small Camden bookshop, struggling with writer's block, until the elderly proprietor dies, leaving him adrift.

  Lexie Worth abandoned a promising career to keep her uncle's beloved bookstore alive. But the store's tabby cat hates her, local poets invade twice a month for scurrilous readings, and she knows she shouldn't get involved with sexy, troubled strangers like Jack. When the FBI comes knocking, with suspicions of fraud and racketeering, Lexie realizes someone's after more than a first edition or two.

  Someone's been using the bookstore to hide their crimes. Someone dangerous—maybe even deadly. Jack wants to protect Lexie—if he can believe her. And if she doesn't find out exactly who he is...

  For all the wonderful folks who helped make my bookstore dream a reality.

  CHAPTER ONE

  JACK TUCKER, BETTER KNOWN to millions of enthralled internet surfers as John T. Jarvis, and to certain Marines as JT, took a long swallow of his extra-hot triple-shot twelve-ounce latte and stared at the door connecting The Campus Cup and Saucer to Horace's Books. A week after Horace's funeral, the door was still closed. He'd heard they were reopening today, but it didn't look that way.

  "Yeah, so go on in!" Gilly Harris said, from behind the espresso bar, agitating a steel pitcher beneath the steam wand.

  "They're still closed."

  "Lexie's there, she came in for a tea this morning. Light's're on, see?"

  Jack turned, latte in one hand, his battered satchel in the other. Gilly, who dressed like something out of a Dr. Seuss book, had a hip cocked and a long froth spoon in one hand. He got an eyeful of a tattoo that he supposed represented a palm tree, spread over her back, visible between the straps of her layered tank tops and camisoles and the ties of her barista apron. Her hair was a shock-pink fauxhawk this week, spiky with gel and strangely Jurassic. Writing—marker, he thought, not tattoos—spiraled down her arm with anti-government slogans and pro-feminist sentiments.

  He remembered what it was like to be that young, earnest and full of blind, unreasoning hope. Even though thirty-six wasn't all that old, Jack had seen too much in the past fifteen years as a freelance journalist chasing disasters around the globe. He didn't hold out hope for the human race. Money intended to rebuild or save the lives of thousands after a catastrophe went instead into the rapacious maws of multi-national corporations. Bureaucracy fouled aid channels, diverting effort and resources into clogging paperwork and busywork, until it was too late to save a home, a neighborhood, a town, a country. Then the aid went to fund bulldozers and backhoes instead of clean water and meals, hammers or nails.

  It was all a waste, and he couldn't look at it any more. The misery had taken his words, the only weapon he had to combat the horror. In the place of words was a vast nothing, empty and still and dark.

  "The door's closed, Gilly."

  "That's because Melville the cat's back. You remember him, all he does is sleep in the front window in the sunshine. He's been at home with Horace while Horace was…" Gilly trailed off, scowling. "You know, doing that dying thing."

  She slammed the foaming pitcher on the counter twice—why, Jack didn't know, but assumed it had something to do with bubbles. Gilly had lectured him around a pink blob of gum weeks ago as she demonstrated her latte art—leaves, little birds, stylized hearts. Foam consistency was everything in a cappuccino or a flat white. Jack had been more interested in how she managed to produce coherent speech around such a large wad of chicle than in the oak leaf she drew in the glossy foam.

  "Doing that dying thing," Jack repeated. "Hell, Gilly."

  She gave an irritated, embarrassed twitch. "I don't like to talk about it. Horace was a good old guy, now he's gone, it's over, whatever. Anyway. We can't leave the door open because the cat's not allowed in here. Just push, it opens."

  Smack, crack, pop of the gum, and a dexterous flick of the pitcher left a sweet little heart in the top of a wide-mouthed cup. Gilly skidded the cup into a saucer and called "Double dry cap!" as she slid the saucer down the counter to a waiting student. Jack watched it skid to a perfect stop in front of the customer, and wondered how many cups had met messy ends on the Saltillo tiles before she perfected her shuffleboard technique.

  "Who's Lexie?"

  "Horace's niece. Store's hers now. The store and Horace's house, I guess."

  Horace had been ancient. Jack had gotten to know Horace well, before illness had rendered him housebound for the past month and reduced the bookstore's open hours as a result. He'd liked the old man a great deal. Their conversations had been epic in scope. He wondered what Horace's niece was like. Would the bookstore only be open long enough to sell the business or liquidate it to satisfy medical bills or settle family estate disputes?

  He expected Horace had been too ill in his last days to pass along the arrangement he and Jack had about that little table in the rare books aisle. That table was the right size, the right location, set amongst books that didn't interest Jack too much, yet still a good line of sight to the front door and the door that connected Horace's Books to The Cup. Placed where no one could come up behind him and peer over his shoulder at the tablet screen and see that it was—still and apparently always, these days—blank.

  Perhaps if he got in there right away, got settled, the niece would simply accept his presence there as status quo, and leave things unchanged for now. He shouldered the satchel and pressed the lever in the French door that connected the two suites. As he came through, Ben Goff glanced up and gave him a small welcoming head jerk. Jack paused to return the gesture. Ben was in his usual bookstore uniform—crisp jeans that looked like they'd been ironed and a bright green polo shirt fitted snugly to his lean, long-waisted build. He'd had a
haircut since Jack had seen him at Horace's funeral, buzzed close to his brown scalp. Melville, the bookstore tabby, shot off his perch at the cash register counter and bolted for the open door. A small, curvy woman skipped after him. She got a foot in front of him, slowing him long enough for Jack to push the door closed.

  "Not today, buddy," Jack said to the cat, who lashed his tail in irritation. "Nice try, though."

  "Thank you." The woman turned back to the cash register counter, where she picked up a stack of books and carried them into the aisles, calling over her shoulder, "Just let us know if we can help you find a title."

  Jack watched her vanish. She had pale skin and short, dark, curly hair, and he remembered seeing her at Horace's funeral a week ago. She'd stood amongst many others at the graveside interment service, one of several people delivering brief eulogies for Horace. He'd been struck by her simple words and awkward stance, her face drawn and tight, her hands crammed in the pockets of a dark blazer.

  "We'll miss our dear Horace. He asks that if we are quiet people—" and there, she had laid a hand over her heart for a moment "—that we make a new friend and broaden our horizons. He asks that we seek first to offer a hand before we judge. But most of all, he asks that we remember him with a smile when we enjoy a cup of strong black coffee or turn the pages of a good book, preferably the two taken together." She had struggled not to cry, lifting her chin instead and managing a wobbly smile that strengthened as she spoke.

  So this must be Horace's niece, the woman who held the bookstore's fate in her hands. Today she was dressed in a skirt that swung as she moved, a knitted blue pullover, ballerina flats and navy tights.

  She was far younger than Jack had envisioned when Gilly mentioned Horace's niece. Horace had been so damned old—more than ninety, if Horace's wild stories were to be believed. Perhaps she was a great niece. Lexie, Gilly had said. Jack stifled the urge to follow her through the store and stare while he indulged his curiosity about her.

  At the desk, Ben nodded as Jack headed for the rare books aisle and his home away from home. Home being a relative term—referring to the studio apartment he'd rented above the midtown food co-op four blocks away, where everything smelled of turnips and old bread. He had stumbled into Camden, Oregon, in the middle of a virulent wildfire season in the state's tree-covered mountains. He had been seeking a base from which to work up his coverage of the eternal struggle between the timber industry, environmentalists and local residents. Camden's small liberal arts college had an excellent library and had granted him use of it. The season had ended with the autumn rains, his articles and videos were done, but he was still here. There had been preliminary talk of a residency at the college come spring if he was still in town and interested, and Jack was tired of living out of a rolling duffel bag.

  Tired, period. He frowned and pushed the thoughts aside. Camden was all right for now, smelly studio or no. It wasn't exciting, but after Iraq and a fiery season in the wilderness, it was a relief. No one was lobbing explosives his way, a forest wasn't burning from crown to roots, the ocean hadn't come ashore to consume whole villages, and buildings weren't falling. He wanted to try his hand at narrative non-fiction, shifting from international disaster and war reporting to more personal accounts. Horace's bookstore had seemed like the perfect place to find the right story angle as he transcribed and amplified his notes and recordings from the fire-lines.

  His notes were nearly complete now, yet he still hadn't managed to find the story in those dozens of threads. He was, figuratively speaking, burned out, and his usual news service backers seemed able to sniff that. There'd been no new freelancing assignments in the past six months. Money was tight everywhere and Jack had savings and royalties, but the usual channels were drying up. In a way, he was grateful for the external pressure to force the internal change, but it wasn't the simple thing he'd thought it would be. Producing meaningful, engaging content without the background of disaster was apparently a skill he hadn't mastered yet.

  Jack's table wasn't in the nook. In its place was a free-standing dictionary podium, surmounted with a massive leather-bound Oxford English Dictionary, open to the Ns, a velvet ribbon bookmark trailing from its middle. The forest green armchair that had stood in the awkward corner formed by bookcases and a set of pipes and conduits was gone. The pipes had long ago been painted a creamy green to match the walls, though most of the walls were covered with shelving to a height of at least eight feet—higher, throughout much of the store.

  He jolted to a stop, satchel half-unslung, finding himself unaccountably shaken.

  He never used to rely on routine. Routine was waking in the same hotel room three mornings running, or traveling in a Humvee with the same crowd of rowdy Marines for a month. When had routine become a hard straight chair and a square table with only enough room for his tablet, keyboard and a cup of coffee? The bookstore had been closed for the past two weeks, so of course things had changed. Still, he had the unsettling feeling that if he wasn't able to bust through his writers block in the Rare Book aisle, he wouldn't bust through at all.

  He turned on his heel and located Horace's niece three aisles over. She sat on the kitschy rug that carpeted that particular spot, the skirt pooling around her like dark water. Her small hands were pulling some books from the shelves and putting others up. A scatter of pages—a list of some sort—lay near at hand.

  "Where's my table?" Jack fought to keep the dismay out of his voice.

  She—Lexie, he reminded himself—looked up. "I'm sorry?"

  "My table. It's not there."

  She straightened, rising to her knees. The skirt moved with her, soft cloth brushing with a quiet sound. "Your table. I'm afraid I don't understand. Did you need to find a place to look at books?"

  "In Rare Books. Horace let me have a table there. We had an arrangement."

  She settled a mild expression on her face, as if she were indulging a petulant child. "Ah. That table. Well. I moved it."

  "Clearly."

  The mildness sharpened slightly, and Jack tightened his grip on the satchel strap. Patience and professionalism would be a plus here, he reminded himself. He'd spent the past two weeks prying words out of his brain while sitting in turnip funk, or trying to form a coherent thought at The Cup with Gilly or her coworkers singing and slinging foamed milk behind the counter. The mere thought of the quiet table amongst the leather-bound books roused a bone-deep need.

  "The thing is, that's where I work."

  A stony little smile fixed itself on her lips as she set books on the floor and got to her feet. She wasn't very big at all—the top of her head would be level with his shoulder if they stood hip-to-hip—but Lexie gave off a vibe that made her seem much taller. Her eyes were a dark blue accentuated by the pullover, and shielded by a black sweep of lash. Her mouth was plump and rosy, but drawn tight. Jack could all but hear her thoughts. He'd been resident in the bookstore for long enough to know plenty of characters wandered in and out all day, some of them more entitled than others. He was already ringing that overly-entitled-customer bell, the one that made a business owner unwilling and unhelpful.

  He spread his hands. "Wait a minute. Let me back up." He took a breath, but she filled the silence first.

  "Here's the thing. That aisle is full of expensive, fragile books. I don't want people to sit there with the books piled on the table, cracking book spines in that nook while they're out of sight. If someone's shopping for rare books, they can cradle them properly in their hands, or come out here to the big tables where we can keep an eye—" she stopped herself and corrected course to a less inflammatory phrase. "—help out if needed. So I moved that table. It's a business decision." She pointed to a spot near the front windows, in full view of three-fourths of the store. "There's where I put it."

  Ben shifted at the cash register, his mouth opening in consternation as he glanced to Jack and back to his new boss. "Lexie—"

  Jack persisted. He felt sure if she only understood, she'd relen
t cheerfully. He didn't want to be on display while he wrote, despite his ease in front of cameras. "Part of the reason the table was in that aisle is because I was helping keep an eye on the books. Horace thought there might be some pilfering going on, so having me work there was an ideal solution for both of us."

  Lexie shook her head. Mink-brown curls flopped. "You're not on the payroll, Mr…?"

  "Lexie," Ben tried again. This time she looked at him. "This is—"

  "Jack Tucker," Jack interrupted. He put his hand out and waited. "I'm not an employee, but I do work here. I write."

  She took a long breath and put her hand out, professional to the bitter end, but in her firm, small clasp, he could feel the steel of her resolution not to give in. "Alexia Worth. Lexie. I own the bookstore now."

  Alexia Worth watched the tall, lean man settle at the little table's new location near the front windows. He was dressed in jeans, a blue chambray work shirt and a gray fleece vest. His interesting, almost-handsome face bore a disgruntled expression. Melville, her great-uncle Horace's store cat and pet, walked close enough to strop his chin against the man's shin en route to the carpeted cat tree in the store window. Her lips compressed.

  Melville was her problem now that Horace was gone. Toward the end, Horace had made her promise to keep the store open at least as long as Melville was alive. The obnoxious cat had no use for Lexie unless she was feeding him or escorting him as he traveled between Horace's house and the bookstore morning and evening. If she petted him, he tolerated it only a few seconds before moving away. Yet here he was, sucking up to an obnoxious customer.

  She took a deep breath. Over the years, Horace had told the whole family stories about customers who, given an inch, took the whole store. Sometimes the stories were funny, but more often they left Lexie wondering if people had been born in barns. It was best to begin as she meant to go on, firmly, with assurance, whether she felt it or not. She went back to the aisle where she'd been working the pull list Ben had helped her print out first thing, and gathered up the books and papers. These were new books Horace had stocked a few months ago, books that hadn't sold and were due to be returned to the distributor for an account credit. The pulls hadn't been done for two months, not since Horace first felt unwell and things began to slide in the store. It was only one of many tasks on the list Lexie and Horace had written down, the activities of the day-to-day, everything from cleaning the restroom to mending damaged books to counseling customers on book choices.