Read It and Weep (A Library Lover's Mystery)

by Jenn McKinlay

  “So that’s why that toad is here,” she said. “So, when romancing me back into your life didn’t work, you decided to send Wargus after me and the show. This isn’t Broadway. Who cares if Wargus trashes the show? Or did you have a different plan? Were you hoping to discover something damaging about me that you could use to cause a rift between me and my daughter?”

  Sterling’s lack of an answer was telling.

  “News flash—there isn’t anything she doesn’t know about me, because that’s how we roll. It’s called honesty. You should try it sometime,” Violet said.

  “Vi, you have to give me a chance or I’ll—” Sterling threatened but Violet interrupted.

  “Or you’ll what?” she said. “Murder me like you did Robbie?”

  Sterling looked shocked, and Lindsey didn’t think he was a good enough actor to be faking.

  “You can’t believe—” he began but she interrupted again.

  “Oh, yes, I can,” she said. Her voice dripped contempt like it was acid. “I believe you’re capable of doing anything to get what you want. Sully, Ian, I think you need to take out the trash.”

  Ian vaulted over the bar as if he had a springboard back there. He and Sully stood shoulder to shoulder and moved forward with the formidable stance of a brick wall.

  “Gentlemen, you would be ill advised to touch me,” Buchanan said, looking decidedly nervous.

  Ian looked at Sully. “I can live with that.”

  “Me, too,” Sully agreed.

  They moved forward. Buchanan moved back.

  “In fact,” Sully continued, “I was thinking Mr. Buchanan here looked thirsty for a little taste of the sea. Maybe we can see if that suit of his is drip-dry.”

  As one, Sully and Ian each stomped a foot forward. Buchanan bolted through the door, moving faster than Lindsey had thought possible. Ian and Sully laughed and knuckle bumped one another. Lindsey turned to find Violet lifting her glass to them.

  “Well done,” Violet said, and then she downed her drink. She handed the glass to Nancy and clapped her hands. “Okay, people, we have a show to put on. Roll out.”

  As the others prepared to leave, Lindsey turned back to her plate and hastily tried to shovel in the rest of her dinner. Sully returned to his seat and did the same.

  “You all go on ahead,” Sully said. “We’ll meet you over there.”

  Lindsey noted the hopeful glances that they got from the others, but refused to acknowledge them. She had no doubt they were all hoping for reconciliation between her and Sully. Whatever.

  When they finished eating, she refused to let him pay for her dinner, and he gave her an exasperated look, but she held her ground.

  Together they made their way to the theater. It was dark now and the wind whipping in off the water had a definite nip as it yanked and tugged at the hems of their jackets, trying to sneak up their sleeves and scratch them with its chilly fingers.

  Lindsey shivered and realized it was time to upgrade to a thicker coat and possibly time to pull out the wool scarf as well. She hunched lower into her jacket.

  “Lindsey!” a voice called from across the street. She turned and glanced over her shoulder. Emma Plewicki was jogging toward them.

  Lindsey stopped walking, and Sully, beside her, paused as well.

  “I got your message,” Emma said. She wasn’t even winded from her jog. “What’s up?”

  Lindsey glanced at Sully. She would have preferred not to talk in front of him because she didn’t want him to know that she’d been looking into Robbie’s background. Then again, if she told Emma what she knew, there was no way in a town this small that Sully wasn’t going to find out the information had come from her, so she might as well deal with it now.

  “Did you know that Robbie Vine had a child?” Lindsey asked.

  Emma frowned. “Yes, why?”

  “What if that child was here?” Lindsey asked.

  She could feel Sully’s gaze on the side of her face. She ignored him and focused instead on Emma’s frown instead.

  “What are you saying, Lindsey?”

  “I think Dylan Peet is Robbie’s son,” Lindsey said. “I think he may have figured out who his father was and he might have been angry enough at being abandoned as a child that he killed him.”

  Emma tossed her dark hair out of the collar of her coat. She chewed her lower lip while she pondered Lindsey’s statement. “What makes you so sure it’s Dylan? Doesn’t that seem awfully coincidental to you?”

  “It would, but Robbie has . . . er . . . had a tattoo of a stylized sun with a date on it,” Lindsey said. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Sully stiffen. She ignored him. “The date is the same as Dylan’s birthday.”

  Emma raised her eyebrows. “Oh, definitely worth checking into then.”

  “I thought so,” Lindsey said.

  Emma looked at her face and then reached out and squeezed her arm. “It’s all right. I’ll tread lightly.”

  “Thanks,” she said. “Oh, and in case you haven’t heard, Sterling Buchanan is in town.”

  “Isn’t he Charlene’s father?” Emma asked.

  “Yes. He was just at the Anchor talking to Violet, and he made it very clear that he was not happy about Charlene’s close relationship with Violet’s acting friends.”

  “Did he threaten her?” Emma asked.

  “Not directly,” Sully said. “But I got the feeling that he definitely has an agenda.”

  “Got it,” Emma said. “And thanks.”

  She and Sully watched as Emma hurried off toward the theater.

  “So, Vine had a tattoo, huh?” Sully asked.

  “It was on his arm,” she said. “I saw it when I was fixing that nasty cut that he got.”

  Sully nodded. But even under the streetlight’s bluish glow, she noted that he looked relieved.

  “I suppose we should go,” she said. Suddenly, she felt as if the bottom of her shoes were made of lead.

  “Hey, you did the right thing,” Sully said.

  “Then why do I feel like such a heel?” Lindsey asked. “Dylan’s just a kid, and what if he’s innocent? What if he doesn’t even know that Robbie’s his father?”

  “Given how famous Vine was, it was going to come out one way or another,” Sully said. “Look on the bright side: maybe it’s just a coincidence and Dylan isn’t his son and someone else murdered Robbie.”

  “Great; then who killed him?” Lindsey asked.

  “Seems to me a lot of people had reason,” Sully said. “Frankly, Sterling Buchanan would be at the top of my list.”

  “True,” Lindsey said. “And boy, I would be so much happier to see him incarcerated than Dylan.”

  “Come on,” Sully said. “Dress rehearsal awaits.”

  Together they entered the theater and stepped into complete chaos. Emma was in front of the stage with Violet and Dylan. The rest of the cast and crew were running around the theater, looking stressed and fretful.

  “How mad do you think Violet is going to be at me?” she asked.

  Sully looked at Violet. She had her hands on her hips and she was obviously giving Emma a piece of her mind.

  “You can’t take Dylan,” Violet was sputtering. “It’s dress rehearsal! I need him.”

  “Sorry,” Emma said. “I need to talk to him.”

  “Now?” Violet asked. “You have to talk to him now?”

  Dylan looked confused and alarmed as he glanced between them.

  “Yes, now,” Emma said. “I’m sorry. I just have a few questions.”

  “But it’s dress rehearsal,” Dylan protested. “I can’t miss it. Why do you need to talk to me?”

  “It’s about Robbie Vine’s death,” Emma said.

  “But I don’t know anything about that,” Dylan protested.

  “It’s just a few q
uestions,” Emma said. True to her word, her voice was gentle and her manner kind.

  Dylan looked alarmed and then he looked at Violet. She studied Emma, and then she put her hand on Dylan’s shoulder.

  “She says it won’t take long,” Violet said. “We have to do whatever we can to help find Robbie’s killer.”

  Lindsey studied Dylan’s face. He looked nervous, but she couldn’t tell if it was guilt making him look that way. Again, it felt like a punch to the gut to realize she had ratted out a seventeen-year-old boy.

  “Steady,” Sully said.

  “I’m going to go see what Nancy needs me to do,” Lindsey said.

  “I’ll be backstage if you need me,” Sully said.

  “Thanks,” Lindsey said.

  She watched Emma take Dylan out the theater’s side door. His shoulders were hunched over and his hands were shoved deep into his pockets. He was the picture of misery, and Lindsey couldn’t help but wonder if she had just ruined his life.

  24

  “What are we going to do without a Puck?” Lola asked.

  She was wearing her Hermia costume, looking perfectly vulnerable, and again Lindsey wondered if that was what Robbie had seen in her. It gave her a tiny spurt of jealousy, which made her feel silly and stupid given all that was happening around them.

  “We’ll have a Puck,” Violet said. “Don’t you worry. Emma just has some questions but Dylan will be back. In the meantime, I’ll read his part.”

  Lindsey wondered if she should go and tell Violet what she knew about the tattoo and Dylan’s birthday. She hated that Violet might get blindsided by having another actor of hers arrested. Oh, god, the entire show could go under and it would be all her fault.

  “Lindsey, there you are!” Nancy cried as she came dashing up the aisle toward her. She had a bunch of costumes draped over her shoulder and her normally sparkling blue eyes looked the teensiest bit deranged.

  “What’s wrong?” Lindsey asked.

  “Ms. Cole lost her floral headpiece,” Nancy said. “Personally, I think she lost it on purpose. She’s being a bit of a prima donna, you know, and she made a real stink when I put yellow buttercups in it. I thought they would pick up the yellow in her gown, but she said I did it to make her look sallow.”

  Lindsey pressed her lips together, and tried not to smile. At least she could count on some things not to change.

  “Anyway, she said that she and Milton were reading lines up in the balcony and she thinks she might have left it up there,” Nancy said. “Would you mind going to look for it?”

  “No, not at all,” Lindsey said. “I’ll meet you backstage for the costume changes as soon as I can.”

  “Thanks,” Nancy said, and she disappeared down the aisle and trotted up the side steps onto the stage.

  Lindsey turned and headed into the lobby. The ticket takers and the ushers were all in the lobby, prepping for their assigned positions during the show. The women wore pretty, black or navy-blue dresses while the men wore black suits with bow ties. She glanced at the group, searching for Dylan’s mother, Joanie. Did she know he had left with Emma? Lindsey didn’t see her and she was relieved. She felt guilty enough without having to look the boy’s mother in the face.

  She slipped around the lot of them and headed up the staircase that led up to the balcony.

  The stairs were carpeted in red and gold, and wall sconces lit the way. The balcony was a modest size, ten rows deep with a fairly steep pitch. The bottom two rows gave a wonderful view of the stage, but the rest were definitely cheaper seating.

  Lindsey stepped out into the balcony and wished she had a flashlight. The lights were lowered, as dress rehearsal had begun. She supposed there was no way she was going to find Ms. Cole’s headpiece unless she went up and down each row, checking each seat and the floor. Now she understood why Nancy had been so annoyed.

  She decided to start with the front row and work her way to the back. Aisles ran down the side of the balcony, so she started with the right side since it was closer. The seats were the sort where the bottom part flipped up. She checked each seat and under it as she went. About ten seats in she spied something on the floor, but it was someone’s sweatshirt, not Ms. Cole’s rejected headpiece.

  She was almost done with the first row when she heard a shout from the stage. She turned and glanced down to see what the commotion was about. One of the actors had missed his mark and collided with another one who was coming out of the make-believe forest that consisted of four fake trees and a wonderfully rendered backdrop.

  “Watch where you’re going,” the actor who played Lysander snapped.

  “Me?” the actor who was Demetrius retorted. “You’re the one who’s off your mark.”

  “Stop it, both of you,” Violet chastised them. “I know nerves are running high, but we don’t have time for this. Take the scene from the top.”

  The two actors exchanged a glare and went back to their spots. Lindsey was about to turn back around when a hard shove hit her square in the back.

  The force of the hit sent her pitching forward. Her hips banged into the balcony rail while her upper body dipped over the edge. Someone screamed from below, but she was so busy trying to grab the rail of the balcony to catch herself that she didn’t see who it was.

  She gripped the rail with her left hand and managed to hook one foot under an armrest, but someone knocked her foot free and she slipped forward over the edge. She caught her left foot on the rail at the last second, stopping her fall to the floor.

  Every muscle in her body was clenched tight, and she was panting for breath as she tried to hold on to the rail with one foot and one hand. Gravity was not helping.

  She could hear shouts and cries coming from below but with her body pressed up against the front of the balcony, she couldn’t turn her head to see if anyone was coming to help her.

  She tried to tighten her grip but her muscles were straining. Her entire body was covered in a sheen of sweat and her fingers began to lose their grip on the rail.

  She glanced down. A twenty-foot fall onto metal and thinly upholstered theater chairs did not seem like something she would survive without a lot of broken bones.

  A banging noise sounded and someone yelled, “The balcony door is locked! We can’t get to her.”

  “A ladder! Where’s the ladder?”

  “Can we catch her?”

  “Oh, my god, she’s going to die!”

  Lindsey wasn’t positive but she thought that last voice was Ms. Cole and she didn’t sound nearly as upset as Lindsey thought she should.

  The muscles she’d been clenching so tightly began to shake from exertion. Lindsey knew that she wasn’t going to be able to hang on much longer.

  “Lindsey, let go!” a voice ordered over the shouts of the others.

  She knew that voice. It was Sully, standing right below her.

  Let go? Was he planning to catch her? He’d be squashed and they’d both be impaled on the furniture. She really didn’t like that outcome.

  She felt her grip slipping. Her hand was covered in sweat and her sneaker was losing traction. She was going to fall either way. She had to trust that Sully had a plan that would work.

  “All right,” she said.

  “On the count of three,” he cried. “One. Two. Three.”

  Lindsey let go. She fell, clenching her body tight for impact. When it came, it was unexpected. Another body hit hers, wrapping around her as it did. The other body, Sully, changed her trajectory, sending them over the backs of the chairs. Together the two of them tumbled onto a thin mattress, which had been dropped onto the hard floor behind the seats.

  The impact was a double crunch of Sully twisting and hitting the floor and Lindsey landing on top of him. The wind was effectively knocked out of her, but it was a much better landing than slamming into metal chairs and breaking
an arm, a leg or her neck.

  She rolled off of him and lay on the ground sucking in huge gulps of air and coughing. Sully was beside her doing the same. He rolled toward her and their faces were just inches apart. He pushed a long blonde strand of hair from her face and looked her over.

  “Are you all right?” he wheezed.

  “Yeah,” she gasped. “You?”

  “Never better.” He groaned.

  He pressed his forehead to hers and Lindsey closed her eyes, thanking her lucky stars that Sully was as quick-thinking as he was.

  The cast and crew surrounded them. Beth was the first to ask, “Are you all right? Lindsey? Sully?”

  Sully pulled away from Lindsey and gave her a small smile. She got the feeling he would have preferred to stay in their cocoon for a while longer and she realized she would, too.

  “We’re okay,” he said.

  He sat up and helped Lindsey to sit up, too. Together they got to their feet and made sure that all of their parts were in fact still working.

  The cast and crew broke into applause and Violet came up to them, looking pale with her hand clutched over her chest.

  “You scared the life out of me, Lindsey Norris,” she said. “What the heck happened up there?”

  The crowd went silent and Lindsey felt all eyes on her. She realized that whoever had pushed her was probably in this crowd now, so there really was no use in lying.

  “Someone pushed me,” she said.

  25

  The crowd emitted a collective gasp. Sully immediately put his arm around Lindsey’s shoulders and pulled her close as if he could protect her from further harm.

  Lindsey appreciated the gesture but knew that whoever had pushed her wasn’t going to be put off by Sully’s presence.

  “But who would do such a thing?” Nancy asked.

  “Why Lindsey?” Mary echoed.

  “It’s obvious, isn’t it?” Violet asked. “Someone wants to stop this show.”

  Murmurs rippled through the crowd like the wind warning of a bad storm on the way.