Her shoulders dropped as she rolled her eyes. “I’m trying my best here. I’d really appreciate it if you made yourself more tolerate-able.”
“That is not even a word.”
She sighed, pushing her hair back with her fingers. “You’re here for the book?”
I nodded, hearing deep thunder rumble low outside. “Do you have it here?”
“No,” she responded.
I frowned, my hands clenching on the desk. “You fucking told me to come get it today.”
“I said it’s here,” she corrected, tone maddeningly casual. “Just not here. It’s in the archives. At the back.”
I blinked at her, staring, waiting for her to drag herself to the archive room and bring the book. But Amelia didn’t move. She just stared back at me with that fixed, unnerving look, like she was stalling for a reason she wouldn’t say out loud.
When I looked over my shoulder, I caught sight of Merton striding towards us, his expression blank. I faced her again.
She smiled—too sweetly—stepping out from behind her desk as she dusted her skirt. “The book is very high and I can’t reach it without my brother’s help.”
Merton stopped beside me, not sparing me a glance as Amelia came to stand on my other side. “Can you watch the desk for a bit? We’ll be back soon,” she said.
I nodded and slipped behind the desk.
My fingers drummed lightly on the counter as I watched them retreat into the rows of shelves, their heads dipping together in quiet conversation until they disappeared near the door at the back, one I’d seen before but had never been beyond.
The library was busier than usual. Even students in uniforms sat around with books, doing things I could only assume were their homework or project.
Others browsed the shelves with their arms full of books. The air buzzed faintly with the low hum of whispering voices, rustling pages, and the occasional squeak of a chair leg against the tiled floor.
After two minutes of waiting for them, the door opened, and three elderly men walked in, each carrying a stack of bound books tied neatly with twine. They looked exactly like the kind of men who volunteered in libraries—cardigans buttoned to their chins, silver hair brushed back, library badges clipped to their breast pockets. One even had those thin reading glasses hanging on a chain around his neck. They nodded politely to me before heading further inside, walking like they already knew their way around.
I sat back, eyes flicking to the shelves again. Still no sign of Amelia or Merton.
Sighing, I leaned forward, propping my chin on my palm, idly scanning the neat stacks of papers, pens, and sticky notes Amelia kept lined up like soldiers. To pass the time, I considered poking around her desk, but she was the kind of psycho who probably had traps set if anyone dared to touch her things.
The library continued to hum with the usual rhythm for a while. Then, like a dropped stitch, something snagged in the silence.
A scent.
Faint. Sweet. Cloying.
Like cheap incense or one of those knockoff scented candles people burned until the whole room felt suffocating. My brows drew together. Was that even allowed in here?
Even if they were, Amelia wasn’t here to light anything. My gaze darted from table to table, hunting for the culprit who had smuggled it in.
But there was nothing.
It was then a sharp cough snapped the steady hum of the library from somewhere in the back.
I looked towards the sound, half-expecting it to fade, but another followed, then another, disrupting the quiet space.
I straightened behind the desk as students abandoned their tables, frowning, coughing into sleeves as they pushed past one another.
I tilted my head up. At first, it was just a ghostly curl of smoke, pale against the lights. Then it thickened, tendrils bleeding into one another, unfurling above the shelves and seeping lower, spreading like fog over the room.
The fire alarm wailed, shrill and jarring, and people stampeded for the main doors, coughing, hacking, waving their hands against the air.
I pressed my sleeve to my nose, but the smoke still slid through the fabric, burning the back of my throat. My head buzzed, vision pricking at the edges.
