A soft chuckle escaped my lips.
He shot a wry look at me and tried again.
This time, it tried to slide off again, but he stopped the machine more quickly than before, then manually wound thebeginning of the reel until it was no longer loose. When he pushed the button to make the spools automatically spin, it stayed on and advanced the reel.
The grin he tossed me was nothing short of smug.
“That’s not the way he showed us how to do it,” I argued.
Luke lifted one broad shoulder. “But it worked. Now, what’s the first date?” He turned the paper on the desk so he could read it.
I huffed. Show off.
“Grab a chair and sit, so you can read this too.” He motioned to the unoccupied rolling chair at the next microfiche station.
Doing as he said, I scooted close.
A second later, I eased away a fraction. He smelled yummy.
The distance didn’t help much, but I was soon able to push his deliciousness to the back of my mind as he found the first article. It was about the woman’s disappearance.
We both skimmed it, but there was no mention of Parker’s Landing or any of its residents.
He moved ahead, and we read the updates, but those, too, were devoid of any clues that would lead us back to town.
For each of the subsequent names, we found more of the same. Nothing that tied any of them to Parker’s Landing or Mr. Shuman.
“Well, that was a bust,” I said as we left the library.
“No. We can cross all those names off the list.”
I raised a finger. “Ozzie would tell you no one is off the list untilprovenotherwise.”
Luke’s mouth tipped up on one side. “Okay, we can knock those names down, then. Pin them as highly unlikely to be the woman in your wall. You have to admit, it’s better than where we started.” He stopped in front of his truck.
“I guess so.” I gripped the strap of my bag hanging off my shoulder. “Sorry. I’m just upset we didn’t find a smoking gun.One thing you’ll learn about me is I’m not the most patient person. And after all I went through to get that building, having to wait even longer is driving me insane.”
“I get it. And I’ll have a crew on standby, so we can get in there as soon as Detective Quartermaine gives you the all-clear.”
“I appreciate that.” I would be badgering Ozzie every day about releasing the scene. He’d probably get sick of me, but I didn’t care. The café renovations needed to happen sooner rather than later. If it wasn’t open, it wasn’t making money, which meant the mortgage on that part of the business was coming out of my coffeeshop profits and my savings.
“Try not to stress, okay?”
Warm fingers briefly touched my crossed arms, glitching my brain. It took me a moment to register that he was still talking.
“… tomorrow night?”
I blinked. “Sorry. I spaced out.” I waved my fingers. “Thinking. Can you repeat that?”
That same look he gave me last week when he showed up in place of his dad entered his storm-gray eyes. The one that said he felt the spark too.
Like the last time, he ignored it. “I asked if you want to come back tomorrow night and look at more names on our list.”
“Oh. Um…” I ran through my calendar in my head. There wasn’t anything special going on, so I nodded. “Sure. Maybe a little earlier, so we can get through more names, though.”
“I can do that. How about we grab dinner first, then come here?”
The glitch from earlier returned and shifted into a full-on meltdown. My mouth worked, but nothing came out.
