Ziya gave her a strange look as Jess answered.
“No,” they said, “she went next door for the memorial.”
“A memorial?” Amie asked. “That’s quick. It’s barely been a day since they found her.”
“Yeah,” Jess agreed, scratching the back of their neck. “Honestly, I don’t think the store can afford to stay closed for too long. Whoever planned it was probably trying to come up with a classy way to keep the doors open.”
“Do you think—” Ziya began, but the barista’s eyes were on the couple that had just entered the caféand were heading for the register.
“Your order will be ready for you at the end of the counter,” Jess said. “Have a great day!”
“What were you going to say?” Amie asked as they walked over to the pickup spot.
“I was gonna ask if they think Madeline will buy the bookstore now.” Ziya lounged against the counter. She had borrowed clothes from Amie—a pair of flip-flops, black running shorts, and a tie-dye T-shirt she’d twisted and tucked into a crop top. “Whether or not she killed Savannah, if she wanted to buy the store before, she can probably do it now.”
“We could ask her,” Amie said. “She’s right next door.”
Ziya cocked her head. “I was wondering why you asked if she’s here. Do you really want to talk to her?”
Amie shrugged, shuffling her feet self-consciously. She wasn’t sure how to explain her guilt around Savannah’s murder to someone who didn’t believe her about the time loop. Then a thought crossed her mind.
“The police are suspecting David,” Amie said. “And we know he didn’t do it. So I was just thinking … maybe I could try to figure out who did. To keep David out of trouble.”
As she spoke, she realized that shewasworried about David. If there was a killer out there who had sent the police after her friend, who knew what else they might do to keep the cops off their tail and on David’s?
Ziya rolled this over in her head. “Could be fun,” she mused. “Okay, I’m in.”
Amie gave a start. “Hang on. Who invited you?”
“Ha. Me, bitch.” Ziya crossed her arms. “David’s my friend, too. Just because you got custody of him in the breakup doesn’t mean I don’t want to clear him of murder.”
“Okay. Fair.” Amie thought this over. Having Ziya join her could be helpful. At the very least, if that morning’s walk to the caféwas any indication, having her around would significantly shorten Amie’s travel time. (Her effect on Amie’s heart rate any time their arms brushed could be distracting, but Amie was willing to work through that.)
They thanked the barista who brought over their drinks and food.
“So,” Ziya said, popping open the lid of her coffee, “let’s chug these and go next door to interrogate Madeline.” She took a sip of her drink, then winced. “Ah! Hot. Too hot to chug. Never mind.”
After finishing their drinks at a rate that was somewhere between a chug and a slow sip, they stowed away their bagel and muffin and headed next door to the bookshop.
Amie was fully aware that their friend date was dangerously close to the sixteen-hour mark. She knew that spending so much time with her ex-girlfriend (who she still had unaddressed feelings for) was probably not the smartest idea. It was apparent to her that despite things going well between them so far, it could all easily fall apart at any moment. She was cognizant of the fact that—
The runaway train of logic that was barreling through her mind screeched to a halt as Ziya pulled open the door to the bookshop and flashed Amie a smile. “Time travelers first.”
Amie paused, startled. She’d assumed Ziya had already forgotten she’d brought up the time loop, chalking it up to Amie trying out a strange metaphor. Apparently, whether she believed it or not, the time loop was still on her mind.
“I’m not a time traveler,” Amie said, feeling shy. She didn’t know how to talk to Ziya about it. “I didn’t really do much traveling through time. I was more like a … time homebody.”
“Yeah, that sounds like you.” Ziya chuckled as she followed Amie inside.
Shelf Starter was a store that used almost every free inch for its merchandise. The space was packed with books, with aisles so narrow that one had to become physically intimate with a shelf of literary fiction in order to allow another person to squeeze by. The only items that came close to the books in quantity (though by a wide margin) were the fresh bouquets of flowers scattered about wherever there was surface space.
The business normally boasted about two or three customers at a time, but on this day there was an unusually large number of bodies packed into the store. Amie watched two people play aquick round of “Which Way AreYouGoing?” as they tried to pass each other in the romance section. A young woman was perilously balancing an armful of books while trying to wriggle through the crowd in the sci-fi aisle. Shelf Starter usually piped calm music through invisible speakers, but if the music was playing, it was drowned out by the ambient noise of a fire marshal’s worst nightmare.
Ziya leaned in close to Amie’s ear. “I didn’t know Savannah was so beloved,” she whispered.
It took Amie a beat to process what Ziya had said, her brain focusing instead on the proximity of her ex’s mouth to her neck.
“Uh, yeah,” she finally managed to get out. “Seems strange.”
