“I did,” Marcus says softly.
I clear my throat. “So, going back to the ring.”
“The ring,” Marcus echoes, facing the road again. “First possibility is that Jason bought the ring,ownsthe ring, and someone is just harassing you. Second possibility is that he could have bought itfromsomeone and they have amnesia.” I smile.
“Alternatively, you think the Instagram person is saying they left or lost their ring in Jason’s car?” Marcus asks.
“What else could it mean?” I say.
Neither of us has many other ideas, but over the next couple of minutes, Marcus seems to morph back into the easygoing, slightly annoying person I know. Idioms and everything.
“I get that we’re a dream team, but what exactly do you want me to do here?” he asks. “Other than kick a soccer ball very accurately at their head for you.”
That makes me smile again. “We’d have to know whose head to direct it to,” I say.
“Which we don’t,” he finishes.
I sigh. “I’m trying to keep my eyes and ears open, to use my Spidey sense and all that, but I think I’m in too deep. If I ask people too many questions or act even a little bit off, I’ll blow up everything.”
“So you want me to…”
“Investigate, keep your ear to the ground. Someone has to know some…Hey, why are we at Corner Books?”
Marcus is pulling up in front of the only used bookstore in Sterlingwood.
“They’re holding something for me.”
He raises his eyebrows in question, but I’m already climbing out, following him into the store.
Sixteen
As soon as we enter Corner Books, the smell of paper and dust in the air, I’m hit with a wave of longing so big it overwhelms me. Whenever I think of books, I think of Dad. He read to me constantly when I was a kid. I grew up surrounded, literally, by copies of his books, pages of manuscripts he was trying to finish. And most of the books I’ve read in the past two years are from our Father-Daughter Book Club. He feels close enough to touch when I’m around books, but then I go back into the real world, and he’s so far away again.
“So you’re areaderreader?” I ask Marcus, speaking over the lump in my throat.
“First, I don’t know what that means,” Marcus says. “Second, it’s not for me.”
“Who’s it for?”
He doesn’t answer because Stan, the eighty-year-old man who owns Corner Books, has spotted us.
“Ah, Marcus Riddick! Back so soon?”
“I can’t get enough.” Marcus grins as the man goes behind the counter and looks around for something.
“And with a different lady on your arm this time,” Stan says with a wink. I feel myself blush down to the tips of my toes. Of course the bookstore is somewhere Marcus brings girls on dates. I should have stayed in the truck.
Marcus is trying to rectify the situation with a “Zadie’s my…” at the same time that I’m saying, “We’re just…”
But both our voices fade when Stan pulls out a copy ofLittle Women. It’s a leather-bound version, elegant and classic. Clearly very expensive.
I gasp. “Oh my gosh.”
“What did I tell ya?” Stan says, talking to Marcus but grinning at me. “Works every time.”
But Marcus is opening the book, flipping to the last page. I see his face fall as he lands on it.
“Not it?” Stan asks.
