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Andy walked slowly through the crowded aisles and shelves toward the long glass and dark wood showcase at the back of the store. The old display case sales counter was probably one of the most valuable pieces in there, but Uncle C. would never have considered selling it.

A row of antique and vintage snow globes, lined along the first shelf of the display case, glinted in the gloom. Tiny reindeer and cottages and pine trees glittered like jewels.

Christmas. That was something that belonged to another lifetime.

A few feet from the counter, Andy rocked to a stop, staring down at the large brown stain on the wooden floor. He’d had nothing but several cups of coffee over the last twelve hours, and his stomach began to roil in protest. That wasa lotof blood.

He swallowed his nausea and stepped around the bloodstain—there were dried drops of brown on the glass of the display case as well—and went behind the counter. Everything was covered in what he assumed was fingerprint powder, although it wasn’t impossible, knowing Uncle C., that fine gray dust was exactly that.

He opened the cash register. The money was gone, of course. He sorted through the few scraps of paper beneath the change slots. There was a, presumably lost, credit card, a couple of layaway receipts, several coin-roll wrappers, and an empty Christmas card envelope with a return address label from a name Andy didn’t recognize.

He closed the cash drawer and opened the drawer in the display case below the register. There was nothing out of place. The black and gold inventory log, and the old-fashioned green receipt book with its triple slip pages and the loose sheet of carbon paper lay right where they always had. He opened the log book, and his throat closed at the sight of pages and pages of Uncle C.’s elegant but increasingly spidery handwriting.

Don’t let him die. God, please don’t let him die.

He should probably let his parents know what was going on. But he’d need to fortify himself with something more than coffee for that phone call. Anyway, wherever they were at the moment, it wasn’t like they could do anything to help.

A faint scraping sound came from the open door to the stockroom behind him, and the hair on the back of Andy’s neck rose. He whirled around, and after a second of heart-thumping hesitation, started for the back room.

Someone left the window open a crack. A mouse got in. A bird got in. A cat got in…

Even as he reassured himself with reminders of all the obvious, most likely explanations, he was looking for something to use as a weapon. The ornate fire poker Uncle C. always kept near the display case was nowhere to be seen—Andy had the sickening thought that it had probably been used against his uncle the night before.

Before he could reach the doorway, the floorboards jumped beneath the impact of a huge crash inside the room.

Chapter Three

Not good.

Not the wind. Not a mouse. Not anything he wanted to confront.

Heart pounding, mouth dry, Andy shouted, “Who’s there?” and grabbed a blackthorn shillelagh out of the umbrella stand next to a squat white china cabinet that vaguely resembled Cinderella’s carriage.

Cudgel raised, back to the wall, he ducked his head around the doorframe. He couldn’t see a damn thing in the dark room.

His heart skipped at a suddenbangfrom the far end of the room.

The lavatory door.

With his free hand, Andy felt for the light switch, found it, flipped it on.

Dull light illuminated salvaged windows and transoms, painted canoe paddles, stacks of empty picture frames, Uncle C.’s desk—half-buried beneath the tall storage shelf lying across the walkway.

Everything that had been piled onto the shelf—vintage box games, old books, the helmet from a suit of armor, and an assortment of fragile glass Christmas ornaments—were now scattered across or smashed on the floor.

That shelf had not tipped over on its own. No way in hell.

Andy swore, climbed over Uncle C.’s already cluttered desk, and picked his way silently—as silently as he could, grinding glass and rustling papers beneath his chucks—down the length of the stockroom to the tiny lavatory at the back.

The door to the lavatory was closed.

He had the craziest impulse to knock first, but instead, used his shirt tail to grasp the underside of the knob and open the restroom door. The little room was like an icebox, and nowonder, given that the sash window over the sink stood wide open.

Winter wind gusted in, rustling the pages of the several-years-out-of-date calendar over the cistern, and spinning the toilet paper roll like a ghostly hand.

“Fan-fucking-tastic,” Andy muttered.

He slammed shut the window and locked it, conscious that action was probably more symbolic than practical. It seemed that Time in a Bottle was holding an open house, whether they wanted to or not.