Page 49 of The Librarians

Jonathan’s house

Two nights earlier

As Hazel pauses at the edge of the den to remove her sneakers, Conrad, standing to her side and a foot or so behind, turns his head toward her.

And Astrid falls instantly in love with their love story. In the gravity and patience of his gaze, she sees a man who has searched a hundred airports and a thousand crowded intersections, not from hope but from a deep-rooted obduracy that even he himself cannot do anything about…

Lost in her own musing, Astrid is only vaguely aware of introductions going around. She might have even shaken Conrad’s hand.

Hazel says something in a gentle but urgent tone. Astrid realizes, a few moments later, that those words have been addressed to her.

“Sorry. What did you say?”

Hazel regards her a moment, then smiles apologetically. “We need a huge favor. Would you consider going back to your condo? Tonight itself, if possible.”

Astrid blinks. “Wh-what?”

Why?

“I wish I could give you more details, but the short version is, we think whoever broke into your place did so not to take anything—or not just to take something but also to install spy devices.”

Goose bumps raise up all along Astrid’s arms. Was that why the intruder didn’t care where she was last night, since her absence made their work easier? “Because of Perry?”

“Because of Perry, or possibly because of me. I just learned from Conrad that Perry and those who intruded upon your privacy were all looking for money my late husband might have hidden. If those intruders believe the two of us have become friends, they are likely to think it’s because we have banded together to look for the cache. ”

“So…I should go back there now. Otherwise they might think it’s suspicious that I started to stay away as soon as they put the devices in?”

Astrid digs her toes into the brown shag carpet. It’s comforting underfoot. Jonathan’s house—with everyone here—feels so much warmer and safer than her own.

“I worked with a local private investigator some time ago,” says Conrad. “Today after I got back to Austin, I put her on retainer out of an abundance of caution—didn’t think we’d need her service so soon, but here we are. May I have her join us?”

He has a reassuring demeanor, not that of a brisk, time-conscious man of business but more like an expedition guide who is invested in everyone’s safety and well-being, willing to explain everything at length.

His question was asked to the whole room, but also to Astrid in particular. She nods tightly.

Conrad calls the PI. “Madeleine, I’m putting you on speaker. Miss Sorenson is here. Please tell her what you texted me.”

“Right, thanks, Conrad,” says a youngish-sounding but efficient voice. “Miss Sorenson, with the information you provided, I did a network scan of your home Wi-Fi network. I am texting you some screenshots now. Can you please take a look?”

Astrid finally bought a Wi-Fi-enabled TV after her roommate Becky moved out, to keep Hulu on in the background so the condo wouldn’t be so quiet all the time.

She took a picture of the information on the side of her router to connect the TV to the network, and still has it in her phone.

Apparently those strings of letters and numbers were what Madeleine needed to perform the audit.

The PI’s screenshots arrive. Astrid zooms in, trying to make sense of what looks like a spreadsheet.

“The fourth column lists the MAC numbers of the devices on your network. I have checked. Most of the devices, according to their MAC numbers, are normal household items, but there are two I cannot account for.

Astrid’s throat closes. “Spy devices?”

“I can’t be entirely sure, not having done a sweep myself, but the likelihood is there.”

Sophie, seated next to Astrid on the couch, places a hand on her shoulder. Astrid reaches up and grips it tightly. “So…what should I do?”

“From what I understand, you don’t wish to alert those who planted these possible surveillance devices that you have become aware of their existence. In that case, you will need to do the sweep yourself.”

“But I’ve no idea how to do any such thing.”

“That will be a drawback, but at least you’ll be in your own home, not someone else’s Airbnb where cameras are concealed inside wall chargers or a speckled-looking piece of decoration. Do you have any pictures of the interior of your home on your phone?”

With unsteady fingers, Astrid scrolls through her album and forwards several recent portraits of her houseplants, which have become a pleasant and largely non-fraught topic of conversation with her mom, who enjoys regular photo updates of her plant grandbabies.

But in those pictures, much of her condo can be clearly seen behind the plants.

“I’m going to say the devices are most likely in the living-dining area,” pronounces Madeleine’s authoritative voice.

“The people who installed them had no assurance that you weren’t at home, so there is a good chance they steered clear of the bedrooms. And if they have installed the devices in the public areas, then they would want a spot that has a clear, unobstructed view of everything.

“A camera wouldn’t be stuck on your window, for instance, because if you shut your blinds, it becomes useless.

But it could be on the end of your curtain rod, facing toward the dining table.

Or it might be on the frame of one of those blackboards behind the dining table—people typically don’t look closely at curtain rods or picture frames. ”

“And if there’s a listening device?” asks Sophie.

“Those don’t need to see so they might be hidden behind stuff.

I see you have a frosted glass light fixture above your dining table; that would be a favorite spot.

The back of the face frame on your bookshelf would be another.

But remember the camera and don’t go looking for anything in an obvious manner.

And assume whatever you say will be transmitted and recorded by a remote device. ”

Astrid swallows. “I might hyperventilate, but I think I understand everything. I should be there so they don’t think I’m deliberately avoiding my condo for some reason. And while I’m there, I should try to find out where the spy devices are, but without coming across as if I’m looking.”

“Exactly. If you choose to return to your condo tonight, I’ll be on hand. I had to leave your cute little gated community when some lady tapped on my window. But I’ll bet she’s gone to bed now, and I’ll drive in after you and be near enough in case you require assistance.”

Madeleine proceeds to give detailed instructions on how to use the two bug scanners Conrad borrowed from her earlier in the day.

All the trained librarians take copious notes—Astrid writes down every word, keeping her nerves in check by keeping her hands busy.

When Madeleine hangs up, Sophie hesitates a moment and wraps an arm around Astrid’s shoulders.

“You okay? You don’t have to look for the bugs tonight. Just go home and go to bed—take something to help you sleep, if you need to. That should be good enough for tonight.”

Around the room, everyone nods in agreement.

It’s tempting, but the thought of not knowing the location of the spy devices bothers Astrid even more than the idea of a surreptitious search.

“I’m okay,” she says. “I’ll be even better after I get a general notion of where the bugs are. It’s just that—”

She realizes she forgot to ask Madeleine an important question. “It’s just that, can anyone tell me how long I’ll have to live like that, with those bugs in my place?”

The four people who came from Conrad’s house exchange glances.

“That will depend,” says Hazel, “on how charming and persuasive Jonathan can be.”

Astrid leaves with Sophie to pick up her car from Sophie’s house. Jonathan decides that he will join forces with Conrad’s PI—or at least, be close enough to make a difference, if push comes to shove. Ryan, after a look at Hazel and Conrad, walks away with Jonathan.

At this point, more reinforcement probably wouldn’t be of any use. But Hazel, like Jonathan, doesn’t want to be too far away. So she takes Conrad to a neighborhood bar a mile or so from Astrid’s place, an old and slightly run-down place where her parents used to attend trivia night.

It’s the second time in three days she and Conrad face each other across a table. Last time she was full of wonder and hope, but this time she’s jittery, her facade of nonchalance peeling and cracking. She takes a sip of her mocktail, not really tasting anything.

He studies her. She is momentarily distracted by the sight of his close-cropped hair. Memory rushes back of her hand on the back of his head, the smooth yet prickling sensation on her palm, the heat of the kiss, his weight on her—

“I need to tell you something, Hazel,” he says, stirring his drink with an agave fiber straw.

“You, sir, need to tell me a lot of things,” she answers more severely than she needs to. “What were you doing at the library on Game Night, for instance? And why are you back so soon, when you told me you were going to be gone for a week?”

The ice in his glass clinks. “I said I’d be gone a week because at the time I didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with Perry’s murder, your possible involvement, and seeing you in person on top of that. I wanted to take care of everything on Perry’s end first and I hoped a week would be enough.”

He’d lowered his eyes to his drink, but now looks back at her.

Her heart quakes, not from the intensity of his gaze but from its simple honesty.

“As for what I was doing at the library, I thought it would be obvious by this point. I had no idea Perry came to Austin again but I knew you were in town because your grandmother posted about the cookies you made for her book club. And then she wrote that you’d be starting at the branch library.