Page 21 of Will Bark for Pizza (Bluebell Springs #1)

SIXTEEN

KIRA

Armed with an iced caramel coffee, I headed for the bookstore half an hour ahead of the time I agreed to meet Dad and the appraiser.

It didn’t matter that the sun was shining brightly this morning, or that Husker was happily zigzagging on the sidewalk in front of me, blissfully unaware of what this all meant. Dread filled every cell of my body.

I hated this so much.

Yesterday, I mostly hid in my bedroom and caught up on all the work I neglected over the past several weeks.

I responded to reader comments and emails—avoiding the most popular question: When is Mateo’s story coming?

I ran numbers, and reevaluated my budget.

Lila was thrilled I gave her more ad money to play with to capitalize on Forever Forbidden’s spike of success.

I also spent an embarrassing amount of time staring at the picture of Husker, with Beckett in the background, smiling right at the camera. Zooming in, and memorizing the tattoos I could see. A unit crest. A panther. A moose skull? I had so many questions.

Though I’d never own up to it—Lila would never let me live it down if I did—I hoped he provided writing inspiration.

But any attempts to write and salvage Diana Davenport’s career were a complete flop. After two hours and several deleted sentences, the single page in my document sat empty.

That was it.

I was done writing.

And Mom’s bookstore was nearly done existing.

“This isn’t fair, Bubbies,” I said to Husker as the going out of business sale sign came into view, causing my heart to sink clear into my toes. I hated that the store was closed because Dad didn’t even have the funds to staff it.

Husker looked at me, then at the door. He knew exactly where we were.

Despite knowing it was closed, I reached for the door handle and tugged.

It was my final prayer that I’d been living a nightmare reality.

That with one tug of the handle, the door would open, the familiar sounds of chatter and laughter would filter around me, and everything would be the way it should be the second I stepped across the threshold.

But the door didn’t open.

The nightmare was real.

Mom would be heartbroken to know her bookstore was closed on a Friday morning.

It was one of the busiest of the week, and one of her favorite days.

Friday mornings were for coffee drinkers, those who read the local newspaper from cover to cover, and her famous buy-one-get-one-half-off sale that tourists absolutely loved.

This was wrong.

I dug my key ring from my purse and inserted the key into the lock, relieved when it turned easily.

I needed a sliver of time to stroll leisurely down the aisles of books, before Dad showed up with the appraiser and shattered my nostalgia once and for all.

Husker tugged me inside, and the old book smell rushed me instantly. At least one thing was the same.

I pulled the door closed behind me and simply stood, taking it all in.

With the exception of the missing staff and customers, it looked exactly as it did last summer.

Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves along every wall, still full of books. Display tables set up for new releases, bestsellers, and fun monthly themes—Whodunnit for June. Though, upon closer examination, the display was . . . a little tacky.

Okay, so maybe not exactly the same.

The puzzle corner where Mom collected the most unique jigsaw puzzles and brainteasers with a half-completed floral puzzle on the square table was a complete mess. I set to straightening it without forethought. But it didn’t take long before my attention was pulled away.

The children’s section toward the back, equipped with beanbags and stuffed animals from the classics, was in disarray.

Books were strewn everywhere, as though someone left in a hurry.

A couple of the covers were torn. The beanbags that once were vibrant and new looked to be on their death bed.

Someone had stuffed a Clifford dog in a kennel made of books on a lower level shelf.

“What the actual fuck ?”

After freeing the stuffed animal, I kept moving about the store.

The old register Mom found at an estate sale and refused to get rid of, even when they upgraded the payment system to a digital one, was still here, and positioned on the front counter. At least Margene didn’t steal that. Probably because it was too damn heavy to carry out of the store.

The cushy, mismatched chairs stationed around the bookstore so people could hang out and enjoy their books and the coffee they picked up down the street were in decent shape, though they were certainly more worn than I remembered.

Okay, maybe “worn” was being generous. Some were actually torn in places, with stuffing sticking out. One had a broken leg.

The table in the middle, where the coffee drinkers and book club members gathered, was scratched and marked up, as though someone had let a classroom of kindergarteners loose with permanent markers and butter knives.

Mom would be sick.

But perhaps the most heartbreaking discovery of all was that the corner reading nook I spent so many days hiding in was missing its eclectic mix of throw pillows and folded blankets.

It wasn’t even a nook anymore. It was now filled with racks of cheap touristy trinkets Mom would never be caught selling in her store.

“What the fuck, Margene?”

Husker sniffed every surface and book as I paced throughout the store. I ran my fingers along the spines, catching dust the farther back I went, and my anger for Margene Miller instantly renewed.

Mom would never allow dust in her shop.

Mom would never allow any of these bullshit changes.

Margene was the assistant manager when Mom was still alive.

They were friends . She took over after Mom’s passing.

No one thought anything of it. Why would they?

Hell, she was invited to family dinners at the farm, and even showed up for a few.

Dad relied on her to keep Mom’s dream alive. He trusted her. We all did.

And now the greedy bitch was likely hiding out somewhere in Mexico with all the money she stole.

I wasn’t a vengeful person by nature, but if it was the last thing I did, I’d find her and make sure she answered for the way she wronged my family.

Maybe I didn’t have enough money to buy the bookstore myself—not that I had a damn clue how to run one—but I had enough saved to hire a private detective, and a good lawyer.

“Hell, maybe that’s how I’ll get back on Luke’s good side,” I said to Husker.

He looked at me, his quirky head tilt suggesting he was trying to make sense of what I said.

Or maybe he recognized my brother’s name.

Husker was a momma’s boy through and through, but he sure loved his guy time with my brothers.

And now Beckett.

Warmth filled my chest as one of the forbidden scenes I considered writing this morning flashed in my mind. One where my heroine’s hands were tied to the bedposts with silk scarves, and a shirtless, tattooed, bearded hero was above her? —

“For fuck’s sake, Kira,” I grumbled.

Where the hell did that come from?

Sure, the man was sexy. But even if he weren’t incredibly off-limits, considering his connection to my entire family, I wasn’t ready to go there with any man. Not even one as tempting as Beckett Campbell was proving to be.

I might need to consider cutting this trip short.

But dammit, I couldn’t fathom leaving now. Not after seeing what a mess Margene made of the store. Not without knowing the fate of Mom’s special place. I felt a personal conviction to stay and see it through, no matter how fucking bad it hurt to watch. I owed everyone that much.

As I circled back toward the front, I noticed a single paperback sitting on the large book club table. A book I felt certain wasn’t there a minute ago. Or was it?

I took a healthy sip of my iced coffee, hoping for a desperately needed caffeine jolt. I hadn’t managed a good night’s sleep since the night before Mom appeared in my dream and insisted, in her own way, that I come home.

“What should I do, Mom?” I asked, looking up at the ceiling.

It didn’t matter that the store was closing, or that Dad would be holding a big going-out-of-business sale that would leave the shelves looking ransacked. Years of calling this bookstore a second home had instilled the habit of putting away any book that was left out.

I reached for the book and nearly dropped my coffee.

It was mine.

The only book not on a shelf in the entire store, and it was mine .

Husker sat, looking at me expectantly, as though the book were a treat.

“This is the first book I ever published, Bubbies,” I explained, feeling tears well up in the corners of my eyes. “And no, you can’t eat it.” I’d caught him licking a book more than once.

My Diana Davenport career didn’t really take off until after Mom passed.

But I published my first book, High Stakes , before then.

Besides Aspen and Alyssa, Mom was the only other person in Bluebell Springs who I shared my secret pen name with.

She was sworn to secrecy, but she sent me a long, gushing text after reading my first book, begging me to do a book signing at her store.

Before I could tell her yes, a man passing through town on his way home to Boulder slid through a stop sign. There were a lot of accidents during that ice storm, but that was the only fatal one that day.

I carried the book to the paranormal romance section, searching alphabetically by last name, and gasped.

I thought there might be a couple of Diana Davenport titles, but I certainly didn’t expect an entire shelf dedicated to her.

Not a single book was dusty, either.