Chapter 9
Jade
The bell over the B fantastic. I attempted to pull myself together, smoothing my blouse and casually brushing dust off my skirt as if I hadn’t just run away from a telepathic bat in a haunted library. Oh God, had I really just thought that?
Gwen gracefully unfurled herself from the cabinet and rose, hands on her hips.
“Sweetheart, you look like you sprinted through a tornado.” She said it so kindly, with a bemused smile and a twinkle in her eye.
She had no idea what had really happened, and there was no way I was going to tell her.
Nuh-uh, the last thing I wanted was for this sweet person to think I was nuts.
Unable to withstand her gentle scrutiny, I blurted, “I need a shower!” and fled, my feet thudding in a staccato, panicked rhythm on the smooth, polished stairs as I raced up them.
I barely managed to shut my bedroom door before pressing my back against it, panting like I’d outrun a pack of wolves.
My heart thudded against my ribs, a mix of adrenaline, confusion, and absolute mortification.
“A talking bat…” I whispered, dragging a hand down my face.
This was worse than what had happened with my stupid ex.
Nobody knew, but the mortification was so real and so heavy that I felt like I was drowning.
“Sure, this is totally normal. Happens every Tuesday.” I drew in a ragged breath that shuddered through my chest. Now what?
Did I try to call a therapist for an emergency consult, or did I try to pretend this hadn’t happened?
Maybe it was a one-time lapse… A girl could hope.
I pushed off the door and stalked to the window.
The library loomed across the street, silent and still in the midday sunlight.
Nothing stirred, nothing flapped, and nothing chattered at me inside my head.
Then again, the windows were still boarded up with wood weathered silver-gray from age.
There wasn’t much to see, just an old building, sad and dark, disgraced in her old age.
“Insanity,” I muttered. “This is just a brief moment of insanity. It won’t happen again.” I would insist on that until my brain cooperated, it was the only outcome I was willing to accept. Anything else simply didn’t fit into my timetable or plans for the future.
My gaze drifted sideways toward the General Store. Through the front windows, I spotted Luther behind the counter, speaking to a customer. It was a broad-shouldered man in a flannel shirt with a cowboy hat angled low. It wasn’t the cowboy who held my attention. No, it was all Luther.
As if he felt my stare, he paused mid-sentence and looked up—right at me, from across the street, through the glass.
Through everything. Our gazes met, his cool, crystalline blue locking onto mine with startling clarity.
A shock rippled through me, hot, unwelcome, and impossible to ignore.
My breath hitched. I yanked the curtains shut like they’d burned me.
In the bathroom, I splashed cold water on my face until my skin tingled.
Then I showered, scrubbing away dust, fear, and whatever strange tension Luther stirred in me.
The bat was banished from my thoughts, I was not thinking about him.
When I dressed again, in jeans, boots, and a plain T-shirt, I felt more grounded.
More like someone who could handle a derelict library, and less like someone who’d dressed prettily in a green skirt just in case a certain frost-eyed man showed up. I groaned and thunked my forehead against the mirror. “Pathetic.”
Downstairs, I found Gwen at the counter, the newly repaired cabinet door swinging smoothly beside her. She had thick slices of sourdough laid out and was layering bacon, lettuce, and tomatoes with practiced ease. “Hungry?” she asked, smiling warmly.
“So hungry,” I said, so grateful for normalcy. A BLT sandwich looked and smelled exactly like the kind of thing to ground me in reality—the familiar scents erasing the odor of dust and decay in ways the shower hadn’t been able to.
We carried our plates out to the back porch, where sunlight spilled across a garden bursting with blooms. I spotted lavender, peonies, climbing roses, and a lot more lush greenery I couldn’t identify on sight.
Bees drifted lazily from flower to flower, while beyond the fence, the forest swayed, dark and inviting.
“It’s beautiful here,” I breathed, surprised that the garden was this extensive.
Gwen beamed. “Rosemary did most of this. She’s got a farm just past the ridge.
Works miracles with anything that has roots.
” Gwen said that as if it was more than just a green thumb, with reverence.
Now I was curious about this Rosemary; anyone who had a gift with plants was a miracle worker in my book.
I couldn’t keep a cactus alive, let alone nurture a rose bush the size of a car to bloom with this kind of abundance.
It was impressive, and, again, grounding.
Soothing. No bats, no voices, and no sharp eyes of the brightest blue.
“She might be interested in the library yard,” I mused, rediscovering some of my earlier enthusiasm to see the library restored to its former glory.
“It could use… well… resurrection.” I remembered the overgrown, tall hedges, the abundance of weeds, and Luther herding me until I was trapped between him and the library.
Not with fear, but with a sharp burst of arousal.
Like I wanted him to hunt me, stalk me. But that was just as crazy as talking bats.
Gwen laughed, her head tossed back, her messy bun bouncing cheerfully.
“She’d love a project like that. She gets restless if she doesn’t have something to prune.
” I imagined this Rosemary was not the only one who disliked being idle.
Gwen’s tool belt indicated she wasn’t done fiddling with things for the day, either, and that sparked an idea.
I hesitated, but in the end, I knew I had nothing to lose by asking.
“Gwen, would you mind coming with me to the library this afternoon? I could use your eye on the repair work that needs doing. You know construction and old buildings.” I gestured toward the beautifully restored B she didn’t question my motives.
She just offered her help freely, gently.
It was exactly what I needed. She appeared absolutely oblivious to the fact that I was using her presence as a shield against my own delusions.
When we stepped out into the sunlight later, the town felt friendlier; less shadowed. The library didn’t seem quite as ominous when Gwen walked beside me, humming under her breath, her tool belt bouncing lightly against her hip.
She watched as I unlocked the door with a cheerful, “Let’s see what we’re working with.
” To her, this was the fun project it had seemed to me yesterday, and even early this morning.
That excitement began to rub off on me just a little, spreading warmly in my chest—a reminder of all the good I was here to do, for this building and especially for these books.
I stepped in after her, dread fading with each step I took into the shadow-filled interior.
There were no whispering voices, and I felt no strange prickles on my skin.
More importantly, there was no red-vested bat glaring at me from the chandelier.
I checked, but it was just dust, silence, and the musty weight of time.
I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. It was loud in the silence, and Gwen proved how astute she was when she asked, “Better?” So she’d known I was uneasy alone inside this building after all. There was no judgment in her tone, though, and for that, I was grateful.
“Much better,” I lied smoothly, and for now it almost felt true. No bats, I chanted inside my head, and no broody shop owner from next door, either. I couldn’t believe it, but I was almost disappointed that he wasn’t waiting in the shadows somewhere; that did seem to be his habit.
The library swallowed us in its familiar gloom as Gwen stepped inside first, her boots crunching lightly over fallen plaster and other debris that had been swept in.
She glanced around with a knowing hum, hands resting on her hips, and the floorboards creaked beneath her feet, as if in agreement with whatever she was thinking.
“Oh, this place has personality,” she said with a grin.
“I’ve wrangled buildings like this before.
They fight you every step of the way, until one day, they decide you’ve earned their cooperation.
” Her eyes flicked to the doorway I was still standing in, and I knew she was thinking of the B&B.
“And I’ve been itching to get a look inside this place, just so you know.
” That seemed so like her that I was relieved.
Clearly, asking for her company was no imposition on her time.