Jasper
Icaught the end of something as I pushed through the door.
Not the words—just the residual tension of whatever had happened.
Cara stood near the front display, a stack of books squared too precisely in front of her, her shoulders held a little tight.
Lucy was beside her, angled just enough to put herself between Cara and the door without making it obvious.
She was in protective mode, arms loose at her sides, chin slightly lifted.
Cara looked up when the bell chimed, and something in her face shifted—not relief exactly, but close to it. “Hey,” I said.
“Hi.” Her voice was easy enough, but her hands stayed flat on the stack of books, like she needed something to hold onto.
“Lucy.” I nodded back. We’d crossed paths enough since I’d been back that it didn’t need more than that, but I held her gaze for a second longer than I otherwise would have. She was reading me the same way I was reading the room. Whatever had just happened here, she’d been in the middle of it.
I looked at Cara. “I finished it. The book.”
She blinked. Whatever tension in her expression a moment ago shifted into a pleased smile. “Already?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s not a short book.”
“I know.” I kept my voice easy, watching the tension ease in her shoulders. I wanted to give her somewhere else to put her attention for a minute. “I need more. Maybe two this time.”
She tilted her head slightly. “Did you like it?”
“I did,” I said. “Didn’t see the ending coming.”
The smile that moved across her face unfurled slowly and satisfied, like a reader who’d been waiting for that exact reaction, and something about it caught me completely off guard.
Not the smile itself—I’d been braced for that, more or less—but the way it reminded me of being at that table in the library with her hit hard.
The way it was entirely unselfconscious, like she’d forgotten for a second to be careful around me.
I’d been on the receiving end of her polite smiles for months, the ones that were warm but measured, that kept everything at a comfortable distance.
This one was different. This one was just her, pleased, not thinking about it.
I wanted to say something stupid just to see if I could get it again.
“That’s Agatha Christie for you,” she said. “She’s good at that.”
“That’s an understatement,” I said. “They all did it.”
“They did,” she agreed. “And somehow you never see it coming.” She was already moving, stepping around the display with the ease of someone who knew every inch of this floor.
The tension in her shoulders had gone quiet, and I noticed that too—the way she moved differently when she was fully in her element, unhurried and sure of herself in a way she sometimes wasn’t when she was thinking about being watched.
She wasn’t thinking about it right now. “Okay. If you liked that, I’ve got something you’ll love. ”
I followed her without hesitation, which probably said everything.
I followed her toward the shelves. The wood floor creaked softly under my boots. Light from the front windows slanted between the rows, catching the dust floating in the air and turning it briefly gold before it settled again.
Lucy trailed after us at an easy distance, her hands in her jacket pockets.
I could feel her attention moving between the shelves and Cara, and then, at intervals, landing on me.
I didn’t mind it. She was watching how I moved in Cara’s space, taking in how I treated her sister. I’d have done the same.
Cara had stopped in front of a section near the back, one hand already moving along the spines, fingers trailing lightly over each one. She paused, tilted a book out, considered it, and put it back. Pulled another one free and turned back to me. “Try this one.”
I took it from her. Our fingers brushed—brief, barely anything—and her hand pulled back a half-second too fast, like she’d registered it before she meant to.
“It’s more modern,” she said, looking at the cover rather than me. “Moves faster. Still keeps you guessing.”
I flipped it over and scanned the back. “You’ve read it?”
“Yeah.”
“You liked it?”
She looked up at me over the top of her glasses. “I don’t recommend things I don’t believe in.”
“Good to know,” I said. I meant it more than I let it show.
She hesitated, then reached back to the shelf and pulled out a second book. “If you want another option, this one’s a little darker. Less cozy, more unsettling.” She turned it over in her hands once before offering it. “Depends on what you’re in the mood for.”
I took that one too. “I’ll take both.”
Her mouth curved. “Going all in.”
“Feels like the right move.”
“It totally is,” she said, and there was something in her tone—warm and easy and a little unguarded—that made me look at her again.
“One can’t ever have too many books to read.
” A faint flush had crept into her cheeks.
She glanced down at the shelf like she was checking something that didn’t need checking.
Behind us, Lucy pushed off the shelf she’d been leaning against. She looked at Cara. “I’m going to run to the Coffee Cabin,” she said. “You want anything?”
Cara shook her head. “I’m good.”
Lucy glanced at me. “Coffee?”
“No, thank you.”
She held my gaze for just a moment—steady, considering—and then gave a short nod, like something had been settled between us without either of us saying it.
“Later, you two.” She lifted a hand toward Cara as she went, fingers brushing her arm briefly in passing, and then the bell chimed and she was gone, leaving a brief rush of cool air in her wake before the door swung shut.
The shop settled around us after that. The street outside softened to a low hum.
Somewhere near the back, a clock ticked steadily.
Cara gathered the books from my hands and carried them to the counter.
I followed, resting my hands lightly against the worn wood while she moved around to the register.
The surface was smooth in the middle, rough at the edges, wear that came from years of use, not neglect.
“You busy today?” I asked.
“Always,” she said, reaching for the register without looking up. “But it’s my kind of busy.” She tapped the first book against the counter once, gently, before scanning it. “I love it here.”
I believed her. Whatever had been sitting in the room when I’d walked in—that residue of tension, the careful posture—it had gone quiet. She moved differently now. Easier. More herself.
“Everything ready for Friday?” I asked.
She let out a small breath, half a laugh.
“Almost. I keep thinking I’ve forgotten something.
” She reached for the next book without looking up, and I watched her hands move over the stack with confidence, like she’d done this ten thousand times and her hands knew it even when her head was elsewhere.
“You probably haven’t,” I said.
“You don’t know that.” She set down the paper she’d been holding and looked at me properly for the first time in a few minutes, which was either a concession or a warning. I hadn’t decided which.
“I know you’ve been thinking about it long enough that if you’d forgotten something, you’d have remembered it by now.”
She looked up at that, caught somewhere between amused and skeptical.
She had her arms crossed loosely over her chest, and she was looking at me with her head tilted slightly, the way she did when she was deciding whether something deserved a real response or just one of her looks.
“That sentence made no sense,” she said.
“It made complete sense.”
“It really didn’t,” she said. But the corner of her mouth had started to give her away, and we both knew it.
She leaned her hip lightly against the counter, arms crossing loosely, giving me her full attention in a way that felt like something she hadn’t entirely decided to do.
Up close like this, I could see the faint smudge of ink on the side of her hand.
The loose strand of hair that had fallen forward across her cheek.
She left it there. I noticed that I noticed it.
“I probably have a list somewhere that proves you wrong,” she said.
“I’d like to see that list.”
“Why?”
“Curiosity,” I said. “And I like being right.”
“Those are two different things.”
“They don’t have to be.” I watched the corner of her mouth twitch. She was trying not to smile and losing, and the effort she was putting into not showing it was affecting my ability to think in straight lines. “Worst case?” I said.
She glanced up through that strand of hair. “It all falls apart.”
“It won’t.” I leaned forward slightly against the counter, closing the distance between us by an inch or two, just to see what she’d do. She didn’t move back. “You’ve got it handled.”
She stilled—fingers hovering over the register, eyes coming up to mine—and I could see her deciding whether to accept that or deflect it.
She accepted it, which was rarer from her than it should have been.
Something in her expression settled, quietly, like a breath going out. “I hope you’re right,” she said.
“I usually am,” I said. “Ask anyone.”
She laughed—a real one, short and surprised—and tucked the strand of hair behind her ear herself, shaking her head slightly. I’d been about three seconds from doing it for her, and I was not entirely sure what would have happened if I had. “I’ll take your word for it,” she said.
“Smart.”
She looked up at me, eyes bright. “Don’t push it.”
“I remember you and your notebooks,” I said. “Back in school. You had a system for everything.”
Her expression softened, the color in her cheeks deepening slightly. I’d caught her off guard with that one, and I wasn’t sorry about it. “Maybe I still do,” she said.
“Then you’re fine.” I held her gaze. “You’ve always been better at this stuff than you give yourself credit for.”
She cleared her throat softly and looked back down at the register, pulling the receipt free and straightening it once before holding it out.
Her fingers grazed mine as I took it—lighter than last time, slower—and she didn’t pull back quite as fast as she had before.
I stayed where I was. Neither of us said anything for a second, the shop quiet around us, the receipt still half in her hand and half in mine.
“See you Friday?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll be here.”
Her mouth curved. “Okay.”
I stepped back from the counter, tucking the receipt into my pocket, and she went back to her books with the small private look of someone trying not to show that something had just happened. I walked to the door, pushed it open and stood for a second in the frame with the afternoon behind me.
I held her gaze for one more second, just long enough for her to know I meant it, and then I took the bag from the counter and headed for the door.
The street outside was bright after the warmth of the shop, the air sharper than I expected.
I made it halfway to my truck before I pulled my phone from my pocket.
A new message lit up the screen—Emmett. I read the first line and stopped walking.
I glanced back once toward the bookshop window. Warm light through the glass. Movement behind it, quiet and unhurried. Then I turned the screen off, slid the phone back into my pocket, and stood there for a moment before I got in the truck.