Chapter Two
Thanks to a terrible night’s sleep that may or may not have been plagued by dreams of Declan Archer, I’m not feeling great on my walk into work the next morning.
There are a few people waiting outside, which is unusual but not unheard of. They’re all watching me as I walk up to the front step and search my too-big bag for my keys. One of them has a cap pulled low over his eyes. He looks up and my heart stops in my chest.
Declan Archer?
I freeze for half a second, my gaze locked on his. Stupidly, all I can think is that his eyes are green. I force myself to take a step forward – to do what, I don’t know – but then someone walks between us, and by the time they’ve passed he’s gone.
Or he was never there in the first place.
Someone coughs beside me, jolting me back to myself. I’m imagining things . A lack of sleep and the stress of talking about the dedication with Yumi yesterday are making my brain insert Declan Archer into a scene where he doesn’t belong.
I shove my hand into my bag to hide the fact that it’s shaking, and in the first good news of the morning I find my keys almost immediately.
I mentally beg them to be kind to me today, exhaling in relief when the right key slides smoothly into the lock.
I’m about to push the door open in a way that is both triumphant and nonchalant, when someone behind me speaks.
‘Are you Clarence Brooks?’
There are only three people who call me Clarence: Annabel Stone, the man from the gym who calls once a month to politely ask if I’d like to reinstate my membership and my mother.
I turn round to see a woman about my age looking back at me. Her skin is smooth and glowing, like she actually knows which skincare products she should use, her hair is in the kind of chic messy bun that I aspire to but can never achieve and she has a pen tucked through the top.
She is not my mother, or Annabel Stone, or Mark from Fitness First. And there’s something about her smile that makes me uneasy.
‘Yes?’ I say, hoping that my lack of confidence in whether or not I’m Clarence Brooks might make her give up and leave.
She doesn’t.
‘Excellent. I’m Elizabeth.’ That’s it. That’s all she says.
Who introduces themselves with just their first name?
I mean, most people, probably. But it’s not very helpful for rapidly getting basic and possibly unreliable information on the internet about someone.
There’s silence as I open the door to the bookshop.
I walk in slowly, my key-related success all but forgotten. I’m ready to close the door behind me to indicate that we’re not open yet, but Elizabeth somehow slips through the gap.
‘Sorry, I’ll be with you in just a few minutes,’ I tell her as the other customers filter in behind her, and I’m hoping a meteor hits the earth before the time is up.
She nods. ‘That’s no problem,’ she says. ‘I’m just browsing for now.’
It’s the ‘for now’ that worries me.
I drop my things out in the kitchenette and rapidly google ‘Elizabeth’ on my phone, just in case.
But, despite her smooth skin and great bun, unfortunately this Elizabeth is not in the world’s top ten.
I splash my face with water and stop short of giving myself a pep talk, because I learned the hard way that sound travels from here to the shelves.
The last thing I need is for the entire bookshop to hear me talking to myself again.
I take a breath, square my pointy shoulders and walk back out into the bookshop.
Elizabeth is studying the shelves by the door, but she turns to smile when I come back in.
‘Wonderful bookshop you’ve got here,’ she says.
I think she might genuinely mean the words. But then she follows them up with these: ‘I’m just not sure why you don’t have Declan Archer’s book displayed up front. He’s a local, you know.’
It’s the same question so many people have asked in the last few days, but there’s something about the way she says the words that makes cold trickle down my spine.
I have a sudden awful premonition that something is about to happen.
And, like a freight train hurtling its way along the tracks, there is not a single damn thing I can do to stop it.
Still, I can damned well try. I look absentmindedly at the shelves.
‘There’s a large display down the back,’ I say, cool and calm like a cucumber.
‘And Declan’s book is doing very well for itself already.
’ Elizabeth raises her eyebrows at me and I know my cheeks start to flush.
Some cucumber. ‘We have many talented local authors,’ I add.
‘I think it’s important to give all of them shelf space. ’
‘I understand,’ she replies smoothly. I look away, busying myself in the hope she might leave, but I can sense her gaze fixed on me.
‘Is there something else I can do for you?’ I ask her, adopting a polite but firm voice I’m pretty sure I’ve borrowed from my mother. ‘I’m rather busy this morning.’
Elizabeth looks around the shop, empty but for one of the men who was waiting outside earlier. Her eyes are gleaming more than her beautiful skin, and she leans forward in a conspiratorial manner.
‘Have you read it?’ she asks, her brown eyes never leaving mine. ‘The book?’
She’s asking the same questions that Annabel and Yumi did yesterday. Why? Why now? The book has been out almost a month already.
You’re being paranoid, Clarrie , I try to tell myself, but Declan’s words feel like they are clawing their way up from my gut: She’s just stumbling around in the dark.
I follow Elizabeth’s lead and look around the shop as well, like that might buy me some time to get my crap together.
And then I see it: the camera the other man in the shop is holding. He’s taking pictures of the books, and the shelves, and . . . hang on, is he pointing it at me ?
‘Sorry,’ I say to Elizabeth, glancing at her and then back over her shoulder. ‘Excuse me, sir?’ I say in a louder voice. ‘Can I help you?’
The man looks up. His eyes flick to Elizabeth and then back to me.
‘You can help him by answering my questions,’ says Elizabeth, smiling and pulling all my attention back to her. ‘We’d love a comment from you.’
‘Sorry?’ I say again. I’m a bit dizzy now. Like the cold at the base of my spine has numbed something in my head. I’m hoping a little desperately for Yumi to come in, to save me from whatever this situation is.
I told Yumi about the dedication yesterday . . .
But before I have time to see the thought to its conclusion, Elizabeth is speaking again.
‘The book has a dedication in the front,’ she says. ‘To a bookseller. Who told Declan to write a better book.’
‘Does it?’ I ask innocently. The words sound thin, even to my own ears.
Elizabeth smiles again, and with her lips curved to reveal shiny white teeth she looks a little like a shark. A shark with really good skin and hair.
‘You wouldn’t happen to be that bookseller, would you?’
I’m shaking my head before she’s even finished. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ I tell her. ‘You must have me confused with someone else. I don’t know anything about any dedication.’
Is lying bad if it’s to save yourself from scrutiny and unwanted questions?
Probably, yes. But why are they here? I don’t ask them, though. I just keep shaking my head like whatever is happening might just stop.
‘Would you mind if I have a look at your lights?’ asks Elizabeth, and it throws me enough that I finally stop shaking my head. Then it dawns on me that she’s asking because of the second half of the dedication. The part about the bad lighting.
But this – this I can work with. The lights might be an unreliable fire hazard, but when they work the lighting is excellent . If they’ll just hold up for a few minutes, maybe Elizabeth and her cameraman will leave with nothing more than a few shots of me looking confused.
‘Not a problem,’ I say, hoping that’s true.
I gesture awkwardly to the light switch on the wall beside the counter and Elizabeth saunters over to it. She looks back over at the camera person and raises her eyebrows, and he obediently takes a step closer to capture whatever magic it is they’re expecting to witness.
Two flicks , I silently beg the lights. Behave yourselves for two flicks, and I will never turn the kettle on again.
Elizabeth glances at me and I try for a look that says I am bemused and faintly amused, and also that I’m a bookseller who has known the difference between the two for longer than six months.
Then with a great flourish, she flicks the light switch.
The lights go on, illuminating the bookshop in a warm, friendly glow.
Then she flicks them off again.
And you know what? They turn off, and nothing shorts out.
Elizabeth narrows her eyes, and flicks the switch again. On. Then off. Then on again.
And the lights behave perfectly .
Elizabeth frowns, then turns to the cameraman.
‘Everything okay?’ I ask her, only a little smugly. My chest expands, like I can finally breathe again.
‘Fine,’ she says tightly. ‘Thanks so much for your time this morning, Ms Br—’
The bell above the door rings. I turn, expecting to see Yumi walking through the door. Instead, a spritely old man wearing overalls and carrying a toolbox walks in, whistling.
‘Hiya, I’m Mike,’ he says, plonking down his toolbox and reaching out a hand. ‘Yumi phoned yesterday, said you were having trouble with your lights?’