Chapter Ten
The following week I get to book club early and take my spot by the window.
I’m hoping Tiago gets here before the others so we can chat about my suspicions about Lucinda.
Since I’ve had plenty of time to ruminate, my notebook of mysteries is bursting with speculations.
I simply must confront her today and tell her I’m on her side, no matter what, so long as he’s a baddie and she’s not offing him for the sake of financial gain, or just for fun.
If I put some logic to it, chances are the man is a liar of some description, disappointing but true. If a man so beloved and wholesome as my dearly departed dad can lie, then trust me, anyone can.
With sunshine streaming above him like a halo itself, Tiago comes strolling up the cobblestoned street, hands casually slung in pockets.
He’s probably whistling a tune, that’s how relaxed he looks.
Whereas I’m taut like a violin string, one twang and I’ll snap.
I’d managed to hold off emailing him about this quandary, as I didn’t want to leave a paper trail or unwittingly be an accessory to murder but it was difficult.
Tiago gives me a goofy half-smile. He doesn’t seem worried at all about what we overheard Lucinda say on the phone last week, but I’m not too concerned because as a bumbling sidekick, his role is to remain unobservant and provide the comic relief.
My body pulses with the thrilling notion that I’m (possibly) smack bang in the middle of a whodunnit, and it’s a race against time to stop Lucinda from acting on her murderous desires, no matter how much her husband deserves it.
‘Viviane!’ All I hear is exclamation marks when Tiago bellows my name.
Tiago takes his regular chair by the window and rifles through his rucksack as if looking for something. Here we go, the old forgot-my-wallet trick.
‘Hi, Tiago. I trust you’re well?’
‘Very well!’ He positively beams and brandishes his book. OK, false alarm. ‘And you?’
I survey him. Is he trustworthy? Can I rely on him to be truthful with me one hundred percent of the time? With the case of course. Not my heart! I’m overwrought, which is to be expected after holding this huge weight alone all week.
Tiago glances up probably at the delay in my response.
‘I’m as well as can be expected. Even though I’m a very busy copyeditor with a full daily schedule, I made a point of stopping to get you this.’ I take the box from my bag and hand it to Tiago.
‘You got me a gift?’
I shake my head. ‘It’s lip balm.’
He reads the label on the packaging. ‘Make your lips soft and kissable.’ His mouth falls open as he struggles to look at me for longer than a millisecond. Oh my God, I didn’t read the packaging!
How did my gift get taken out of context in such a way? I fight to engage my brain to reply with a witty comeback but all I can think of is his soft lips and that wasn’t my intention at all. My mouth opens and closes, guppy-like, while I will my mind to think. To explain.
‘You OK, Viviane?’ Zephyr asks, plonking herself at the table.
‘I’m – I’m fine.’ Due to my keen observational skills, I observed that Tiago is always biting his lip, and I’d thought perhaps he needed some kind of moisture but upon reflection, what a terrible idea!
People bite their lips for all sorts of reasons.
Nerves, flirtation, indecision, so which one is it?
Actually, I do not care. I have important matters to put my energies towards.
‘Thanks, Viviane,’ Tiago eventually musters, grinning at me shyly. ‘I need this. Need to start taking care of myself more, actually.’
I give him a curt nod and drop my gaze. Disaster averted. Just. Next time I’ll read the label!
Thomas arrives and takes his seat. ‘Beautiful day, isn’t it?’
Old Albert is next, shuffling in, eyes downcast. ‘Hello, everyone. Awful weather. Melt the skin off your bones. Not the whisper of a breeze.’
‘I’m going to dive into my book,’ Thomas says.
Usually, I’d be ecstatic a book club member was following the silent reading rule but I’m not. Because there’s one big problem. Lucinda hasn’t arrived. And I haven’t asked Tiago about his thoughts on the matter yet because of the soft and kissable lip balm debacle.
Tiago raises a brow at me, as if noting she’s not here.
‘Where is she?’ I whisper to him.
‘Who?’ he asks.
Oh, Tiago! ‘Lucinda. What if she doesn’t arrive?’ Surely we’re on the same page, like all good detective–sidekick duos are.
He taps a finger to his chin. ‘Then we wait. She’s probably busy.’ Busy? Busy doing nefarious things?
‘Wait? For how long?’
He frowns. ‘Should we follow the rules and read?’
Me and my damn rules! ‘But she said …’ My voice peters off.
I’m hesitant to lob a grenade into the group along the lines of: Excuse me, silent readers, but I have a PSA: Lucinda could be plotting to kill her husband if I’m reading the clues correctly.
No. Because hasn’t book club been going swimmingly for us socially awkward, avoidant personality types?
Sure, we’re a member down, but that could be for many plausible reasons.
It’s no use. My whodunnit senses tingle, and I just can’t let it go.
‘What is it, Viviane?’ Zephyr says, over the top of her book, surveying me in my jittery state. ‘You can break the no-talking rule, it’s not really a rule, is it?’
‘It really is.’ I can’t get lax about that now or it’ll be a free-for-all.
Do I share my worries with them? I don’t want mass panic.
I definitely cannot handle any high-pitched screaming.
I weigh that up against the alternative and decide breaking the rules is necessary and I’ll have to weather any fallout.
I consult my watch. ‘OK, I have to share something with you, but I call for calm, OK?’ The book club members nod.
‘It’s precisely 4.27 and Lucinda isn’t here. ’
I wait for histrionics. There are none. A yell. A scream. Hands cupped over open mouths. Instead, they give me blank stares, even Tiago, who should really understand what this is all about.
‘And … ?’ old Albert says. ‘You’re not going to make a rule about punctuality too, are you? I sure as hell don’t want book club becoming some kind of nanny state. What’s next, book club bylaws?’
Tiago’s expression hardens while mine becomes rather flummoxed. How can everyone be so calm when Lucinda foreshadowed this herself? ‘That’s a bit much, mate,’ Tiago says to old Albert. Is he coming to my defence?
‘Albert, your concerns are noted, but we have bigger problems than nanny states and bylaws. Did you not all hear Lucinda announce that the only way she’ll miss book club is if she’s dead? And here she is …’ I drop my voice for effect ‘… missing.’
Tiago gives me a supportive eyebrow raise, it’s a touch flirtatious or perhaps I’m reading it wrong in the moment. Thomas doesn’t lift his head from his Crimean War hardback. Zephyr tilts her head to one side. And old Albert folds his arms over his belly. ‘So?’ he says with a dismissive chortle.
‘So? So! Do you not think that’s worrying?’
Zephyr has the audacity to pat my hand as if I’m a little old lady who has lost her marbles and she’s humouring me. ‘She’s probably lost track of time. It’s a sunny day and she is lowkey obsessed with her garden … It’s kinda cute you care though.’
Dare I tell them about the phone call? The kill list? They’re giving me looks verging on pitying, as if I’m overwrought for no good reason. Their perfectly innocent faces almost undo me. Perhaps I’ll hold off sharing anything more for now until I have further proof.
But I can question them and see if they have any intel that might help point me in the right direction.
I really do need a co-captain to jolly along beside me and help to crack the case.
Tiago is going to have to officially become the Dr Alexander to my Amber Quill.
A thrill races through me, which I tamp down as it’s uncouth to revel in a new friend’s murder plot.
‘Who is Lucinda, really?’ I try to rally the troops and get a couple of frowns in return. ‘Did anyone catch which way she walked home? Her surname? Anything?’ Desperation leaks from my voice at their lack of response.
Zephyr blows a black curl from her forehead. ‘No idea. I did hear her on the phone though, she said something about finding people for a focus group.’
‘A focus group?’ Tiago queries. ‘So, she must work in market research or product development?’
Out of the corner of my eye, I see the man with the blue beret.
The person who knocked into me outside once.
He was here the week before that too. This must be his local, my mother did say I was great with patterns, and here’s one to make note of.
The man is doing his best to listen without appearing to listen.
It’s all in the body language, the way he leans forward at an odd angle, how he quickly averts his gaze when I train mine his way. Suspicious.
Out of an abundance of caution, it’s best he doesn’t hear anything else about our missing book club member.
The man could be anyone. His description is going in the notebook of mysteries, and his name shall now be capitalised in the manner befitting a person of interest. ‘Right, well, thanks for listening and now let’s read in silence. ’
Tiago gives me a thumbs-up.
We wait the designated two hours and there is no sign of Lucinda.
Tiago spends an inordinate amount of the session sending me long looks, that I just do not have time to decipher right now but have a feeling only mean one thing.
I push it aside. In the anatomy of a whodunnit, our missing book club member would be the first clue that soon the crime itself is going to take place …
or that it already has. Am I too late to stop Lucinda doing something she will surely regret?