The Plot Thickens (Nevermore Bookshop Mysteries #10)

Chapter 1

Quoth

“Excuse me, I was just wondering…” A middle-aged woman leaned over the counter to address Heathcliff. Oddly enough, the scowl with which he greets her does not deter her inquiry. “Did Anne Frank ever write a sequel?”

Heathcliff blinks. From my perch atop the armadillo, I see the steam coming out of his ears. “A sequel to her diary?”

I pretend to be busy preening my tail feathers.

“Yes. I really enjoyed it. I was hoping there was a sequel where Anne escapes to the south of France and finds true love.”

“It’s a non-fiction book,” Heathcliff’s voice drips with scorn. “She’s sent to a concentration camp, where she died. So no, there’s not a bloody sequel.”

“Oh, that’s such a shame,” the customer tuts as she makes her way to the door. “She was a talented writer.”

The woman slips into the hall. Heathcliff's eyes roll so far back in his head that I’m frightened they'd get stuck there. He slams his head into the desk several times.

"Kill me now, birdie. Save me from the idiots of this age. Shut the door after her, would you? I can't deal with another imbecile today. And make us some tea."

Heathcliff doesn’t mean to be bossy. The customers wear on him.

He isn’t the ideal person to run a bookshop, being more suited to rambling wild upon the moors or perhaps shouting at people on the internet, but he’s our only option.

Mr Simson left us in charge of the place.

I can’t stay in human form long enough to praise the latest Sarah J Maas, and it’s rather difficult to operate the ancient till with my beak.

And if Morrie gets a hold of the shop finances, it will take him all of twenty-four hours to turn Nevermore into some kind of nefarious enterprise.

Besides, Mr Simson liked Heathcliff. They used to stay up all night, swapping stories over a bottle of whisky.

As much as Heathcliff hates customers, ordering books, dealing with The-Store-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named, sweeping up, and pretty much every other aspect of running a bookshop, I think he’s secretly quite honoured that the old man trusted the shop to him.

Today he’s in a mood because of the bet.

Morrie – a true chaos gremlin – made Heathcliff a bet that if he put up an ad for a shop assistant, he’d find some poor glutton for punishment desperate enough to take Heathcliff’s abuse and do all the bookshop jobs he hates, thus leaving Heathcliff with more free time to read his books, pet Grimalkin, and glower at the universe or whatever it is that Heathcliff likes to do.

Heathcliff said no one would ever be that desperate, so he accepted Morrie’s bet on the condition that he got to write the ‘help wanted’ ad.

I proofread Heathcliff’s ad, and he did a great job at making Nevermore Bookshop sound like the most terrible place in the world, so I think he’ll likely win.

Morrie put the ad up on the Argleton community app that morning, and Heathcliff’s been a ball of nerves ever since.

I unfurl my wings and swoop out of the room before Heathcliff starts throwing books, which is his usual method of venting his frustrations.

I perch on the top of the hallway bookshelf beside my wall of trophies and peer through the window above the door into the street below, checking no one’s around to see through the windows when I shift into my human form.

As usual for this time of the afternoon, Butcher Street is deserted. People have better things to do after lunch than get yelled at by literature’s greatest gothic villain.

I’m just about to force my shift when I catch movement out of the corner of my eye.

A girl stands on the footpath outside, staring up at the facade of the building.

I missed her before because she’s so still.

Her heels rise off the ground as she cranes her neck to see right the way up to my attic bedroom.

Radiant light from the afternoon sun bounces off her face, highlighting the mixture of determination and apprehension that cross her pretty features.

Whatever her reason for being here, she doesn’t intend to come away empty-handed.

Long brown hair falls over her shoulders in waves, picking up flecks of the violet light spectrum only my raven eyes can see.

The girl glances down at her phone, holding the screen closer to her face than most humans normally do. As she slips it back into her purse, I catch a glimpse of the Argleton community app open on the screen.

Hmmm, that’s where Morrie placed Heathcliff’s ad…

Uh-oh.

From the main room behind me, Heathcliff snarls.

He must have seen her out the window, and he’s bracing himself for another horror.

Already today, there’s been the Anne Frank lady, and before her, a customer came in and asked for a copy of George Ormand’s Nineteen Eighty-Six.

Another found a scribbled price of ￡1 from a previous bookseller in a 1920s volume we’d priced at ￡15 and tried to argue we should sell it to him at that price.

Then The-Store-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named glitched, and we sold a first edition collection of Dickens for 4 pence.

Heathcliff is not in the right humour to meet an applicant for the assistant job, especially not if it means he'll lose a bet to Morrie.

And especially not a woman like her.

I glance at her again, and my body freezes in place.

It isn’t just because she is beautiful, although she’s certainly that.

There’s something beyond her surface beauty that arrests me – behind that determined look, her green eyes shine with impossible depth and sadness. I recognise a fellow haunted soul.

Whoever this girl is, she needs something to take away her pain. Heathcliff isn't exactly going to be able to give her that. He'll just as likely cause fresh wounds.

My chest aches with longing. I wish I could be that person for her.

I scratch at my wing feathers. I’m not technically a person at all, much less the sort that a girl like that should have anything to do with. I am a dream within a dream, and that’s how things have to stay, no matter how much I wish for more.

The girl opens the front door and steps inside. The gloom of Nevermore Bookshop encloses her like a shroud. I peer down at her as she passes beneath my shelf, feeling like a creep for staring but completely unable to take my eyes off her.

Her bright red boots sink into the worn carpet. She runs her fingers along the spines of the books as she makes her way tentatively down the hall.

Is she reconsidering her application, or is she moving slowly because she can’t see in the gloom?

“Hello?” she calls, her voice as sweet as the first plums of spring.

Hello, beautiful, I think sadly as she moves underneath my perch without noticing me. A strange sensation prickles the back of my neck, between my feathers. The tips of my wings itch.

Something about this girl calls to me. I want to talk to her as a human. That’s never happened before. But I know that can’t happen. I can’t talk to anyone, not if I want to stay safe and protect Heathcliff and Morrie.

It doesn’t matter anyway – Heathcliff is about to chase her out of our lives for good—

The girl’s head whips around, her eyes scanning the darkness. “Hello?”

What?

The pricking feeling intensifies. There’s been no other sound in the shop, no reason for her to look up in my direction. Did she just hear me?

No. That’s not possible. As far as we know, only other fictional characters like Heathcliff and Moriarty can hear my raven thoughts. And this girl is far too raw and enchanting to be the product of some writer’s imagination.

The girl peers up at me, her confused expression weakening my heart.

She can’t see me, I realise. She has bad eyesight.

And I’m perched atop this bookcase of quaint and curious volumes of forgotten lore, peering at her like the villain I am.

I find myself overwhelmed by the desire for her to know I’m here, to acknowledge me, even if only as a bird.

I unfurl a long wing and swoop off the shelf, flying close enough that I ruffle her hair.

“Argh!” She flings up her arm, slamming a sharp elbow into my wing. I hop back onto my perch as she topples into a stack of books, scattering the volumes across the hall.

Oops, great. Wonderful first impression, Quoth. You terrified her. Why can’t you just—

A random thought that isn’t my own strikes me between my ears, cutting off my depressing monologue.

That was a raven! I’m pretty sure it was a raven. It’s large and black. What in Astarte’s name is a raven doing in here? It’ll poop over the books. I wonder if it’s got a nest in the roof somewhere? We’ll have to find that if we want to chase it out…

I croak with surprise.

Okay, this is strange. Those are her thoughts, but I shouldn’t be able to hear those, either.

It could mean…

That maybe she’s…

“I guess you kind of suit the place.” The girl speaks aloud as she bends down to retrieve the books. She stacks them haphazardly on the side of the aisle. “A raven in Nevermore Bookshop. Once upon a midnight dreary—”

“Croak.”

Oh, no, you don’t. You may be the girl we’ve been waiting for, but I’m not listening to that poem from your perfect, bow-shaped lips.

“Fine. Fine. I didn’t come here to quote poetry to a bird.” The girl straightens up, rubbing her elbow. “I want to talk to the boss. Do you know where I might find him?”

I’ll show you. Happy to be useful, I unfurl my wings, swoop past her, and fly through the archway on the left into the main room, where Heathcliff keeps his desk beside the grand old fireplace. I perch on the ancient till, tapping the metal in an attempt to get his attention.

Heathcliff, there’s someone here to see you.

Tell them to bugger off, is his response.

Not this time. And you’d better be nice. I like this one.