“Bullshit. I interrogated you. You’re smart and sharp, and you’re lying.”
“Okay, you explain it. What do you think happened?”
“I don’t know.”
“Can you think of anything that might explain what you found?”
A muscle worked in his jaw. “No.”
“Then what do you expect me to tell you? That evil creatures of the night have taken over Dublin? That they’re right down there“—I flung my arm out to the right—“and they’re eating people and leaving the parts they don’t like behind? That they’ve claimed certain territories as their own, and if you’re stupid enough to walk or drive into one after dark, you’ll die?” There, that was as close to warning him as I could get.
“Don’t be a fool, Ms. Lane.”
“Ditto, Inspector,” I said sharply. “You want my advice? Stay out of places you can’t find on maps. Now go away.” I turned my back on him.
“This isn’t over,” he said tightly.
It seemed, lately, everyone was saying that to me. No, it certainly wasn’t, but I had a sinking feeling I knew how it was going to end: With one more death on my conscience to occupy my already sleepless nights. “Leave me alone, or go get a warrant.” I slid the key into the door and unlocked it. As I opened it, I glanced over my shoulder.
Jayne was standing on the sidewalk, in almost exactly the same spot I’d occupied five minutes earlier, staring down into the abandoned neighborhood, brows drawn, forehead furrowed. He didn’t know it, but the Shades were staring back, in that faceless, eyeless way they have. What would I do if he began walking down there?
I knew the answer and I hated it: I’d whip out my flashlights and follow him in. I’d make a complete and utter spectacle of myself rescuing him from something he couldn’t and wouldn’t ever be able to see. Probably get locked up in the mental ward at the local hospital as thanks for my trouble.
My headache was turning brutal. If I didn’t get aspirin soon, it was going to spike right back up to vomiting pain.
He looked at me. Although Jayne had perfected what I call cop-face—a certain imperturbable scrutiny coupled with a patient certainty that the person they’re dealing with will eventually sprout several extra assholes and turn into a complete one—I’ve gotten better at reading people.
He was scared.
“Go home, Inspector,” I said softly. “Kiss your wife, and tuck your children in. Count your blessings. Don’t go hunting for curses.”
He looked at me a long moment, as if debating the criteria of cowardice, then turned and stormed off toward Temple Bar.
I heaved a huge sigh of relief and limped into the bookstore.
Even if it hadn’t been a much-needed sanctuary, I would have loved BB&B. I’ve found my calling, and it isn’t being a sidheseer. It’s running a bookstore, especially one that carries the best fashion magazines, pretty pens, stationery, and journals, and has such an upscale, elegant atmosphere. It embodies all the things I always wanted to be myself: smart, classy, polished, tasteful.
The first thing that strikes you when you step inside Barrons Books and Baubles, besides the abundance of gleaming rich mahogany and beveled glass windows, is a mildly disorienting sensation of spatial anomaly, as if you’ve slid open a matchbox and found a football field tucked neatly inside.
The main room is about seventy feet long and fifty feet wide. The front half vaults straight up to the roof, four grand stories. Ornate mahogany bookcases line each level, from floor to molding. Behind elegant banisters, platform walkways permit catwalk access on the second, third, and fourth levels. Ladders slide on oiled rollers from one section to the next.
The first floor has freestanding shelves arranged in wide aisles on the left, two seating cozies, fore and aft, with an elegant, enameled gas fireplace (in front of which I spend a great deal of time trying to thaw out from Dublin’s chilly weather) and a cashier station on the right, behind which is a fridge, a small TV, and my sound dock. Beyond the rear balconies on the upper levels are more books, including the very rare ones, and some of those baubles the sign mentions, secured in locked display cabinets.
Costly rugs drape the hardwood floors. The furniture is old-world, sumptuous, and expensive, like the authentic tufted Chesterfield sofa I like to curl up on and read. The lights are antique sconces and recessed bulbs of a particular amber hue that cast everything in a warm buttery glow.
When I cross the threshold from the cold, wet, crazy streets outside and step into the bookstore I feel like I can breathe. When I open for business and begin ringing up purchases on the old-fashioned cash register that tinkles a tiny silver bell each time the drawer pops open, my life feels simple and good, and I can forget all my problems for a while.