Page 65 of Mountains Divide Us

I sighed. “Okay.”

When we got to the rear hallway, I looked all over, but I still wasn’t seeing anything nefarious. But then he pulled a small, hand-sized flashlight from his coat pocket and shined it on the floor in front of the back door. There were dried shoe tracks there, and they certainly didn’t look like they’d come from my boots. They were way too big.

No one used the back door but me, or sometimes delivery drivers, but I hadn’t had any deliveries in more than three weeks, and I’d mopped the floors the last time I was here.

Frank was right. As he led me from room to room this time, I noticed a bunch of things that didn’t fit. Trash filled the bins in the book club room and in the small bedroom-turned-conference room upstairs—food wrappers and bandages with small drops of blood and dirt on them, and even an empty can of French-cut green beans, but I knew for a fact that I’d emptied them the night before, and no one had been upstairs since, other than Vern and me. Besides, who the heck would bring a can of green beans to the library? Why?

“I think I may have an idea who your burglar is,” Frank said.

“You do?” I asked, turning to him behind me. But he didn’t look angry or macho protective. He looked… worried. “Who is it?”

He pulled a chair out at the conference table and sat, placing his hat in front of him. I sat, too, and scooted my chair closer. Something was making me want to hold him, so I reached for his hand and held it.

“There’s a kid…”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

FRANK

“He’s homeless?” she squeaked when I explained my suspicion that the teenager I suspected of breaking into the library was also the book thief.

I hadn’t even met the damn kid yet, but my gut was screaming at me that it was the same person.

“I dunno for sure, but I’m guessin’ he is. I tried to look him up, but all I have is a nickname. I didn’t find anything. There’s no missin’ or unaccounted-for kids in Wyoming or any other state fittin’ his description or with that name.”

“What’s the name?”

“Murphy.”

“And what were the titles of the stolen books?”

“Don’t remember, but he turned his nose up at The Great Gatsby. I wrote the books down. Here.” Pulling my notebook from my jacket pocket, I slid it across the table toward her. “Flip through to my last page of notes.”

She did what I asked, then surprised me with, “Frank, your penmanship is beautiful. I wasn’t expecting that.”

I laughed. “Thank you?” What was I supposed to do with that compliment?

“Okay,” she said, reading the list, and her eyebrows dipped a little, “so the stolen books are The Catcher in the Rye, Journey to the Center of the Earth, Of Mice and Men, and Oliver Twist.”

“What?”

“It’s nothing really. I was just wondering if the books all had something in common. And I mean, they kind of do. For example, they’re all classics, and I suppose they all have a sense of… I don’t know. Adventure? Maybe that’s not the right word. The main characters in these books are all searching for something.”

“Hm.”

She laughed at my response and leaned her head to the side, gazing over at me, a relaxed smile on her lips. “I love the sound of your voice, even when you grumble and growl. Which is kind of a lot.”

Now, that was a compliment I could get behind. I already suspected she liked my voice, and it was something I could use against her. If she liked it, I’d remember that, and when the time was right, I’d aim it right at her.

I tried it out, low and slow. “Thank you, darlin’.”

Her cheeks turned the blushed peach color I loved, and despite the potentially serious situation, something stirred beneath my zipper again.

“But how do you know the person who stole the books is the same person you think is breaking in here?”

“C’mon. Missin’ books, missin’ food, and now someone’s hidin’ out in here? How many delinquent teenagers you think we got in Wisper?”

“Okay, well, do you think something happened to his mom?”

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