Page 28 of Dying to Read

“Sounds fun,” Rarity said as she gave Drew a hard look. “If he’s local, get me a card or contact information if you talk to him. I’ll schedule him for a signing for hisnext release.”

Drew said good night to his dad, then turned to Rarity. “So why did you throw methe sour face?”

“Are you here to walk me home? You men need to realize I can find my house all by myself.” Rarity focused on closing up the register. Shirley had left earlier as Kathy wanted to stop by the nursing home and then takeher to dinner.

“I only worry about you during these murder investigations. Especially when you have your posse trying to dig up evidence. And now, you’ve got someone dropping off items that were stolen yearsago during a robbery where someone was killed. It’s making me antsy.” He leaned against the register. “Besides, I wanted to look at your security feed with youfor the week.”

She swatted at him. “I’d say I was sorry for jumping to conclusions, but I’m pretty sure you planned when you were going to look at the security feed for right when I’d need to be escorted home since Jonathon is heading to Flagstaff. You know your dad probably needs to be in Tucson more than he is. His life is there.”

“Mom’s coming up tonight with Joanna and Savannah for the egg hunt Saturday and one in Flagstaff Sunday. My place is going to be a madhouse. I might hang out at Archer’s apartment.” Drew nodded to the door. “I’ll go lock it if you’re done. Then we can look atthe footage.”

“Let me walk through the store, but go ahead. I don’t want to strand anyone inside.” She locked down the register and pulled the key, tucking it into her tote before heading to do a walkabout. She’d started the practice last week after finding theAlicebook. If someone was leaving valuable books out, she wanted to know sooner than later.

When she’d finished her pass through the bookstore, she met Drew in the back room at the security closet. She walked over and double-checked the back door lock—another habit.

“Anything new?” Drew asked as he keyed up the video files. He knew her system better than she did. Of course, he’d been the one to recommend the local security company to her. Probably most of the shops in Sedona had the same guy and, more than likely, the same system.

“No new rare books, if that’s what you’re asking. There are always books lying around, but all the ones I found tonight are supposed to be on my shelves, waiting to be sold.” She leaned against the table as she watched him. “Hey, does the Sedona Memory Care home use the same security system provider?”

“That’s an oddly specific question, but no. The local company lost the contract at the first of the year. William Jully went with an out-of-state company. I guess they had a lower bid.” Drew chuckled as he stepped back with the remote. “Now Sally’s furious since they’re not taking any responsibility for the system breaking down. She has to pay Terrance on top of what they’d budgeted for this company. Iguess it’s wreaking havoc on her budget. I bet they’re going back to Scott’s company next year.”

He pointed the remote at the television and pressed Play. “Stop me if anything looks off.”

They watched the video and Drew fast-forwarded through the periods where no one was on the screen. Nothing jumped out at her.

“Can we watch it again?” She glanced at him. “I’m not keeping you from a date with Sam or anything, am I?”

“Nope. Mom has a spare key to the house if they get there before I do, so no worries. What’s bothering you?” He reversed the video to where he’d started before.

“There are several people I don’t recognize. Of course, I’m not here all the time anymore. Monday, I don’t come in at all. But if they’re local, I’ve usually met people at least once if they’re readers. We didn’t have a lot of tourist traffic this week. Everyone’s waiting for the festival tomorrow.” Rarity listed off the reasons she should have recognized the people walkinginto her shop.

“Show me the people you don’t know. It’s a start. I’ll compare them to last week’s traffic when the first book was left.” Drew pulled out his notebook and a pen.

Slowly they went through the people. If Drew knew them, he put context to the face. If not, Drew wrote down the time and date they came to the shop. After they were done, he went back to the system and reset it for the night. “I’ve already sent myself a copy of this time frame we were looking at. If I have time tonight, I’ll compare it with what we pulled last week.It’s a shot.”

As they walked toward Rarity’s house, Drew seemed lost in thought.

“Tell me you’re making progress on Jully’s murder,” Rarity said as she watched Killer sniff the curb.

“You mean you want me to tell you that there’s another suspect besides George,” Drew clarified.

She chuckled and added, “I’d like Terrance off your list as well. What about this cheap security system? Maybe that was the reason behind Jully’s death.”

“Unless Sally killed him, and she says she has an alibi, I don’t know who would have been that mad at him.” Drew chuckled as Killer started barking at afire hydrant.

“No one at the facility liked him,” Rarity said as she pulled Killer away from the bright red hydrant. “I wonder if it was that bad at his last facility. How much background information do you have onWilliam Jully?”

Chapter 11

Drew had even walked through her house before leaving last night. Rarity had wanted to tell him that no one considered her a viable threat in the solving of either of the murders the book club was investigating. She didn’t know bunk. All she’d done so far was look up people on the internet. And visit a bookstore. Nothing groundbreaking.

Friday morning, she heard knocking on her door; then her phonerang. “Hello?”

“I thought we were meeting at eight to go stock your booth?” Archer sounded normal, playful even. “I came a little early for coffee. Don’t tell me you’restill in bed.”

“Fine, I won’t tell you. Let yourself in. I’ll be right out. Killer needs to go outside too. Don’t let him distract you.” Rarity hung up and headed straight into the bathroom. Killer had stairs that let him get up and down off the bed, so she figured he’d be fine. She needed a shower and a cup or two of coffee to wake up. How had she not reset her alarmthis morning?

As she started the shower, she heard her phone going off with the wake-up alarm. As usual, Archer was ten minutes early. But she hadn’t added in time for herto get ready.

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