Page 28 of Bear In A Bookstore
Curious how much about herself she might spill, he carefully schooled his reactions.
“I see.”
“You probably didn’t need to know that.”
“Actually, there’s nothing about you that I don’t want to know. We’re friends, remember?” He winked and took a sip.
Friends. Right. That’s why he’d totally take her to bed right now if she gave him the word, and he couldn’t get her out of his head, or stop the impulse to watch over her.
Trailing a finger in a circle on the counter, she eyed the book, then looked at him. The edge of a pink sticky note stuck up from the pages. He flipped it open, his mind swimming at the plethora of very small text on the pages.
“It’s helpful when I’m working on a book idea to research things. For instance, my characters are going on a quest. There’s a magical forest and some danger and obstacles to overcome. What better way to formulate the story in my mind than by doing a little on-the-page treasure hunting?”
“What kind of book are you writing?”
“Young adult fantasy.”
“Have you always written that type of book?”
She slid the book back to herself and flipped a page. “No. I normally write about murder.”
“Really? What kind of research did you do for those books?”
She grinned.
Lifting her coffee mug in one hand, she flipped another page. “I’m not saying that I’m going to go traipsing around the woods with a shovel and a metal detector. Maybe just unravel the clues.”
Desi raised a brow. “That’s kind of boring. Why wouldn’t you go traipsing around the woods with a shovel? Sounds like you might have some experience with that, writing murder and all.”
She wagged a finger at him. “Funny. You’re funny.”
There was a blip of emotion in her expression, there one moment and gone the next. Frustration, maybe? He sensed she secretly wanted to have a grand adventure, exactly like she’d write about in her book, but . . . couldn’t.
“You don’t get out much, do you?”
She scoffed. “What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know. I suppose because you’ve been in town how long? Three, four months and I never saw you once until I went into your store. I’ve never seen you at the bakery, the café, or the pub, and I’m around town every day, so I would have noticed you. The locals never mentioned meeting you and trust me, they would have. And, you haven’t explored the city because if you had, you’d have seen the signs for the most beautiful waterfall just half a mile walk outside of town, perfect for a fantasy book.”
Kora winced as if he’d touched a nerve. He didn’t mean to. He was just trying to figure her out.
“I’ve . . . been busy.”
“You go to the bookstore and then you come home.”
“I go to the QuikMart for groceries once a week.”
“No, you don’t. You have Trader Bob’s deliver.” He motioned to the reusable shopping bags on the kitchen counter with the grocery store’s logo on them and a delivery tag still attached.
She turned away and walked to the sink where she dumped out her coffee and rinsed her mug. “What’s your point, Desi?”
“You could have lots of little adventures right here around town if you’d just step out your front door. Go ahead and look for that treasure. Outside, and not just on the pages of this damn book.”
He rapped his knuckles on the page.
He appraised her expression to see if he’d offended her. She shrugged and returned to the counter and fiddled with the book.
“How about I start with solving the clues and take it from there. Look, see, it’s hard to read.” She leaned her elbows on the counter. “The author crammed a lot of words on each page, probably to make it even harder to figure out solutions to the clues. I think these two reference my store, though not in the way you might think.”
