“Hey there, Miss Minnie.” Heather flashed a smile. “Your timing is awesome. Mrs. Albright was just talking about that picture book she’d read to her kids. Any chance you found a copy?”
I dug through the crate, found what I wanted, and brandished a copy of Make Way for Ducklings. “Ta-dah!”
“You are the best,” Heather breathed, taking the slim volume. “No matter what Max says, you’re my favorite librarian ever.”
“For crying out loud,” Max protested. “You weren’t supposed to tell her!”
I sighed heavily. “All those other librarians who bring you books are taller, smarter, and funnier than I am, aren’t they? It’s something I should have accepted a long time ago.”
Heather lightly bopped Max on the head with the book. “Now see what you’ve done? Fix that before she leaves. See you later, Minnie. And thanks!” She hustled away, heading off to do one of the zillions of chores that CNAs are tasked with doing.
“We don’t have any other librarians,” Max said in a stage whisper. “So you kind of have to be our favorite.”
I grinned. “It’s nice to be the favorite, even if I’m the only one.”
“Excellent attitude.” Max winked. “Then again, if you’d really like a competition, we could put you into a bigger pool. Say, all the volunteers.”
Though I did have a small streak of competitiveness, trying to be the favorite unpaid help at Lakeview wasn’t part of it. But to keep Max happy, as I unloaded the rest of the books, I asked, “Who would be my competition?”
He stopped paging through the Sandford book and started counting on his knobby fingers. “There’s Lisa, Denise, Molly, and Emily. We have Toni, Theresa, and Tracey. And there’s Esther, Rosalind, and Maureen.”
“I don’t know, Max,” I said, tidying the stacks of books into neat piles, because I couldn’t just plop them there all caddywampus. “That’s a lot of people. How can I possibly win?”
Max kept naming names. “There’s Dan, Bonnie, and Bax. And on Fridays we have Rob, Callie—”
“Hang on.” I aligned the books with the edge of the table—perfect!—and turned around. “You said Bax. Is that Baxter Tousely?”
“Rob, Callie, Tom, Chris the girl, and Chris the boy.” He squinted at the ceiling. “Yes, I think that’s it and I have no idea what any of their last names might be. Eighty-six years old and that’s how you want me to use up what’s left of my short-term memory?”
As if. All terms of his memory were better than mine. “How old is Bax?”
“Younger than me.”
Not helpful. “What does he look like?”
Max’s attention started drifting back to the book, so I put my hand out and covered up the page. “What does he look like?” I could have asked someone at the front office, but this would be faster and easier and less likely to be spread around. If Max cooperated, that was.
He heaved a dramatic sigh. “A little wide. Not short, not tall. Dark curly hair almost always in need of a cut. Wears one of those silly little beards so many young men have these days.”
“Anything else?”
Max squinted at me, and I suddenly realized I needed to justify my questions. “A friend of mine might be thinking about hiring him to do a video thing, so I thought I’d see what he’d be like to work with.” As an impromptu explanation, it had to be one of my best ever.
“Huh.” Max’s squint didn’t go away, but it lessened in intensity. “He started showing up here a couple of years ago when his grandmother was recovering from hip surgery. Says he likes hanging out with us old folks. He’s a decent kid, but a little off. Vegetarian. Shovels his neighbor’s driveway. Finds homes for stray cats. No, I’m not making that up.” Max held up his hand. “Swear on a stack of Bibles. The kid’s the closest thing to a freaking saint I’ve ever met. I should hate him. Hasn’t happened yet, though. Maybe next week.” He sounded hopeful.
“Anything else?” I asked.
Max studied me. “I keep telling him he needs a girlfriend, but he says that never seems to work out. You know, he’ll probably be here in a few minutes. How about you ditch that Rafe and I set you up with Bax?”
“Only if you want me to set you up with Lillian,” I said.
“Nooo!” Max clutched his heart. “Cruel librarian, to threaten me with that woman. Go away and don’t come back until you have another Sandford book.”
Laughing, I popped into the front office, collected the returns box, and headed back out into the cold.
So Bax was the kind of guy who volunteered. Rescued cats. Helped his neighbors. He sounded like a kind and gentle soul, the kind of person who would never, ever kill someone.
I tossed the crate into my trunk and slid into the driver’s seat.
But as Detective Hal Inwood had told me many times, and as I’d come to learn firsthand, given the perfect storm of circumstances, pretty much everyone had the potential to be a killer.
I started the car and sat there for a moment, letting the engine warm up enough to defrost the window. After a few shivering minutes, the last of the window fog vanished and I saw, walking toward the facility’s entrance, a man with his head down and his hands in his pockets, and even from ten feet away, I could see the sadness etched into his face. Just as I was wishing I could make him smile, I realized I was looking at Bax Tousely.
Huh.
A lot of things could cause that level of emotion. The death of a loved one. A bad breakup. But the paper had been free of obituaries for almost a week and his breakup with Anya had been years ago. So what was causing his melancholy? Had he been fired from his job? Did he hate winter? Was he giving up on his dream of post-video production?
I tapped the steering wheel with my mittened fingers, feeling sympathy for a man I didn’t even know, but also wondering if what I’d first taken as sadness had instead been guilt over murder.
Chapter 13
I have a confession to make.”
Aunt Frances had spoken in a tone that was quiet, shy, and would have been called reluctant if it had come from anyone other than my confident and self-assured aunt.
“Okay,” I said, trying to match her tone. “Can I ask what this is about? Because if the police need to get involved, I have contacts with both the sheriff’s office and the city police.” She had the same contacts, of course, but I was trying to be funny. Instead of laughing, she sighed. Not a good sign.
“It’s a civil matter, not a criminal one,” she said. A few moments ticked past, then it all came out in a rush.
“I hate Otto’s kitchen. Can’t stand it. The design is ridiculous, those fancy cabinets with all their trim are expensive dust collectors, and I’ve always hated side-by-side refrigerators. I know some people love them, but not me, and I cringe when I think of having to use that thing the rest of my life.”
I started to say something, but she wasn’t done.
“And that kitchen island.” Her voice grew louder and more Aunt-Frances-like. “At best it’s a complete waste of space and a safety hazard at worst. That room isn’t big enough to have an island and I don’t know what the designer was thinking.”
Probably that the person paying the bills wanted an island, but I didn’t say so out loud.
“I can’t tell Otto now,” she said. “The first time I was over there, I told him I loved his house. He even asked about the kitchen specifically, and I said something like if I ever stop cooking for a full boardinghouse that I wouldn’t mind a kitchen like his.”
“Ah.” I now understood her problem, although it was really Otto she should be confessing to and not me. But even though I understood the problem, I didn’t truly think it was that big.