The gaze he gave me was anything but weak. I gulped, then drove away, watching in my rearview mirror as he jumped into the Bentley, started it up and followed me out of the lot.
I tossed and turned all night and woke up the next morning feeling groggy and out of sorts, with a dull headache accompanied by an impending sense of doom. I wasn’t sure whether to blame Derek Stone or the pint of Coney Island Waffle Cone Crunch I’d consumed the night before while watching Survivor: East L.A.
I was happier blaming Derek, I decided, as I stumbled to the kitchen to grab my first cup of strong coffee before heading for the shower.
I stared at the contents of my closet and remembered I’d most likely be meeting the Winslows today. I chose a semiconservative, fitted gray pin-striped suit with a short flared skirt, crisp white shirt with a stand-up collar and black heels.
Robin had insisted I buy this suit because it made me look like a defrocked postulant. I’d figured it was a compliment but later had to Google the word postulant. I’d found a Web site of a nunnery in Indiana filled with photos of happy young women bowing their heads in prayer as they answered the heavenly call to become brides of Christ.
There were no photos of the defrocked variety, but it no longer mattered. Sometimes it was better not to examine Robin’s words too closely.
After I poured my second cup of coffee, I went next door to check on the cats. Somehow I’d forgotten to feed them last night, another offense I would lay at the feet of Derek Stone. I washed their kitty bowls and gave them fresh water and some mushy food from a can mixed with kibble bits.
Pookie and Splinters were in a playful mood, so I stuck around for ten minutes to keep them company as they careened around a massive redwood log and a couple of hunks of burl, then zoomed up the tower of their deluxe carpeted cathouse and back down again.
As the cats chased each other and their tails, I thought about last night at Abraham’s studio. I’d barely avoided meeting a murderer. He’d been there-whoever he was-carrying on a hasty search while I’d blissfully visited with my family a few hundred yards up the hill.
Creepy.
I couldn’t put a face to whoever it was. I wondered again whether he’d been looking for the same missing item I was after. Or was it something else? Had Abraham been hiding other secrets?
And speaking of secrets, I hadn’t told Derek Stone about the cocktail napkin I’d found with the scrawled note from someone named Anandalla. I wondered guiltily whether I should’ve told him, then shook my head. There were only so many sins I could deal with at one time. I’d tell him about the note later.
It wouldn’t hurt to stop at the Buena Vista tonight, chat up the bartenders and ask whether they knew someone named Anandalla. It was a long shot. I couldn’t describe her.
Did the cocktail napkin note even matter? Was I picking at nits? Possibly. Nevertheless, I was overcome by a sudden desire for Irish coffee. I could tag Robin to come with me if she didn’t have a date. She probably had a date. Fine. I could go alone.
Maybe Derek Stone was available. He seemed to have nothing better to do than follow me around, so why not include him?
“It’s not like it’s a date or anything,” I muttered aloud. “More like an outing.”
Pookie hopped onto the couch and gave my thigh a much-needed head butt.
“Come here,” I murmured, and settled the cat in my lap, where he proceeded to lick and groom himself. Splinters paced in front of my feet and meowed loudly.
“I thought cats were supposed to be aloof,” I said, scratching Pookie’s ear. “You’re embarrassing Splinters.”
Pookie apparently got the message because he leapt off the couch to rejoin Splinters in their chasing game. I watched them for another minute, chuckling and wondering if maybe I should get myself a cat. Then I caught a whiff of something horrendous and remembered I hadn’t cleaned out their litter box.
“Oh, mercy.” I grabbed a plastic bag, covered my nose and approached the offending box.
So maybe I didn’t need a pet right now.
As I walked back to my place, I realized my headache was gone. I packed leftover Chinese food for lunch, collected the tools I would need for the day along with some leather and paper samples, then locked up and took off across town.
When I got to the Covington, I headed straight for Ian’s elegantly masculine office to sign all the necessary papers to become an official independent contractor for the Covington Library.
“You won’t be leaving early today, right?” Ian asked, as he walked to a large Renaissance painting of a nude woman lounging on a bed and holding an orange shawl that did nothing to cover her lush body. He pulled the frame away from the wall, revealing a wall safe. “I’d hate to disappoint the Winslows two days in a row.”
“I’ll be here,” I assured him, then added lightly, “I guess they’re used to everyone kowtowing to them.”
He turned. “The Winslows are our largest benefactors, so it’s in our best interests to kowtow our butts off to make them happy.”
I grimaced inwardly but said, “Kowtowing here, boss.”
He smirked. “I like the sound of that. So you’ll stick around?”
“Of course, don’t worry.” But it still annoyed the hell out of me that the Winslows got away with making everyone bend over backward to accommodate them.
I shouldn’t have been so irritated, but after overhearing that suspicious discussion the night Abraham was killed, I couldn’t help feeling that they weren’t nice people. Had one of them killed Abraham?
I had to say, it gave me a warm feeling to picture Meredith Winslow spending twenty years or so in an ill-fitting orange jumpsuit, cozying up to a great big gal named Beulah.
“Here you go.” Ian removed the Faust from the wall safe and handed it to me. The book was still wrapped in the white cloth I’d secured it in yesterday when I left it with Derek.
“Thanks.” I gripped it close to my chest, feeling a strange urge to protect it. I had a sudden picture of Abraham clutching the book inside his jacket as he died.
A pounding wave of grief washed over me and I had to fight the urge to curl up and cry. I wondered how many other painful memories the book had been witness to. Could a book hold memory within its covers? When I peeled away its covers, would the pain seep out and hurt me? Was I going a little crazy?
Maybe it was a good thing Ian kept it in the safe.
He was watching me closely, I realized. Were all my feelings showing on my face?
“Guess I’ll be downstairs,” I said.
He smiled uncertainly. “Have a productive day, Brooklyn.”
Productive. Right. Get to work.
“Ciao,” I said, and rushed out of his office.
“First, do no harm” was not just for doctors. In book restoration, the same was true. The less manipulation and disturbance of the original work, the better. As I stared at the thick black leather cover where the spine was mildly cracked along the front seam, I determined exactly how to proceed, step by step, and made notes accordingly.
Of course, I wouldn’t take any steps until the Winslows had come and gone. I didn’t mind an audience when I worked, but I drew the line at book owners. For some reason, they rarely handled it well. It was as if they were watching me destroy their baby, pulling the little darling apart and spreading its tiny limbs and body parts out across the work space.
Plus, owners had opinions-which they were entitled to, of course, but that didn’t mean I wanted to hear them.
So while I waited, I pulled out my camera and photographed the book from every possible angle. I took shots of the interior pages and the gorgeous Armageddon painting that was just as staggering on second view as it had been yesterday. I zoomed in on the brass eagle’s claw clasps in both latched and unlatched positions and got close-up shots of each, then photographed the embedded jewels from several angles to catch their many facets.