One Book In The Grave

I rolled my eyes, looked around the table, and palmed another cookie. “So what do we do right now?”

“I’m going to get another beer,” Max answered. “Anyone else?” There were no takers, so Max strolled out to the kitchen.

Someone knocked on my front door and I flinched, disturbing the cat enough that he turned and grunted at me and his claws came out. If I nudged him off, would he ever speak to me again? Could I live with that?

“I’ll get the door, darling,” Derek said, already halfway there. “Don’t disturb your new friend.”

“Clyde thanks you,” I said, smiling gratefully. “It’s probably one of the neighbors wanting to commiserate.”

Derek glanced through the peephole and gave me a look. “It’s a woman I don’t recognize.”

“As long as it’s not Minka, go ahead and open it.”

“I hate to disrupt the cat,” he said, “but I’d rather you confirm that you know her first.”

“Okay.” I gently nudged Clyde off my lap and walked over to the door, where I squinted through the peephole at the woman waiting in the hall.

My jaw dropped to the ground and my heart stuttered in my chest. But I managed to recover enough to whisper, “Emily?”

Chapter 21

“One of your neighbors let me into the building,” Emily explained, clutching her hands together nervously. “I hope that’s okay.”

“That’s…wonderful.” Taking Emily’s arm, I led her into the apartment. “Come in, please. Wow. How are you? It’s been a long time.”

“Yeah, I know,” she said, hesitating just inside the doorway. “Sorry to just drop in.”

“It’s no problem.”

She took a moment to gaze around my workroom, and I could see her eyes focusing on the many shelves and rows and rows of threads and tools and papers and map drawers. “Nice space.”

“Thanks. Oh, Emily.” I grabbed her in a hug. “I’m so glad to see you.”

Glad she was alive. Glad she hadn’t been hurt, and just glad in general. Of course, this opened a whole new world of uh-ohs, too. Max was here. In the house. Emily thought he was dead. And I wouldn’t have the chance to warn either one of them before they saw each other, so…uh-oh.

“Yeah, me, too,” she said, hugging me tightly. “It’s been too long.” After a moment, she stepped back and ran a nervous hand through her long brown hair. She hadn’t changed much, except that she’d grown her hair longer and had gotten even prettier than she’d been three years ago. More elegant somehow, and calmer.

“Look,” she said, folding her hands as she spoke, “I’m sorry I didn’t return your phone calls. I wanted to, but I was visiting my parents, who are staying in Cleveland for a few months. My dad’s sick. He’s at the Cleveland Clinic and…well, you don’t need to know the details. Anyway, I just flew into SFO and didn’t feel like driving straight home. So I thought that as long as I was in town, I’d take a chance and stop by. I hope you don’t mind, but I Googled you and got your business address. Anyway, here I am-and, God, I’m talking too much.”

“No, you’re not,” I said, laughing. “I’m sorry to hear about your dad. But I’m so happy to see you. I’m blown away that you came by.”

I glanced over at Derek and saw the What do we do about this? look on his face, and I answered with a shrug. One glance at Gabriel’s smile told me he was enjoying the drama of the situation. I was willing to bet that Max wouldn’t.

“What’s going on, Brooklyn?” she asked. “Your messages made it sound urgent.”

“Yeah, it is. But first, I hope everything’s okay with your dad.” I knew the Cleveland Clinic’s reputation for working medical miracles-sometimes.

“Thanks,” she said. “I do, too. I’m going back there next week, but I had to take care of some things at home.”

“Well, we can go into the living room, I guess.” No way to avoid the death cooties from Angelica’s body now, and I couldn’t keep Emily standing in the workroom. Now it was my turn to be nervous.

“Okay.” But she stopped and smiled at Gabriel and Derek. “Hello.”

“Hi there,” Gabriel said with a grin.

Derek nodded. “Hello.”

“Sorry. My manners went missing,” I said. “These are friends of mine. This is Derek Stone and that’s Gabriel.”

“Hi,” she said again, and went back to clutching her hands together. “Well. You look really good, Brooklyn.”

“Oh, thanks. So do you.” This was ridiculous. I had to give her some kind of hint about why I’d been calling. It wasn’t fair to just spring Max on her. She was young, but a shock like that could bring on a sudden heart attack. God, why hadn’t she called me first? “Look, Emily, I don’t how to-”

“Found more chips,” Max said as he walked back into the room, shaking the bag. He stopped abruptly and stared, gaping at the woman. “Emily?”

I heard a long gasp, then a moan. I was just in time to catch her on her way to the floor.

“Emily!” Max cried out, and ran over. I moved out of the way as he took her from me. He knelt down and laid her out on the floor, slipping his hand under her head and pressing his other hand to her cheek. “Oh, my God, Emily. Emily.”

Shoot! This was awful! I should have found a way to warn her. But was there really any way to prepare her for seeing her dead boyfriend all hale and hearty? Watching the expression on Max’s face, hearing the desperation in his voice, I had to blink to clear my tear-filled eyes. I’d been doing that a lot lately.

Derek closed the front door and, to be safe, knelt down to check her wrist for a pulse. “She’s fine. Just a bit of a shock, I’m guessing.”

“Just a bit,” I said dryly. He stood and grinned and wrapped his arm around my waist.

“Max,” I said softly. “You scared the hell out of her.”

“She scared the hell out of me, too,” he said, looking up and scowling mildly. “Probably took ten years off my life. Why didn’t you warn me?”

“How could I warn you? She just showed up here! I didn’t know she was coming. Besides, if I were going to warn anybody, it would’ve been her. You already knew you were alive.”

He shook his head and looked back at Emily, moved his hand over her shoulder and her hair, barely touching her in case he might hurt her. All the while he whispered over and over, “So beautiful. Still so beautiful.”

“She’s waking up,” I murmured. “Maybe you should get her off the floor.”

I watched Emily blink a few times, then focus on Max’s face. She groaned. “No. I’m dreaming.”

“Oh, sweetheart, no. You’re not dreaming.”

She silently began to cry.

“Please,” he said, burying his face in the crook of his elbow. “Please don’t cry.”

“Max, pick her up,” I whispered. But he seemed frozen in place, unable to take action. Derek squeezed my waist and I looked up at him. He tilted his head toward the living room, indicating we should leave them alone.

Is he kidding? I shook my head and he frowned at me. But come on. Seriously? Maybe it was nosy of me, but there was no way I was leaving the two of them alone. I wanted a front-row seat, wanted to savor every last second of their tearful reunion. I’m just a big sap that way.

As her tears began to dry, Emily hiccupped a few times, then swallowed awkwardly. Glancing around, she took a deep breath and let it out, then said, “Help me up, please?”

Max immediately slipped his arms under her and stood with her still in his clutches.

“You can put me down now,” she said.

“No, I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“I’m never letting you go again.”

“Like you did before? Let me go, I mean.” Emily just stared at him, her expression unreadable.

“I didn’t want to.”