Lighthouse Libary 02 - Booked for Trouble by Eva Gates

Author:Eva Gates
Language: eng
Format: azw3, mobi, epub
Tags: Mystery
Publisher: NAL
Published: 2015-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

* * *

I returned from the ladies’ room to find Louise Jane telling Mom that she was prepared to step into the empty position at the library the moment I left. Mom smiled at me as I pulled up my chair. “Isn’t that nice, dear, to know you don’t have to worry about leaving your colleagues in the lurch?”

Mom had ordered a glass of Pinot Grigio. I was having a hot tea, and Louise Jane had an Outer Banks Brewing Station Ale. No matter how much Louise Jane and Mom might conspire to get me to leave the Outer Banks, I had no intention of going anywhere, so I shouldn’t have minded their scheming. But I did, and so I stubbornly insisted on staying to have a drink with them.

“If you’re interested in the paranormal history of this area,” Louise Jane said to my mom, who had never before in her entire life shown the least bit of interest in history, paranormal or otherwise, “I’d love to tell you some of my ideas for the haunted exhibit the library’s putting on in the fall.”

“Thinking of perhaps putting on. Maybe,” I said pettily. “How’s Dad, by the way?”

“I assume your father is well,” Mom replied, an answer that meant absolutely nothing.

“Good afternoon, ladies.” A booming voice sounded behind me as George, manager, arrived at our table. “I hope you had a pleasant day.”

“Very nice, thank you,” Mom said.

“Why, you have nothing to go with your drinks.” He snapped his fingers and a waiter appeared in a puff of smoke. “A bowl of mixed nuts and a couple plates of whatever’s good in the kitchen. Put it on my account.”

The waiter scurried to do the boss’s bidding.

“That’s very kind of you, George,” Mom said.

Uninvited, he plopped down in the vacant fourth chair. “Nothing’s too much for an old friend.” He beamed at Mom. She smiled back.

My head spun.

“Louise Jane was giving Lucy and me a tour of the hotel.”

George blinked in confusion. “If you wanted a tour, Sue, I would’ve been happy to show you around.”

“Louise Jane’s tour was highly individual. Fascinating, too, wasn’t it, dear?”

“Fascinating.”

“Gotta run.” Louise Jane swallowed the last of her beer in one gulp. She jumped to her feet. “Are you working tomorrow, Lucy?”

“Yes.”

“That’s too bad. You won’t be able to come with us. See you tomorrow, Suzanne.” She dashed away before the hotel manager realized she was trying to scare the life out of his guests with stories of undead housemaids lurking on the second floor.

The idea of Louise Jane spending more time with my mom was scaring the life out of me.

“Tomorrow?” I said to Mom. “You’re meeting her again?”

“First I’ve heard of it,” she replied.

The waiter arrived, loaded down with plates piled with appetizers.

I snagged a slice of bruschetta. “I’m off, too. If you, ahem, have to be here longer than you’d planned, why don’t you call Dad and ask him to come down?”

“Your father’s much too busy.”

“Tell him to make the time. One of his army of lackeys can take his cases.

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