Much Ado About Murder: a reverse harem murder mystery (Nevermore Bookshop Mysteries Book 7) by Steffanie Holmes

Author:Steffanie Holmes [Holmes, Steffanie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bacchanalia House
Published: 2022-03-09T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“Unhand me, villains,” Puck yelled as the police escorted him out of the bookshop. A crowd gathered on the street, because this was Argleton and they had nowhere else to be, and they whispered amongst themselves as Wilson shoved Puck into her squad car.

“He’s always been a strange one,” said Deirdre from the post office. “Why, just last week I caught him at the pub. He’d swiped Harriet Wistledown’s stool and knelt on the floor so she sat on his back! And then he toppled over, and down fell she! Her skirts went up over her head and you could see her petticoat. He thought it hilarious, but poor Harriet was beet red for days.”

“Mind you, they always attract the oddest people to that bookshop,” said her friend. “Remember the social media star who only wore bedsheets and spouted New Age nonsense in the streets?”

If you consider Classical Greece the New Age, I wanted to shout, wishing I had Heathcliff’s insult book on hand.

Quoth – who was stressed enough that he’d transformed back into his raven form – dug his talons into my shoulder and nodded his head in agitation.

“I bet that scary Heathcliff put him up to it,” sniffed Tom the butcher. “Mark my words, he’s the mastermind behind this. A new bookshop comes to town and suddenly the owner is conveniently knocked off, just in time for Nevermore to swoop in and save the day? I don’t believe in coincidences, not after all the murders that have been connected to that place. And have you seen his cold, dead eyes? Cross Heathcliff Earnshaw and you’re a dead man.”

Oh, no you don’t. No one is going to blame my Heathcliff for this murder.

Mina, wait— Quoth flapped his wings, trying to distract me, but I ducked under him and urged Oscar toward the door.

“Mina, wait—”

I burst outside, waving my arms around to draw their attention from the departing police cars. “You’ve got it all wrong. This isn’t Heathcliff’s fault, and it’s not Puck’s, either. I know he’s a bit of a trickster, but he’s not malicious. The police have no evidence that he’s the murderer. You can’t condemn a man before he’s even had a fair trial—”

“He turned me into a donkey,” Hiram Abernathy yelled. “If that ain’t malicious, then I—”

Beside him, Dolores thumped him on the back of the head. “You shut your pie hole, Hiram Abernathy, and stop blaming another man because you were hiding in the stables from your breakfast smoothie.”

“Exactly. Thank you, Dolores,” I said. “Obviously, no one has the power to turn someone into a donkey. And Puck will have his name cleared of this murder, you’ll see. Now, unless you want to buy some Shakespeare books, I suggest you get out of here because the vein over Heathcliff’s eye is popping and—”

I didn’t have to say another word. The crowd scattered, although I could hear them muttering and mumbling as they wandered away.

This village is too bloody suggestible.

Oscar and I scrambled up the steps to the shop.

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