“Danger Within by...um...Logan Walters.” She wondered if somehow news had already spread through town about Logan’s visit.
If Danielle had heard, she didn’t reveal it. “Here it is...part of the Van Gardener series, right?”
“That’s it. Do you have the complete set?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I just put them on the fifty-cent table outside.”
Leigh suppressed a cringe. Logan would certainly take a blow to his ego if he knew the first four books of his popular series were reduced to the quick-sale bargain table.
If he found out she bought them, she’d claim she’d spent at least a dollar on them.
“Great, I’ll take them all.”
* * *
THIS TOWN REALLY had changed a lot since the last time he was here, Logan thought as he left the sports museum, Legend’s, with a signed NFL jersey he’d paid a premium for. Most of the items in the museum were rare collectables, things that used to belong to Don Jamieson, the late NFL quarterback who used to own Legend’s when it was a sporting-goods store. Logan wasn’t that into sports, but he knew his agent would love the signed jersey. He owed the man a good Christmas gift after the headache of a year they’d suffered.
As he turned the corner of Main Street and Commerce Avenue, he came to a halt as a long line of children getting off a school bus blocked his path.
The young schoolteacher smiled. “Sorry, we’re almost at the end of them,” she said, continuing to check off her list of students as they went past, up the stairs to the... Logan glanced at the building, shielding his eyes from the midmorning sun. Library. At three stories, it was by far one of the largest buildings in Brookhollow.
“No problem. Field trip?” he asked.
“Yes, sort of. It’s literacy week, so we’re here to listen to today’s readers.”
Literacy week. That’s right, in New York every year he donated proceeds from his book sales to this great cause. He’d credit books with helping him find his own future path, often providing an escape and hope that was rare in the harsh reality of his foster-care situations. As the last child passed, Logan followed the teacher up the stairs. In truth, though New York was home to one of the country’s most beautiful libraries, he hadn’t been inside one in years. Maybe it would help with the writer’s block. “I think I’ll check it out myself. Thank you, Miss...?”
“Ally. Miss Ally.” With a wave, she disappeared after the children inside.
Pausing at the top of the steps, Logan took a moment to read the literacy-week schedule posted on a sign on the door. Readings for children and adults...book discussion groups...a book sale that weekend. All the same events hosted by the big-city libraries. Without the crowds, he speculated, as he entered the building.
Two school groups were gathered in a reading room to the right of the main entrance. He could tell they were two different groups by the colored uniforms they wore. The sight of the smaller ones in their navy smocks and tights reminded him of his daughter. Amelia, eight, attended a private school in New York, one of the few that still insisted on a dress-code uniform.
Amelia.
He missed his little girl so much. She would have loved a school outing like this. Her favorite subject was English. Liked to make up stories...some of which he’d illustrated for her. He had those stories saved in the top drawer of his writing desk in his apartment in Manhattan, one of the few things he’d taken from the home he’d shared with Kendra when he moved out two years before.
Two years.
Some days it felt as if they’d been battling in court over the separation and custody forever, and other days it felt like no time at all. He just hoped they reached a conclusion next month. He couldn’t take much more of this.
His weekly phone call to California to speak to his kid was hardly enough, but with the time difference and his daughter’s need to adjust to her new surroundings, he was biting his tongue and giving them space. He didn’t want to make things harder on Amelia. But next month, regardless of the outcome of the custody case, things had to change. He deserved and wanted more time with his daughter.
He stepped into the library.
To his relief, it looked pretty much like he’d expected it to, which was soothing to his frayed, blocked nerves. Big city or small, there was comfort in the familiarity of the rows of shelves and the smell of books.
To his right was a children’s section, complete with a puppet theater. But the focal point was a floor-to-ceiling plastic oak tree with the alphabet in its leaves, benches around its trunk and books stashed in the bark.
A librarian reshelving books asked, “Can I... Oh my God.” Several browsers on the other side of the shelf turned to look at them.
“Hi,” he said.
“You’re Logan Walters.” The woman, not old but older than him, stood.
“Yes, I am.” He extended his good hand to her.
She stared at him, wide eyes, mouth agape, not moving.
Maybe he should have said no, he thought when she continued to stare. Uncomfortable, he shifted from one leg to the other. Then he dropped the hand he’d extended. “You okay?”
“Yes...this is incredible,” she said, finding her voice. “I’m sorry, I just wasn’t expecting... I mean no one told me you were coming. That’s the mayor’s office for you. They forget to tell us everything. Although maybe they wanted to surprise me—that was nice of them.” Her face lit up in a wide smile and she readjusted her thick, red-rimmed glasses higher on her nose and tucked a few strands of strawberry blond hair behind an ear. The unruly wisps just bounced right back toward her cheek.
Cute.
“Actually no one sent me. I’m staying at the Brookhollow Inn, working on a book.” Duh. He shouldn’t have said that. Guess his plan to stay here unnoticed was out the window.
“Oh, sorry, I thought since it was literacy week... We sometimes bring in guest authors, though no one as famous as you.” Her open admiration made him a little shy.
It had been years since he’d encountered a fan; mainly because he’d reclusively avoided all opportunities to meet them. But also because he hadn’t published a book in so long. Out of sight, out of mind was usually the case in this industry. Guess Clive had been right about the diehards standing by, waiting for his final book.
He just hoped he could deliver what his fans expected and deserved. “I seemed to have got caught up in the wake of all these kids coming into the library and was swept in myself.... Kids are quite a force of nature,” he added lamely, losing the calm the library had given him in his returning panic over the writer’s block.
“Well, it’s certainly a pleasure to meet you. I’m Kate Richardson.” She extended her right hand, but for the first time noticed his in a cast and quickly switched to the left one for a clumsy welcome. “That looks like a new cast. What happened?”
“Broke my wrist.”
“How?”
“Trying to help someone a couple of days ago.”
She nodded. “As they say, no good deed goes unpunished.”
“I guess not.”
“Gotta be tough to get any writing done like that.” Her smile was sympathetic.
He didn’t want to tell her that the break gave him a more plausible excuse for the lack of productivity that was driving him insane, so he just nodded. “Quiet day?”
“Well, e-books have really made a dent in our clientele.” But she shook her head. “Not quiet today with two loads of schoolkids for literacy week. The kids who swept you in here?” she reminded