Prize and Prejudice Read online

  A few moments later, Jasper emerged, his brows pinched together in the middle. He was holding both of her other coffee pots by the handles.

  “I’ve been instructed to walk you back to the bookstore,” he growled.

  So another person was getting chased outside to calm down and walk off some steam.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I’d appreciate the company.”

  She took a more scenic route back to the bookstore, saying that she needed to stop at the bakery on the way back. After the first block, Jasper let out an enormous breath of air that puffed up around him like a cloud briefly before disappearing.

  “So you’ve heard that we’re having a meltdown,” he said.

  “What happened?”

  “The registration computer went down.”

  “Oh, no,” she said. Just the thought of it was raising the hairs on the back of her neck. Of all the things she could imagine going wrong, a computer malfunction was second only to a credit card machine losing its connection. “At the same time that you were out of coffee. No wonder.”

  “Everyone is freaking out,” Jasper said.

  “Is there anything I can do to help? You could write down everyone’s details and come over to the bookstore, then enter them in the database there? Our connection should still be up.”

  She only knew that because she had been trying to show Janet how to check on book stock from Angie’s distributor and backup distributor.

  “No, no, if it gets that bad I’ll just take everything home and do it overnight. Or maybe I’ll try my hand at fixing the computer,” Jasper said.

  Angie nodded. She wouldn’t argue with him—he knew she would help him if she could. Besides, she could totally understand the urge to handle everything herself. She wondered if Jasper was caught in the same dilemma she was: balancing issues of trust, training, time, and paranoia like a bunch of spinning plates in a circus act.

  If so, at least it wasn’t just her.

  They continued walking.

  “Ah!” Angie suddenly remembered Reed’s arrival. “I have a friend coming to the island today, and I want to know if he’s checked in yet? If you don’t mind. If you don’t remember, it’s fine, but—”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Reed Edgerton.”

  Jasper screwed up his face, as if trying to recall a face to go with the name.

  “He’s about this tall,” Angie pointed at Jasper’s sleeve, “with broad shoulders, a big bald spot, a salt-and-pepper beard, and more of a New York accent than a Boston one.”

  Jasper laughed. “That’s not a very flattering description.”

  “He’s also very perceptive and very drily funny, but he tends to clam up around strangers.”

  “I haven’t seen him, unfortunately. I think I would have noticed. And…a name like Reed I would have noticed on the paper ledger we’ve had to start using.”

  “Oh well.”

  “A friend of yours?”

  “I’d like to think so. But mostly I’m just someone to take to art shows, I think. He’s an art history professor at Harvard.”

  As they walked toward the bakery, Angie told Jasper the story of how she had met met Reed. She was just concluding her explanation when they reached their destination.

  “This will just take a moment,” Angie said. “But I’ll understand if you want to hand over those empty coffee pots and head back to work.”

  “I think they were trying to get rid of me for a while,” he admitted. “I’d better not.”

  “Me, too,” she said. “Aunt Margery practically kicked me out the door. Let’s see how the Jerritt twins are doing, shall we?”

  The twins were sold out of their regular pastries and were, once again, making up large batches of cupcakes to carry their customers over until the next morning. They had established an assembly line for filling and frosting and decorating huge trays of cupcakes that spanned from one side of the back of the bakery to the other.

  “Wow,” Angie said. “Are you really selling all those cupcakes?”

  “Except for the ones we’re giving away,” Jo said, adding dabs of blue frosting to the top of a row of white-capped blueberry cupcakes. Her apron could have posed as an Impressionist painting called “leaning over the bench at the bakery all day.” Her forearms were almost as badly smeared with frosting. There was a long streak running up her cheek and into her hair, too.

  “She made me make the same cupcakes two days in a row,” Mickey complained. He didn’t look up either. Being so much taller, he didn’t have to lean as much and was correspondingly cleaner.

  “They’ll still be just as delicious,” Jasper said. “Believe me, we would be in even worse trouble if you hadn’t sent over those boxes yesterday.”

  Jo turned to glance at him, then went back to her blue swirls. “Heya, Jasper.”

  Mickey put down the pastry knife he’d been using and wiped his hands on a towel. He walked over to Jasper and shook his hand. “Ignore her. She’s short on sleep.”

  “We all are,” Jasper replied.

  “Some of us cling to sanity more easily than others,” Mickey said.

  “I heard that,” Jo said.

  “I haven’t had much time today,” Jasper said, “so I haven’t been able to do much searching, but it seems as though your guess was correct.”

  “Really?” Mickey said excitedly.

  “Remember, even if the painting is found in the attic, you won’t be able to claim the prize money.”

  Mickey made a face. “So, hypothetically, if that were the case, who would get the money?”

  “No one,” Jasper said.

  “Lame,” Jo interjected.

  Angie wished she could have slapped a hand over Jo’s mouth.

  Jasper rolled his eyes, but Jo didn’t seem to notice.

  “That’s the way Mr. Snuock set it up,” Jasper said stiffly.

  “I know. But it’s still lame. No offense, Angie.”

  “None taken.” It was impossible for Angie to take offense at anything that came out of Jo’s mouth anymore. They’d known each other too long.

  “We were discussing using the funds for a locals-only party,” Jasper admitted. “But that would have to go through Walter.”

  “Okay, marginally less lame,” Jo said. She straightened up, put down her piping bag, and stretched out her back. “You want me to box up a couple of flat boxes for you to take back with you?”

  “Y-yes,” Jasper said. “I hope you don’t mind if I leave you here, Ms. Angie, but I think everyone will be much calmer if we have cupcakes for them to eat while they fill out their forms.”

  “That’s fine,” Angie said. She claimed the two coffee pots while the twins quickly boxed up a pair of flat boxes with a variety of cupcakes. Jasper left with not quite a spring in his step, but he definitely looked happier.

  “What’s this about a painting in your attic?” Angie asked.

  “You know that Pastries & Page-Turners was the location of the office that Victor Nouges worked from while he was on the island, right?” Mickey asked smugly, clearly expecting her to give a shocked “no.”

  “Of course,” Angie answered, like she hadn’t just learned it recently from a customer.

  Jo snorted. “I told you she would know.”

  “You did,” Mickey said sadly. “Anyway, my guess is that the mysterious lady was one of the Snuocks. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have had a chance to meet the handsome merchant who became her lover.”

  “I was thinking the same thing, more or less,” Angie said.

  “I told you,” Jo said.

  “And,” Mickey said, determined to push through, “I think the painting is hiding somewhere inside one of the Snuock properties.”

  “Was the bakery here back then?” Angie asked.

  “Yes,” Mickey said, at the same time that Jo said, “No.”

  “Well? Which is it?”

  “There was a building here,” Jo said, “but it was remodeled heavily in
the 1990s. If the painting had been here at the time, it would have been found then.”

  “Not necessarily,” Mickey said.

  “Have you checked the attic?” Angie asked.

  “No,” Jo said.

  “She told me not to.”

  “We’ve made almost enough money to pay off the last of the loans,” Jo said. “The sooner this painting gets found, the sooner the moneybags leave again.”

  “Christmas will take care of it,” Mickey said.

  “Just because we’ll have paid off our debts doesn’t mean we’ll be set for January. You can never count on spring showing up when you need it. I am not taking out another loan just to stretch us from January to Memorial Day.”

  “I promise I won’t tell anyone if I find it,” Mickey said.

  “You will. You’ll blab.”

  The two of them argued until Angie realized they’d been doing it all day—if not all week—and would still be arguing about it until the painting was found.

  Then again, they argued about everything.

  “I’m headed back to the bookstore,” she said. “Keep me updated, okay? And watch out for tourists. I had one try to pry my bookshelf off the wall, looking for a secret passage.”

  “Was there one?” Mickey said.

  “Not unless you count the back of the other bookshelves on the other side.”

  “Aw, man.”

  Chapter 5

  The End of an Era

  Back at the bookstore, things were in a reassuringly good state. No shouting, no spilled coffee, and no bookstore employees running around with their hair on fire. Angie patted herself on the back mentally for managing the store so well. The influx of treasure hunters had been a shock to the system, but she had adjusted quickly and things were running more smoothly now. She needed to figure out how to delegate more responsibility to others, but she was making progress.

  “Empties,” she announced.

  The two women both watched her for a moment, then glanced at each other.

  Then back at her.

  “You seem calmer,” Aunt Margery said.

  “I’m sorry,” Angie said. “I got spun up and stopped thinking about how other people were feeling and just focused on how worried I was about the bookstore. I need more time to think about it, but I’m going to be working on how to hand over both responsibilities and opportunities to Janet without being such a freak.”

  Janet laughed, then came around the café counter and gave her a hug. “Thank you. I needed to hear that.”

  “I didn’t realize how much I was stressing both of you out.”

  Aunt Margery let out a breath. “How are things over at the Chamber of Commerce?”

  Angie decided not to ask her if she’d lied about the phone call. “Worse than here. Their registration computer went down.”

  Aunt Margery winced.

  “I told them they could come over and use ours—the one in the back, I mean,” Angie said, “But Jasper said he planned to take the registration slips home and enter them himself. They kicked him out of the office, too, so he walked with me to the bakery and took some cupcakes back with him to the office. I think that’ll help.”

  “‘Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there some day.’”

  “Winnie-the-Pooh,” Janet said.

  Angie smiled. She really needed to get to know her new employee better.

  “So am I allowed back to the store?”

  “Yes,” Aunt Margery said firmly. “What time are you meeting Reed for dinner, by the way?”

  “Oops. I need to check.”

  She rushed to the back of the store, stopping only to help three customers find things on the shelves and to answer their questions.

  Reed had sent her an email only a moment or two ago saying that he would be available at six-thirty if she was still interested, but didn’t offer any more clarification on what his actual ‘quest’ was. She sent a quick reply, telling him to meet her at Sheldon’s Shuckery in time for a six-thirty reservation. She knew he’d be there at least half an hour early, in case she was early. Sometimes the man’s fastidiousness made no sense to her.

  He emailed back almost immediately, saying that he had found the address and would be there, but that he wasn’t on the island yet. He didn’t offer the name of the hotel or B&B where he would be staying, and she didn’t ask—he might have thought it was rude. He would either tell her or he wouldn’t. She had seen the way he had tensed up at art shows when other acquaintances of his had asked him seemingly innocuous questions. He would answer politely but without revealing anything, and she could sense his annoyance radiating off him. He seemed to think that people should be able to have an intelligent, well-informed conversation without having to discuss irrelevant personal details, like one’s job, where one lived, whether one had a family, etc. Prickly? More than slightly. But still charming.

  She shook her head, smiling. She was no better than the nosy people that annoyed him. In her heart of hearts, she had already mentally set him up with Aunt Margery. She looked forward to introducing them to each other. Sparks would fly, one way or another.

  She called the Shuckery and set up the reservation, then walked back into the bookstore.

  “Six-thirty at Sheldon’s,” she told Aunt Margery. “We should be back by—”

  Aunt Margery raised a hand. “You will not rush back. You get here if and when you get here.”

  Angie laughed. “Yes, ma’am.”

  It was four o’clock. She’d leave a little early, run home, and change into something a little more dressy.

  Sheldon’s Shuckery was an oyster bar on the harbor that was known for its good food and its terrible taste—in puns. Not only was Sheldon a character in and of himself, but he’d decorated the bar in Nineteenth Century Gothic, more or less. Where every other oyster bar in town went for nets, rowboats, and fishing bobs—or, well, Northeastern Pretentious—Sheldon’s went for dusty old antique bottles behind locked cupboards with signs like, DO NOT DRINK—POISON, weird medical equipment, felt top hats, and a board supposedly from the trap-door of the gallows at Salem.

  She arrived at six fifteen, concerned that Reed would already be there. He would be too polite even to wait for her at the bar. But to her relief, she’d beaten him to the restaurant. Right ahead of her was Tabitha Crispin.

  “I’m surprised to see you here,” Angie said.

  “Everyone has left but Jasper,” she said. “He’s insufferable right now. Carol was afraid that she was going to kill him, so she sent us all home at five.”

  “What if a big group of tourists comes in?”

  The look that Tabitha gave her told her that any tourists would, in her opinion, deserve whatever they got.

  Angie explained that she was waiting for a friend. Tabitha told her to have fun and waved at a small table. The woman who’d been waiting for her there waved back.

  Angie had no problem waiting for Reed at the bar rather than claiming a table. She told Sheldon, who was playing bartender alongside the regular one, that he could give her whatever he wanted. He made her a kir royale, a simple mixture of Champagne and crème de cassis—the specialty of the evening. She saw several other people with the aperitif at their tables or at the bar.

  He was in a good mood.

  “So,” he said, leaning in conspiratorially, “you’re out on an important date? Does Walter know?”

  She laughed and leaned toward him. “No, Walter doesn’t know!”

  Sheldon stuck his lower lip out. “It’s not actually a date, is it? You don’t have a secretive bone in your body, Agatha Prouty.”

  “I really don’t,” she agreed. “Or do I?”

  He chuckled. “My wife wants to talk to you.”

  “Yes, I got the message.”

  “Who are you meeting tonight? The suspense is killing me.”

  Angie told him about Reed Edgerton.

  “So you think he has information on the painting?” Sheldon said.

&
nbsp; “I’m not exactly sure. His expertise is in art, but he said he’s not planning on hunting for treasure. I was hoping to get some clarity here at dinner. A registered tourist has to be the one to find it, so I can’t imagine he’s here just for the views and shopping,” she said.

  “Well, if he does give us some information on the painting, maybe Jeanette and I can hire a tourist and split the money with them, right?”

  “Sheldon!”

  He cackled, patted her on the shoulder, and said, “I’ll keep an eye out for this fellow. He sounds interesting.”

  “He is,” she promised him. “I think you’d get along like a house on fire.”

  “I hope not!” Sheldon pushed through the swinging half-door between the bar and the kitchen. Angie heard him calling for his wife, using the most ridiculous pet names. “Jeanette? Whoopie-Pie? My savory little sweet potato? My little crème fraȋche?”

  Angie sipped at her drink, checked the time on her phone, and half-turned so she could keep an eye on the front door.

  No Reed.

  It was six-thirty.

  She told herself not to worry. She checked her messages and email, but there was nothing, so she finished the kir royale as she waited. Sheldon appeared, took the empty, and checked the clock over the bar, which was ten minutes fast.

  “Everything all right?”

  She gave him a smile that felt stretched and fake. If it had been literally anyone else, she wouldn’t have been worried. Life had a way of affecting plans. But Reed hadn’t called or sent a message. That wasn’t like him.

  Sheldon tilted his head. “Something is wrong,” he said.

  “He’s normally early,” she managed to say. Her throat felt tight. “I’m just being stupid.”

  “Listen to your instincts, ma chère,” said a voice from behind her.

  Jeanette was wearing an adorable apron covered with cute kittens chasing balls of yarn.

  “Just call him,” Sheldon said in agreement. “He’ll understand that you’re worried about him.”