Sugar Pine Trail

Why, oh why, had she ever said yes to Eliza?

Julia sighed and finished checking out the book for Sam. “Here you go,” she said.

“Thanks, sweetie.”

“Bundle up. It looks nasty out there,” she said, as her friend slipped the book club selection into her slouchy hand-sewn purse.

Sam tightened her scarf and pulled on matching mittens. “The perfect weather for an afternoon of cuddling by the fire with hot cocoa and a certain someone. I don’t have a fireplace or a certain someone right now, so I might have to settle for hot cocoa and the latest episode in the series I’m glomming right now.”

That actually sounded like a lovely afternoon to Julia, if she didn’t have to work.

“Here’s an idea,” she suggested. “You could always actually read the book you just checked out. We don’t meet until eight tonight.”

She would have preferred earlier, but the late meeting was a concession for those who had small children and liked to get bedtime out of the way first.

“Maybe. I’ll have to see. Catch you later tonight. Give Jamie a kiss for me.”

She rolled her eyes as Sam gave a cheery wave and headed out the door.

Sam always made Julia feel ancient. She wasn’t sure why. Yes, she was a few years older than Sam’s twenty-six, but thirty-two didn’t exactly make her a tottering old crone, did it?

Give Jamie a kiss for me. Why did Sam have to put that particular image in her head? The very thought of it left her feeling slightly breathless.

What was she going to do about this ridiculous crush she had on the man?

For the rest of the afternoon, she tried to put thoughts of Jamie out of her mind. It helped that the library was far busier than she expected for the Monday before Thanksgiving. She would have thought everyone in town would be too busy grocery shopping or cleaning their houses for upcoming family parties. Instead, a regular stream of patrons came through, renting videos, seeking reference information, or trying to go online. And plenty of her patrons still checked out books, much to her continual delight.

“Here you go,” she said as she scanned in Muriel Randall’s regular weekly allotment of cozy mysteries. “That should hold you for a few days.”

“I figured I had better stock up. We’ve got snow coming tomorrow, plus you’re closed on Thursday and Friday. I would hate to run out.”

Julia smiled at the neatly dressed older woman whose late husband had once run the butcher shop in town. “What are you doing for Thanksgiving dinner?” she asked.

Muriel slipped the books into her library bag with a smile that looked more than a little forced. “I was supposed to go to my son’s house in Boise, but his wife decided they should go to her family’s again this year. I’ll probably cook a turkey tenderloin and cuddle in with a good book.”

Julia’s throat tightened, both at the lonely image Muriel painted and because it felt entirely too familiar, given her own circumstances. “I’m helping to serve at the nursing home in Shelter Springs this year,” she said. “We can always use another set of hands. Why don’t you join me?”

“What could I do?” Muriel held up her shaky, wrinkled hands. “I’m not much good in the kitchen these days. I’m afraid I would cut myself.”

“There’s plenty to do. You can help set the table or set out water glasses or be the official greeter. I would love to have the company, and I would be happy to give you a ride.”

Muriel looked touched. “Thank you for the invitation. That’s very nice of you. It might be better than sitting home by myself.”

“Is that a yes?”

“It’s a maybe. I’ll think about it,” she said.

She smiled. “Perfect. Unless I hear otherwise, I’ll plan on picking you up about 10:00 a.m. on Thursday.”

“I said I’ll think about it,” Muriel said in an exasperated tone. “Give me five minutes to do that, would you?”

“You can have from now until 10:00 a.m. on Thursday,” Julia said.

The older woman snorted as she picked up her book bag and headed for the door.

After she left, Julia glanced at the clock. The library closed early on Monday nights and only a few patrons remained.

She walked through, reminding those stragglers that the library would be closing in ten minutes. To her surprise, in one of the alcoves in the children’s section, she found two young boys she had seen come in hours earlier after school.

They must be dedicated readers, since she had seen them here Friday and most of the day Saturday, too.

As a librarian, she certainly couldn’t find fault with that, though she did think it a little odd, especially since she hadn’t seen them here very often, prior to the previous weekend.

They looked up when she approached them. “The library is going to be closing in a few moments,” she said, glancing out the window where the gray light of early evening was punctuated by a few stray snow flurries. “Do you have someone coming to pick you up?”

The younger boy opened his mouth to answer, then closed it again with a quick, somewhat nervous look at the older boy. Up close, it was obvious the boys were related. Both had wavy hair the color of rawhide, a scattering of freckles across their respective noses and eyes the same shade of green.

The older boy, who looked to be about eight or nine, placed a hand on his brother’s arm—whether in reassurance or warning, she couldn’t quite tell. “Yes,” he said. “We can get a ride.”

“Good. It’s dark out there and can be dangerous for pedestrians, especially this time of year when the roads are icy.”

“We’ll be fine. Come on, Davy. Let’s put these books away and get our coats on.”

His brother didn’t look thrilled at the order, but he obediently scooped up the large stack of picture books beside him.

“You know you can just put them in the return cart, right?” Julia said. “That way we can make sure they’re reshelved in the right place.”

The younger boy nodded. “If they get all mixed up, people won’t know where to look if they want to read them. That’s what Clinton told me.”

“Clinton is exactly right,” she said. She always admired when children could be respectful of others. “Thank you so much for your help with keeping the library organized.”

She had other duties that occupied her attention for the next few moments, while she prepared to close down the library. Still, she kept an eye out for the boys as they returned books and loaded their belongings into two ragged-looking backpacks.

Who were these boys? She couldn’t remember them ever coming in with a parent or guardian. Come to think of it, she didn’t know if they had ever used a library card that might have an identifying name on it. They never checked out books, only seemed interested in reading storybooks in the library.

There was a time when she knew just about everyone in Haven Point. The town was growing so much these days, with the development of the new Caine Tech facility a few years earlier. New people were moving in all the time, and she found it hard to keep up with them all.

After she checked the library one more time, then turned off the lights and locked the door, Julia hurried outside. Her new matador-red Lexus SUV was the only vehicle in the parking lot, and when she unlocked the door, the intoxicating smell of glossy leather seats greeted her.

The engine purred to life, and she sighed with guilty pleasure. She loved this vehicle, even if it was a big reason her cash flow had slowed enough that she had to rent out the top floor of her house.

As she carefully pulled out of the parking lot, she noticed the two boys passing under a streetlight about a block down the road.

She frowned, troubled for reasons she couldn’t quite identify. They had lied when they said someone was picking them up. Though in retrospect, they hadn’t actually said that. We can call someone to pick us up. That’s what the older boy said, not we will call someone.

She hoped they didn’t have far to walk. Those stray snowflakes on the November wind could bite into bare skin like tiny, vicious arrows.

Where did they live? If the boys came in the next night and again stayed until closing, she would investigate further.