Read One Book in the Grave: A Bibliophile Mystery for Free Online

shake off the tension. “Anyway, poor Joe Taylor is dead, murdered. I found him. And the fact is, things like this are happening to me with alarming regularity. Don’t you think?”
     
    “I do indeed,” he said soberly. “But let’s talk about that later. Tell me, who is Joe? And where are you? I’m coming to meet you right now.”
     
    I leaned against the last shelf of books. “I appreciatethe offer, but you don’t have to do that. I’m sorry for snapping. I’ll be fine. It just gets a little old, that’s all.”
     
    “Yes, of course it does. Can you tell me what happened?”
     
    I sighed. “Joe Taylor is a bookstore owner I’ve known for a long time. He sold Ian a book that I needed some information about, so I drove over to see him and found him dead. It must’ve only happened a minute or two before I got here. His throat was cut.”
     
    “So there’s blood,” Derek murmured, then added briskly, “What’s the address?”
     
    I gave up pretending I didn’t need his help. “Thank you,” I whispered. Derek knew my aversion to blood and was willing to come and hold my hand. I was touched. “I know you’re busy. Maybe you shouldn’t—”
     
    “It’s Friday and I’m the boss,” he said. “Besides, I’m never too busy for you, darling. Now give me Joe’s address.”
     

Chapter 4
     
    Derek arrived ten minutes after the first police officers showed up. He walked right into the shop and pulled me close, and I just about melted in his arms. The man oozed dark sensuality and charm, but that wasn’t the only reason I was happy to see him. I’m not a wimp about this stuff; I’d faced the police alone plenty of times and I was used to it by now. But Derek and I, we were a team. Especially when it came to dealing with dead bodies.
    Maybe that made us sound a bit suspicious, but with Derek’s intelligence background and his current work in security, he definitely came in handy around a crime scene. That was how we first met, after all. Me kneeling over Abraham with my hands covered in blood. Derek, the first to accuse me of murder. It was a match made in heaven. Call me a romantic fool, but when it came to finding a body dripping blood on an Oriental rug, there was no one else I’d rather have on my team than Derek Stone.
     
    “The police officers are cordoning off the back room,” I said, pointing in that direction. “That’s Joe’s antiquarian room, where he died. They told me to wait out here.”
     
    “Have they called Homicide?”
     
    “I don’t know, but I went ahead and called Inspector Lee.” I shrugged. “I’ve got her on speed dial.”
     
    “That’s handy.”
     
    “Isn’t it? I had to leave a message.” I told Derek exactly what had happened from the moment I walked into Ian’s office at the Covington and saw the
Beauty and the Beast
to my arrival at Joe’s bookstore, where I found the body. I explained about the papermaker’s knife and concluded by confessing what I did when I heard the killer run out the back door.
     
    That was when Derek pulled me back into his arms and held me tightly. “You scare the hell out of me, you know,” he muttered against my hair.
     
    “You’ve mentioned that before,” I said, then admitted, “It was disconcerting.” I was still shaken by the reality of what might have happened if I’d managed to catch up to the killer. “I tried to be careful. But I’m not looking forward to telling the whole story to Inspector Lee. I’m sure I’ve left fingerprints on everything.”
     
    I could just imagine what my favorite Homicide cop would say when she found out I’d stumbled over another dead body. This wasn’t going to be pretty.
     
    “Joe was a sweet old man,” I whispered. “Who would want to hurt him?”
     
    “He might’ve overheard something he wasn’t supposed to hear,” Derek suggested. “Or perhaps he angered a business associate.”
     
    “Maybe.”
     
    “It could be as simple as a robbery gone