The Nassau Secret (The Lang Reilly Series Book 8)
an elliptical parcel of ground dotted with palm trees, Rawson Square on the south side of Bay Street. They walked past a bust of a man the carved legend proclaimed to be ‘Sir Milo Butler, first Governor General of the independent Bahamas.’ Not exactly in the middle of the park, bronze dolphins leapt in a fountain enclosed by marble railing. Across the street, tourists took turns posing in front of a mile post with wooden arrows pointing toward the various islands of the Bahamas with mileage.
                  Phil leaned against the marble surrounding the fountain and looked around, another tourist taking in the local scenery.
                  “You think we were followed?” Celeste asked.
                  Phil turned toward the dolphins. “With this crowd it’s hard to tell. I keep seeing too many of the same faces.”
                  Particularly a pair of men. Ironed golf shirts, creased shorts, spotless white sneakers. Though they weren’t together, they each occupied a side of the street. One dropped back, the other would move up. Standard surveillance technique. Eyes hidden behind sun glasses, it had been impossible to tell if they had been interested in Celeste and Phil. But they weren’t your average tourists. One had a nose that had been broken more than once. Tall, short cropped hair and a bearing that seemed to scream military.
                  Phil didn’t see either at the moment. “OK, start at the beginning and tell me everything leading up to your friend’s disappearance. Keep your voice low enough so everyone in the park doesn’t hear.”
                  She had just begun when he turned his head. “That’s enough for now.”
                  “But. . .”
                  He took her by the arm. “Later.”
                  One of the men had appeared, ear phones plugged into what looked like an iPad. But Phil doubted there was wi-fi here in the park. And he had noted the way the man moved the pad as though searching for a target. Even the slimmest electronic pad these days could house the parabolic dish necessary for listening from a distance. Paranoid or cautious?

7.
    Nassau Public Library
    Bank Lane & Shirley Street
    (Parliament Square)
    Fifteen Minutes Later
     
                  According to the plaque outside, the pink and white four story building dated to the mid-eighteenth century when it had served as a prison. Now it was a combination library and museum. The coolness of the stone construction washed over Phil as he followed Celeste inside. It was the first place in downtown Nassau Phil had seen that wasn’t crowded.
                  Except for books. Books were piled on tables, on the floor and every available space. Had a patron wished a place to read, he would have had to sit on a stack of books. The place had a musty smell, the odor of old paper mixed with what? Maybe lime and mortar?
                  Celeste lead him up a rather elegant oak staircase, Phil wondering as to its origins. As far as he knew, there were not and had never been oaks growing in these islands. Perhaps wood from a wrecked ship?
                  He forgot the stairs at the top. The room he was viewing had shelves of skulls behind fly-specked glass, along with a few crude tools Phil speculated had come from the indigenous Indians, Lucayan, Caribe, Arawak or whatever. There was no sign of any exhibit featuring a murder.
                  Celeste echoed his thoughts. “Where. . .? This isn’t like it was when Livia and I. . .” she turned to Phil and misread his expression. “I didn’t make this up!”
                  “Didn’t say you did. Don’t suppose you saw the librarian, did you?”
                  They found the woman downstairs, a bespeckled grandmother type doing just what they might expect: Stacking

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