It was his father’s fault. Dragging him to auctions and estate sales. Wedging him between boxes in the backseat on the way home. Infecting him with the stench of cotton rag and printer’s ink. Stuart’s fate had been sealed before he could talk. His father had trapped him in this business.
No one needed to bring a gift. The bride brought music. The groom brought words. And a lifetime apart had brought china and linens and two very nice toasters.
But nothing lasts forever, and wedding guests feel awkward showing up empty-handed. So each brought a box as covered with ribbons and bows on the outside as it was empty within.
The stonemasons’ brick and mortar had long since run out, but men still scrambled to repair the breach with whatever rubble they could find.
A blind woman and two guys with Mets baseball caps took the last three seats when the bus stopped at Penton, so Adele had been obligated to stand for the last 257 miles. She stayed in the back, pushing herself as flat against the wall as she could when one of the other passengers lurched down the aisle toward the bathroom. They walked past Adele without looking her way, without even twisting sideways to avoid her.
Jakub inherited everything from his father. His dark eyes and stubby fingers. The little house in Stare Mesto, with the front room that his father had turned into a restaurant. Even the recipes that kept the place popular enough that Jakub could hire another cook and a girl to wait tables.
He’d inherited the gold-filled fusee pocketwatch that his father had carried throughout Europe while he collected those recipes. And he’d inherited the curse that came with it.
Bennett’s mother slapped his fingers away from the bandage. “Stop scratching.” Her eyes never left the road.
Contrary to his name, Chancey was anything but a risk taker. Even if he had been inclined to life’s more dangerous pursuits, however, Pendergast’s secretary would have been hard pressed to understand as the captain wrenched the airship door open, pulled goggles over his eyes, and stepped off the deck into the nothingness of open air.
Jayce closed his eyes and breathed in deep. The air had the taste of commercial-grade cleaner and fresh Cinnabon. “Sorry,” he mumbled, then yanked the fire alarm lever down.
The clerk smiled as he handed Abigail a brochure. A plastic tag pinned to his chest named him “Franklin”, but Abigail suspected the man had helped himself to an old nametag from behind one of the retail shops on Market Street.
The brochure was a single page. Tri-folded and laid out in columns and sections, it looked for all the world like a restaurant menu.
Post-It notes decorated Allison’s apartment, two-inch by two-inch squares laminated and mounted to walls, mirrors, and appliances with cellophane tape that had been rubbed transparent with a thumbnail and trimmed square with an Exacto knife.