One Book in the Grave: A Bibliophile Mystery

see him rush into the clearing, glance around, and dash over to Emily. Aw, that was nice.
     
    “Back off,” someone groused. It was Minka, of course, bitching at whoever was trying to help her. Always the charmer. “Just get me the hell out of here.”
     
    I tried to ignore her migraine-inducing snarls and sputterings as I closed my eyes to conduct a mental checkup of my physical condition. Every muscle in my body groaned in pain. My neck ached and my head was pounding like I’d gone ten rounds with the champ. I guess I had, sort of.
     
    Apparently my face was also bloody and bruised. Saving Emily made it all worth it, but why did the events of this horrific night also involve my saving two people who didn’t deserve it—Minka and Solomon?
     
    That whole Nemesis thing Guru Bob had talked about was highly overrated. Right now, all I wanted to be was the mild-mannered bookbinder I’d always been.
     
    “Darling Brooklyn.” Derek knelt on the tarp and took hold of my hand.
     
    I told him what had happened in the parking lot with Melody, then blurted out, “I should have stayed inside the restaurant.”
     
    “Yes, you should have.” He ran his knuckles gently along my hairline. “But by going outside and talking to her, you helped lead us straight to Emily. You saved her.”
     
    “What took you so long to get here?”
     
    He paused, then said, “Gabriel ran into Melody.”
     
    “He ran into her?”
     
    His mouth twisted in a sardonic grin. “To be accurate, Melody ran into him. She tried to run him down with her burgundy van.”
     
    “Is he all right?” I whispered. “Those women are formidable. And crazy to boot.”
     
    “He’s fit as a fiddle. He shot out her tire and she ran the van into a tree.”
     
    “Good,” I said darkly. “I thought I saw him wrestle Crystal to the ground.”
     
    “You did indeed. You’ve no need to worry about Gabriel any longer.”
     
    “I’m glad,” I muttered. But I was going to hold a grudge against both sisters for a long time to come.
     
    Derek stretched out on his side next to me and wrapped his arm over me. My anger faded and I was warm and safe for the first time in a few hours.
     
    “Darling,” he murmured. “It was brave and ingenious of you to leave a chocolate trail. How did you ever think of it?”
     
    I smiled, then moaned from the stinging pain around my eye. I figured I must look like a black-and-blue hag, but Derek didn’t seem to mind.
     
    “Chocolate saves lives,” I whispered.
     
    He laughed. “
You
saved lives. You did a fantastic job of keeping Crystal from killing all of you, even if you had to put your pretty face in harm’s way to do so. I’m veryproud of you.” He leaned over and barely touched his lips to my cheek.
     
    “I love you,” I said.
     
    His smile was radiant. “You said it first,” he whispered, playing with my hair.
     
    “I did.” I laughed softly. “Well, then, it must be true.”
     
    “I hope so. I love you, too, my darling.”
     
    I smiled and closed my eyes. For a guy like Derek, I might even be willing to play Nemesis one more time.
     
    There was the little matter of traipsing back to civilization through the dark woods. We were a merry band of cops, EMTs, heroes, and walking wounded. Derek offered to carry me, but while I was proud of my relatively low body-mass index, I wasn’t about to test our relationship by letting him stagger through the forest with me in his arms.
    Emily, however, was in no condition to walk a half mile through the dark, rough woods in the middle of the night, so Max carried her. Emily was sunburned and bruised and a bit traumatized, but she insisted that she would be fine as long as she was with Max.
     
    Despite my aches and bumps and bruises, the walk might have been tolerable if it weren’t for Minka. She bitched and ranted and shrieked at every brush of a tree branch against her, every root she lurched over, every bush she bumped against. All I could hear was her angry voice as she seethed and fumed, mainly about me. She refused to take responsibility for her own paranoid actions that led to her being kidnapped by Crystal Byers. No, it was all my fault. I was the Death Zone. Disaster loomed all around me. Beware to anyone who stepped within my Circle of Doom.
     
    Derek hugged me close as Minka vowed loudly and repeatedly never to come within a thousand yards of me again.
     
    Oh, if only she meant it. Honestly, what had I done to deserve being