It was the craft coloring page that took me under. Some kids broke the crayons, some kids crumbled the paper, while some just fell asleep. Trying to keep everyone engaged was exhausting.
“Librarian? I never figured you for the type.” The familiar southern drawl snickered from behind me.
“Hank.” I stood up from trying to get one of the children to sit and color. “I mean, Detective Hank.” I gulped. “Detective Sharp.” I looked away when I felt myself blush. “I had to get a job and this . . .”
“This seems to be harder than you thought?” He laughed. “You look frustrated. Let me help.”
I took a step back, “If you think you can do better.”
“Hey kids.” He spoke above their whimpers, giggles, and chatter. “Who would like a police sticker?”
The kids ran screaming towards him with their hands flailing in the air.
“Great. When you finish coloring your paper, bring it to me for a sticker,” he spoke in a gentle and kind tone.
Quickly, the children I’d been trying to get to color along with the rest of the kids hurried back to the miniature tables and were silent as they colored the page.
“I didn’t know I could bribe them.” I smiled. “Thanks for the tip. I need stickers. I’m guessing you aren’t here to check out a book?”
“I’m here to check you out.” He looked at me. I wasn’t sure if that was a pick up line, but he completely clarified. “Not check you out, but talk to you and I heard over at the diner about you going to The Tough Nickel and then you went to see Alvin.”
“Gosh, word sure does travel fast around here.” I rolled my eyes and put my hands on my hips. “Everyone in town thinks I killed Paul.”
“Did you?” He asked.
My head tilted, I glared.
“I cleared all that up with everyone. I told them you didn’t because the preliminary report came back and it appears Paul had been there a few days.” His words were music to my ears only for the fact that it showed I didn’t kill him. “According to the pings on your cell phone,”
“You pinged my cell phone?” My jaw dropped as I interrupted him.
“I got a warrant.” He pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket. “You weren’t anywhere near Normal.”
“I told you that. But it still upsets me that Paul was murdered. You have a whole town of suspects,” I said and began to rattle off, “Not that I think Ty Randal did it, but he has reason, then you have Henry, who I really don’t think did it, but what about Dottie Swaggert?”
“Hmmm…maybe reading to little kids and being in charge of a trailer park is what you need to stick to,” he said.
“What does that mean?” I drew back.
“It means that you aren’t a detective. I’m only here to let you know that you’re off the hook. You can leave Normal today if you wanted.” He looked down when a little child walked up and tugged on his pants with their scribbled page done.
“I’m not leaving Normal,” I spat. “I’m staying and I’m going to fix up Happy Trails.”
“Really?” He looked all sorts of not happy and a little shocked rolled up into one. He took out some of those stickers he’d promised the kids and doled them out to the little hands like candy.
“Yes. Really.” I confirmed and took a few more coloring pages as he gave them the sticker.
“I just figured you’d go back to your old life.” He apparently didn’t listen to me last night after I told him why I was in Normal.
That tip of my eye started to twitch and the anger boiled inside of me.
“You figured?” I questioned.
“Are you mad that I thought you’d leave?” He questioned, his voice a little louder. “It’s not every day that someone with your social status decides to live in a run-down camper in a rural Kentucky town they know nothing about. Unless you do know more about Kentucky than you’re letting on.”
“I see that you’ve been snooping in my background, which was a lifetime ago. I’m sorry to disappoint you, Hank,” I put an emphasis on his name, “but I own a campground that needs to be fixed up. I’m sorry that you figured wrong about me and my intention to stay in town.”
I left out the fact that I had no place to go or zero cash to do it with. Normal was all I had and he came along with it whether I liked him or not. Because currently, I wasn’t liking him.
He took a step back.
“According to my sources, your family perished in a horrific house fire and you survived. There was talk about how you got out and not everyone else.” He brought back memories that taken a lot of therapy and money to get rid of. “Then you had to live with foster families up until you turned eighteen.” His eyes lowered as did his voice, “Why is it that you’re really here in Normal?”
“Listen,” I lowered my voice when I noticed there were no children in the children’s section and Abby had peeked her head around the corner. “As much as you and everyone in town would like to believe, I don’t have a caring bone in my body, I do. I want to help out the people in Normal and I’m going to prove it. You didn’t hear a word I said to you last night, did you?”
I tried not to even comment on what he’d said about my past.
“I didn’t listen because I was busy making sure you had electricity.” His southern charm turned on and I tried to assess if he did it on purpose or if just came naturally.
“Recap.” I put my hand up for him to stop talking. “My only home is that RV and Happy Trails. Yes. My entire family died in a house fire. It was awful, but not as bad as being thrown from one foster family to the next. I got out of Kentucky and I’m sorry if it’s not the grand place everyone thinks it is, because it’s not fond for me.”
I sucked in a deep breath and stuck my hand up when he opened his mouth.
“Now that you know I’m not a suspect, I’m going to try my hardest to make Happy Trails what it used to be. It might take me years, but I’m here and I’m going to do it. I’m terribly upset about what Paul did to the citizens in Normal. Whether you want to believe it or not, I never will excuse Paul for what he did, but he didn’t deserve what someone did to him either.”
“Are you trying to tell me that not only are you staying here, but you’re not going to stop snooping around with this list of suspects you have in your head?” He questioned.
“It means that I’m going to try to make everything right. If that means making good on the people he wronged here in Normal while trying to figure out who killed him. . .” I hesitated, “Yeah. That’s what that means.”
We stood there in silence staring at each other. He opened his mouth and shut it a couple of times like he wanted to say something to me. It appeared I’d stumped him and he didn’t have the words. As he did this little internal battle with himself, the words that’d come out of my mouth about how I was going to make everything really did start to settle into my soul.
Then it dawned on me. I wasn’t here to just to get Happy Trails back to the way it was, but to make everything right with everyone in Normal. That also included Paul and what happened to him.
“Here’s the book for the next book club.” Abby handed me a worn out paperback book that was kept together with duct tape.
“I’ve got to get going.” Hank gave me one last long hard look before he turned around and walked out of the library.
“I don’t read.” I reluctantly took the book and curled it to my chest as I thought about Ty Randal and his situation.
He was the first person I was going to see in the matter of who did Paul in.
NINE