Cape Hope Capers Read online

  Cape Hope Capers

  Cape Hope Mysteries

  Winne Reed

  Contents

  Cape Hope Capers

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Afterword

  Copyright © 2019 by Winnie Reed

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover Design by http://www.StunningBookCovers.com

  Cape Hope Capers

  Cape Hope Mysteries Book Four

  An antique book. A mysterious old photo. Emma’s curiosity and perseverance and an old mystery about Cape Hope’s royalty.

  Join Emma on her next adventure with the adorable Lola, Detective McHottie, and a certain photographer who’s decided to make an appearance.

  Chapter One

  “How many old horror books can a bookstore hold?” I wondered aloud, plopping another paperback on top of the ever-growing stack. “It’s like there was a purge and everybody decided to get rid of them at once.”

  My sister snickered. “This didn’t just happen. These books have been traded in for store credit for, like, ever. Since I opened the store and decided it would be a fabulous idea to offer credit for used books.”

  She looked around at the piles and piles of books all around us with a heavy sigh. “And voila. Here we are. Combing through them to see what I can give away.”

  “You’re making space for new inventory,” I pointed out with a smile. “Isn’t that great?”

  “Who are you and what have you done with my sister?” she laughed. “Since when are you a Pollyanna?”

  “I would hardly call myself a Pollyanna,” I retorted. “And I don’t have to spend my Monday night doing this with you, either.” I glanced out the window, noting the growing darkness. It was almost nine o’clock, but there was still light enough to see by out there.

  Weird. I could never live someplace like Sweden or Alaska, where the sun was up late at night.

  “What else would you have done?” Darcy asked, all smug-like and older-sisterly.

  “Ew!” I stuck out my tongue. “Don’t act all superior just because you have a boyfriend now.”

  “I’ve told you, Karl’s not my boyfriend.”

  “Oh! He has a name now? I’m allowed to know his name? I’m honored.”

  “Anyway, he’s not my boyfriend. Not yet.” She could try all she wanted, but my sister couldn’t hide from me. She tried to turn her face away before I could see her frown, but it was no use.

  “What’s his issue? What, he’s too stupid to see what a catch you are? How stupid it would be to let you get away? Do I need to have a talk with him?”

  She blanched. “No, for God’s sake, anything but that.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “I don’t mean that, idiot.” She picked up a handful of paperbacks and started sorting them out. “I mean, I don’t want him to feel pressured.”

  “Oh, we wouldn’t want that. We wouldn’t want him to feel like there’s any need to tell you what’s on his mind, whether he wants the two of you to be an actual item or not. Wouldn’t want him to take your feelings into consideration.”

  “Are we still talking about me?” she asked. “Or somebody I know?”

  “I’m talking about you, obviously.” This time, I was the one looking away, neatly piling a dozen books so they wouldn’t fall over. Like my life depended on them staying upright.

  “Because you sound a little too passionate. Like you have a personal problem along these lines.”

  “Well, I don’t,” I murmured.

  “So you’re not even a little annoyed that Deke hasn’t confirmed when he’s coming to town—or even if he definitely is, since he hasn’t committed?”

  “He’s coming this week. I know he is.” And I almost dreaded it, seeing as how Joe Sullivan was already staying in town.

  I didn’t have any commitment to either of these men.

  Heck, I could barely spend ten minutes with Joe without wanting to do something that would only result in my arrest. And Deke? He floated to and fro on the breeze, going from place to place on assignment for Haute Cuisine and randomly flying to France at the drop of a hat.

  They were both enough to make me want to give up on men forever.

  Why did it bother me so much, the thought of them being in town together? Like spending time with one meant being unfaithful to the other? I owed nothing to either of them, except friendship and gratitude since they’d both helped me through difficult times and had probably saved my bacon more than once.

  Darcy only smirked as she stacked another pile of used books. “Without you knowing if he wants the two of you to be a thing?”

  “A thing?” I snorted. “I don’t wanna be a thing.”

  “Don’t get all cute with me, Emma. You know what I mean. You want to know what he’s thinking. Whether he wants something for you guys, instead of him drifting in and out of your life.”

  “He made it sound like he does,” I reminded her. “When I talked to him last week.”

  “Before you found that body floating in the pool, at the casino.”

  “Exactly. Thanks for bringing that delightful memory back.”

  “Anyway, don’t get all annoyed on my account when it’s your account you’re more upset over. You’re in limbo and limbo has never been your favorite place.”

  “Is it anybody’s favorite place?” I asked the ceiling. The ceiling didn’t have an answer for me, but I preferred its silence to my sister’s know-it-all smartypants attitude.

  I pulled another bunch of books my way rather than continuing with this pointless discussion. “Whew. Musty.”

  “Some of these books are so old,” she agreed. “I know there’s been one or two times when somebody’s died and whoever was in charge of packing their things brought the books here. I didn’t want to tell them not to bother. I hate to see books getting thrown away.”

  “What do you plan on doing with these?” I asked.

  “Not throwing them out, if that’s what you’re trying to ask. There are all kinds of places to donate books. Schools, prisons, halfway houses, that sort of thing.”

  “Well, I hope they like horror, whoever they are.” I picked up an old, hardback book whose title I couldn’t make out. The dust jacket was nowhere to be found, and whoever the book had belonged to had rubbed the letters pressed into the cover until they were illegible.

  Something about that intrigued me. This was a beloved book. Somebody had sat down with it so many times, running their hands over the cover. I’d had a lot of books like that over the years. The ones I could read over and over.

  “You think I could have this one?” I asked, still examining the cover.

  “Sure. Which one is it?”

  “I don’t know.” I looked up at her, fully aware of how strange I sounded. “It’s not even about that. It’s about somebody loving this book. They loved it. I
t meant a lot to them.”

  “How do you know that?” She wasn’t kidding anymore, though. Her voice went soft. If anybody could understand what it meant to love a book, it would be my sister. The bookstore owner.

  “They rubbed the letters off the cover. See? And the pages are worn, too.” I flipped them to show her. And I noticed a stiffness toward the end. Like something was tucked in there.

  “Ooh, a picture!” I worked it out from between the pages.

  “Let me see!”

  “Wait your turn,” I muttered, pulling my arm away. Maybe not my most mature moment, but what did I care? I was studying an old picture.

  It was black-and-white, on thicker paper than I was used to seeing pictures printed on. A girl stood in the foreground, off to the right, wearing a pretty, floaty sort of dress. One hand rested on her belly.

  Her very pregnant belly.

  She wasn’t looking down at it, though, not like some women did in their pregnancy photos. Instead, she looked off into the distance, toward the left of the frame.

  “She’s so pretty,” Darcy mused from over my shoulder. “But she looks…”

  “Sad,” I whispered. “She looks so sad.”

  “Don’t go jumping to conclusions.”

  “What were you gonna say?” I asked, elbowing her. “She looks what?”

  “Like she’s about to pop. Very pregnant.”

  And sad. She looked very sad. It didn’t matter what Darcy said. There was a wistful look in the girl’s eyes. “I wonder when it was taken. I wonder if maybe the baby’s father died or something. Like in the war.”

  “There goes your imagination.”

  “I’m a writer.”

  “You write about food,” Darcy pointed out.

  “Okay, fine, maybe she was thinking about a piece of pie she just ate. Maybe she already missed it and wished there was more. Is that better?”

  She burst out laughing. “Yeah, terrific. Well, she’s standing in front of the Montbatten house, so she was probably well-off.”

  “She could’ve been a servant there, right? And there’s no ring on her left hand.”

  “Hmm. True.”

  “I wonder who she was. I wonder if she was ever happy after she had her baby.” I was already thinking about her, making up stories in my head. Darcy was right—my imagination was already getting ahead of me.

  “She probably was.” Darcy shrugged. “I mean, if everything went well.”

  “Now I just have to know.” I flipped the photo over. The back was blank. There was nothing else stuck in the pages of the book, which according to the title page was The Scarlett Letter.

  I pointed to it. “Now, tell me that doesn’t mean anything. Here’s a picture of what looks like an unmarried woman carrying a baby, and it was tucked into this particular book. Come on. Tell me that doesn’t intrigue you.”

  “I’m pretty sure you need a hobby,” Darcy snickered. “Come on. I’d like to get through with this sometime tonight.” I made it a point to put the book aside so it didn’t get lost before getting back to work.

  “So,” my beloved sister grinned as we packed the books in boxes, “when are you getting together with Joe?”

  “Who says I’m getting together with him?” I tried to move a box, but she stopped me.

  “You have to take it easy on that wrist, remember?” The wrist I’d sprained falling into an empty pool. Falling wasn’t the right word, exactly. I’d launched myself at the woman threatening to shoot her literary agent and me, and we landed in the empty pool together. Leave it to my sister to keep an eye on me.

  She continued after placing that full box on top of another. “I do, because I know you. And Mom said he was very familiar and friendly when he came into tell you he was around for the week.”

  “I’m sure Mom worked in a bunch of details that didn’t really happen, too. Did he bring me flowers? Did he ride up to the café on a literal white stallion? Was his shirt half-unbuttoned to show off his rippling chest?” I batted my eyelashes and pretended to swoon.

  “Wow, it’s like you were there when she told me,” she laughed.

  I was shaking my head when my phone buzzed. And boy, did I dislike the way my heart jumped into my throat at the thought of it being Joe. Only it wasn’t—though the man who’d sent the text was the first important man in my life.

  “Hey—it’s Dad,” I announced.

  “Oh?” Darcy suddenly became very interested in a piece of lint on her t-shirt.

  “Wants us to come for dinner tomorrow night.”

  “Good for him.” That had to be an incredibly tough piece of lint. Invisible, too, since I couldn’t see it. But she kept picking at it, absorbed.

  “Darce.”

  “Em.” Her eyes met mine under lowered brows. “Why are you so insistent on giving me grief over this? Why can’t you just let it go?”

  “Why can’t I just let it go that you won’t speak to our father because he, God forbid, found a girlfriend after divorcing Mom? Why does that bother me? Because you’re my family, for starters.”

  She heaved a put-upon sigh, stacking more books. “We’re still your family, even when I don’t feel like talking to him. Especially not when he’s with his little girlfriend.”

  His little girlfriend. My head was starting to hurt. “Her name is Holly, and you know it. She’s a pretty substantial person. A businesswoman—you know how that goes. And she loves him. Plus, she makes a mean red sauce.”

  “Fabulous.” She held up her hands, palms out. “I don’t wanna talk about this. You know it. I don’t see why it’s so hard for you to understand that.”

  “I only want us to get along, that’s all.”

  “You can’t make people get along. You can’t save everybody. This is one fight you won’t be able to win. Sorry about that.”

  She didn’t sound very sorry. I decided to let it go, since banging my head against a brick wall wasn’t exactly something I enjoyed as a pastime.

  Chapter Two

  “How’s your wrist, hon?” Dad examined my bandaged wrist with a deep frown. “You’re lucky you didn’t break it.”

  “I know, I know.” I accepted his hug, leaning against him. No matter how independent I was, no matter how old I got, there was nothing quite like a hug from my dad. “But it could’ve been a lot worse than that, too. A broken wrist is nothing compared to a hole in the head.”

  “Oh, Emma!” Holly gasped, turning away from the oven with a piping-hot lasagna. “Don’t even talk like that!”

  My father then said the very last thing I would’ve expected. “Let’s change the subject.”

  My eyebrows almost shot right up off my head. “I’m sorry. Where’s my dad? What have you done with him?”

  He shot me a warning look. “For once, I wanna lay off you, and you’re wondering why I don’t come down harder. Explain that one to me.”

  “Okay, fine. Far be it from me to look a gift horse in the mouth.” I got back to work smearing garlic butter on two halves of a loaf of bread, which Holly then placed in the oven to bake. My mouth watered at the aroma.

  “I saw somebody familiar in town earlier today,” Dad reported in a far-too-casual tone.

  “Oh? Who’s that?”

  “The detective from Paradise City. Joe What’s-His-Name.”

  “Oh? That’s nice. He told me he’d be in town this week when he stopped by the café yesterday morning. He needs rest after a panic attack he had last week.”

  “Oh, poor guy.” Holly shook her head, glancing at Dad. “Work-related?” She was probably thinking about him, wondering if he was liable to have the same trouble. Cape Hope was a far cry from Paradise City.

  “Yeah, it was during the investigation into the death at the resort. Hundreds and hundreds of conference attendees, anybody could’ve been responsible. He didn’t look good before the attack. And he ended up in the ER, thinking his heart was going out on him.”

  “Poor guy,” Holly mused again. “You seem pretty aware
of what went on.”

  We exchanged a knowing look which my father seemed to miss. I liked Holly a lot. Unlike Darcy, I saw how good she was for my dad. Mainly because I bothered spending time with them, which my sister hadn’t yet found it in herself to do.

  That didn’t mean we were best friends, or that I appreciated her giving me a look that meant she was onto me. Like we shared a secret. I only stuck my tongue out at her, the way I would’ve done to Darcy or Raina.

  She smiled wide. I knew she loved it when she felt like we were getting along and I was accepting of her and their relationship. I did want to be. She was such a nice person, and it wasn’t her fault there was such a wide age difference. She made Dad happy. That was all that mattered.

  “I just happened to be the only person around who cared that he was in the hospital,” I shrugged, popping a slice of pepperoni in my mouth. “I felt bad for him.”

  “A cute guy like that doesn’t have a girlfriend?” Holly teased.

  “He works too much. Too hard. And he takes his work very seriously. He needs this time off, and more balance in his life.”

  “He needs somebody who’ll take care of him,” Holly reasoned.

  “I’m sure he does. I’ll mention it to him if and when we see each other.” I got to work setting the table, eager to get off the subject. “So how’s everything with work? I almost never get the chance to hear about it, and I’m sorry. It seems like every time I come by, we’re talking about me.”

  “We’re both interested in you,” she reminded me with a wink, joining me with a stack of napkins and silverware. “Work’s going great. I just landed the job of helping restore the old Montbatten house—they’re turning it into a museum of the entire town’s history.”