“What about him?” I asked, finding it odd that Leo would have asked me about the inspector.

  “Well, I spoke with him this morning—I don’t normally gossip, but they reckon that kid who works in the antiques’ shop…”

  “Hugo?”

  Leo nodded. “That’s him. They reckon he’s gone missing.”

  It was my turn to nod. “He wasn’t at the fair yesterday.”

  “Didn’t show up for work this morning, either.”

  I swallowed hard. I hoped Hugo was okay and as to Leo telling me all this—he was right, he wasn’t one for gossip so I was pretty sure he was telling me just so we didn’t have to split ways. And that was—well, it was pretty darn sweet and pretty darn cute and no, I was not going to let my heart run away with me. “Are they searching for him?”

  Leo shook his head. “Apparently, he’d packed a bag, so it looks like wherever he went, he was planning to go there. Might be taking a holiday and just forgot to tell anyone?” He shrugged. “Probably nothing to worry about.”

  “They don’t think he’s been kidnapped?”

  Leo laughed and shook his head again. “No. Certainly Inspector Lean doesn’t. I mean, as far as I know, there’s been no ransom note, no sign of violence or anything like that, and I suppose people seldom pack before being kidnapped, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Anyway, I’d thought you’d like to know since I know how much you like that shop. Besides, maybe it’ll be another little mystery for you for your books.”

  I sighed. “I hope this one doesn’t end up with a dead body.”

  Leo laughed. “That got grim fast.”

  “I’m sorry,” I answered on a little, embarrassed smile.

  He smiled at me and I felt butterflies start in my stomach which was just so dumb. “It doesn’t sound like it will end up in anything macabre,” Leo continued. “Might just be a bit of village intrigue at the end of it. That’s the other reason I thought you might be interested.”

  “Well, thanks,” I finished, not really sure what to say.

  “You’re welcome, Gwen,” he answered and then we both just stood there, looking at each other blankly, until Leo spoke again. “You’re, uh, you’re looking well.”

  “Thanks. You are too.” And before either one of us could further embarrass ourselves, I added, “well, I should be getting home so the ice cream doesn’t melt.” I hadn’t even bought ice cream.

  “Well, bye then Gwen.”

  “Bye, Leo.”

  Heading home with my grocery items, I did find myself wondering about Hugo. Leo hadn’t said if Fiona Potter was gone too, and I couldn’t help but wonder. It was probably nothing—nothing more than my active imagination running away from me. One of the problems of being a writer who trades mainly in mysteries is that you start seeing them everywhere.

  Maybe it was because my mind was on Hugo, the antiques’ shop assistant, that I didn’t see Bastian coming my way until it was too late.

  “Gwen! Gwen Dance!”

  Determined to prove something to Petra (who wasn’t even here at the moment), I’d decided to walk back through town, as I usually would, rather than taking my ‘shortcut’ which reduced the chance of my bumping into someone I didn’t want to see. And right now, Bastian was the last person I wanted to see because we were still in sight of the general store and if Leo came out, he’d see me with a man for whom he now had nothing but hatred.

  Son of a bitch.

  “Fancy seeing you here,” he continued with a Crest smile that brightened his entire handsome face. Good lord, the man was charming.

  “Fancy that,” I mumbled.

  He walked right up to me and I was worried he was going to try to give me a hug or kiss me or something so I took a step back.

  “Hi, Bastian.”

  “Gwen.” That devil may care smile.

  “Bastian.”

  “Long time no see.” He paused, then gave me another of his best wicked smiles. “And indeed; long time no anything else too, for that matter.”

  I swallowed hard at that as my lady parts started to hum at the memory. Ugh. “Good to see you, too.”

  He cocked a brow at me and then crossed his arms against his muscular chest. “A more suspicious man than I might suspect you’ve been avoiding me.”

  “Avoiding you?” I frowned and then made a pah sound. “Now, why would I do that?”

  Bastian threw up his hands in mock confusion. “You’ve got me. I can’t think of any reason you wouldn’t want to see me.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. “Not one reason, huh?’

  He shook his head and took a step closer until the sultry notes of his cologne were dancing all around my head. “I’m a pleasure to look at, to be with, and in many other ways—as I’m sure you remember.”

  “How could I forget,” I grumbled.

  That made him smile even more broadly. “Avoiding someone as charming, handsome, rich and exceptional in bed as I am would only be cheating yourself, my dear lady.” Then he paused and looked at me in a way that said he was remembering what I looked like naked. I felt my cheeks blush hot.

  “And you wouldn’t want to cheat yourself, now would you?” he purred.

  My heartrate had picked up and I made the firm decision that I needed to get control of myself and the situation. I raised my brows at him and decided to throw some of that bravado back at him. “Charming? Okay, I’ll give you one.”

  “Thank you, my dear.”

  I nodded. “Handsome?” I cocked my head to the side before nodding. “Okay, decidedly so.”

  His grin was beaming. “And thank you for that one too.”

  Then I laughed. “But rich? Please, Bastian, it’s safer to say you’re in debt.”

  Bastian played the part of the rich wastrel well, but his gambling problems meant that most of it was a façade. Though that made no difference to his spending.

  “Oh, ouch,” he said and gripped his heart.

  “And exceptional in bed?” I continued. “Um...” I remembered Bastian’s phone conversation I’d overheard when I’d broken into his home and how he’d described me as essentially ‘okay’ in the sex department. “I’m happy to say you’re decent in bed.”

  Bastian shook his head and gave me a faux injured expression. “Ah, milady, you harm me! And we were having such a pleasant conversation about such an engaging subject.”

  “You were talking about yourself.”

  “My favorite topic and it could be yours, too.” Now he was just fishing, but unluckily for him, there weren’t any fish biting today.

  “It’s not.”

  “All joking aside,” he started, and a serious expression took hold of his mouth. “I’ve been thinking a lot about you.”

  “Yeah, I can tell.” I frowned.

  He chuckled. “Not just bedroom related, I can assure you. I’ve been thinking about... well, you as in: you.”

  “Have you?”

  He nodded. “You’re going to force me to say it, aren’t you?”

  I shook my head and frowned at him. “I don’t know that I’m forcing you to say anything.”

  “You’ve tied my hands.” He laughed then. “Okay, you win, I miss you.” Then he waggled his eyebrows like a used car salesman.

  “You are an original, I’ll give you that.”

  “And if that’s all I’m going to get, I’ll take it.” And there was that charming chuckle of his that had no doubt won him his last few bedfellows.

  It was hard to convey why Bastian’s arrogance was so amusingly charming. Maybe because I knew it to all be an act. Bastian had made the mistake of letting me in and allowing me to see the real him, and that was the person who interested me—not this shell of the man he thought he thought he needed to live up to. The real Bastian was a good man, funny and sensitive with a big heart.

  “You’re in a good mood today,” I offered.

  For a moment, the façade cracked, and I got a glimpse of the man beneath, who smiled at me with genuine affection. “Well, I haven’t seen you for a while and... I’m glad I got to see you, because it’s always nice to see you, Gwen.” He paused. “And I hope you can tell that I mean that.”

  I couldn’t help but smile back. My half-hearted and most recent resolution that Leo was obviously the man for me suddenly seemed a lot less certain than it had mere minutes ago. What the hell was wrong with me?

  “Of course,” Bastian went on, “it’s also quite nice to know that, for once, everyone in Morley’s not talking about me.”

  “I thought you liked being talked about.”

  “Depends what they’re saying,” said Bastian darkly as he shook his head. “Not everyone shares the high opinion of me that you have.”

  “What makes you think I have a high opinion of you?”

  He laughed. “Gwen, I can honestly say that you’re the only woman who teases me unapologetically and yet, I only want more.”

  “Maybe you should see a shrink about that?” I gave him a knowing expression, and his grin broadened. He seemed entirely delighted to see me, and I couldn’t help but admit that it was flattering. “So, you heard about Hugo then?” I asked, figuring a subject change was probably in order.

  He nodded. “Big news.”

  “Not that big, surely?”

  “Ah,” Bastian held up a finger. “Maybe you haven’t yet heard the latest bulletin.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “You know that he was dating Fiona Potter?”

  “I’d heard.”

  “Well, she didn’t vanish, so the current gossip has it that he’s run off with another girl.”

  “Bastian, you’re as bad as all these Morley old biddies who can’t keep other people’s names out of their mouths.”

  He frowned. “I am, aren’t I?”

  “Yes,” I answered with a laugh, and reached out to swat the brute. As soon as I did, he grabbed my hand, bringing it to his mouth as he kissed the back of it. Then he just held it until I remembered that Leo would be leaving the store any second and pulled it away from him. “But going back to Hugo. That’s a shame he’s run off with another woman.”

  “Fiona, of course, is pretty cut up about it,” Bastian continued on a nod. “Her parents not so much. Neither of them ever liked Hugo or trusted him, from what I understand. They’re the monied elite (like me but less tolerant of their social inferiors—and, of course less handsome, charming and amazing in bed).”

  “My God,” I muttered, shaking my head as Bastian laughed.

  “Fiona’s parents, according to all the Morley old biddies, mind you,” Bastian continued with a little, boyish grin, “are over the moon to have all their worst suspicions confirmed.”

  “They are?”

  He nodded and I could see how excited he was to be passing along the gossip which amused me. “This is exactly what they’d been telling Fiona was going to happen with Hugo and it has. But, really, what can you expect of someone from that sort of background? (That’s what Godfrey’s saying, not me.)”

  “Did you pick all of this up at your quilting circle?”

  His eyebrows met in the center of his forehead. “If I knew what that was, I could give you an honest answer.”

  I looked at his handsome, boyish expression and could only shake my head.

  “You missed me too, admit it,” he started and appeared so enthusiastic about my answer that he reminded me of a golden retriever getting ready to go after a ball.

  “Who is this other girl?” I asked, still interested in Bastian’s gossip about Hugo, even while knowing that if I didn’t get away soon, Leo would see the two of us standing here. And I just... well, I wasn’t ready for that yet.

  “No one knows.”

  “Do they even know if there is another girl?” I wasn’t sure why I cared so much, but figured making conversation about Hugo and his womanizing ways might keep Bastian’s mind away from the subject of the two of us.

  “Of course not,” laughed Bastian. “Haven’t you been in Morley long enough to know how the rumor mill works; how it grinds up the truth, adds spices of its own concoction and puts out nonsense with a veneer of fact.”

  “I think I’ll reserve judgement,” I said and sighed. “Now I should be getting home because my ice cream’s probably already melted.”

  Good old ice cream excuse coming through for me again.

  “And what sort of gentleman would I be if I didn’t offer to carry your belongings for you?”

  “You are anything but a gentleman.”

  He put his hand over his heart. “Another low blow, Gwen! Ouch!”

  I laughed. “Thanks, silly, but I can manage.”

  “Of course, you can—you’re an independent, self-sufficient woman.”

  He looked as crestfallen as Leo had earlier and, of course, I was ready to be just as dumb.

  “Another time though.”

  Bastian instantly brightened. “And I’ve always got a ready pair of hands.” He winked at me then. “For groceries or... whatnot.”

  “I’m well aware of that, Bastian.”

  I made it away before Leo came out of the store and saw us, but that had been too close. And I’d made tentative arrangements to see both the men I was trying to avoid. Was it possible that a lot of this situation was my own fault? I knew what Petra would have said to that, so I told her nothing about my run-ins with either man when I got back home, but just related the latest gossip about Hugo, Fiona, and Fiona’s parents.

  Chapter Three

  Fans

  “I reckon Hugo’s run off with another girl,” Petra said.

  “That’s just gossip.”

  “And gossip is true more often than not. Even the educated guesses come good.”

  She wasn’t totally wrong, but I was happy to put the whole matter out of my head. As Bastian had said, it was nice for village gossip to be about someone other than me.

  After a light lunch, I retreated to my work room (I’ve always disliked the word ‘office’) and spent a fruitful afternoon working on my latest novel. It was shaping up pretty well, incorporating some good local color into a story drawing on the mythic history of the area. I was on such a roll that it was starting to get dark by the time I quit for the day.

  Busying myself in the kitchen, I was surprised to hear the doorbell ring. My stomach tightened; could it be Bastian or Leo? Had they taken our more cordial relations earlier as a greenlight for an unannounced visit? That didn’t seem like something Leo would do, but it was right out of the Bastian playbook, and if so, it could only make things more complicated between the two of us, because in general, I found it hard to say no to him.

  Opening the door, I was relieved to find neither man but instead a young woman I didn’t recognize.

  “Hello?”

  “Hi,” the woman—barely more than a girl, really—gave me a lost look. “Are you Gwen Dance?”

  “Yes,” I answered, wondering to whom I was admitting this.

  “I’m a big fan of yours. Er, of your books, I mean.” I didn’t think that needed clarifying, but maybe it was just as well.

  “Did you want me to sign something?”

  It did happen that on occasion a reader recognized me while I was out and about and requested an autograph. And, to be honest, I didn’t like being confronted at my home. It was as well to be polite though, because it was the ones who showed up on your doorstep that you had to watch (well, if Misery was anything to go by anyway).

  “No,” the girl said and then apparently realized that might have sounded rude because her eyes and mouth went wide as she violently shook her head. “I mean… I wouldn’t mind if you signed something for me. I mean... that would be really lovely, actually because... well, I am a big fan. Of course, I didn’t bring anything for you to sign because I wouldn’t be so presumptuous but… If you don’t mind using your own pen and paper. But, um, that’s not why I’m here.”

  “Why are you here?” I found myself genuinely nervous about what she might say next.

  “My name is Fiona Potter,” she answered as my jaw about dislodged and dropped on the ground. “I… well, the truth is that the police won’t listen to me and I thought… you know what—I live in the same town as the greatest mystery writer of all time.” That was a bit of a stretch, but I wasn’t going to argue—I mean, people’s opinions are their own, not to mention they’re also a bitch to try and change. “I figured if she can’t help me out, then who can?” She looked up at me with big, plaintive eyes. “So... do you think you could... maybe help me?”

  “I’m not sure what you need my help with?” Maybe I was just slow.

  “A mystery.”

  A few minutes later, Fiona was sitting in my kitchen while I finished my dinner (which was coming out of a tin can because I was running late).

  “Did you want anything to eat or drink?” I asked.

  She looked at the can of baked beans and abruptly shook her head—not that I could blame her. “No, thank you.”

  “Excuse me if I eat while we talk, but it’s been a busy day and I’m starving.”

  “Oh, that’s okay.”

  “Why don’t you talk while I cook? Tell me what’s happened and how you think I can help.”

  Fiona Potter took a deep breath. “Well, it’s my boyfriend.”

  “Hugo?”

  She nodded as she frowned. “How did you—”

  “There isn’t much in this town that flies beneath the radar.”

  “Oh, right. That’s true. Anyway, my boyfriend, Hugo Williams, has vanished.”

  “Vanished?” I turned to look at her and frowned, pretending like I didn’t already know all of this. It just seemed like maybe it was the right thing to do so I didn’t seem like a nosy woman or something like that.

  She nodded. “Like poof. Just gone with no word to anyone and no explanation.”