Linda opened up this morning so I got an extra ten minutes in bed, bliss.

“Morning, Nina,” she said, as I dropped my jacket on the back of my chair.

“Hey, Linda. Anybody in yet?” I cast a glance around the ground floor but the only movement came from Oscar, whose tail curled around the Fiction A-D shelf to follow his body. He was on the prowl, surveying his literary kingdom.

“Nah. But Herself had a good day at Library HQ yesterday.” She nodded towards the issue desk, directing my gaze until I spotted the new addition.

“What’s that?”

“A box.”

“Well, yeah, I can see that. Why is there a shoebox on the desk?”

Even as I spoke I had a bad feeling about this, like a character in a 1980s George Lucas m...

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