Every Trick in the Book Read online

  PRAISE FOR

  Buried in a Book

  “Cheer up—there’s no middle-aged malaise for Lila. This cozy debut, written by a pseudonymous duo, excels at describing bucolic North Carolina. Think Kate Carlisle for her intergenerational ensemble style or Mark de Castrique’s series for regional Tar Heel flavor.”

  —Library Journal

  “Buried in a Book provides a charming new protagonist and cast of characters, and promises rewarding exploits in future series novels. Keep your eyes peeled for the next Novel Idea Mystery.”

  —Mystery Scene

  “Snappy, funny, and charming, with delightful characters and a cozy plot.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  “A witty, captivating read that mystery fans will enjoy. I’m looking forward to my next visit to Inspiration Valley.”

  —Novel Reflections

  “This is the start of a new series by Lucy Arlington and it has great potential. As a fan of cozy mysteries, I enjoyed this book about the crazy cast of characters at a literary agency.”

  —Night Owl Reviews

  “Buried in a Book will appeal to anyone who loves reading, especially anyone who loves discovering a new author…A satisfying first mystery.”

  —The Mystery Reader

  “Lucy Arlington has a winner with this debut…A first-rate whodunit all cozy fans will enjoy!”

  —Escape with Dollycas Into A Good Book

  Berkley Prime Crime titles by Lucy Arlington

  BURIED IN A BOOK

  EVERY TRICK IN THE BOOK

  EVERY TRICK

  IN THE BOOK

  Lucy Arlington

  BERKLEY PRIME CRIME, NEW YORK

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL,

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s

  imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business

  establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over

  and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  EVERY TRICK IN THE BOOK

  A Berkley Prime Crime Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Berkley Prime Crime mass-market edition / February 2013

  Copyright © 2013 by Lucy Arlington.

  Excerpt from Books, Cooks, and Crooks by Lucy Arlington copyright © 2013 by Lucy Arlington.

  Cover illustration by Julia Green.

  Cover design by Lesley Worrell.

  Interior text design by Tiffany Estreicher.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or

  electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of

  copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ISBN: 978-1-101-61913-1

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME

  Berkley Prime Crime Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY® PRIME CRIME and the PRIME CRIME logo are

  trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  ALWAYS LEARNING PEARSON

  To all librarians.

  Thank you for inviting us to enter the world

  of books time and time again.

  Table of Contents

  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

  Books, Cooks, and Crooks

  Chapter 1

  BY THE MIDDLE OF OCTOBER, THE HEAT AND LASSITUDE of a Southern summer had finally loosed its hold over the quaint, artsy town of Inspiration Valley. Cool air traveled down from the foothills and encouraged the people of North Carolina to search their closets for lightweight sweaters and to spend their weekends at football games or strolling through pumpkin patches in search of the perfect gourd.

  Signs of fall were everywhere. Advertisements were stapled to nearly every telephone pole, enticing the public into taking hayrides, attending apple festivals, and purchasing potted mums from the local plant store, the Secret Garden. An electric charge was present in the crisp mornings, and a bowl of warm grits or a cup of hot cider never tasted better. Folks went about their business with a spring in their step.

  Although I loved autumn and welcomed the brisk breezes and the harvest moon hung from a canvas of deep indigo, I was too busy to enjoy the season. Having been promoted from a lowly intern two months ago to the position of full-fledged agent at Novel Idea Literary Agency, my schedule was full. I have cherished each and every day in this career. There’s no other job in the world that would give me the chance to discover captivating new voices, unforgettable characters, must-read plotlines, or settings so original and alluring that I long to be transported to the author’s fictional realm on the spot.

  And those are just the query letters! I also get to sit at my desk, sipping hot caramel lattes brewed to perfection by Makayla, the talented barista who works downstairs at Espresso Yourself, and delve into a fat pile of manuscripts. Because I represent traditional mysteries and romantic suspense, much of my day is spent reading about intrigues, secrets, and schemes. You’d think that I’d quickly grow tired of those themes, but I haven’t. I love a good murder mystery, no matter what its form.

  This autumn, working in conjunction with the town of Inspiration Valley, Novel Idea was on the verge of hosting the area’s first Book and Author Festival. The entire town was dedicated to art in all its forms, and the literary agency, located at the heart of the burg, was one of Inspiration Valley’s most enthusiastic supporters. I was in charge of registration for both the participants and the guest speakers. In addition to this time-consuming assignment, I had to find our agency a new intern, because the woman I’d hired in August to take my place as intern had been forced t
o accompany her husband in an abrupt job transfer to Minnesota.

  This meant that come Monday, my desk and email inbox would be crammed with unfulfilled tasks. Thank goodness today was Saturday and the work I had before me was of the kind I’d been looking forward to for months. Today was moving day.

  Most people view this activity as a miserable one. True, it involved plenty of hard labor and emotional stress, but I was giddy with excitement when my son, Trey, pulled up in front of my mother’s house in a borrowed pickup truck.

  “Ready to put these guns to good use?” he asked and then flexed his biceps. As usual, he was wearing a T-shirt. Freezing rain could cover the surface of Inspiration Valley and my son would insist that he wasn’t cold.

  “Manual labor suits you,” I told him. “If you still have energy after a day of shoveling out the goat pens or chopping wood, you could always hike down the mountain and mow my lawn.”

  Trey puffed out his chest, pleased that I’d noticed how strong he’d become since joining the co-op up on Red Fox Mountain. “You won’t have a man around, Mom. So if there’s anything you need, just say the word and I’ll totally be there.”

  Touched by his offer, I smiled at my only child. Trey was tall with the wide shoulders of a football player and had brown eyes that were prone to twinkle with mischief. His chestnut hair was too long for my taste, but I reached up and ruffled it fondly. He squirmed away from my touch, readjusting his shaggy locks while introducing me to two young men from the Red Fox Mountain Co-op who’d be helping us transfer the furniture and boxes stacked in a Dunston storage unit into a charming cottage located minutes away from Novel Idea.

  I’d had my eye on this butter yellow house with periwinkle shutters since it came up for sale. But at the time, there was a snag in my finances due to Trey totaling my car and trashing East Dunston High’s football field and bleachers in the process. This prevented me from making an offer on the picket fence paradise until I sold my house in Dunston. Instead, Trey and I moved in with my mother for the summer. The moment my financial burdens eased, I rushed into the Sherlock Holmes Realty office and made an offer that was immediately accepted. I happily put down a deposit to ensure that after a mid-October closing I could lay claim to the two-bedroom house in the lovely subdivision of Walden Woods Circle.

  Throughout the months of August and September, I’d fallen asleep to visions of the cottage’s sunny rooms and secluded rear garden. I couldn’t wait to hang family pictures on the walls and dig up the previous owner’s spent annuals, to plant row after row of perennials that would burst through the ground the following spring. My head was filled with images of van Gogh’s irises and sunflowers, Matisse’s dahlias and daisies, and a riot of Manet’s roses. I planned to transform my backyard into an impressionist painting.

  As for the interior, I wanted to decorate using a combination of furniture from my old place as well as some new pieces in bright, cheerful hues. Unfortunately, I’d have to sell a few more of my clients’ books to major publishing houses before I could afford to head over to High Point to pick out comfy living room chairs or a farm table for the kitchen. Up until now, I’d only sold two book series. One was a cozy mystery featuring a sushi chef and the second was a romantic suspense set in a Scottish castle. And I couldn’t really take credit for the sale of the romantic suspense. That deal was already in the works when I was promoted to literary agent.

  Upon our arrival at the storage unit in Dunston, I pulled out boxes of clothes and milk crates stuffed with books for the boys to load into their truck. As I worked, my thoughts focused on another client I’d inherited. I still couldn’t believe that I now represented the international bestselling romance author Calliope Sinclair. If I could just convince her to make some changes to her latest manuscript, I felt certain that several publishing houses would enter into a bidding war to acquire the latest masterpiece from one of America’s best-known authors.

  “Stop gatherin’ wool, girl!” My mother’s voice startled me out of my reminiscing. “You’re standin’ in the middle of the path and this box isn’t gettin’ any lighter. What’ve you got in here? Cannonballs from the Civil War?”

  Putting my own box on the ground, I rushed forward to take my mother’s burden and set it in the bed of her turquoise pickup truck. I added the last box and then shut the tailgate, causing the magnetic sign plastered to the side of the truck to fall askew. I realigned the purple and black sign advertising the services of Amazing Althea, Psychic Advisor. “Sorry,” I told her. “I was thinking about work again.”

  “This is work. Good work. The kind that gets you out in the open air and invites the sun’s rays to paint your face. Before long, it’ll be winter and we’ll all be starvin’ for this feelin’.” My mother held out her free arms as though she could embrace the whole world. “I always feel like a kid durin’ the fall. This is gonna be the best Halloween ever. I’m gonna decorate the front door and scare the masks right off the kids who toilet papered my holly bushes last year. They won’t come near my place totin’ rolls of Charmin ever again.”

  I waited until we were both inside the truck before saying, “Is that an official prediction?”

  My mother swatted me with the paperwork from the storage facility. “I don’t read the cards for somethin’ like that. I’ve gotta save my spiritual energy for when someone needs me, and my appointment calendar is as stuffed as a Christmas goose.”

  We chatted about her clients as I maneuvered the winding roads leading to Inspiration Valley, with Trey and the guys following right behind me in his pickup truck. The town sat in a circle of low mountains like a teacup in a saucer, and I never grew tired of the view. After that last sweeping curve, the town suddenly became visible through my driver’s side window—an oasis of tree-lined streets and beautifully designed houses, storefronts, and buildings. There were no concrete boxes in Inspiration Valley. Nearly every home boasted a garden, and the business district was lush with public green spaces.

  Making my careful descent, I was struck anew by its charm. An army of multicolored trees surrounded the town, standing guard like timeless sentinels over the bookstore, garden center, organic grocery, restaurants, art studios, and tidy subdivisions. Today, the foliage show was magnificent. Corn yellow, pumpkin orange, and spiced cranberry leaves encouraged rich and aromatic fantasies about the first meal I’d cook in my new house.

  Not for the first time, I sent up a grateful prayer of appreciation for the circumstances that brought me here. When I was handed a pink slip last spring from my job as a Features reporter for the Dunston Herald, it had originally seemed a setback. There I was, a forty-five-year-old single mother with a college-bound son, having to start a new career. However, being fired had spelled not only the beginning of an exciting and unique career path, but an opportunity to make my home in this delightful town.

  By the time we’d unloaded all the boxes and I’d arranged my pots, pans, dishes, and utensils in the green and ivory kitchen, I was too tired to do anything but order takeout, and the meal I had envisioned en route to the house vanished.

  “What would you boys like to eat?” I asked Trey and his friends.

  “Everything!” Trey answered wearily, putting his feet up on my coffee table.

  I knocked them off with the sweep of one hand and held out the menu for Godfather’s Pizza with the other. “Your wish is my command, gentlemen.”

  The three young men suddenly shucked off their fatigue and began to argue over the merits of pies made of sausage and mushroom, ham and pineapple, quattro formaggi, pepperoni, or spinach and feta. Before they could get too fired up, I promised to have all five delivered to my new house.

  After the pizzas arrived, my mother and I set the table and put a pitcher of iced tea and a pile of extra napkins in the center and then called the boys into the kitchen.

  “Thank you so much!” I told them, feeling my heart swell at the sight of my family gathered around my table.

  Trey raised his glass of iced tea.
“To making new memories!”

  His two friends shouted a hearty “hear, hear” and then dug into their food.

  Trey devoured the pizza with such gusto that I couldn’t help but wonder if my son was getting enough to eat living in the self-sustained community he’d joined in June. Although I’d had my reservations at the time, I had to admit that the Red Fox Co-op had done Trey a great deal of good. He was stronger, more independent, and treated his elders with respect. He’d gained a quiet confidence and was willing to throw himself into hours of demanding physical labor. Yet at the same time, he was missing out on a college education.

  In early August, Trey had received a letter from UNC Wilmington containing a welcome packet and the name and contact information of his future roommate. Several weeks later, when my son should have been attending his first class as a college freshman, he was grooming the co-op’s herd of goats and preparing for a trip to Dunston to sell goat products to a selection of natural food stores and chic boutiques.

  I had called the school and managed to defer Trey’s admission until January, but I feared he’d refuse to attend then as well. From the beginning, I’d assumed his interest in the rustic, rather primeval way of life on Red Fox Mountain was a passing phase. It seemed that his enthusiasm had been compounded upon meeting the lovely and ethereal Iris Gyles, the co-op leader’s younger sister.

  Autumn in North Carolina is a gentle season, but I was worried about Trey spending a cold winter up on the mountain. The members of the co-op stayed warm with the help of woolen clothing and potbellied stoves. However, if our area received more than a dusting of snow or a freezing rain, the dirt road leading to the mountaintop community would be impassable. I hated the idea of my son being cut off from electricity, medical care, and me. I was ready for him to resume the life of an average American teenager, and was terrified that he would never do so.

  Pushing these irksome concerns aside, I focused on one last task before a dessert of raspberry sorbet. I had picked up a fabulous mirror at Dunston’s largest consignment shop and was given an enormous discount by the owner. When I was still an intern, I’d passed along her query letter on decorating with vintage objects to Franklin Stafford, the agent representing nonfiction books. He had found her idea compelling and later signed her as a client. As a result, the oval mirror, set in a wood frame embellished with carved flowers and small birds, didn’t cost me much more than tonight’s pizza order.