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“I’ll help you unpack the new books,” he said, coming over to her desk area where three boxes waited to be opened.
“I’ve already cut them open. We can just look through them. You can take my chair. I’ll sit on the desk. I do that a lot.”
It was awkward, the tension building almost immediately when they’d walked into the store. Lucy didn’t have a clue where it came from, let alone how to get rid of it. She’d wanted to help Zack relax and get his mind off of things, but she might have simply made it worse.
Trying to diffuse the situation, she perched on the edge of the desk and picked up a book from the top of the box, turning it over to read the back of the dust cover.
At first, she thought Zack wasn’t going to sit down but he did, also reaching into the box for a book. He’d chosen a new thriller from a popular author, and he paged through it before finally turning to the back.
He was reading it. The end of the book. What in the ever-loving hell…?
“Are you reading the end of the book?”
He looked up, a confused expression on his face.
“Yes, why?”
“You can’t do that.”
Chuckling, he scratched his chin, the corners of his lips quirked up in amusement.
“I can’t? Why not?”
“What do you mean why not? You can’t read the end of a book before you’ve read the book. It’s…it’s against the rules.”
“There are rules? Who made them? Who enforces them?”
Now he was just laughing at her.
“I don’t know who made them, but everyone knows them. You don’t read the ending first. It spoils the story.”
“Isn’t it okay if I spoil the story for myself? It’s a choice I’ve made. I’m not reading the endings of books and going out and telling everyone about it. I’m not ruining their chance to read the story from beginning to end.”
“It’s still wrong.”
“I don’t care about spoilers. For me it isn’t about the end of a story. It’s about the journey along the way. And just so you know, I don’t read books that have a crappy ending. I like optimistic endings. That’s why I read the ending ahead of time. If it has a sad ending, I’m not going to spend my scarce spare time reading it. Of course, these days I have a lot less on my to-do list.”
With his background it made complete and total sense that he didn’t want to read a downer story. It was also kind of nice that he enjoyed a book because of the journey it would take him on, not necessarily a fun plot twist at the end.
Let’s face it. I’m a sucker for a good plot twist.
“Well…just don’t tell me the endings. And stop trying to hide your laughter. I’m on to you, buddy. This is not a laughing matter.”
She’d tried to sound stern, but it came out far too goofy. She sounded like her second-grade teacher who tried to get all the kids to stop breaking their crayons during art time. Why broken crayons bothered her, Lucy didn’t know, but they seemed to drive that poor woman crazy. Despite her pleas and threats, pretty much every crayon had been broken in half by the end of the year.
“It kind of is. I can see you take your books seriously.”
“I do. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone else about your terrible book habits.”
“I appreciate your discretion.”
They worked their way through the first book without saying much. Lucy had set aside a few titles to put on her to-be-read list, and Zack had set the thriller he’d read the ending of aside as well.
She was engrossed in the back cover blurb for a new cozy mystery when Zack placed his hand on her knee.
“Thank you, Lucy.”
She didn’t pretend not to know what he was talking about.
