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“This isn’t my shop. My bookcases … my phone. Where is it?”

My phone was gone. The book was gone.

This wasn't possible. People didn't just fall through books? That wasn't a thing. That was fiction. Bad fiction. The kind even I wouldn't read.

My breath came faster. Too fast.

"Breathe," I told myself. "You're having a panic attack in your own shop. That's all. You fell asleep. The storm, the thunder⁠—"

But the voices were still there. Getting closer.

Holy shit. What was happening?

“I hardly think that was necessary.”

An unfamiliar voice to be terrified of. Fantastic.

“She said someone was back there.”

“Jesus, Riven. What did you not get about us trying to assimilate?”

“Apologies, my lord.”

I peeked around the bookcase.

“Kenton, you asshole. Remind me why I agreed you coming to Stone Haven was a good idea again.”

Stone Haven? Where had I heard that before?

“It’s a woman. And she’s scared. I thought you said people were used to our kind here?”

Our kind.

Stone Haven.

That was the name of the town in the book I’d just started. It was a contemporary romance and the author’s note mentioned Jim Thorpe in Pennsylvania as the inspiration town. But I wasn’t in Pennsylvania. I was in New York. In Kitchi Falls.

No, you’re not. This isn’t your bookstore.

How was that possible? Stone Haven is fiction. A book. Everything started spinning. I took a step forward, but my legs wouldn’t work. There were voices still, but they were muffled. Far away.

And then everything went black.