Chapter 5: v
The lock clicked shut behind her, a sound that usually meant safety. Tonight, it felt flimsy. Margaux leaned back against the door, the cardboard box pressing into her ribs. The walk home had been a blur of side streets and lowering sun, her arms aching, the encounter at the firehouse replaying on a loop in her head. Sam’s leer. Matthew’s deceptively gentle smile. The way they’d flanked her.
You seem the stubborn type.
Damn him for being right.
She pushed off the door and carried the box to her small dining table, shoving aside a stack of unread literary journals. The apartment was silent except for the low, persistent hum of the fridge. She lifted the books out one by one, placing them with a librarian’s care on the scarred wood.
Wide Sargasso Sea. The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath. Beloved. The Bell Jar. A water-stained edition of Rebecca. Each one was clean, shockingly so. Someone had taken a cloth and wiped every cover, every page edge, removing the soot and the smell. It was a respectful act. It should have felt kind. Instead, it felt like someone had handled the innards of her mind with surgical gloves.
She reached into the bottom of the box. Her fingers brushed cardboard.
Empty.
A quick, mental inventory. Her stomach tightened. She counted the books on the table again, then pictured her usual stack on the little stool behind the bookstore counter. The blue-spined Oxford World’s Classics edition of Jane Eyre. It wasn’t here.
It wasn’t in the box.
A hot prickle of annoyance cut through the haze of her grief. That book was hers. The spine was cracked in three specific places. She had underlined passages in faint pencil. I am no bird; and no net ensnares.
Had she left it somewhere? No. She’d seen it and grabbed it.
It had survived the fire only to be misplaced by its rescuers.
Her eyes flicked to the captain’s card, still lying where she’d dropped it this morning. Calling was out of the question. The thought of that low, measured voice in her ear, in this quiet room, was unbearable. Going back to the firehouse, facing the twin attentions of Sam and Matthew again so soon, made her skin crawl.
Texting was a neutral ground. Impersonal. A transaction.
She picked up her phone, her thumbs hovering over the screen. The message needed to be simple. Unemotional. Not a request, but a notification of an error.
After a minute of drafting and deleting, she sent it.
This is Margaux Auclair. I picked up the books from the station today. Thank you. One is missing: a paperback Jane Eyre, blue cover. If you find it, please let me know.
She hit send and immediately put the phone face down on the table, as if it might burn her. She busied herself arranging the salvaged books on her already-overflowing shelf, fitting them between Dostoevsky and Didion. They looked like refugees. Out of place.
Her phone buzzed. A single, concise vibration.
She stared at it for three long breaths before flipping it over.
The reply had come in less than two minutes.
Captain Anders. It was not with the others, my apologies. I’ll deliver it. Location?
The swiftness of it was a dart. Was he asking for her address? The offer to bring it was less an offer than a decision.
Her fingers were cold. She typed back, careful.
There’s no need to inconvenience yourself. I’ll come by the station again tomorrow.
The three dots appeared instantly. He was typing.
I’m off shift. It’s no trouble. I’m nearby.
Nearby. The word sat in her gut like a stone. How could he be nearby? The firehouse was twenty minutes away. Unless he’d been… elsewhere.
Another message followed before she could respond.
The Coffee Bar on Elm. 15 minutes. I’ll leave it at the counter for you if you prefer.
It was a concession. A seemingly polite one. Giving her an out, a public place, no direct meeting required. It was so reasonable it felt like a trap. But the alternative was another trip to the firehouse, another gauntlet of stares. Or waiting, knowing a piece of her world was sitting in his possession.
Okay. She typed the word before she could second-guess it. I’ll be there in 15.
See you then.
The Coffee Bar was a ten-minute walk. She spent five of those minutes standing perfectly still in the middle of her apartment, listening to the echo of her own choices. This was stupid. This was how people in novels walked into trouble, ignoring the faint, discordant music behind the polite invitation. She shook her head, pulling her hair back into a loose bun. She wasn’t a character. She was a woman getting her book back.
The evening air was still warm, thick with the smell of cut grass and distant grills. The coffee shop was at the end of a leafy, gentrified block, all exposed brick and soft lighting. She pushed the door open, a chime announcing her.
And there he was.
Not at the counter. At a small, two-person table in the back corner, half in shadow. He sat perfectly upright, not leaning, not scrolling through a phone. He was reading a paperback. His own, not hers. He looked like a man who knew how to wait without fidgeting.
He glanced up as the chime sounded. Those steel-gray eyes found her immediately, tracking her progress through the scattered tables. He closed his book and set it aside, then stood. It was an unhurried, controlled motion. He was in dark jeans and a plain grey henley, the scar on his face a stark, pale line in the low light. He looked both ordinary and utterly intimidating.
“Margaux.” He acknowledged her with a slight nod. On the table in front of him, next to his coffee mug, sat her blue Jane Eyre.
“Captain Anders.” She stopped a few feet from the table. “You said you’d leave it at the counter.”
“I considered it.” His voice was just as she remembered—a low, calm gravel. “But the binding is fragile.”
The binding is fragile?
She forced herself to step forward and take the chair opposite him. She didn’t sit back. She perched on the edge.
He pushed the book toward her. It was pristine. Too pristine. The cover, which had been slightly faded, looked almost new. The cracks in the spine were still there, but every speck of ash, every watermark, was gone. He had not just cleaned it; he had restored it.
“You… cleaned it.”
“It required careful attention. The pages were trying to bond. I separated them.” He said it like a surgeon discussing a procedure. His fingers, resting on the table, were long and capable, marked with old burns and scars. One knuckle was split, freshly scabbed.
She picked up the book. It felt different. It smelled of nothing. Not smoke, not old paper. Just the faint, clean scent of paper and whatever mild solvent he’d used. It was a corpse, expertly embalmed.
“Thank you,” she said, the words automatic.
“It’s a significant book.” He didn’t ask. He stated.
“It is.”
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me.” He quoted it flatly, without sentiment. A fact. “A defiant statement. I always found it interesting that she still ends up at Ferndean. Still within the confines of his world, just a chosen one.”
Margaux went very still. The air in the cozy coffee shop felt thin. “It’s about choice. She chooses to return.”
“She chooses the man who built the net,” he said, his eyes holding hers. “The context makes the cage acceptable. Safer, even.”
He took a slow drink of his coffee. She realized he had not offered to get her one. This wasn’t a social call. It was a transfer of property, with commentary.
“Why were you nearby?” The question left her before she could cage it.
He set his mug down. “I live in the neighborhood. I often walk after shift. Clears the head.” His gaze drifted past her, toward the window and the darkening street, then back. “This is a good area. Quiet. But it’s wise to be aware. Even in quiet places.”
The warning was implicit, velvet-wrapped iron. Be aware. Be careful.
“I’m always careful,” she said, a thread of defiance in her tone.
“I know you are.” He almost smiled. It didn’t reach his eyes. “I saw your fire escapes. The clear paths to the door. You’re orderly. You pay attention.” He leaned forward, just an inch. The movement was predatory in its restraint. “That’s good. But the world is full of unpredictable elements. Fire. Or people who see something quiet and think it’s meant to be… disturbed.”
Sam’s grinning face flashed in her mind. Matthew’s attentive gaze.
“I can handle myself.”
“I don’t doubt your capability.” He said it like he meant it. “But capability isn’t always a deterrent. Sometimes it’s a lure. To a certain type of man.”
The conversation was a maze, and he was leading her steadily toward its center. She needed out. Now. She stood up, clutching the book to her chest. “Thank you for the book. And the advice.”
He rose when she did, a old-fashioned gesture that felt deliberately anachronistic. “Of course. It’s my responsibility.” He paused. “The investigation into the fire’s cause is ongoing. I may need to ask you a few more questions. I have your number now. I’ll be in touch.”
It wasn’t a question. It was a schedule.
She nodded once, unable to speak, and turned toward the door. She could feel his eyes on her back, a physical pressure between her shoulder blades, all the way until she turned the corner onto her street.
Back in her apartment, door locked, chain slid across, she sank to the floor. The sterile book lay beside her. He had quoted her favorite line. He had diagnosed the novel’s ending. He knew where she lived, not just the street, but the neighborhood. He’d been walking there.
Her phone, still in her hand, buzzed again. A new number.
Hey Wine Girl. You left in such a hurry today. Forgot to give you my digits. In case you get bored. Or lonely. – Sam
She stared at the screen, a cold laugh catching in her throat. The net, it seemed, wasn’t being built by one man. It was a collaborative effort. And they all had her number.