Chapter 15

“Right then.” Jace jumped up and rubbed his hands together, “Who wants coffee? I’m buying.” He said, cheerfully. It was like, now I had an official case, they were all galvanised.

My father, however, in his usual stoic fashion, pointed out to Jace that, as there was an open tab at the local café, the drinks would most certainly be part of his expenses budget. Meaning, in short, that the bookshop would be footing the bill, anyway!

Jace simply grinned and took the order.

It didn’t take him long to return, and as usual. Jace had heard the local gossip.

My father tutted, and strode off into his man cave, as soon as he heard, “you’ll never guess what?” But I always sought it out. There was nothing like people ‘talking’ to one another, to get more details than had been released.

People knew stuff, like who was where, and when. Why they were there and not at work, or home. Who was seeing someone on the side, or just being a bit shady, in general.

The gossip in this realm was never very juicy, in fact, some people would hardly call it gossip. But over on the other side?

Whenever I would go on a retrieval for the agency, I would sit amongst the living and just people watch, before I did anything else. The things I have learnt over the past few years about some of the politicians that run the country, would make your eyes pop out of your head. I could write one of those things, what were they called?

I couldn’t remember, so I quietly asked Jace, he frowned at me and shrugged his shoulders. Brilliant, I would have that rattling around my head for hours now. I hated that, instead of focusing on the new case. I would still be trying to find out what that word was.

My father walked back over to the table and placed an open book in-front of Jace.

“Write down anything and everything you hear, while you are away from the bookshop. No matter how insignificant you think it might be. The devil is in the details, as the saying goes.”

My eyes flew to my father’s. We just looked at each other for a few seconds. I saw one of his rare smiles form on his face, as he said, “You didn’t invent the art of people watching, Destiny. Oh, and by the way. That word you couldn’t think of, is exposé.”

I goggled at him while he just sat down and started to write in another book. My mother gave me an amused smile before sitting down next to my father.

She began handing out notebooks to Jace and myself. As she passed mine to me she whispered, “apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, does it.” And gave me a cheeky wink.

I looked at my hand, which was still holding the small notebook, “mom, I already have a ton of these, I carry a notebook everywhere with me.” I grumbled. That just made her smile wider, “well then, now you have one more.”

I raised my eyebrows at her, but didn’t say anything. I could see my father was getting impatient, so I asked Jace to continue telling us what he had heard.

It turned out to be quite interesting actually. Even my parents were nodding their heads as they scribbled down what Jace had said.

I asked a few questions, about who had said what. Then made the decision to pop over to the library myself. There was nothing like good old fashioned, boots on the ground.

As I stood up, we all heard a crash, someone swear, not very lady like, then another crash. At this point we all stood up and my father made to walk over and see what all the commotion was. When a very red faced Ruby came in to view. Over her shoulder was slung the biggest bag I had ever seen. The crashing noise was now evident, in that Ruby had squeezed through the door that led from Rosie’s office. And because her bag was so big, it had smacked into various objects, and made them crash to the floor.

“I’m here.” She said, rather redundantly. As we could all see she ‘was here’.

“Sorry about the mess I have made. I will clean it up, if you want?”

My father jumped towards her, his hands outstretched, in a peaceful gesture, which seemed extremely odd to me. I looked at Jace, to see if he had noticed my fathers strange behaviour. But found him staring agog at Ruby.

Frowning, I looked around at the people currently in the bookshop. My mother was a flush with excitement, Jace had a look of complete adoration on his face, whilst my father, who should have been raging at the mess in his neatly organised man cave, was almost bowing while facing my best friend.

‘Of course.’ I said to myself. Having worked here for many years, they all knew Ruby to be the secretary to the PTB’s. That made her a big deal. To us lowly agents, Ruby was like a myth. The only time you got to see her, was if you were called to Gabe’s office. And that happened so rarely, many agents had never seen Ruby. Let alone spoke to her.

“Ruby, what are you here for? I can’t move my stuff at the moment. I just caught a case.”

I explained, in a friendly tone. Jace swung his head around to stare at me now. He looked incredulous at the familiarity in which I had address Ruby.

Ruby patted the huge bag that hung off one shoulder, “It’s all good, Dess. I got all your stuff in here. So when we are done investigating old man Frogget, we can go straight home.”

I didn’t get the chance to respond, as my mother had also swung around to face me. The exact incredulous look on her face, that Jace still wore.

“This is your new roommate,Destiny? You are moving in with Ruby?” The way Mom said Ruby’s name had my eyes narrowing. What was so wrong in moving in with Ruby, I thought to myself. This was answered by the sardonic voice of my favourite cat.

come on now, Dess. Ruby has celebrity like status. You should already know this. Everyone here is just shocked that someone as ordinary as you, would know someone as extraordinary, as her

I watched Jace burst out laughing, he of course, could also hear Remus. As Remus was his cat, or guardian, or something. ‘Wow, its been a long day’ I thought, then looked at the clock and realised it was only noon. I rubbed one hand down my face, tiredly.

I stopped, midway down my face, and peered through my fingers at Ruby, her words only now registering properly. She had grabbed my stuff, an awesome thing for her to do, by the way. So we could go home straight after visiting the library. WE, could go home. After WE had gone to the library.

“You are coming with me.” I asked her. I couldn’t keep the surprised tone out of my voice. “Of course, silly. I told you yesterday. Don’t you remember. I said I would be your little side kick.”

It was my turn to goggle at her now. “I didn’t think you were serious about that, Ruby you are not a trained agent. You could get hurt.”

Ruby’s response was to look at me through her lashes. The sardonic look on her face made me giggle. “Oh, right.” Was all I said.