Chapter 14

Three years later, I opened a bookshop. Nothing grand. A narrow storefront in Hollow Creek, a mountain town on neutral land, where the radiator clanked every morning and the front window fogged in winter. I painted the shelves myself. Chose every book myself. Misspelled the hours on the first chalkboard sign and left it that way because a customer said it gave the place character. The apartment upstairs was mine. Small. Warm. A fire escape where I drank my coffee every morning. Black. No sugar....