Chapter 1
The rain arrived without apology, a gray shroud draping the city since dawn. It wasn’t a grand storm—just a steady drizzle, seeping into everything, unnoticed until it weighed heavily on the world.
Through the fogged windows of Rosenthal & Co. Books, the street outside blurred into motion and shadow. Horse-drawn carts creaked over wet cobblestones, their wheels groaning against stone worn by centuries of footsteps. A couple of men passed by, silhouettes beneath crooked umbrellas, their faces ghostly in the mist. A gas lamp flickered, its light dissolving into the gloom like a half-spoken secret.
Inside, the bookstore was a world apart—quiet, but not peaceful, more like a weight pressing against your ribs. The shelves rose like sentinels, packed with books that smelled of old ink and faded paper, their spines like gravestones for lives now distilled into paragraphs.
Behind the counter stood a woman. She wasn’t striking, but there was a quiet elegance in her—a symmetry like frost on glass. Her dark hair framed a face too still to be serene, shadows carving out her high cheekbones.
Her name, etched in marble on the counter, read: Harlyn Rosenthal, Proprietor. But it didn’t need to be there. The shop was a reflection of her—worn yet enduring, filled with things unspoken.
Beside her, Salem, her black cat, stretched languidly, amber eyes tracing the slow crawl of raindrops down the window. Time moved differently for cats. They knew things we didn’t.
The door creaked open, the bell above jangling. A woman entered—old, wrapped in a crimson coat, her umbrella dripping onto the wooden floor. She carried a worn book, its cover frayed like a letter read too often.
Placing it on the counter, she asked, “How much for this?”
Harlyn didn’t immediately respond. Her gaze drifted past the window, as if searching for something unseen. Her fingers tapped softly on the wood, a rhythm only she could hear. Finally, her voice broke the silence.
“Twelve francs,” she said quietly.
The woman frowned. “Twelve? For this? It’s falling apart.”
Harlyn’s lips curved slightly. “Most things worth having are.”
The woman studied her for a moment, then paid, dropping a few francs onto the counter. Her voice was laced with forced sympathy as she added, “I heard about your separation. Have you filed for divorce?”
Harlyn’s voice turned cold. “Not yet.” No more was said. The woman left as quietly as she had come, her footsteps lost in the fading hum of the rain.
Then the phone rang.
An old rotary, shrill and jarring in the stillness. Harlyn stared at it for a moment, then picked it up, as if afraid it would vanish when touched.
“Rosenthal & Co.,” she said, her voice colder than before.
A man’s voice answered, flat and precise. “Lucas is dead. He was murdered last night.”
The words landed like an echo Harlyn had been waiting for. Her face remained unreadable, but her grip on the receiver tightened.
“Meet me at four. Blue Café. Don’t be late.”
The line went dead.
The shop felt heavier, the silence now thick with the weight of those words. Salem stretched, then slinked off into the shadows, leaving the room as still as it had been before. Outside, the rain continued, indifferent to the unraveling beginning inside the bookstore.
