Free Leather Bound by Shanna Germain Page B

back room – for the next year.
    Some of which I did in college, and I was so not willing to do that again.
    ‘What the hell?’ I said. ‘I don’t think they can do this. Doesn’t our lease go for at least another four months?’ I tried to count backward, to when we’d opened the place, but my head was doing funny things. Numbers usually liked me, but right now I couldn’t think.
    ‘Two,’ Lily said. ‘Two months. They’re trying to raise it with the next lease.’
    ‘So we have two months to either talk them out of this, find a new place or start making a whole lot more money.’
    Lily chewed her perfect lower lip and nodded. ‘Yeah,’ she said.
    ‘Well, that sucks.’ I dropped my ass into my desk chair and let the letter fall into the recycling box. ‘Fuck-fuckity-fuck,’ I said.
    Lily didn’t say anything. She just leaned against the doorway, staring down at her painted toenails.
    When we moved in here three years ago, we got lucky. Our landlord was a book-lover who quickly took us under his wing. Conrad was the only reason we’d been able to afford the place. He’d rented it to us for way less than it was worth, and he’d made us a rent guarantee, with the promise that he’d keep the rent low as long as we promised to visit with him and to give him a discount on books.
    Neither promise was hard to keep. First, he was easy on the eyes. He was just getting to that stage men have where they’re going grey at the temples, and the phrase ‘tall, dark and handsome’ described him perfectly. More importantly, he became a friend. Someone I trusted with every bone in my body. Conrad quickly became a fixture at Leather Bound, and his sense of humour and kindness made it easy to spend time with him.
    But Conrad had died two months ago, leaving a hole in lots of places. Sometimes it felt like our entire little community was still grieving for him. I knew that I was. And Lily too.
    Our new landlord was no Conrad, but he’d mostly been hands-off. Or at least he had been until now.
    ‘What a jerk,’ I said. ‘I’ll have to go talk to him. What’s his name? Walter? Weiner?’
    ‘Wes,’ Lily said. ‘And I think maybe I should be the one to go and talk to him.’
    I realised I’d been swearing, rather loudly, and kicking the leg of my desk repeatedly. Trying to let go of the rising anger and panic I felt, I inhaled big and let it out with one last ‘Fucker’.
    ‘Rar?’ Lily said, which always made me laugh.
    ‘Fine, rar. You’re right. You should probably be the one to talk to him.’
    ‘I’ll just show him my tattoos,’ she said.
    ‘That’s a great idea,’ I said.
    I closed my eyes. My head was thumping hard, a tiny headache making its appearance known behind my eye. We didn’t bring in enough money to pay double rent, but I wasn’t sure we had the money or the ability to start all over again either. Behind my eyelids, I saw Leather Bound slipping away.
    ‘What are we going to do, Lil?’
    ‘Stop turning down potential customers, for a start,’ she said, all business. ‘Call Davian up and tell him you’ll take the job.’
    ‘I already turned him down,’ I said.
    ‘Then turn him back up,’ she said.
    ‘I think he’s a little crazy. I don’t even think there is a book,’ I said. ‘There has to be another way.’
    Even as I said it, even as I considered taking on Davian’s job, I felt my heart speed up, knocking against my chest in its excitement at seeing him again. Stupid traitor, that lustful heart of mine.
    ‘Not that I can think of,’ Lily said.
    I sighed. No matter how crackpot crazy Davian might turn out to be, it turned out that we might need him. At the very least, we needed his money.
    ‘People suck sometimes,’ I said.
    ‘And not in the good way,’ Lily said.

CHAPTER 5
    Stupid things make me feel stressed, I’ll admit it. When I was in college, if a professor scolded me or even gave me a disapproving look for something I’d done, or even something I