Gently Used Still Works (A Psychic Consignment Mystery Book 2) Read online

  Gently Used, Still Works

  Book 2

  JB Lynn

  Copyright © Jennifer Baum GENTLY USED, STILL WORKS: Psychic Consignment Mystery 2

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted by US copyright act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in any database or retrieval system, without prior permission of the author.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, establishments, or organizations, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously to give a sense of authenticity. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Gently Used, Still Works is intended for 18+ older and for mature audiences only.

  © 2020 Jennifer Baum

  Cover designer: Leiha Mann

  Editor: Parisa Zolfaghari

  Proofreader: Proof Before You Publish

  Formatting: Leiha Mann

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Author’s Note

  Also by JB Lynn

  About JB Lynn

  Prologue

  “Letty wasn’t a thief,” Beatrice, the youngest of the three Concordia sisters insisted, staring at a hollowed-out cookbook that contained a wad of cash. The way she was pouting, sticking out her lower lip, she looked more like a three-year-old than a woman of thirty.

  “Nobody said she was,” Amanda, the oldest of the sisters, soothed while simultaneously glaring at their middle sister for daring to upset the baby of the family.

  Winnie shrugged. At thirty-five, she was unwilling to be cowed by Amanda’s wrath or swayed by Bea’s unshakeable faith in their recently deceased godmother. “The money had to come from somewhere.”

  “We have more important things to worry about than that.” Amanda snapped the book shut, pressing down on the cover like she wanted to punish it for the secret it held. “Like who killed Letty.”

  The three sisters looked from one to the other for a long moment, Amanda’s declaration hanging in the air, a specter of death. Bea looked stricken, Amanda appeared determined, and Winnie? Winnie felt overwhelmed. She was in the business of advertising, not investigating, and quite frankly, the constant company of her sisters was wearing her out.

  Not that she dared to say any of that. She chose to utter much safer words. “We need to open the store. I’ll put this upstairs.”

  Amanda scowled but handed over the book.

  Winnie snatched it up and climbed the flight of steps to the apartment above the One Woman’s Junk Consignment Shop. The scruffy brown rescue mutt, Nutmeg, followed, practically colliding with her heels. She wished she’d never found the hidden money. She shoved the cookbook back into its camouflaged-in-plain-sight hiding spot in the kitchen and listened as her sisters below moved about the store, preparing to welcome in the public.

  As a creative, Winnie chafed at the confines of working in the shop, but both Bea and Amanda seemed to have a real talent for it. Bea was a whiz at understanding the value of and displaying merchandise, and Amanda had an aptitude for connecting with customers.

  The apartment over the shop was a long studio, with a bedroom area, a kitchenette with a bistro table and two chairs, and a living room section that featured a desk and a sleeper sofa. Amanda, being the oldest, had laid claim to the bed, but Winnie had taken over the desk.

  While the space may have served their godmother well, it wasn’t really big enough for the two oldest Concordia sisters, who’d threatened to kill each other more than once when they’d shared a room as teenagers.

  Winnie was glad to be in the apartment alone. She needed breathing room. Both she and Amanda were being as respectful as possible of the other’s needs, but privacy was impossible to attain in a place where the only door was to the bathroom.

  Sinking into the chair at Letty’s desk, Winnie settled in to do the kind of work she was best at in this scenario, crunching numbers. Nutmeg lay at her feet, the stray seeming to have adopted her as his human for the day. She fiddled with the amethyst bracelet Letty had bequeathed her, admiring the purple stones against her skin, as she waited for the laptop to boot up. She wondered, not for the first time, how her life had turned out like this. How had she ended up living in an apartment over a storefront, running a shop with her sisters that sold used goods in Sarasota, Florida?

  Fate had taken her plans for a perfect life and put them through a shredder. First, she’d lost her advertising company because she’d trusted the wrong people. Then, Letty, her godmother, the woman who’d raised Winnie and her sisters, had been taken from them.

  By a killer, if one was to believe Beatrice and Amanda’s theory.

  It had been easy to discount the ramblings of sisters she didn’t know that well when Beatrice had been talking about getting visions from touching objects and Amanda claimed to talk to a ghost. Winnie had thought they were both reacting badly to the shock of Letty’s passing. That, combined with the unfortunate episode of all three of them being struck by lightning on the beach while scattering their godmother’s ashes, could have explained their questionable beliefs.

  On top of that, Beatrice had recently been in an accident that had left her in a wheelchair for a while, and Amanda was traumatized by a recent divorce.

  It wasn’t a stretch for Winnie to ignore her sisters’ crazy theory.

  But then Detective Tom Keller, who seemed to be a perfectly logical and sane human being, had started poking around and declared that Letty’s death seemed suspicious. Suddenly, there was some legitimacy to the claim that their godmother had been a victim of foul play.

  The shop bell jangled below, jolting Winnie out of her dark thoughts.

  A smile played at the corners of her mouth as she heard Piper, one of their store owner neighbors, ask, “Why isn’t Angus outside?”

  “Because he’s too heavy to wrestle out there,” was Amanda’s terse reply.

  She couldn’t make out the rest of the conversation, but she heard Bea’s distinctive laugh.

  “Never underestimate the power of caffeine and carbs,” Winnie muttered to herself.

  A moment later, s
he heard footsteps on the stairs and then a tentative knock against the wall. She turned in the direction of the sound. “Come on up, Piper.”

  The perky pigtails of Piper Woodruff appeared first, making it seem like the owner of the local coffee shop had antennae sticking out of her head. “Can’t stay. I left a couple of muffins downstairs, but you’ll have to act fast if you want to get one.”

  As though the dog understood what she’d said, he leapt to his feet and galloped down the stairs in search of food.

  Chuckling at his antics, Piper handed Winnie a cup of steaming coffee and a manila envelope. “I found the contract you asked for.”

  “Thanks,” Winnie said, placing both on the desk.

  Piper was already disappearing back down the stairs, the ties of her apron flapping behind her.

  “I’ll bring it back this afternoon,” Winnie called after her, but Piper was already gone.

  She sipped the coffee and then slowly opened the envelope. She might not know how to get her own life back on track, or who had killed Letty, but she was determined not to let Peter Perkins, the owner of the strip mall where both their shops were located, evict Piper just so that he could sell it and earn a tidy profit from developers who wanted to put up condos.

  Winnie knew that Letty would have wanted her to help her neighbors. That was the kind of woman she was; leading by example, she’d modeled kindness and generosity like they were the noblest of callings. Letty had been the sort of woman that sacrificed her life plan to raise three orphaned sisters.

  The least Winnie could do was to uphold her legacy.

  And maybe help solve her murder.

  1

  “Besotted,” Amanda declared.

  “Who’s besotted?” Winnie asked, descending the stairs into the shop. She’d needed a break from staring at spreadsheets and invoices, and had decided to head over to PerC Up for a coffee break.

  Her older sister sat behind the cash register, absentmindedly tugging at the rose quartz earrings she wore. “Ash is besotted with Bea.”

  Beatrice was over in the housewares section, head down, jaw clenched, pretending to study an old muffin tin. She’d recently graduated from a wheelchair to crutches, and every time Winnie saw her, she looked like a feather could knock her off her feet.

  Taking pity on her, Winnie decided to give her a break from their older sister’s proclamations by teasing Amanda. “Did your ghost tell you that?”

  Annoyance flashed in Amanda’s eyes. “Anybody can see that he is, the way he keeps closing up his shop to take her to her physical therapy appointments.” She glanced over at the bookshelf and added, “And, yes, if you must know, Rupert agrees with me.”

  Winnie saw Bea raise her gaze in the direction of the books. She assumed that, like her, she saw nothing out of place. But unlike Winnie, Bea was convinced in the legitimacy of the ghost Amanda claimed to see.

  Secretly, Winnie agreed with Amanda, too. Ash Costin, the carpenter, was definitely infatuated with their younger sister and Winnie suspected she felt the same way about him.

  But she and her sisters didn’t have the sort of relationship where they shared that kind of thing. Instead, they were masters of avoiding and deflecting any subjects that might help them get to know each other more authentically.

  Before the issue could be resolved, the bell at the door jangled. The Concordia sisters all looked to see who was joining them.

  Greta, the shop’s part-time employee, breezed in with a smile and an apology. “I can only stay for an hour. I have a meeting at the kids’ school.”

  “But we were counting on you,” Amanda began to protest. “Bea has PT and I…I have an appointment.”

  Winnie’s curiosity spiked, wondering what kind of appointment she had.

  “I’m sorry,” Greta said firmly. “But my deal with Letty was that the needs of my children always outrank the needs of the business.”

  “I can reschedule,” Bea offered.

  “It’s okay,” Winnie told her. “I’ll cover the shop.”

  “You?” The amount of disbelief Amanda managed to inject into a single syllable would have been impressive if it hadn’t irritated Winnie so much.

  “Yes. Me. I’m taking a coffee break and will be back in forty minutes. Will that leave you enough time to get to your appointment?”

  Amanda nodded.

  Winnie grabbed her sketchpad and pencil case and hurried out the door.

  Nutmeg followed.

  “No,” she told the dog firmly. “I’m going to sit inside today, which means you have to wait here.” She made a shooing motion at the dog, who, ears flattened, slunk back into the consignment shop.

  Shaking her head, Winnie walked down the strip mall sidewalk in search of a few minutes of alone time.

  Ash Costin was standing outside PerC Up, in deep conversation with another man who looked familiar to Winnie, but she couldn’t identify. She assumed that he was either a regular at the coffee shop, or he’d attended her godmother Letty’s remembrance service.

  Not wanting to interrupt, Winnie gave a nod to Ash as she walked past.

  “Winnie,” he called out. “Have you met Bruce Gold?”

  Winnie shook her head, pasted on a polite smile, and extended her hand. “Pleased to meet you.”

  Bruce, in his early sixties, grinned back.

  She was startled, and slightly amused, to see that he had two gold front teeth.

  “Bruce is the dry cleaner,” Ash explained. “And Winnie is one of Letty’s girls.”

  Bruce pumped her hand and grinned wider. “Welcome to the neighborhood.”

  “Thank you.” Winnie stood there awkwardly, not knowing what else to say. “I’m kind of on a tight schedule,” she said, pointing at the coffee shop.

  “Of course, of course.” Bruce released her hand.

  “Have a good day,” Winnie said, heading into the store. She didn’t make it to the door before a slight, sandy-haired man came barreling out.

  “Jim,” Ash called. “Have you met Winnie?”

  The man peered down at her and blinked. “I don’t believe so.”

  Winnie shored up her smile, wondering why Ash had decided to be the welcome wagon this morning when all she wanted was a moment’s peace. “Winnie Concordia,” she said, extending her hand.

  “Jim Pickney,” he replied, slipping his palm against hers. She started a bit, as what felt like a spark jumped between them. Her eyes flew to his. He, too, seemed startled.

  Ever the friendly host, Ash filled in, “Winnie is one of Letty’s girls. And Jim is the local accountant.”

  Instinctively, Winnie glanced in the direction of Jim Pickney’s storefront. Not for the first time, she wondered why he’d set up in such an eclectic strip mall type place instead of a more sedate business park.

  “I’m very sorry for your loss,” Jim murmured, squeezing her hand. “She was a wonderful woman.”

  His sympathy was genuine. She could hear it both in his voice and see it in his eyes, and it caught her off guard. Tears prickled the back of her eyes. “Thank you.”

  “Winnie’s in a rush,” Ash told Jim. “You should let her go.”

  Looking down to see their hands still joined, Jim’s eyes widened slightly, and he dropped her hand as though it were a hot potato.

  Winnie fought not to wince as a feeling of unexpected loss crept over her.

  “It was nice to meet you,” Jim said. He held the door open for her and she passed into the shop, shoving her hand in her pocket in hopes the feeling would disappear. Piper was behind the counter, deep in conversation with Matt the baker, someone Winnie had not yet been introduced to. She really wasn’t in the mood this morning to meet him, either, so she hurried over to a table in the corner.

  The scent of lilies wafted toward her, and she sniffed the air, looking around for flowers but not spotting any. The cloying sweetness was an off-putting odor, considering the place usually smelled wonderful, a combination of coffee and warm baked goods. She glance
d over at the only customer, a grizzled man in worn jeans and a t-shirt spattered with paint. She doubted that he was the one giving off the aroma.

  Taking out her sketchbook and pencil, she began to absentmindedly draw.

  A couple of minutes later, Piper strolled over and put a steaming hot cup of coffee in front of her. She glanced curiously at what Winnie had been creating. “Who’s that?”

  Winnie shrugged, looking down at the teenage boy whose profile she’d created. “Don’t know.”

  Piper shook her head. “I wish I had that kind of ability.”

  “It’s just a way to fill time,” Winnie told her. “Thank you for the coffee.”

  Taking the hint that Winnie needed to be alone, Piper nodded and walked away. “Do you need anything else, Hank?” she asked the older man who was nibbling on a scone.

  “No, thanks,” he said quietly.

  The baker walked out, scowling. Winnie was pretty certain it was his permanent expression. She wasn’t sure she had ever seen him smile, which was one of the reasons why she wasn’t in a hurry to meet him. She turned her attention back to her sketch, tilting her head. Piper’s question was logical and for the first time, Winnie wondered why she drew the boy.

  “Who are you?” she whispered.

  2

  Amanda had already left for her “appointment” when Winnie returned to One Woman’s Junk.