Sydney leaped out of the car and raced down the blocks until she reached the diner. She barely noticed the curious stares she was receiving. It was nothing compared to the stares she would get if someone read her notebook! She bolted inside the diner and glanced around frantically.
“Hi, Sydney,” Laura greeted with a curious look. “Weren’t you just here?”
“I forgot something,” she said breathlessly as she hurried through the diner. She spotted the table where she’d been sitting and exhaled sharply with relief when she noticed it hadn’t been cleaned yet.
“Was it your purse?” Laura asked as she followed. “You don’t have to worry about that. It will still be there. This is Seedling.”
Sydney didn’t see the notebook on the table or on the seats. She crouched down and looked on the floor. Nothing. Her stomach twisted with dread. “Did anyone find a notebook?”
“No,” Laura replied.
It was gone. Her throat closed up with panic. This couldn’t be happening. Her erotic diary—the one that described every scandalous thought she’d ever had about Matthew Stone—was missing.
If anyone reads it...
Sydney dragged her hands over her face. No, she wouldn’t think about that. She just had to find it. Immediately.
3
THE NEXT MORNING Sydney rushed into Seedling Library. The moment she crossed the threshold, she braced herself against the chill of the air-conditioning and the scent of musty books. The outdated dark green carpeting muffled her footsteps as she searched around the circulation desk for the notebook.
“Good morning, Sydney,” Doris Brown said. Sydney stopped and saw the older woman seated at the end of a scarred wooden table. Doris’s glasses were perched low on her nose as she flipped through a magazine.
Sydney halted her search and gave a polite smile. She had been in a panic for the past twenty-four hours as she’d searched everywhere for her notebook, hoping she had left it at home or at the office. But she didn’t want to show her concern and have people start asking questions. “Hello, Miss Doris. How are you doing today?”
“Finished reading a scorcher and now I’m trying to find something else to read.”
Sydney frowned. “A scorcher? Really? That doesn’t sound like something from the reading circle’s book list.”
“It’s not. Just something I...picked up.” Miss Doris’s eyes twinkled.
“You’ll have to tell me about it sometime. Right now I’m looking for Isabel and Laura. Have you seen them?”
Miss Doris nodded. “They went upstairs.”
“Thanks.” Sydney hurried to the stairs but paused on the first step when she had the odd sensation she was being watched. Studied. Evaluated. She was all too familiar with that feeling. She glanced around the library but no one was paying attention to her. Sydney gave herself a mental shake. Losing the notebook had made her paranoid.
She went to the second floor of the library. The high ceilings and large windows made the building seem larger than it was. As Sydney walked past the rows of bookshelves, she noticed very few patrons today.
She spotted Laura in the last row wearing a bold purple top and black miniskirt. It took a moment to notice Isabel next to Laura, wearing a white sheath dress. Sydney sagged with relief at the sight of them. She had to confide in someone and her two friends were the only ones who would understand.
“There you guys are,” Sydney said in a fierce whisper as she approached them. “I really need your help.”
Laura paused in the act of shelving a book. “What’s going on?”
Sydney glanced around to make sure no one could eavesdrop. “I lost my fake diary. I have looked everywhere and I can’t find it.”
“Is that what you were so upset about at the diner yesterday?” Laura asked as she continued her task of shelving books. “It’s no big deal. The diary was just a challenge.”
“No, no.” Sydney waved her hands around. “You don’t understand. The diary sounded very real.”