If you’ve never had the misfortune of being tasked with finding a needle in a haystack, allow me to summarize the experience for you in four words: I’d rather eat dirt.
Regrettably, I don’t have that option.
Case 43b has been my strangest yet. The file includes a black-and-white photograph of a
In the waning hours of Black Friday, a Yuletide spectacle appeared next door, in glittering LED glory. As Millie shuffled across the driveway to her warmed-up Buick, she used her hand to cover her eyes, wincing at the neighbors’ radiant display. She eased herself into the driver’s seat
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Miles—scarab beetle and humble photojournalist—strained to listen. He glanced at the surrounding trees, spectral colossi in the moonlight. A fallen log sat rotting, just ahead.
“I don’t hear anything.”
Calvin—atlas beetle and journalist—stood stock still. His three horns curved upward in a graceful silhouette against the dark horizon.
His brother used to make voice memos every night, and now, three months after Justin’s fatal accident, Colbert still couldn’t sleep without them.
The time glared at him from the lockscreen of Justin’s old phone. He scrolled through a year’s worth of recordings until he found the one he’d left on last night.
The thick liquid coated Violet’s tongue.
They say that when a person loses one sense, the rest compensate. Although she never did figure out why her sense of taste exploded—figuratively speaking—after a bomb destroyed her hearing, killed Silas, and nearly killed her.
A small vibration tickled her fingers when Felix tapped the table.
Gossip shouldn’t feel like a responsibility.
I didn’t want to be the one to tell Stephen, but duty came in odd packages, and he needed to know. So, I squared my shoulders and pushed open the touristy saloon-style doors.
Pausing just inside, I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply.
The conservatory would be positively majestic if not for the body lying in the center.
Mr. Jerome Arkwright had noticed a peculiar aroma as he stepped into the conservatory that morning. Usually, he could smell the imported orchids as soon as he entered the wispy glass room, but an acrid odor masked their fragrance.
Few places in Scarabburgh were built for Atlas beetles. Rhino’s Pawn was no exception.
Calvin ducked through the door, taking care not to snag his horns—two on his thorax and one on his head—on the narrow, wooden frame.
A short rhinoceros beetle stood behind the counter, a ring through the horn on his head.
Tansy Cooper was her name. Some girl from down Chapel Street. A young, pretty thing with hair like sunflower petals, and now she’s face down in the best egg-and-cress sandwich in York.
The poor dear.
The high-backed chair beside me screeches on the wooden floor as Pippa takes a seat. Her face is paler than normal,
Pan pulled at his leash, and it took everything in Peter to hold him back. The burly black-and-tan German shepherd was having none of it.
“Come on, boy. We’ve got to stay focused. If we fail, we’re kicked out for good.” Muscles straining, Peter tightened his grip and heaved in the opposite direction.
Archie peered out from the small tent as the sun began to rise. The propane heater did little to break the cold as he and Lily huddled among a mound of sleeping bags and blankets, staring through the small window.
Their equipment was spread around the floor of the tent. Flashlights lay between them.
Through the mist, a faint glow hung over the water. I shifted my hydro-scooter into neutral and flicked the light off. The glow wasn’t Samuel’s spotlight. Besides, hadn’t he mentioned that the constables’ fuel allowance had been cut?
My scooter bobbed in the waves, a bit of salt spray dampening my boots.
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