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Jonah opened his mouth but I pushed past him. “The library reel with the birth, death and marriage records for the family buried in the cemetery is missing. Where is it?”

He squinted like I was crazy. “How the hell should I know? Do I look like a librarian to you?”

“I mean add a cardigan and—”

Jonah cut in. “You’re the only one with a reason to have taken it, so make it easy on yourself and hand it over.”

Mercer took a half step back from Jonah but kept that hollier-than-thou look on his face. “Why do you want the records?”

I threw up my hands. I really did hate this guy. “To find the real story and—”

“Ah hah, right. The real story.” He pointed a finger in my direction. “I don’t give a shit about the real story. You bitch about that all the time. You’ve seen my content. I’m at a different place every week. If it wasn’t for you two fucking up my livestream I’d be interviewing a woman in Milwaukee with a teddy bear she thinks is the reincarnated spirit of Marilyn Monroe.”

I rolled my eyes but he was making way too much sense.

“So you don’t have the reel is what your saying?” Jonah clarified.

Mercer tapped his temple. “Not as dumb as you look.”

Jonah made a sound similar to a growl and I laid a hand on his chest.

I hated Mercer.

I hated everything about him, from his snarky attitude to his haircut to the way he exploited people for money. But I tended to believe him in this case. He wasn’t the type to carefully research the background of anything, and he did tend to jump from one story to the next, pumping out content at an unbelievable rate.

Jonah looked at me and raised an eyebrow, and I gave him a nod.

“All right, Mercer. We’ll let this drop. But you need to do some damage control.”

He sneered. “What? You want me out there with a rake and a scrub brush like you?”

I huffed a breath. “No, just call off your dogs so your fans don’t get here and wreck the place. Spin it how you like, just tell your fans you’re fine and there is no need to come to Woodbridge Falls.”

He opened his mouth to reply but Jonah cleared his throat, throwing a death glare in his direction.

“Fine. I’ll make the video. I’ll spin the story somehow that makes me rich, and then I’ll leave this shithole town for good.”

He slammed the door before we could say anything else, and walked back towards the truck, both lost in thought.

“There have to be more copies of those records,” Jonah said.

I nodded. “I’m more interested in why they went missing in the first place.”

He ran a hand through his hair. “Maybe a descendant of the family would have the records we need, and it would shed some light on who would want the story to stay buried.”

“Who?”

“The man who hired me,” he said. “He wanted the cemetery protected because his ancestors are buried there. I’ve met him once, and I have his address in my file.”

I licked my lips. “It’s worth a try…isn’t that putting your job at risk though?”

His lip twitched. “My boss is used to some of us guys going off script. He’ll understand.”

I took a breath. “Alright, let’s solve this thing.”

Chapter Fourteen

Jonah