Donna’s wary expression grew even warier, but she needn’t have worried, because all the bookmobile chores were fun. Setting up for each stop, tidying afterward, wrestling with the occasional technology issue, chatting with patrons, taking their requests for special orders, finding the exact book they wanted—it was what we were here to do, and it fulfilled me like nothing else.

“So what do you think?” I asked at the end of the day as we pulled into the library parking lot. “Isn’t this the best job ever?”

“Mrr!”

“Thanks, Eddie, but I wasn’t asking you. I was talking to Donna.”

“Donna is all talked out.” She patted Eddie’s carrier. “Thanks for helping me out with all the twins, by the way.”

I laughed. Donna had endured the ultimate bookmobile visit. The Engstrom twins had descended upon us today in full force. After more than two years, I finally had the names of all three sets of twins stuck in my head. Rose and Trevor, Emma and Patrick, Cara and Ethan. Ages fourteen, eleven, and eight, respectively, although I wouldn’t have sworn to it. Their father, Chad, a designer of educational video games, worked out of their house and also homeschooled the entire group.

It had been young Ethan who, on the bookmobile’s first trip, had outed the stowaway Eddie. Literally outed, because I’d been freaked out by my cat’s unexpected presence and had been putting him in the vehicle’s biggest cabinet when patrons were aboard.

All six were good kids, but they could become rambunctious at times, something Eddie wouldn’t tolerate for more than a few minutes. And apparently, neither did Donna.

“You’re lucky you have a carrier to escape into,” she told Eddie as I hefted him down the bookmobile steps. “Maybe we could come up with something like that for adults.”

It was an interesting idea, and as we ferried the crates of returned books into the library, I wondered out loud if hobbies were the equivalent of a hideaway.

“Golf is, for sure,” Donna said.

“Maybe anything outside,” I mused. “All those things you do, snowshoeing, running, they can be meditative, right?”

“Sometimes.” She shrugged. “Sometimes it’s just plain hard work and you wonder why you’re out there, but other times, maybe even most times, it’s a mental vacation.”

I was still thinking about Donna’s comment after I’d returned Eddie to the houseboat and driven to Lakeview. “Bicycling,” I said out loud. Bicycling could also fall into the category of a hobby that was a mental vacation. And if I’d been on vacation this week, I could have delayed giving Max this news.

“Minnie!” Max zipped over before I’d walked ten feet into the lobby. He rolled to a stop inches from my toes and peered up at me. “You are the one person I wanted to see. Come into my office.”

Office? “Um . . .”