The brute took note of my lingering presence. I had no choice but to leave. Just as I turned, another woman came in. I’d waited on her at the café. A part-time hairdresser and full-time busybody with more gumption than sense.
Mr. V’s adrenaline shot through the roof.
“This is pretty,” I said, pointing to the necklace so I could hang around a bit longer.
“Hi, William.”
“Good morning, Ellen. I have your lamp boxed up and ready to go.” He cast a quick gaze at the brute as though asking permission, then shuffled to a shelf in the back to get the box.
“I’m so excited,” she said, oblivious. Or not. “It’s going to look great in my foyer. Oh, Natalie missed her hair appointment. I hope everything is okay.” She was fishing. Must’ve been running low on scandal.
“Oh, yes, I’m sorry.” Mr. V walked back to the counter, box in hand. “We had a family emergency. She and the kids had to go to my mother’s for a few days.”
Lie.
“Oh, goodness.” Intrigue drew her closer as the melody of fresh gossip slid inside her ears. “I hope everything is okay.”
’Nother lie.
“Yes. Yes.” He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his aquiline nose. “It’s fine. My mother fell and bruised her hip, so Natalie is staying with her this week.”
She took the box, her razor-sharp gaze raking over him. Did she know he was lying? She let a calculated smile widen across her face. “Well, you give her a big hello when you talk to her. And tell your mother to get better soon. I’ll be expecting more of that fabulous zucchini casserole before too long.”
He forced a soft laugh, but I felt fear radiate out of him. A fear that was so genuine, so dire, it pulled the air from the room.
Having gained nothing terribly gossip-worthy, the hairdresser waved a saucy good-bye and left with her lamp. Mr. V cleared his throat when he realized I was still waiting. Dug into a pocket. Dropped several coins on the floor but ignored them to rummage through the small bills he’d freed.
“Janey, sorry, what’s the damage?”
It took me a moment to realize he was so distraught he was trying to pay me again.
“It was twenty-seven.” I waited a second as he counted out the bills and another nice tip before adding, “But you already paid me.”
When his blue gaze crested the gold rim of his glasses, he flushed. “I did, didn’t I?”
I gave him a sympathetic nod.
“Sorry.” He stuffed the bills back into his pocket. “Did you want to look at something?”
I didn’t figure “The back room?” would go over well. My only question at the moment – besides the one involving the letters W-T-F – revolved around how much English the brute knew. I couldn’t risk talking to Mr. V in case the man was as fluent in my native tongue as I was in his, and I didn’t know enough about the situation to try to signal the anxious storeowner.
“Nothing I can afford,” I said with a teasing grin. “Have a good day.”
He took off his glasses and began to clean them. “Yes. Absolutely. You, too.”
The brute had bitten through half the sandwich and was glued to the magazine again, but I doubted very seriously he had any interest in Mr. V’s copy of Antiques & Fine Art.
I’d had zero intention of getting involved when I walked in. By the time I left, I had zero intention of leaving it alone. Mr. V was in such a state of distress, I was impressed he could even speak. But how much longer would he be able to keep up the charade? He was cracking inch by inch. Whatever his new friends were up to, there were at least four involved. That bag held four sandwiches, none of which Mr. V could eat. He was allergic to eggs, yet he’d specifically ordered mayo on all four.
I opened the door and listened to the cheery chime of the bell, so at odds with the climate inside. This time the frigid air served only as a reminder that I was not dressed for the frozen tundra. But a picture caught my eye just as I was leaving. It was on a shelf, meant to display one of the antique frames that were for sale. It had a sign by it with a child’s writing that read, For sale: Frame $50. Parents $49.95 OBO.
I let the door close behind me and fought a shiver. To display the frame, Mr. V had put a picture of himself and his family in it. I knew that family; I just didn’t know they’d belonged to Mr. V. They came into the café a couple of times a week. His wife, Natalie, was gorgeous. She looked like an islander with exotic coloring and thick black hair. Her children were a combination of the blond-haired, blue-eyed Mr. V and the rich dark colors of his wife.
Their names were Joseph and Jasmine. Joseph was around ten, and Jasmine a few years younger, six or seven perhaps. I remembered them so vividly from our very first meeting partly because of the combination of dark hair on both of them and crystalline blue eyes.
“You’re really bright,” Jasmine had said to me as I took their order.
“Well, thank you.”
“Are you an angel?”
Joseph elbowed her without taking his eyes off his phone.
I laughed softly. “Not usually.”
“Sorry,” Natalie said. “Jasmine thinks she can see auras.”
“Wow.” I turned to her. “That’s a cool ability.”
“You don’t have an aura,” she said, in awe. “You are one.”
“Aw, that’s so sweet. Thanks.” I winked at her and asked Joseph what he wanted to drink.
“Coffee. Black.”
Knowing he couldn’t be more than ten, I looked to his mother for assurance.
She lifted a shoulder. “It’s his only vice,” she explained.
At his age, I should hope so. When I poured him a cup, he took out a chocolate bar from his coat pocket and dropped a square into the coffee.
“His only vice?” I asked Natalie.
She smirked. “Does that count as two?”
Ever since that first meeting, I automatically took Joseph a cup of coffee and added the caveat “Drink responsibly.” He would laugh from behind the cup or give me a thumbs-up while Jasmine studied me, tilting her head this way and that, looking for my wings. I’d fallen head over heels for them.
I leaned back against the brick wall of the building. Were they involved somehow? Were they in trouble? Once the cold got to be too much – about nine seconds later – I pushed off the building and headed back, playing out the hundred scenarios that might explain the bizarre events in Mr. V’s store. The men were digging near the west wall. The only thing beside the shop was a dry-cleaning business. Why would a group of Middle Easterners tunnel into a dry-cleaning business?
I stopped and glanced back at the cleaners. Everything appeared normal. It looked, well, like a dry-cleaning business. What could it possibly have that would convince a group of what seemed like perfectly sane men to tunnel into it?
I looked past the cleaners. The next building was vacant, and there was a wine shop beyond that. It was a very popular store. Tourists loved wine.
Who was I kidding? I loved wine. Who didn’t love wine?
Seeing as how the men were risking so much to tunnel into a dry-cleaning business in the middle of the day when they could be spotted and/or heard, there had to be something pretty spectacular in that building. But my mind spun with a thousand questions.