At Wick's End (Book 1 in the Candlemaking Mysteries) (10 page)

“
Sorry about your
great-aunt,” he said easily. “You don’t happen to have any coffee
around, do you?”

“
I’ve got instant,” I said,
going for my transported stash in the freezer.

“
No, I’d rather go without
than drink that slag,” he said with a grimace. “If that’s it, I’ll
be going then.”

“
Excuse my asking, but I
was wondering what exactly it is you salvage and recover” I asked,
the lateness of the hour accounting for my direct
approach.

He grinned slightly. “Oh, this and that. If
it’s gone, I’ve got a knack for finding it.”

“
And I bet you go here and
there to do it, don’t you?” I replied.

“
Now you’ve got it. If
that’s it, I’m going to go scrounge up some real java.”

“
Thanks for stopping by,” I
said.

He nodded and headed out the door. What an
odd bird he was. I’d learned absolutely nothing about him, except
for the fact that if he’d wanted Belle dead, shoving her off that
ladder wouldn’t have been a problem for him at all.

Now that I was wide awake, what in the world
was I going to do with myself for the next six hours? Going back to
sleep was out of the question; once I’m up, I’m up. It was a curse
I’d had since childhood.

There was really only one thing I could do
that made any sense at all. I got dressed quickly and headed down
to At Wick’s End.

“
You’re here early,” Eve
said as she came in, removing her jacket and hanging it carefully
up on a peg in the office.

“
I couldn’t sleep,” I said,
“So I thought I’d get some work done.”

Eve looked worriedly around. “I hope you
haven’t switched anything around. Belle and I worked out the
perfect system for our inventory, and I’d hate to see
it...modified.”

I shook my head. “I didn’t change a thing.
Actually, I’ve been studying.” I gestured to the eclectic
collection of candlemaking books lying open in front of me.

She caught me yawning and said, “Harrison,
your work here is important, but you certainly didn’t need to lose
any sleep over it.”

I considered telling her about my late-night
caller and my inability to get back to sleep, but decided to let
her think I’d been up cramming for my new career. I gestured to one
of the open books in front of me. “It’s all quite fascinating,
isn’t it?”

“
It certainly can be,” Eve
said. “So, should we get started on that pouring lesson before the
brunt of our Saturday crafters come in?”

“
Is Saturday a big day for
the store?” I asked.

“
Normally it’s our
biggest,” she admitted. “Shall we stick to our system yesterday?
You did quite well on the register.”

“
I should be fine as long
as the prices are marked.”

“
They should be, but don’t
hesitate to ask. Now let’s go get some supplies so we can get a
quick lesson in before the rush begins.”

Unfortunately, that lesson was going to have
to wait. Before we could even collect our supplies, customers
started flowing in at an amazing rate.

There was barely time to eat our lunches in
hurried ten-minute shifts, and by the time we were five minutes
from locking the door that evening, I was exhausted.

“
Why don’t we go ahead and
lock up early?” I suggested.

Eve said, “Harrison, it’s your store to do
with as you wish, but Belle always believed that if the hours were
posted, they should be honored.”

“
Okay, I understand that.”
I started straightening up the sales counter and added, “Thanks,
Eve.”

“
Selling candles is what I
do, Harrison.”

I said, “No, I didn’t mean that. Well, I do,
but what I’m really thanking you for is staying on and helping me
run this place.”

“
I didn’t have much choice,
Belle would haunt me for the rest of my life if I deserted you in
your time of need.” She patted my hand gently. “I believe we’ll
make a candle-maker out of you yet.” She checked her watch and
said, “Two minutes till closing. It’s been a good day.”

The warmth of her words didn’t last nearly
long enough when I heard a familiar voice coming from the
front.

“
Is anybody
here?”

It looked like Becka was following through
with her threat to visit me at Wick’s End. I’d forgotten all about
her promised visit, but apparently she’d meant it when she’d
threatened to drop by.

Chapter 7

“
I’ll take care of her,”
Eve said as I finished neatening the display of tea lights on the
counter.

“
I wish you could,” I
said.

“
Pardon me?”

“
It’s an old acquaintance
of mine,” I admitted. “And she’s not here to shop for
candles.”

“
I understand,” Eve said,
though clearly she didn’t. Heck, I didn’t get it myself. Why was
Becka suddenly trying to get back into my life? The breakup had
been final, at least from her end of things. I’d managed to get
over her without too much of a problem, though I’d only dated a few
times since we’d split. One thing was certain—I knew better than
anyone else that it was time to move forward and not back. The last
thing I needed in my life at that moment was a walk down that
particular memory lane.

Becka rushed to embrace me when I walked
toward her, but she must have gotten the hint when I didn’t return
her enthusiasm.

“
Going somewhere special
this evening,” I asked as I took in her carefully coiffed blond
hair, her stylish outfit with a short skirt sure to raise more than
a few eyebrows of our conservative clientele, and enough Obsession
to drown out the strongest scented candle we had in
stock.

“
I came to see you,
Harrison. Surely that’s enough of a reason to get dressed up, isn’t
it?”

“
I’ll have to take your
word for it. I guess you’re here for your tour of the shop, but
we’re just about ready to close up for the day. In all honesty, I
didn’t know you were that interested in candles.”

Becka frowned. “Harrison, if you had
inherited an art gallery or a restaurant, I’d be just as interested
in that.”

I nodded, suspecting as much. “So whatever
windfall I managed to come into, you’d be more than willing to jump
back into my life. I understand, it all makes perfect sense
now.”

Becka frowned gently at me. “Harrison, are
you trying to be difficult?”

I grinned. “No, but sometimes it just comes
naturally. I’d love to stay and chat, Becka, but I’m kind of busy
at the moment. Thanks for stopping by, though.”

I saw Eve frowning from the back of the
candle shop, and knew I was setting myself up for another lecture
on customer service, but this was one customer I was just as glad
not to have shopping at Wick’s End.

Becka looked around the empty store and
said, “Yes, I can see you’re up to your eyebrows in customers at
the moment.”

“
As I said, we’re
closing.”

She moved closer to me, nearly knocking me
over with her perfume. I never should have told her I liked that
particular scent, not if there was a chance she was going to
suffocate me with it.

In a voice nearly a whisper, she said, “I
admit it, I was too hard on you when we broke it off. I’m sorry,
Harrison.” When she saw her apology wasn’t having the desired
effect, she added, “What do I have to do here, get down on my knees
and beg?”

“
No, I’d hate to see you
ruin a new pair of hose,” I said.  “Becka, I’m starting a new
life here. I don’t mean to be ugly about it, but I’m not interested
in repeating old mistakes with you. You were right to break up with
me, I should have had the guts to do it myself, so let’s just leave
it at that, shall we? I’m excited about this opportunity, and I’m
not just talking about the store. I figure that’s the real gift my
great-aunt wanted me to have.”

She pursed her lips, then said, “I’m not
giving up on you, Harrison. I’ll be back.”

Before I had the chance to reply, she was
gone.

Eve came out, so I decided to fire a
preemptive strike before her lecture started. “Okay, I was a little
rough on her, but Becka’s no customer, she’s an old
girlfriend.”

“
That’s not it,” Eve said,
a puzzled look on her face as she stared out the door after Becka.
“That young lady looks familiar to me for some reason.”

“
I can’t imagine anyone
ever seeing Becka and forgetting her,” I said. “She’s got a way of
being noticed that’s tough to hide.”

Eve said, “Something’s different about her,
but I swear I’d recognize her anywhere.” Suddenly, she said, “I’ve
got it. She’s been here before.”

“
Eve, I can’t imagine Becka
coming into At Wick’s End, not without admitting it to
me.”

She said adamantly, “The young lady had a
scarf around her hair, and her attire was quite a bit more
conservative, but I saw her here. I know it.”

“
So she came in candle
shopping one day,” I said. “There aren’t that many choices in
Micah’s Ridge.”

“
You don’t understand,
Harrison. The real reason I remember her is because she was
fighting with Belle about something when I walked in, and the next
thing I knew that girl was storming out of here as if she were on
fire.”

“
When did this happen?” I
asked, chilled by the thought of Becka fighting with my great-aunt
Belle.

‘
Two days before Belle
died,” Eve said simply.

As much as I hated the idea, I was going to
have to speak with Becka again and find out if Eve’s declaration
was true. What could Becka have been fighting with Belle about? How
did she even discover we were related? I didn’t remember telling
them about each other. My private life was just that, and I’d never
introduced any of my girlfriends to my great-aunt. Truth be told,
none of them were all that permanent.

Still, I had to dig deeper and see if it was
possible that Becka could have had anything to do with my
great-aunt’s death.

A headache that had been hovering just out
of range suddenly slammed down on me, pounding so hard I could
barely see.

Eve was right; Saturday was hopping at
Wick’s End. I knew we’d sold a lot of supplies over the course of
the day, but the total surprised me as I went over the deposit
after we finally locked up for the night. I’ve never been that big
a fan of cash, but clearly I was in the minority, at least when it
came to our customers. Not that there weren’t plenty of checks and
credit card receipts in the bundle too, but the tens and twenties
were in abundant supply.

After the front shades were pulled, I said,
‘That was some rush. Is it always this crazy?”

“
Not a chance, Harrison. I
think every regular customer we ever had came by today.”

“
To pay their respects?” I
asked, stunned by the outpouring for Belle from her
customers.

Eve shrugged. “Most of them were sincere,
I’m sure, but I’m willing to wager a lot of them were coming by to
see if we were CTD.”

“
What’s that
mean?”

Eve explained with a slight blush, “CTD
stands for ‘circling the drain’. One of our best customers works in
the Emergency Room over at County Hospital. I suppose I picked up
the lingo from her.”

“
They think we’re going
under?”

“
It’s not that outlandish a
thought, Harrison. When word traveled through the crafting circles
that a neophyte inherited At Wick’s End, what else could they
think?”

I threw the deposit into the bag and said,
“They could think we’re going to be just fine. What do you think,
Eve?”

The question obviously startled her for a
moment, so I added, “I want your brutally honest opinion.”

“
That’s all I ever give,”
she said with a wry smile. Eve pondered the question a few moments,
then said, “Honestly? Belle kept the store afloat, but she wasn’t
much on promotions and advertising. If things stay the way they
were, we’ll do well to break even.”

I’d been told by too many people how
borderline the operation was. “Breaking even isn’t going to be good
enough. I know how you feel about the tradition of the place, but I
want this shop to succeed. If that means we have to try new things
in order to bring in more customers, so be it.”

“
What did you have in
mind?”

I tucked the zippered bag with our deposits
under one arm as I headed for the door. “Give me a few days until I
can polish my ideas, then we’ll talk about them.” That was purely
smoke and mirrors. I didn’t have a clue yet what I was going to do,
but by Monday night I would.

After thirty minutes at the library, I had
accumulated enough articles on running a small business to take me
a month to digest. I gathered up my copies and headed back to the
truck. After I dropped the bank deposit off, I planned to dig a
little deeper into some of the sheets I’d printed out.

When I got to the parking lot, I walked
toward Belle’s truck and saw that someone had broken the passenger
window.

My heart raced as I hurried to the vehicle,
but my worst fears were realized when I saw the empty deposit bag
on the floor of the cab—the one that had just recently been
brimming with cash. The checks and credit card receipts were
scattered in a mess on the floor, but all of the cash was gone.

How in the world was I going to explain to
Eve that I’d forgotten to do the deposit before I went to the
library, and had ended up losing so much of our hard-earned
money?