“I’m sorry.” Becca immediately went into comfort mode. “What happened?”
Clara looked from her person to the downcast girl at her side. All the options—the absences from her post, the possible theft, the philandering—ran through her mind. Becca had to be aware of these, and yet she appeared as focused and concerned as she’d be if one of Clara’s sisters had started to limp. Becca was tender hearted, Clara knew. She loved her for it, but atthe same time, it made her worry about her person, too.
Gaia took so long to respond that they’d reached the end of the block. By then, Becca had her arm around the other girl. Taking a deep breath, she asked, her voice gentle, “Was it because of Frank?”
Gaia started, and her quick intake of breath must have been audible even to human ears. Exhaling even more noisily, she nodded, and reached up to wipe a tear that had escaped to roll down her cheek.“What a jerk,” she said.
Becca’s eyebrows went up at that, but she held her tongue. After another pause—not so long this time—Gaia began to speak.
“That was stupid,” she said, staring off down the block as if she could transport herself even farther away. “I didn’t even really like him that much, you know?”
Becca wisely chose not to respond. Sure enough, Gaia kept on talking.“He was funny. He used to come into the shop all the time and flirt with me, even though he was this little pudgy bald guy. Like he had all this confidence, you know? He’d bring me a muffin when I opened in the morning. He used to say I was too skinny. I needed someone to look after me. He’d tell me I should get more sleep. Take more breaks. At some point, he started massaging my shoulders. And, you know, he was really good at it. And then he asked me to read the Tarot for him. A private reading in the back, even though he knew I couldn’t really read the cards.”
She broke off and blinked back more tears, though if they were for the man who had died or the job she had lost, Clara couldn’t tell.
“Anyway, it wasn’t more than a couple of times. It wasn’t like I was going to be his girlfriend or anything.” Clara saw Becca open her mouth to comment and then close it again, unable to find the words. “If it weren’t for that old witch of a sister-in-law showing up, I don’t think anyone would have found out.”
“You mean Elizabeth?” Becca latched onto the name.
“Yeah, it was right after she stole my plant. She marched in and said something about ‘dangerous friends.’ I knew then the jig was up.”
For a moment, Clara thought Becca was going to speak out. Gaia was being as unreasonable as Laurel or Harriet. When she didn’t, Clara had to wonder once again at the similarities between them. When Becca finally did respond, it was in a deliberate tone that Clara knew meant she had put some thought into her words.
“Gaia, we need to go to the police.” When the other girl started to speak, Becca put up her hand to hold her off. “Not about the asafetida. I understand that you were upset, and I think we can just pretend that didn’t happen. But about what you heard or may have heard about Frank. And now with this about your plant… I spoke to Tiger.”
The other girl stared at her like she’d grown a second head, the black smears around her eyes adding dramatic emphasis. “Tiger? How did you…?”
“I am a witch detective.” The corners of Becca’s lips twitched. She didn’t, Clara noted, mention her lunch with Gaia’s ex. “And I’m sorry if I overstepped. But you did hire me to look into what was going on, and then you said that he was still worried about you, and I saw—I might have seen—someone hanging around the shop after I left this morning.”
“That might just have been Tiger.”
Becca shook her head.“I know you said he worries too much. But maybe he’s got reason. I gather that he knew about your affair with Frank.”
“Tiger? No, he didn’t…”
Becca cut her off before she could continue.“Maybe he didn’t want you to know that he knew, but he did. I don’t know if that’s connected. But he told me he thinks there was bad blood between Margaret and her husband. Really bad.”
A shrug led Clara to believe the black-clad girl didn’t care that much about the other woman’s distress. “Frank wasn’t serious about me. He was never going to leave her.”
It wasn’t a question, and Becca didn’t answer.
Gaia acted like she had heard something, though. Kicking at a pebble, her lower lip jutting out like a toddler’s, she glanced over at her companion. “I guess I messed up, huh?”
Becca held her tongue and the two walked in silence for a bit, until Gaia stopped and turned toward Becca.“You think that’s why she tried to frame me?”
“Frame you? Did you ever, um, meet at his office?”
“No.” Gaia looked miserable. “I went down to the lot once, but I didn’t like the sleazy guys he worked with. Is that where he…?” For a moment, the death of her former paramour seemed to register, before she brushed it away as if it were a mere annoyance. “No, I didn’t mean…that. Poor guy. Just that she tried to set me up for stealing.” She bit down on the words. “Why she told you, told everyone, that I was taking money out of the register.”
“And you weren’t?” Becca’s voice was as soft as kitten fur. “Not even as a loan?”
“Me? No.” Gaia scoffed at the idea. “I don’t care about money. If I did, you think I would have stayed in that dead-end job? Besides, Tiger’s always telling me I can work with him. He makes pretty decent money.”
“Do you like to ride?” Clara couldn’t tell if Becca was curious or slightly miffed. The little calico found herself relieved by the idea that the pale messenger still harbored feelings for this pale and painted girl.
“What? No, in sales. I’m good behind a counter,” she said, waving off any evidence to the contrary. Even as she did, the reality of her situation seemed to hit home. “Not that I’m going to get any kind of a reference now,” she moped.
“It does seem like maybe it was time to move on.” Becca spoke as gently as she could. “But you said you weren’t even sure you were fired.”
Another shrug.“I don’t know for certain. I mean, it’s Margaret’s shop, but I think her sister is really behind it. She’s the reason Margaret hired me.”
“She is?”
Margaret’s words came back to Clara as she watched her person take this in.
Gaia stretched out her black-clad arms.“I guess I look the part. Or I thought that’s what was happening anyway. Margaret said something about her sister telling her to get ‘that girl,’ like she had me in mind, special. Only I think Elizabeth had it out for me for a while. Just last week, I heard her telling Margaret that she’dmade a mistake. That she’d hired the wrong girl. Actually, she kind of liked you.”
Gaia regarded Becca with a gimlet eye.
“Me?”
Gaia nodded.“She must have seen you when we talked. Or maybe it was when you came in to hang up that flyer. Anyway, she was all excited that you’d come back to the shop. Wanted Margaret to reach out to you right away.”
Becca bit her lip, and Clara knew she had to be thinking about Elizabeth and her sister. Margaret had reached out to Becca, all right, but as a client. And Becca had sent her away.
“Anyway, I don’t know for sure what’s going on, only that she came in and told me to get lost. That I was gone. But I don’t know. Truth is, I think she’s going senile. That old bat couldn’t even get your name right. She kept saying she was waiting for Clara.”
“Well, that’s curious.” Now it was Becca’s turn to look distracted. But Gaia didn’t give her a chance to think it through.
“Wait a minute.” She reached out for Becca’s hand again. “Something doesn’t make sense.”
Becca shook her head, waiting.
“If Tiger was only warning me because he wanted me to be more careful around those Cross witches, then why is he still worried? I mean, it’s not like I’m still going to see Frank. Unless…” Even under her smudged makeup, the goth girl’s pallor was obvious.