Death and a Dog

“Absolutely not,” Lacey told him firmly. “You did nothing wrong.” Her narrow-eyed gaze roved back over his shoulder and out the window. She fixed it on Taryn, following the woman as she gingerly waltzed to the back of the van like she had no cares in the world. Lacey’s annoyance at the boutique owner grew stronger. “If anyone’s to blame, it’s the driver.” She tightened her hands into fists. “It’s almost as if they did it deliberately. Ow!”

Lacey felt something sharp in her palm. She’d squeezed the broken ballerina’s arm so tightly, it had nicked her skin.

“Oh!” the man exclaimed at the sight of the bright globule of blood swelling in her palm. He pincer-gripped the offending arm from the middle of her hand, as if removing it might somehow mend the wound. “Are you okay?”

“Please excuse me for one second,” Lacey said.

She headed for the door—leaving the bemused-looking man behind in her store holding a broken ballerina in one hand and a disembodied arm in the other—and marched onto the street. She paced right up to her neighborhood nemesis.

“Lacey!” Taryn beamed, as she heaved up the back door of the van. “Hope you don’t mind me parking here? I have the new season’s stock to unload. Isn’t summer just your favorite season for fashion?”

“I don’t mind you parking there at all,” Lacey said. “But I do mind you driving too fast over the speed bump. You know the bump is right in front of my store. The noise almost gave my customer a heart attack.”

She noted then, that Taryn had also parked in such a manner that her bulky van blocked Lacey’s view across the street to Tom’s patisserie. That was definitely purposeful!

“Got it,” Taryn said with fake joviality. “I’ll make sure to drive slower when it’s time to get in the autumn season’s stock. Hey, you should pop in once I’ve set all this up. Switched up your wardrobe. Treat yourself. You deserve it.” Her eyes roved down Lacey’s outfit. “And it’s certainly time.”

“I’ll think about it,” Lacey said tonelessly, matching Taryn’s fake smile with her own.

The second she turned her back on the woman, her smile turned into a grimace. Taryn really was the queen of the back-handed compliment.

When she got back into her store, Lacey discovered her elderly customer was now waiting by the counter, and a second person—a man in a dark suit—had also entered. He was perusing the shelf filled with all the nautical items Lacey was planning on auctioning tomorrow, while under the watchful eye of Chester the dog. She could smell his aftershave even from this distance.

“I’ll be with you in a moment,” Lacey called over to the new customer as she hurried toward the back of the store where the elderly gentleman was waiting.

“Is your hand okay?” the man asked her.

“Absolutely fine.” She looked down at the small scratch in her palm, which had already stopped bleeding. “Sorry for rushing off like that. I had to—” she chose her words carefully, “—attend to something.”

Lacey was determined not to let Taryn get her down. If she let the boutique owner get under her skin, it would be akin to scoring an own goal.

As Lacey slid behind the sales counter, she noticed the elderly gentleman had placed the broken figurine upon it.

“I’d like to buy it,” he announced.

“But it’s broken,” Lacey countered. He was obviously just trying to be nice, even though he had no reason to feel bad about the breakage. It really hadn’t been his fault at all.

“I still want it.”

Lacey blushed. He really was adamant.

“Can you let me try to fix it first, at least?” she said. “I have some super glue and—”

“Not at all!” the man interrupted. “I want it just as it is. You see, it reminds me of my wife even more now. That’s what I was just about to say, when the van went bump. She was the Royal Ballet Society’s first ballerina with a disability.” He held up the figure, twirling it in the light. Light caught off the right arm, which still looked elegant outstretched despite stopping in a jagged stump at the elbow. “She danced with one arm.”

Lacey’s eyebrows rose. Her mouth fell open. “No way!”

The man nodded eagerly. “Honest! Don’t you see? This was a sign from her.”

Lacey couldn’t help but agree. She was searching for her own ghost, after all, in the form of her father, so she was particularly sensitive to the signs of the universe.

“Then you’re right, you have to take it,” Lacey said. “But I can’t charge you for it.”

“Are you sure?” the man asked, surprised.

Lacey beamed. “I’m positive! Your wife sent you a sign. The figurine is rightfully yours.”

The man looked touched. “Thank you.”

Lacey began to wrap the figurine up in tissue paper for him. “Let’s make sure she doesn’t lose any more of her limbs, huh?”

“You’re holding an auction, I see,” the man said, pointing over her shoulder at the poster hanging on the wall.

Unlike the crude hand-drawn posters that had advertised her last auction, Lacey had had this one professionally made. It was decorated with nautical imagery; boats and seagulls, and a border made to look like blue and white gingham bunting in honor of Wilfordshire’s own bunting obsession.

“That’s right,” Lacey said, feeling a swell of pride in her chest. “It’s my second auction ever. It’s exclusively for antique navy items. Sextants. Anchors. Telescopes. I’ll be selling a whole array of treasures. Perhaps you’d like to attend?”

“Perhaps I will,” the man replied with a smile.

“I’ll put a flier in the bag for you.”

Lacey did just that, then handed the man his precious figurine across the counter. He thanked her and headed away.

Lacey watched the elderly man exit the store, touched by the story he’d shared with her, before remembering that she had another customer to attend to.

She looked right to turn her attention to the other man. Only now she saw he had gone. He’d slipped out silently, unnoticed, before she’d even had a chance to see whether he needed any help.

She went over to the area he’d been perusing—the bottom shelf where she’d placed storage boxes filled with all the items she was selling at the auction tomorrow. A sign, in Gina’s handwriting, stated: None of this lot is for general sale. Everything will be auctioned! She’d doodled what appeared to be a skull and crossbones beneath, evidently confusing the Navy theme with a pirate one. Hopefully the customer had seen the sign and would be back tomorrow to bid on whatever item it was he was so interested in.

Lacey took one of the boxes filled with items she’d not yet valued out, and carried it back to the desk. As she took out item after item, lining them up on the counter, she couldn’t help feeling excitement coursing through her. Her last auction had been wonderful, yet tempered by the fact she was hunting for a killer. This one, she’d be able to fully enjoy. She’d really get a chance to flex her auctioneers muscles, and she literally couldn’t wait!

She’d just gotten into the flow of valuing and cataloguing the items when she was interrupted by  the shrill sound of her cell phone. A little frustrated to be disturbed by what was undoubtedly her melodramatic younger sister, Naomi, with a single-parent-related crisis, Lacey glanced over at the cell where it lay face up on the counter. To her surprise, the ID flashing up at her was David, her recently ex-husband.

Lacey stared at the flashing screen for a moment, stunned into inaction. A tsunami of different emotions rushed through her. She and David had exchanged precisely zero words with one another since the divorce—although he seemed to still be on speaking terms with Lacey’s mother of all people—and had dealt with everything through their solicitors. But for him to be calling her directly? Lacey didn’t even know where to begin theorizing why he’d be doing such a thing.

Against her better judgment, Lacey answered the call.

“David? Is everything okay?”

“No, it’s not,” came his sharp-sounding voice, bringing forth about a million latent memories that had been lying dormant in Lacey’s mind, like dust stirred.

She tensed, preparing for some terrible bombshell. “What is it? What happened?”

“Your alimony didn’t come through.”

Lacey rolled her eyes so hard they hurt. Money. Of course. There was nothing that mattered more to David than money. One of the most ludicrous aspects of her divorce from David was the fact that she had to pay him spousal support because she’d been the higher earner of the pair. It figured that the only thing to compel him to make actual contact with her would be that.

“But I set the payment up through the bank,” Lacey told him. “It should be automatic.”