Eleanor said something in response to my apology, but it was hard to hear her, since there was a lot of shouting in the background.
"Eleanor?"
"What?"
"What is going on there? Are you okay?"
"Yes," she said grimly. "But Oscar might not be. He has Bill tied up—literally."
"Oh, boy."
"See you tomorrow, Tess. I have to go." She hung up.
When I told Jack, he sighed. "Do you want to go over there and make sure they're all right?"
"He's twelve years old. I'm pretty sure Eleanor can handle him."
Jack wandered into our bedroom and came out a few minutes later wearing swim trunks and carrying my new swimsuit. "How about we take some time in the pool, just the two of us?"
"Why not?"
Five minutes later, I was floating in the pool on my inflatable lounger with a glass of lemonade in the beverage holder and a smile on my face. Jack, being Jack, swam laps, passing me by every few minutes. When he finally finished, he swam over and yanked me into the water, sunglasses and all.
I came up sputtering with laughter. "Hey!"
"I told you we should have stayed gone for a month."
"I'm wishing I'd listened," I admitted. "Also, Uncle Mike told me more about the McKee feud than I'd ever heard before, after he got done telling us what a sketchy character Cletus's father was. Apparently, Cletus Senior was a con artist, dealing in shady or nonexistent investments, but nobody could ever prove it. He stole from lots of people, but when he stole from his own family, they finally had enough and ran him out of Dead End. He took Cletus, Junior, with him, and the news has filtered through the grapevine that he's a chip off his dad's crooked block."
"Great." Jack scrubbed his face with his hand. "Why would your Aunt Ruby contract with him?"
"She never heard the worst of it, I guess. And she didn't tell Uncle Mike she was considering him, so he didn't know to fill her in."
"What happened to Senior?"
I shrugged and headed for the steps to climb out. "Not sure. I guess I can ask Cletus if I see him again."
"I have a feeling we won't be able to avoid seeing him again," Jack said darkly.
"Even though he was brought up by a con artist and maybe was a little crooked himself in the past, he could be on the level now. People can change."
"Not very often, in my experience." Jack jumped out of the pool and grinned at me. "Now, on to happier topics. What should we have for dinner?"
11
Tess
Tuesday morning at the shop was blissfully normal. Nobody tried to sell me magical items or mutant vegetables or even evil-spirit-possessed mirrors.
It wasawesome.
I was fairly busy, though. Lots of pre-holiday traffic. With the Fourth coming up Friday, out-of-town friends and family were in Dead End for the fireworks festival. I'd already turned down three invitations from people who wanted me to help staff food stands or booths where they planned to sell their baked goods, canned goods, or crafts.
Eleanor called and offered to work that afternoon, and her voice carried more than a hint of desperation, so I gladly accepted. I also promised we'd do the pool party thing that evening.
I was itching to do some deep cleaning, since I hadn't been there for a couple of weeks. Eleanor was great, but she was my sales assistant, and I never expected her to do more thanbasic dusting and sweeping. But since she'd be here, she could concentrate on the customers while I got to work.
Plus, I liked to clean. At home, I used to play music loudly and sing along while I mopped and scrubbed, until I got involved with a man who had Superior Tiger Hearing (capital letters his) and had once raced into my house ready to fight whoever was making me "scream with pain."
