Across the street, where the figure had stood, a single playing card fluttered in the breeze—The Collector, from a deck Delilah had never seen before.
18
Morning sunlight streamed through the windows of Crystal Clear Visions, casting rainbow prisms across the freshly painted walls. Delilah stood back, admiring the new sign hanging above her display counter: "Crystal Clear Investigations" in elegant silver lettering that subtly shifted color when viewed from different angles.
"A little to the left," she called to Sam, who was balancing precariously on a ladder to hang a framed municipal license beside it.
"It's perfectly level," he grumbled, yellow eyes narrowing as he used a tiny level to confirm. "Your counter is the crooked part."
"My counter has character," Delilah countered, moving a crystal ball slightly to catch more light. "Unlike your filing system, which has all the personality of a tax audit."
One month after their battle with the silver witch, their partnership had evolved from reluctant allies to... whatever this was. Business partners officially. Something more unofficially. The kind of something more that involved lingering glances and stolen kisses between client meetings.
Sam descended the ladder and surveyed their transformed space. The front remained Delilah's fortune-telling domain, but the back room had been converted into a proper investigative office, complete with maps, filing cabinets, and a massive corkboard where they tracked supernatural occurrences.
"This folder system isn't working," Sam muttered, rifling through a stack Delilah had labeled with increasingly creative sticky notes. "What exactly does 'possessed but make it fashion' mean?"
"The haunted vintage clothing store case." Delilah adjusted her purple off-shoulder dress and moved to his side. "You know, where the ghost kept forcing customers to wear 1980s shoulder pads?"
"That goes under 'Spectral Disturbances,' subsection 'Commercial.'" Sam pulled out a meticulously labeled folder. "We need categories, not just 'weird stuff' and 'really weird stuff.'"
Jinxie hopped onto the desk, her three legs moving with surprising agility as she batted at Sam's color-coded tabs.
"Fine, but I draw the line at color-coding client folders by supernatural classification." Delilah scooped up Jinxie before she could do more damage. "Besides, my system is intuitive."
"For who? Elder Thornberry?"
"I heard my name invoked!" The door jingled as Elder Thornberry himself materialized, carrying what appeared to be a pineapple wearing sunglasses. "The fruit of knowledge comes bearing gifts! Or was it the gift of fruit brings knowledge? Semantics are slippery when tropical produce is involved!"
Sam pinched the bridge of his nose. "How does he always know?"
"Elder sense," Delilah whispered, accepting the pineapple with practiced grace. "Thank you, Elder. Is this for our... office warming?"
"Protection against the watchers between walls!" Thornberry nodded seriously. "Pineapples are natural enemies of eavesdroppers. Something about the spiky exterior and sweet interior—very contradictory! Confuses those who listen from shadows!"
Sam and Delilah exchanged a look. Since their confrontation with the witch, they'd been researching "The Collector"—the shadowy presence that had been manipulating events. Elder Thornberry's cryptic warnings suddenly carried more weight.
"Have you seen more shadows lately, Elder?" Sam asked carefully.
"Shadows are everywhere! Behind, before, between!" Elder danced in a small circle. "But the pineapple knows. Place it in the eastern corner where morning light first touches."
The bell jingled again as Mayor Grimble entered, his hat today shaped like a miniature detective's office complete with tiny working blinds.
"Ah! Just the supernatural investigators I was seeking!" The Mayor beamed, adjusting his hat which kept trying to close its blinds. "I've come with your first official municipal contract!"
"We already have clients," Sam pointed out.
"Yes, but this is official business." The Mayor lowered his voice dramatically. "Strange reports from the cemetery. Grave markers rearranging themselves overnight. Into pairs."
Delilah felt a chill despite the warm morning. Pairs. Just like the pattern they'd seen before.
"We'll take it," she said, catching Sam's eye. Their first case as official partners—and possibly their first lead on The Collector.
Behind the Mayor, Elder Thornberry placed the pineapple precisely in the eastern corner, humming his familiar melody that now seemed less random and more like a warning.
Sam tugged at the leash as the white fluffball at the other end strained toward a squirrel. The park stretched before them, a deceptively normal patch of green in Assjacket's supernatural landscape.
"Take it easy, Snowball," Sam muttered, the name feeling ridiculous on his tongue.
