Bewitched (Betwixt & Between #2) - Darynda Jones Page 0,21
that hinge on the state of my cuticles.”
“And you never really got to see Salem.”
“Of course.” Make me fall in love with the town so I’d stay. Clever.
“I’ve seen it all since moving here. I’ve also worked at like half the stores and restaurants in the city proper.”
“How many jobs have you had?” I asked, appalled.
“A lot. I was hoping our business would take off sooner.”
“I was in a mystical coma.”
“I know.” She pouted. “I don’t blame you, per se.”
I laughed. “Thanks. Can I shower first?”
“Yes, but hurry. I want to get there before Parris does.”
“Our neighbor?”
“There’s something about that woman. She’s icky. And she’s a menace. It’s Saturday, and she always steals Fiona from me. Fiona is the best technician there. I kind of love her.”
“You’ve really settled in.”
“I had no choice. It was kill or be killed.”
I frowned at her.
“No, that’s not right.” She bit her lip in thought. “Survival of the fittest? Yeah, that’s it. I had to survive somehow.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have gotten fired from every place you’ve worked.”
“Who says I got fired?”
“Papi. Last night.”
“He was referring to the one time I did get fired. I kept quitting. I only wanted to work at each place long enough to get to know the owners and the clientele. If we’re going to start our own business, we need to know the locals. We need to blend in. We need them to like us.”
“Then maybe you shouldn’t have quit every business in town.”
“Yeah.” She bit the inside of her cheek. “I didn’t really think it through.”
“I’ll be ready in forty-five. You should probably change into something less devout.”
She sulked. “But these are my favorite sweats.”
“They have more holes than a can of Spaghetti-O’s.”
“And?”
Two hours later, we walked out of the nail salon with hands and feet we could proudly display in public. Thank God. The state of my toes had really been weighing on me.
“Feel better?” Nette asked, hope shimmering in her gray irises.
“My toes do.” I did a perfunctory search for Roane. I could’ve sworn I saw him while the technician was doing her own kind of magic. But when I’d looked back, he was gone.
“A step in the right direction. I’ll take it. So, what was it?” she asked for the tenth time.
We hadn’t been able to talk about . . . well, anything . . . in front of the technicians, so she’d been digesting what I’d told her about my underbelly tour of the house before we went in and had to hold her questions the entire time we were being pampered. She’d kept squirming, like it was her bladder I’d asked her to hold, until I was worried her head would explode having to keep all that angst inside.
“I don’t know. But it was very dark and very powerful.”
“But it couldn’t get past the door?”
“No.” I chewed on a freshly manicured nail that tasted like battery acid thanks to all the chemicals they’d used while Annette led me through the beautiful city of Salem.
We dodged tourists and stopped at various kiosks to check their wares. But my mind was too occupied to pay much attention.
“You’re sure?” she asked. “It can’t, like, escape and kill us all in our sleep?”
“Salt,” I said as a thought emerged. It happened.
“Salt as in yes you’re sure? Or salt as in no you aren’t?”
“The shiplap.” I turned to her as she held a pair of earrings up to my ear. “It smelled like salt all through the passageway and in the attic. Even in the dungeon, the walls were drenched in it.”
“Which we need to discuss in much greater detail.” She put the earrings back, thanked the vendor, and continued down the path. “I mean, seriously. A dungeon? Are we talking The Princess Bride or Fifty Shades?”
I thought about last night with Roane, heating up all over again. “It could go either way. What if salt really does keep spirits out?”
Annette stopped so abruptly, I almost ran into her. “Or in.” She turned and pointed an index finger at me. “Percy has never been able to leave the house. Now Ruthie can’t. Do you think it’s the salt in the wood?”
I looked around. She’d had led us farther down Essex. “I thought the restaurant was the other way?”
“Um, it is.” She started walking again, dragging me behind her by my hand. “We just have some time to kill.”
I’d known her far too long to mistake her hedging for anything other than hedging. “Why would we have time to