Fallen Angel (17 page)

"Nah. I'll be there. Just give me a couple of hours to take care of things, and I'll be there. I might be a little late, but I'll be there."

"Um." They'd almost forgotten Rosemary was sitting there at the table. "Do you think it's okay for me to go back to my house? I'm still a little freaked out about everything . . . "

Sarah looked at her, and gave it some thought. "I think you're okay. He wants Zach, but I don't see any reason he'd hurt you. He's more likely to come here, I think. It's up to you, but you'd be alone here, too, so that wouldn't really be any better. I think you'll be okay if you're careful."

"Okay." She shrugged. "Let's go, then. I'd probably better go in to work and see if I still have a job."

They were all in the car heading for the bookshop before Cate thought to ask where Zach was. "Did he stay over, too?" she asked, sliding her eyes toward Sarah. "Nope," Sarah answered. "He left when I went to bed."

"Ah."

Sarah had been wondering where he was, too. Dinah had been in the kitchen waiting patiently by her food bowl when they got up, and Zach had been nowhere in sight when she opened the front door and looked out. She had to assume, from what he had said the night before, that he'd be back, but it was slightly unnerving not to have any idea when she'd see him again, or where, or
how
.

But she had to trust that he wouldn't abandon her, at least not without saying goodbye. She pulled up in front of the bookshop and got out, Cate got out and took the driver's seat, and Rosemary moved up into the front. "You guys be careful, okay?" Sarah said as she turned to walk into the store.

"We will," Cate answered. "We're still going to have to juggle cars around. I'll be back at 2:00 or thereabouts--can you take me home when we close?"

"Sure. See you later." Sarah opened the door, and walked into chaos.

24.

Jason was behind the counter, looking harried as he rung up a stack of children's books for a grandmotherly looking lady who stood at the head of a line of people that wound all the way back to Sarah's office. Elizabeth was sitting at a folding table that had been set up in the corner; she was gift-wrapping
another
stack of books for an equally grandmotherly looking woman who was tapping her foot in a quite
un
grandmotherly way as she waited.

Even Elizabeth's husband Donald had been enlisted to help--he was sitting at the gift-wrap table with Elizabeth. They seemed to have quite a system going. She would take a book from the to-be-wrapped stack, show it to Donald, who noted its title on a Post-it note, then once she had wrapped it, he took it, stuck the Post-It to it, and put it in a shopping bag.

It obviously wasn't going quite fast enough for the woman who was waiting, though.

Sarah worked her way through the store to her office, where she dumped her bag, noticed Sophie lying in a disgruntled ball on the chair, and came back out in the main room and looked around. She touched the coffee urn--cold. Jason hadn't thought--or had been too busy--to make coffee. She smiled and mouthed a
Thank you
at Elizabeth, who returned her smile, then edged through the crowd to the back of the counter. She smiled again, this time at the shoppers in general, and leaned over to whisper in Jason's ear: "What's going on?"

He finished ringing up the stack of children's books, then passed the stack and the sales slip to the woman, who thanked him and went to stand in the other line, the one in front of the gift-wrap table.

"Two things," he said as he raked a hand through his disheveled hair. "One, the weather service says we may have a tropical storm coming. And two, the post office just came out with their recommended cut-off dates for getting Christmas packages delivered on time. Between the two, everyone's panicking that their families won't get their Christmas presents on time.

"Ah. Okay, well, hold the fort, I'm going to go make some coffee." There was a little kitchen in the back of the store next to her office, and she quickly started a pot of coffee, and then found the packages of cookies she had bought earlier with the plan of setting them out during Christmas week. One of the packages had been opened--obviously Jason had discovered them during a less busy period when he had time to rummage through the cabinets.

She arranged the cookies on two trays with a stack of Christmas napkins which she had also stockpiled, brought them out and set one on Elizabeth's table and one on the corner of the sales counter. "Coffee's brewing, it will be out soon," she said to the woman waiting for her books to be wrapped, and the woman gave her a grateful smile. "Thank you, dear," she said. "This is a fine mess, isn't it?"

"Well," Sarah answered, "I guess we'll just have to make the best of it." She came back behind the counter again; two people were really redundant behind the counter, since there was only one cash register, but she figured she might as well lend at least some
moral
support to Jason. She could smile at the customers and hopefully keep them from getting too agitated from having to wait in line.

She suddenly had another thought, and rummaged underneath the counter for a Christmas CD. She found an old Narada one that would lend some Christmas spirit without being too annoying, and slipped it into the CD player. Soon the strains of "I Saw Three Ships" were wafting out of the speakers in the corners, and some of the shoppers visibly relaxed.

Sarah had been in some of the big chain bookstores over the holiday season, and felt that their musical selections left a lot to be desired. For one thing, most of them seemed to play a
lot
of Celtic music. She didn't have anything against Celtic music,
per se
, but it didn't seem like the optimal browsing music to her; on the contrary, it made her want to get what she came for and then
get out
. It might be more suited to a--well, she couldn't think of any retail establishment that would rather people just get something quickly and then get out. Maybe a restaurant.

But on the other hand, you didn't want it to be
too
quiet. Most people seemed to feel a little uncomfortable shopping in a store that was completely silent--it made them feel self-conscious. So Sarah always tried to have some soft music playing in the store, something mostly innocuous, but not so innocuous that it seemed more like "elevator music." It was a fine line.

She seemed to have struck the right chord with the David Arkenstone, though--people were turning to chat with each other and the store was losing some of the frantic air it had had when she walked in.

Ambience taken care of, she moved toward the cash register and took the stack of books from the next person in line. "Why don't you go put the coffee in the urn and start another pot?" she said to Jason. He practically ran to the back room, grateful for the break from smiling at customers and trying to be jolly when he obviously felt anything but. When she turned back to her customer, she saw that it was the elderly woman who had been in earlier, buying Christmas cards. "Hello, dear," the woman said. "Hello," Sarah said, smiling. "How are you?"

"Just fine, just fine, but I hope we don't have the storm I heard they're predicting. I thought I'd better finish up my shopping just in case--my grandchildren live in Minnesota, you know." She clucked. "How anyone can live in a place like Minnesota is beyond me." Then she laughed. "Well,
I
did, of course, but when my Edward died, I told my son I wanted to move someplace where it was warm all the time. Of course, I didn't think about the hurricanes."

"No one does,” Sarah said, smiling. “Hopefully it won't turn into a hurricane, and at least you'll have your shopping done." Sarah rang up four picture books and a angel calendar. "That's $52.50," she said, stacking the books neatly. She picked the calendar up again. "I haven't seen this one, it's beautiful. Who are you buying it for?"

The elderly woman chuckled. "That one's for me. See? It even has the picture that was on my Christmas cards." She opened the calendar to July, which was illustrated by a print of the Thayer angel. "My children never get me anything practical--always perfume and dusting powder and handkerchiefs. I thought I'd splurge and buy a Christmas present for myself this time. I might even get it wrapped!"

She moved over to Elizabeth's table with her stack, and Sarah turned to the next person in line.

Jason kept busy refilling the coffee urn and passing around plates of cookies, and by the time Cate came in to relieve him at a little after 2:00, things had calmed down considerably. The first wave of panicked shoppers had subsided, and although the store was still crowded, things weren't quite as crazy as they had been when Sarah had arrived.

Cate took over coffee pouring and cookie passing duty while Jason shrugged into his jacket and picked up his backpack. "So what were you guys doing last night that kept you out so late?" he asked. Cate and Sarah looked at each other. "Nothing," Cate said, and Sarah said, "We'll tell you later."

"Fine." He sounded just a little sarcastic--obviously miffed that he'd had to run the store alone while they ran around doing God knew what. "I'd pursue that, but I've got to get to class. See ya!" and he was gone.

It had slowed down enough that one of them could run the cash register while the other did the gift wrapping, so Sarah sent Elizabeth and Donald on their way with grateful thanks for helping Jason. "Oh, it was no trouble at all!" Elizabeth exclaimed. "We enjoyed it, didn't we, Donald?" She had to poke Donald to get his attention--he was flipping through a book about Hemingway--but he looked up, startled, and said, "Oh, no trouble at all!"

They took off to get a late lunch and do some Christmas shopping that didn't involve books.

"Did you get Rosemary home?" Sarah asked Cate, once they were alone in the store.

"Uh huh. She still wasn't very happy about being home by herself, but I went in with her and made sure all the doors were locked, and she said she was going to go in to work later. I think she'll be okay."

"I hope so. Did you get registered for your class?"

"Nah. It was too late, the one I wanted was full."

"Oh, I'm sorry!"

"It's okay. I don't mind. There'll be another one in a few months. I wouldn't have missed last night for the world!"

"Hey, I want to talk to you about that," Sarah said. "It turned out okay, but what was the deal with the gun? When did you learn to shoot?"

"Uh--" She looked embarrassed. "Well, it was a boyfriend thing. There was this guy . . . I broke up with him, but he wouldn't take no for an answer, you know?"

Sarah nodded.

"He dropped by the house a few times uninvited, and one time he wouldn't leave, and it kind of scared me, living out there by myself. So I got a gun. I took the classes and everything. It's no big deal."

She obviously didn't want to talk about it at length, and Sarah didn't blame her, but she felt like she had to pursue it, just a little bit. "Okay, well, you obviously know what you're doing, but you know last night could have been really bad, right?" Cate, abashed, nodded. "I know you feel like you need it to protect yourself at home, but I don't
ever
want to see it in here, or see you carrying it around again, okay?"

"Yeah. Okay. Sorry. Hey, did Zach ever turn up?"

"No, but don't try to change the subject!"

"I'm not!"

"Uh huh." Sarah took pity on her. "No, I haven't seen Zach today, but we were so busy, he could have walked in and I'd have missed him."

It was Cate's turn to be sardonic. "Yeah, right."

"Yeah, okay, maybe not."

"That's what I thought."

25.

Cate went over to the corner and busied herself making a cup of tea. She spoke without turning around. "So what do you think is going to happen?"

"About?"

"About Zach, and everything."

"I don't know. What do
you
think is going to happen?"

"You never told me where he came from. Why he's here. I mean, yeah I saw him sprout wings out in the street that night, but . . . how come? What's it all about?"

"Well, it's complicated."

"Things usually are."

"Well, basically he said he's my guardian angel and . . . I don't know. He came to make me happier. That's what he said, more or less."

"Is it working?"

Sarah looked up. "Yes, I think it is. In spite of everything, I think it is."

Cate's face lit up in a brilliant smile. "Well then," she said, rising and throwing her arms around Sarah in a hug, "good for you!"

Several customers came into the store then, in rapid succession, and they got busy helping them find what they needed, ringing up purchases, and gift-wrapping books. Although a lot of the customers were there to purchase gifts, there were other shoppers, too--a couple of people came in wanting books about tropical storms, and several people who apparently didn't take the local newspaper came in wanting copies of the day's issue. When the second person came in wanting to find something about emergency preparedness, Cate finally gave in to her curiosity and asked them why.