Waiting for Daybreak (12 page)
The morning progressed, through Ora’s coffee-making tips, three customers, and very few phone calls. The slow pace gave Paige time to think. And wonder some more.
When Clarissa arrived, she walked into the dispensing area, a smile on her face. “What did you think of my uncle Tony?”
Paige tried to keep her voice noncommittal. “He’s nice.”
Clarissa quirked her eyebrow. “Nice? Admit it. You like him.”
“Of course I like him. Why wouldn’t I?”
“Um-hmm.”
Paige felt the heat in her cheeks. “What?”
“Where’d these come from?” Clarissa pointed at the flowers.
“Don’t know. Someone left them at our door this morning.”
Clarissa looked toward the door, then back at the flowers.
Her eyes narrowed for a split second, a spark of what looked like anger flamed then disappeared. “Really?” She put her hand over her mouth. “I hope it’s not some weirdo stalker or something. I say we throw the whole thing away.”
Paige laughed outright. “Get a grip. I am not throwing them away—they’re beautiful. Someone went to a lot of trouble for these.”
“If it will make you feel better, I’ll take them home with me tonight so you won’t have to worry about the ‘stalker’ coming in and seeing them.”
The pharmacy door opened just as she said it, but the man entering didn’t look like a stalker. He carried a huge bouquet with several colors of roses and other flowers Paige couldn’t name. It was gigantic.
Clarissa went to the counter, already reaching, a smile on her face. “And who might these be for?”
The man looked at his clipboard. “Paige and Clarissa—pharmacists at Richardson Apothecary.”
Clarissa jerked the card from the bouquet without acknowledging the clipboard awaiting her signature.
Paige signed the form. She fumbled in her pocket for a tip and handed it to the man with a smile. “Thank you so much.”
He nodded. “Enjoy ’em.”
Clarissa turned and leaned against the counter, card still in hand. “They’re from Tony. It says, ‘I enjoyed our time together last night. Let’s do it again soon.’ ”
She held the card up to Paige’s face. “Notice how the names are listed?
Paige
and Clarissa, not
Clarissa
and Paige. See it? Your name’s first. You know what that means.”
“That the person in the flower shop took it down wrong?” Paige took in the colors of the bouquet, then looked at the little Mason jar. “Maybe he brought the wildflowers, too.”
“Not a chance.”
Paige looked at her, wondering where the sharp tone had suddenly come from. She sniffed the bouquet. “This is nice. My uncles never send me flowers after they buy me dinner. Come to think of it, my uncles never buy me dinner.”
“
Yeah, I
’
m just lucky I guess.
”
Clarissa walked to the back of the pharmacy. There was no mistaking the way Tony had flirted last night. Maybe he was here to check out Paige, but he had crossed the line into
checking her
out
. The order of their names on the card gave all the proof she needed. She was going to lose him, too.
The scraggly bunch of weeds called wildflowers stared at her from the pathetic excuse for a vase. She knew they were from Cory, she’d seen the way he’d been watching Paige. Last night he had obviously been waiting for her at the door, and then he left in a huff when he realized the three of them were going to dinner.
Yeah, this was a jealous-about-Tony kind of gift. Why couldn’t they have been for her?
She could still remember those weeks before the pharmacy opened. The smell of fresh paint and sawdust lingering in the air, gleaming cabinetry, spotless carpets. While she stocked the shelves and generally set things up, Cory supervised the finish construction work. He would sometimes stop what he was doing and spend an hour helping her unpack office supplies or arrange displays, or just talking. The lingering looks and flirting had eventually led to phone calls, dinners, and staying out late enough to watch the sun rise on a new day.
Then Paige showed up. The cute new girl in town. Suddenly, the old one didn’t measure up.
When she walked to the front, a middle-aged woman smiled as Paige was explaining her medicine. The woman had probably waited half an hour for Paige’s ridiculous amount of rechecking, but she smiled and laughed. Why did everyone love Paige?
The transaction complete, Paige walked up beside her. “Hey, Clarissa, you all right? You seem like you’re not feeling so well.”
Clarissa shook her head. “Just tired.”
“It looks like it’s going to be a slow day. Why don’t you go home and get some rest. Take Tony’s flowers with you. That will cheer you up.”
“Oh, you know, I think it will do me good to stay the whole time. Sometimes nothing works better than staying busy, you know what I mean?”
Paige nodded. “I feel that way a lot.”
Yeah, I’ll just bet you do, Miss Perfect Life.
At noon on Monday, hunger forced Paige to stand in line at the coffee shop. She could not afford this, had no business spending six dollars on lunch, but she hadn’t made it to the grocery store over the weekend. She went up to the counter and ordered a sandwich and a bottled water, vowing to skip a meal to make up for the expense.
“My treat.” Before Paige could get her wallet out of her purse, Lee Richardson was handing the girl at the counter a twenty-dollar bill.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Of course I don’t have to. I want to. You’re doing me a great service by working here with my granddaughter.”
Paige smiled at him. “You keep saying that, but you did the service for me by getting me this job. This place is beautiful.” She looked at him. “I didn’t realize you were here today.”
“Just got here. About to go check in upstairs. Mind if I come down and talk to you for a few minutes while you’re eating?”
“Not at all. There’s a bench out front that’s in a nice sunny spot. I was planning to sit out there.”
“Good, I’ll come find you.”
As he walked away, Paige noticed an extra heaviness in his gait today. Something else felt different too, but she couldn’t pinpoint exactly what. His eyes maybe. Yeah, that was it, they looked so dull.
When he came outside a few minutes later, she decided to come right out with the question. “Lee, are you all right?”
“All right?”
“I don’t know, you just seem sad. The sparkle’s missing from your eyes today.”
He looked at her for a minute then shrugged. “It’s a long story.”
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to pry.”
“No, you weren’t prying. You see—” he took a sip of water “—today is my fiftieth wedding anniversary.”
Paige put a gentle hand on his shoulder and squeezed. “I’m sorry. You must really miss your wife today.”
“Yeah. I had promised to take her on a cruise through the Greek Islands for our fiftieth. She loved archaeology, traveling, sightseeing. I hated all of those things and did as much as I could to put off doing them. I kept promising her that for our fiftieth anniversary, I would go wherever she wanted, she could call all the shots. She had brochures for Greek cruises in our house for the last five years, had figured out every last detail, down to which cabin she wanted on which ship.”
“When did she pass away?”
“Three years ago. It’s been the hardest three years of my life.”
Before Paige could offer her regrets, a shadow fell across their table.
“Hey, boss. Hope I’m not interrupting anything.” Cory walked up to Lee. “You did invite me to join you, right?”
Lee looked at Paige. “Hope you don’t mind. Thought I’d catch up on the news at both places at once.”
“Not at all.” She scooted over. “Have a seat, Cory.”
Cory sat beside Paige, a little too close. She inched further down the bench. “Did your mother get her medicine okay?”
“Yep. She said you did a superior job of refilling and to tell you thanks.”
Lee smiled, but when Paige looked directly at him he coughed—as if he could cover it up that easily. He held up his empty water bottle. “I’m going to throw this away, be right back.” He walked toward the trash can so slowly, it was obvious he’d left the two of them alone on purpose.
Cory shifted so that his arm rested against hers. “Nice day, hmm?” He grinned and took a bite of his sandwich.
Paige knew that her discomfort would only encourage Cory to be more bold. Time to put him off balance with a new topic of discussion, one that Cory couldn’t manipulate into something that it wasn’t. “What happened to Lee’s wife?”
“She died a few years back.”
“I know that. I mean, how did she die?”
He stretched his arms up, then locked his hands behind his head. “Malpractice.” The word sounded so matter-of-fact. So . . . clinical. “I’m surprised you didn’t know that. Once he gets started talking about the carelessness in the medical profession these days, he can go on for hours. The man’s intense, but you’ve probably already noticed that.”
Paige tried to swallow a gulp of her water, but it could not get past the lump in her throat. She began to cough.
Cory reached over to thump her on the back. “You okay?”
Lee returned just then, his chuckle even louder than Paige’s gasps for air. “What do you think, Cory, do you need to try the Heimlich?”
Paige looked up at him and tried to breathe. “No. I’m okay.”
Nothing could have been further from the truth.
Clarissa looked toward the door for the tenth time. “I’m starving. Where is Paige?”
Dawn shrugged. “She should be back in about five minutes.
You want to go ahead and get a head start?”
“Yeah, maybe I’ll just do that. Leave everything out for her to check when she comes in, okay?” So what if it bothered Paige. It was time she learned the realities of small retail.
Clarissa was picking up her purse when her cell phone vibrated in her lab coat pocket. “Hello.”
“Have you heard about Kelsey?” Alexa’s shrill voice came through the phone. It only added to the annoyance of the whole situation.
Clarissa sighed. “Yes, I’ve heard. What’s she thinking? She hardly knows the guy.”
“Oh, I think it’s romantic. A love that would not suffer separation.” She said the last part in her best movie announcer voice, then she sighed. “Yep, it’s the kind of thing they write about in novels, my friend. Aren’t you excited for her?”
Clarissa turned her back on the store and leaned against the counter. “Yeah, right.”
Dawn poked a bottle and prescription under Clarissa’s nose for checking. Clarissa nodded and waved her away.
“She’s running off to marry some guy she hardly knows. I don’t know that
excited
is the right word.”
“But she’s happier than I’ve ever seen her.”
Dawn was back, this time holding a rectangle of paper in front of Clarissa’s face. The words were written in blue ink. “Look over your shoulder. The man in the suit is acting kind of weird.”
Annoyed, Clarissa turned around and immediately saw the man in question. His brown hair was arranged in a bad comb-over, his suit looked rumpled and cheap. He snapped his gaze away and started browsing through the cough and cold section.
“Hey, Alexa, I’ve got to go. I’ll talk to you later.” Clarissa hung up and whispered to Dawn. “What’s he doing?”
“He’s been in here for a while now. Every time I look over at him, he’s watching the pharmacy. As soon as he sees me looking, he starts acting like he’s browsing through the aisles, but I’m telling you, he’s watching us.”
Clarissa thought about the narcotics locked in a safe just a few feet away. Small pharmacies made prime targets for addicts, and there was nothing more dangerous than a druggie with a weapon. She looked around the store. There were three customers in various places. Was he waiting until the store was empty? She turned to Dawn. “I’m going out to talk to him. Keep your hand on the phone. Dial 9-1-1 if he so much as twitches a finger.”
Dawn put her hand on the phone. “Got it.”
Clarissa drew up her shoulders in an effort to appear taller than her five feet five inches. She walked directly up to the man, who was pretending he didn’t see her coming. “Hello there. I’ve noticed you’ve been looking for a while. Something I can help you find?”
“As a matter of fact, yes.” His words were not slurred as she’d expected, and when he looked up, his eyes seemed clear. No hint of desperation in his voice.
Whew.
Her shoulders relaxed a bit, easing the straining muscles in her back.
He reached into his back pocket and drew out a fake lizard-skin wallet. He flipped it open and pulled out a business card. “My name is Gary Powell. State board inspector.”
Clarissa felt the smile droop off her face. A board inspector?
Although she’d heard stories of how they sometimes stood out front like just another customer and observed store operations anonymously, she’d never expected it to happen in this little place. She quickly offered the most sincere smile she could muster and took care to use her sweetest southern accent. “Oh my, an inspection. To what do I owe this great honor?”
Gary Powell didn’t smile. “Routine.”
When she thought of how close she’d come to leaving Dawn alone while he was watching, she almost cried. Wouldn’t Paige have a fit if she knew.
She took a quick mental inventory of everything that had transpired in the last half hour. She’d been on the phone a good bit of the time, but there was no law against that. Dawn had brought everything over to check, even while Clarissa had her back turned. He would have seen that. Okay, so far, so good.
“I’m Clarissa Richardson.” Her hand shook as she extended it to him.
Gary Powell offered a courteous shake. “Nice place you’ve got here. I was just admiring the workmanship.”
Clarissa tried to relax. “Thanks. My grandfather’s company did it. Richardson Construction.”
He nodded, first at her and then at the dispensing area. “Mind if I see your files?”
Like she could refuse. “Oh, please, come on back.”
As she led the way, she could see Dawn watching her, on the alert. Clarissa opened her eyes as wide as possible, trying to communicate an all-out alarm. Hopefully, she’d get the message. When she reached the counter, she beckoned with a smile. “Dawn, please come meet Inspector Powell. He’s with the state board, he’s going to look over our files.”
