“And take away my reading time? You’d do that to me?” Sasha tapped her purse. “I carry my book with me everywhere, and if I have ten or even five minutes, that’s a few more pages.”
“So you’re telling me that you like me showing up late because you get to read more?” I laughed as I went to the counter and washed my hands. Then I started the regular pot of coffee as Sasha started the decaf. We’d been working this shift together for over a month now, and we had the chores down to a choreographed dance. Sasha worked a full shift with me on Tuesdays, then on Wednesdays, she worked with Toby and helped Aunt Jackie close. She had Thursdays off, then ran the same schedule for Fridays and Saturdays. We’d carved out full-time hours so we could get her on our health insurance. Toby had benefits with the police department, so Sasha was our only employee with full benefits.
“What can I say, I’m great at time management.” She held up the list Aunt Jackie had left by the counter on Saturday night. “You want to handle the extra or the ordinary list?”
“I’ll do the setup and any customers who come in. You handle the queen’s instructions.” I liked to tease my aunt that she tended to overschedule us with activities, but honestly, most of her ideas were gold, especially in the area of marketing. She’d started the book clubs, sponsored a launch for a well-known mystery author at the store, and even set up the last mystery dinner theater. Of course, finding a real dead body meant that hadn’t been in the plan, but the idea was solid.
We worked in relative silence for a half hour before we got our first rush of commuter customers. After the last one, Bob, ambled out of the store and on his way to his job at the bottling plant down the road, Sasha leaned against the counter and folded her bar towel.
“Have you heard from Toby?”
Her question surprised me, and I looked up from cutting a new banana nut coffee cake for the display counter. I set the knife down and ripped a slice in half, giving her the larger piece. My heart sank at the realization. “Crap, something happened with the investigation and he’s not coming in today?” I almost inhaled the bread, not wanting to think about what could happen to Austin, especially since I had the information to free him. “What else did they charge Austin with?”
Sasha frowned. “I don’t know.”
Now it was my turn to be confused. “Then why won’t Toby be coming in to work?”
“Who said Toby wasn’t coming in?” Sasha paused, then laughed. “Oh no. That’s not what I meant. I wondered if you heard how Toby and Elisa’s date had gone on Friday.”
Relief filled me, and I made a mental promise to go to the station and confess as soon as my shift was over. I went back to checking the prices in the cash register. Aunt Jackie made me do the routine double-check first thing every week, just in case gremlins had come in over the weekend and played with our pricing codes. “I don’t know. I guess fine. I mean, I don’t really hear from Toby unless it’s about work.” Or my sleuthing, I added silently.
“Oh.” A twinge of disappointment echoing in Sasha’s one-word answer caused me to pause from the verification task again.
“What’s going on? Anything I need to know about?” This was the second time I’d asked Sasha about her emotional health in less than a week. The girl had me worried.
She waved away my words. “I’m fine. I was just concerned about Toby, that’s all. A girl doesn’t set up a mandatory dinner for her beau unless she has big news.”
My mind started racing. “Oh no. You don’t think she’s pregnant, do you?”
Sasha’s eyes widened. “No. I mean, I don’t know. Do you think she’s pregnant?”
I thought about Toby’s complaints about Elisa being moody and hard to deal with. “It could explain a lot, especially her mood swings.” I shook my head. “Toby as a daddy, I just can’t see it.”
Sasha headed toward the back. “I can.” Then she disappeared through the swinging doors.
I stepped toward the office, but the bell over the front door stopped me. Harrold strolled through the door and set a leather-strapped briefcase on a table near the window. He waved at me, then came up to the counter. “Hey, Jill, is Jackie down yet?”
“Down? She doesn’t work until three.” Harrold looked good. Clean jeans, a button-down shirt, and, I sniffed just to make sure, he was also wearing cologne. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him in anything but T-shirts, mostly ones with different railroad insignias. That was the fun of making a hobby into a profession; you could dress the part. Today, Harrold looked like a successful California real estate broker, or maybe one of those dot-com kings.