Oscar snorted and Selena uttered a sullen “I guess so.”
I glanced around the room in the vain hope that I would remember a piece of pie or a few cookies I’d forgotten. I liked to keep the cookie jar stocked for an energy boost during work breaks, but I’d been so busy lately that I hadn’t had time to bake. Then I remembered a tin of homemade “energy bars” left over from the coven meeting yesterday. I took the little tin from the cupboard where I’d hidden it from Oscar, and offered one to Selena and one to Oscar.
They accepted the peace offering without enthusiasm—the honey-sweetened oatmeal-and-walnut energy bars looked good but were no match for extravagantly iced cupcakes—and joined Maya and Bronwyn on the shop floor.
Patience was waiting for me.
“I don’t have all day, you know,” she said, and as much as I didn’t want to hang out with her, I couldn’t put it off any longer. I left Bronwyn and Maya in charge of Aunt Cora’s Closet, encouraged Selena to continue trying on dresses with their moral support, and led the way up the back stairs.
I hesitated when I reached the little landing outside my door. I don’t bring many people into my private apartment, so it felt strange to invite someone who wasn’t exactly my best buddy. But that was silly; Patience had been here once before, with Sailor.
Sailor.
The thought of him sitting in a jail cell, facing boredom and worry at best, threats and intimidation at worst, made my stomach flip and urged me to step outside my comfort zone.
If Patience could help us, I would do whatever it took.
Chapter 13
Once we entered, Patience looked around the foyer, noting the herbal sachets and protective charms. She sauntered into the bedroom, her tongue worrying the inside of her cheek as she picked up a small photo of Sailor I kept on my bedside table. She set it back down and continued her tour, pausing in front of the bookshelf in the living room.
“Nice crystal ball,” she said.
“Thanks. It was a present from my grandmother.”
“Can you see anything in it?”
I shook my head. “Not often. I try, but . . .”
“But what? You still can’t scry?”
“Not really,” I admitted.
She lifted one eyebrow, and I lost what was left of my self-restraint. “I think it’s important to remember all the things I can do. I really am quite gifted at a great number of things.”
She shrugged. Listlessly, she walked around my living room, looking at Oscar’s stack of detective novels—he was partial to 1950s noir—running her fingers along the backs of chairs, picking up an old music box and then setting it down in the wrong place. I fought the compulsion to follow her around and set things aright. I realized that the last time she had been here, it had been after a very trying evening, and she hadn’t seemed to take it in like she did now.
Finally she finished her tour and faced me. “The shoe box?”
“Yes, the shoe box.”
“Why are you hesitating?”
“It’s just that Aidan was wary about opening it—”
“Hold on one second. You’re saying Aidan was afraid to open it? Aidan Rhodes?”
“I wouldn’t say ‘afraid.’ More like cautious.”
“Uh-huh,” Patience said, sounding unconvinced. “So cautious that he refused to open it with you?”
“We were about to. He was going to help me—of course he was. But then—”
“You screwed up.”
“Why do you always assume the worst about me?”
“I could ask the same of you, princess.”
“Okay, all right, fine. Yes, I screwed up. We got into an argument.”
“About what?”
“That’s personal.”
“Since you’re asking for my help to open a potentially dangerous box, I’d say it’s my business.”
“We had an argument,” I said, “about Sailor.”
“What about him?”
“Aidan says our relationship weakens me.”
“Weakens you how?”
“He says it makes me vulnerable. That I need to concentrate on myself and my powers, and work with him to keep San Francisco safe. He thinks . . . I know it sounds a little strange, but Aidan thinks we’re the coincidentia oppositorum, the male and female. He says a witch like me can’t maintain my power while in a romantic relationship.”
“Aidan said that about you and Sailor? That’s kind of harsh.”
Her response surprised me. “I thought you’d agree with him.”
“I don’t understand Sailor’s fascination with you, but so what? Who am I to question the ways of the heart? I mean, he’s pretty over the moon for you—anyone can see that.” She shrugged. “I’d love to split you two up by agreeing with Aidan, but I don’t. We’re women, not nuns. Why can’t a woman fall in love and still be powerful? I don’t hear anyone saying that about men. Do you?”
“To be fair, Aidan says that’s why he’s not with anyone.”
“I don’t know, Lily—maybe he has a point. Maybe relationships do make us vulnerable—but so what? Maybe the ability to connect with others, in this world and in the next, is what makes us powerful. Have you thought about that?”
I couldn’t help but smile. Seems Patience and I shared some common ground, after all.
“How about you?” I ventured. “Is there someone special in your life?”
She snorted. “Just because I don’t buy what Aidan’s selling doesn’t mean we’re BFFs. I’m not here to share secrets of the heart over flavored coffee and biscotti. We have more important things to do.”
“Fair enough,” I said. Once upon a time, not so very long ago, Patience’s words would have stung. Not anymore. Not everyone will want to be a friend, Bronwyn had told me. If you try and fail, oh, well. Move on.
“So where’s this mysterious box of yours?” asked Patience.
I brought the shoe box out of my bedroom and set it on the coffee table. I wouldn’t make the mistake I had with Oscar, of underestimating the weight of my memories, and the power of my grief. Though I couldn’t remember much of what had happened with my father in Germany, I knew it had been traumatic.
The thought of my father in that burned-out manor house . . . it made me shiver.
Then Jamie’s words came back to me. He claimed Tristan Dupree had come to San Francisco to work with Renee. But before going to see Renee, Tristan had come here, to Aunt Cora’s Closet, to recover something from me. If Jamie was telling the truth, did Tristan’s death make me even more of an enemy to Renee? Was I her target now? Did this mean she was after the bēag? What would keep her from sending Jamie—or another one of her lackeys—to ransack my place one day when I wasn’t home, in search of the bēag Tristan had been looking for? Could her magic overcome my beefed-up protection spell?
“What’s all that?” Patience asked while I gathered my supplies in a basket, then brought them to the coffee table.
I held up a jar with a narrow spout. “These are my special salts—ordinary table salt would do for most threats, but I’m going to pull out the big guns for this box.”
“I think that’s best,” she said with a nod. “What do you need me to do?”
“Watch, don’t interfere, and follow my lead.”
I poured a thin line of salt in a circle around the box, chanting: At this place and in this time,
lock tight the doors of our minds.
Spirits who wander, spirits who keep,
do not bring our souls to weep,
guardians of the night and arts, shield the keys to our hearts.
Glancing up at Patience, who sat silently watching me, I felt a wave of self-consciousness.
“That’s how it goes,” I said, my tone defensive. “It’s a protection spell.”
“Rock on, witchy woman.”
I almost never cast in front of others. But since this was for Sailor, I repeated the chant over and over, forcing myself to focus my intent.