Clock and Dagger (4 page)

I'd always loved walking into the shop. We hadn't had to do much work—it was already perfect, with beautiful oak-and-glass cases creating the customer counter. There was shelving that had acted as a wall to the back of the shop, with a gap in the center to allow someone to come from the back to the front when a customer came in. As part of the renovation, we took the back off the shelves, allowing for a peek into the workroom. We'd also taken down the wall to the right, opening up the tiny side space as a showroom. The shop was still tiny, cramped, and overflowing with clocks, but a new paint job, better lighting, and reupholstered chairs scattered about for customers to sit on made it more welcoming. It was perfect.

For tonight, Pat had created a screen that blocked both the shelves and the showroom area. We'd open them for the grand opening next week. We were going to use the front counter for food, drinks, and displays about the other shops. The side showroom featured some of our stock, all beautiful, but nothing too precious. I worried about some of our more expensive pieces being knocked off the wall or tipped over by exuberant visitors. Of course, that was if people showed up.

I looked over at one of the clocks. One minute to the hour. That's why Pat wanted me to come downstairs. This was a dress rehearsal for tonight.

I glanced over at Pat, who had come in and closed the door behind him. He looked as nervous as I felt. I held my breath as the minute hand clicked over. A cacophony of bells and chimes began to fill the space. I could tell that they weren't all in sync, and I made a mental note to move up the minute hand on the grandfather to the left of the door. Still, it was wonderful.

“That will knock their socks off, don't you think?” Pat asked.

“I do. Or scare them to death. Do you think we should hold off until the grand opening?”

“Nah. Let's give them a preview of the big show. For the opening we'll have a few more ready to go. Plus, folks will be able to see them all.”

“I hope I remember to shut off a few of these chimes before I go upstairs tonight.”

“I'm putting one of those sticky tabs on the doors of each one with a chime, so they'll be easy enough to shut off. Bezel doesn't love them, does she?”

“She really doesn't, poor thing. She shoots under the couch and hunkers down the instant the first chime rings
out. But the new door upstairs is a pretty good sound barrier. So, Pat, what do you think? Will Kim Gray show up tonight? Is Beckett Green trying to put me out of business?”

“It's like a soap opera around here,” Pat said, delicately sticking a little pink tab to a clock with his big, rough hand. “Of course Kim Gray will show up. I hope it's on the hour, so she can hear the chimes. It will help make the case for the clock tower, don't you think?”

“How so?”

“The chimes make you feel alive. You practically glow from the inside when they go off. They'll work on Kim Gray. Imagine if we can fill up Orchard with that sound?”

“Imagine that. I think you want this to happen as much as I do.”

“Maybe more,” Pat said. “Your grandfather talked about it for years. This last year, I'd begun to imagine how it would feel to work on it. Lost hope for a while, but you've brought it back. This will happen. We need to help Kim Gray see the light.”

“Or hear the bells,” I said.

•   •   •

“W
ho else is here?” I asked Pat. We were doing one more walk-through of the shop, trying to make sure everything was being shown off to its best potential.

“Nadia and Mark are going to put the watches in the front case, so folks can see them tonight,” Pat said, explaining what the two of them were doing, huddled in the side room surrounded by boxes. It looked to me like they were holding hands.

“I thought she was heading home to get dressed,” I said, half to myself.

“She went and picked up her clothes, and Tuck's. They're going to get dressed over at Ben's.”

“Pat, you are a fount of knowledge, you know that?”

“No, I'm in the business of keeping the peace. Moira was looking for Tuck earlier, needed him for something or another. It threw off Nadia's schedule for the evening, so we all had to come up with a plan.”

Pat and I were moving one of the mantel clocks to a safer space, away from where we were planning on putting the food. It was a beautiful old piece, hand painted to look like marble, with gold columns along the front. It was in terrible shape when it came to us as part of a collection. Not only was it not running, it had obviously not been tended to for years. I'd been working on it for a while, and I finally had it running up to my standards. Moving it was a risk, but it was a good test. I looked at it carefully and checked the time against other clocks in the area. I'd make sure it was still keeping time tonight, poor old thing. I couldn't sell it if it wasn't working well. Even if I was tempted to keep it, I'd need to get it running. That was the part of my work I really loved—bringing old pieces back to their former glory. I grabbed a rag and brushed out the smudges we'd added to the veneer.

I heard a tapping sound coming from the front of the shop. “Is there someone at the front door?” I asked as we put the clock down carefully and slid it toward the back of the countertop. I went over and peered through the blinds, feeling a grin split my face as I saw Ben standing on the front stoop.

“I found three bags of candy on the floor of the backseat. Since I didn't buy them, I thought they must be yours.”

“Thanks, Ben. That's my just-in-case stash.”

“‘Just-in-case stash?'”

“My grandmother always had one. Some candy or nibbles she could put out just in case food was running low. The thought of completely running out of food was too horrible to imagine.”

“There's fifteen pounds of chocolate here. That's quite a stash.”

“Holiday candy, on sale but still seasonal. And you're right, I'm sure we'll do a fine job here in the shop if we don't open this up during the next week.”

“Ben, you just missed the show!” Pat said.

“The show?” Ben said, coming into the shop and putting the candy on the countertop.

“I don't want to ruin the surprise, but let me say this. Be here on the hour at some point tonight. You won't be sorry.”

Ben smiled. “Mark and I have a surprise tonight too.”

“You and Mark? Really?” I asked.

“Yeah. Mark and I cooked it up last week while we were painting the red wall in the showroom for the twentieth time.”

“Don't exaggerate. It only took five coats,” I said.

“‘Only five coats,' she says. Pat, it seemed like twenty coats, didn't it?”

“Ruth had a specific color in mind. That takes some work. You've got to admit, that accent wall looks terrific. Makes the clocks really pop.”

“Thank you, Pat,” I said. “Anyway, while you were painting you hatched a plan?”

“A secret plan. To take place right after the open house, right before Caroline's party.”

“You're not going to tell me anything, are you, Ben?” I said, squinting at him accusingly.

“It's a secret, Ruth. You're not good with secrets, are
you?” Ben and Pat both laughed, and I pretended to. But he was right—I wasn't good with secrets. I could say that the switch had happened when I discovered my ex-husband was having an affair, but that would be a big lie. I'd never liked secrets and had always done everything I could to uncover them. No matter what the cost.

“By the way, Moira brought the cake over,” Ben said. “I put it in the shampoo area of my shop—right where we usually put towels, so if Caroline goes by to get something, it isn't in plain sight.”

“Great, I'll go over and get it before the birthday party,” I said.

“Does Caroline have any idea about the party yet? Between Nancy and Flo, it is hard to keep a secret like that,” Ben said.

“So far she has no idea,” I said. “She probably wouldn't come if she did. She thinks we're gathering to unveil the new website. Which we are, sort of.”

“I'm really looking forward to that,” Ben said. “I'm amazed at how much material you've all been working on for the new site. Makes my static page with directions and hours seem pitiful, and I haven't even seen the finished product.”

“Still not sure why you needed me to do those videos,” Pat said. “Can't see how seeing my old face is going to help us sell clocks.”

“Nadia thought they would help with some of our marketing efforts. I'll admit, I was skeptical, but they are really terrific. Tuck did a great job with the editing. I wish Mark and Caroline would have agreed to do a couple of them.”

“Some folks are camera shy,” Pat said.

“So, what are these videos?” Ben asked.

“Short videos on some of the clocks, or how to wind a grandfather, or naming the different parts of a clock. We're going to rotate them out on the site, and I'm hoping it will be something to drive traffic.”

“So no videos of Pat tap-dancing around the shop?” Ben said, nudging the older man with his elbow.

“You heard Ruth. We're trying to drive people to the shop, not away from it.” He turned toward me and smiled. “You sound like a marketing expert,” he said. “Nadia's rubbing off on you.”

“I'm becoming one. Being a small business owner is a huge learning curve for me. Sometimes I wish I could just fix clocks, but I really have to sell some of them too.”

“Lots of them, actually, to pay for all of this,” Pat said, gesturing around the shop. It was hard to see with all of the curtains masking the back of the shop. I could easily have skipped the cosmetics down here, left the back closed off, the floors scuffed, and the woodwork worn down. But if not now, when? I needed to make the upstairs habitable, and doing all the work at once made sense. Sure, my bank account was pretty anemic. But it was all going to pay off. It had to.

“Pat, if I didn't have you, all of you, to help me, I never could have pulled this off. Look at what you did in a few weeks. It's amazing. I can't wait to show it off to the world.”

•   •   •

P
at and Ben left together, and I locked the door behind them. I grabbed the three bags of candy off the counter. I needed to hide them in plain sight and not in my apartment, or fifteen pounds of candy would be fourteen in no time. Chocolate was my downfall.

I walked through the curtains to the back of the shop. This area was, perhaps, the least changed. My grandfather's presence was still omnipresent, and I wouldn't do a thing to change that. Not for anything. I stepped to the right, planning on putting the candy in one of the cubbies where we kept the work that was ready for customer pickup. I had a lot of choices for where to stash the stash. That had to change.

As I turned the corner, I caught another glimpse of Mark Pine and Nadia Wint, still bent over a piece of paper, arms touching. They didn't hear me come in, and I was tempted to back away rather than interrupt this intimate moment. Mark Pine personified shy, at least with me. Obviously, Nadia had a different effect on him. I couldn't help but wonder what her boyfriend, Tuck, would think.

A part of me would be fine with Nadia and Mark being a couple. Tuck and I didn't really hit it off. His hipster disdain for me was palatable. It wasn't only for me, though. He was too cool to show enthusiasm for much, including, in my opinion, Nadia. His work was good, and he was fairly reliable. Still, he made me feel like I was missing a joke. I didn't like the feeling.

As an employer looking at a week of business openings, this love triangle, if that's what it was, would be way too much of a distraction. Adding drama to an already tense week—not good for my stress level. I had a lot riding on those three people. I hated that I was worried about Tuck being able to take photos tonight, about the website work Nadia still needed to finish before we went live, about Mark's focus on the jobs he'd taken on. Hopefully, the romantic drama wouldn't interfere.

One of the bags of chocolate slipped from my arms and
smacked onto the hardwood. Nadia and Mark jumped apart. Mark had the good grace to blush as he pushed the papers they were looking at back in the folder. Nadia looked annoyed, but she always looked a little annoyed. I wanted to wipe off Nadia's dark eyeliner, pull her hair back from her face, and tell her to smile. But I held off.

“Whoops,” I said, plastering a smile on my face as I scooped up the bag. Nadia shot me a look that could fry ice, but I ignored it. “Hey, just so you both know, this chocolate is in case we run out of food tonight.”

“You're kidding me, right? We have, like, ten dozen clock cookies.”

“I know.” Boy, did I know. Caroline and I had spent the last week rolling them out, frosting them, and then using a stencil to dust them with a shimmery clock face. Last night we'd had a bagging party—putting each cookie in a cellophane bag, tying it with ribbon, and attaching a Cog & Sprocket card to the bag. My fingers still ached from curling ribbon.

“Do you really think we'll have that many people come by tonight?” Mark asked.

“I have no idea. I'd love to think so. Otherwise, we'll be eating cookies for days.”

“We're all over social media,” Nadia said. “I posted a picture of the cookies. Having food will definitely help get folks to come by. Otherwise, and don't take this the wrong way, getting people to party at a clock shop might be a hard sell. This is a great opportunity to get some fun video and pictures and let people know the party starts here. No need to freak out.”

“Okay, I won't panic. Until I'm eating clock cookies for the next month.”

Nadia laughed and looked shocked at the sound. “We
need to get a group shot tonight. Maybe at Caroline's party afterward?”

“Sounds like a plan. Now, I think I'm going to go up and get dressed. Unless you need me down here?”