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“I got Clover to hack their schedules,” Jewels added. She checked the pocket watch she wore on a gold necklace—a lot of vintage eye candy today. Creepy dolls excluded. “She gets off at three.”
“What time is it now?” Sabrine asked her.
“Quarter after.”
Travis stared at the building. “Hopefully they’re not taking forever because they’re waiting for cops.” He wouldn’t doubt it. Tamika had only been involved with them once, when she’d shown up at Hell’s Gate with info about Spirit Terra. It was possible that she regretted getting involved with them and had resorted to calling the emergency number.
Another five minutes passed before the front door opened. Three female employees emerged wearing scrubs; the one in mint-green was Tamika. Her sleek, dark hair was tied up in a ponytail, glasses on. Darien was right; this witch would look really good on Tanner’s arm. Too bad neither of them seemed to want anything to do with each other. Atlas was stubborn like that, though; he was married more to his job than any of them.
The other two employees spotted their group first and started whispering as Tamika locked up. One of them reached into her bag—probably for pepper spray or a cell phone.
Travis heard the one lady mutter the names ‘Darien Cassel’ and ‘Travis Devlin’. It seemed she couldn’t figure out who he was.
Did they really look that much alike? Darien was bigger than him and had darker hair, but he supposed their features and eye color were close enough to make telling them apart a challenge. Travis’s hair had grown out a bit too; it was closer to Darien’s length now, and he’d recently got the back and sides faded. He highly doubted a haircut made that much of a difference, though.
Tamika dropped her keys into her small handbag and evaluated their group from across the lot. She whispered to her panicked employees, “Don’t call anyone. They just want to talk to me.”
“You?” one of them hissed. “Why?”
“Tamika!” the other begged. She looked like she might faint.
“It’s fine,” Tamika said. “I’ll see you both at work tomorrow.” She started heading this way, the other two drifting toward their cars.
“Yes, tomorrow!” one of them called. “We’ll make sure you’re here for your shift!”
Tamika cupped a hand to her brow and rolled her eyes.
She stopped several feet away, both hands moving to grasp the strap of her bag. “Why are you here?” Her eyes flicked about the parking lot that was now empty aside from them and their cars. A third that Travis figured must belong to Tamika sat in the corner of the lot.
Sabrine took the history book out of her book bag that was constantly strapped to her body like an extra limb. “Any particular reason why you shelved this in the wrong section?”
Travis added, “And why you loaned it at all.”
Her eyes flicked about the parking lot. She pushed the eyeglasses that were sliding down her small nose back up. “Follow me.” She took out her car keys and made for her vehicle.
Tamika Isley lived in the Victoria Amazonica District in a mansion nearly as big as Hell’s Gate.
Travis was surprised by this. He hadn’t expected someone so well-off to work at a tiny, humble business like Angelthene Optometry.
After parking their vehicles in the long driveway, Tamika brought them inside and gave them a tour of the ground floor. There were a lot of polished wood accents in here, a lot of marble-and-gold statues that looked like they’d cost almost as much as the house.
“Do you live here by yourself?” Travis asked as they followed her into a study. Sunlight brightened up the patterned rug, the behemoth of a desk, and the collection of brown leather furniture by the window.
“I live with my mother and our butler, Harold.”
Travis shared a look with Lace and tipped up an eyebrow. “I’ve always wanted to get me one of those.”
She smirked. “Hire Arthur.”
“He’d be good at it.”
One whole wall in the study was covered with a glass display case of spectacles, some of the frames so old they looked like they might crumble to dust.
Logan drifted toward the display case, his size dwarfing it. “You really like your job, hey?”
“I love my job,” Tamika said. “I don’t usually tell people this, because it sounds a bit pompous, but I don’t have to work. My dad left me with a large enough fortune, but the years go down better if I have something worthwhile to spend my time on.” Emotion flickered in her eyes as she studied the display case. “That’s my dad’s collection. Some of those are very rare.”
“What are the red ones for?” Jewels asked, pointing a pale hand at the gold frames with red lenses.
