“I’ll take it for what you paid.”
“I’m not in the business of breaking even.”
“I’mnot in the business of going into debt.”
“This isn’t even my business,” Max concluded, throwing his hands up and leaving Beth. He paused at my side to take the petty cash I retrieved from my shoulder bag, then went to fill the antique brass register for the day.
“It’s not like it’s a first edition ofAlice,” Beth tried. “Take what you can get.”
“I can get two thousand,” I answered. “It comes with an original game card and two of the nine counter pieces.”
“Fifteen.”
“Two thousand.”
“Seventeen.”
“I’m about to make a comment regarding your age and your hearing,” I warned.
“I wish Mom and Dad would stop fighting,” Max mock cried from the counter.
“Stay out of this,” I said over my shoulder.
“Suck-up,” Beth called.
“Working here has to be against some kind of labor law,” Max grumbled, just loud enough to be heard.
“Sebby—”
The shop phone rang and I waved at Beth. I turned toward the steps, walked up to the elevated counter, and grabbed the trash bin from beneath, as well as the cordless phone from beside Max’s elbow. A copy ofThe City’s morning edition lay headline up—“Ouija Killer Ups the Ante!”—and the coffee in my gut churned uncomfortably. I walked back to Beth, gave her the bin, and said, “File a complaint here and I’ll have my secretary look at it.”
“You’re such a little—”
“Snow’s Antique Emporium,” I answered.
“—Shit,” Beth finished. She huffed, clutched the bin to her chest, and took it for a walk around the showroom.
“Sebastian, is that you?” asked a warm and smooth, familiar voice. “It’s Chris Manzi.”
“Good morning,” I said as I walked to the stairs closest to the office, peered around the counter, and confirmed the haunted King Charles spaniels were still packed and waiting for eventual transport. “How are you? I’m afraid I haven’t been able to look into that teapoy yet—”
“There’s no rush when I’m only indulging myself.”
“Is there something else I can help you with?”
“It’s those mutts I bought for Cynthia. I made the mistake of mentioning them and now she’secstatic.”
“That’s good, right?”
“Yes, but she wants them in place for some costume party she’s hosting tonight,” Chris continued, his tone easy, tolerant, like price would never be an obstacle when it came to guaranteeing his young wife’s happiness. “Do you think you can have them delivered this morning? I’d pick them up myself, but I have a stockholders’ meeting in twenty and I expect that nightmare to take the better part of a day.”
“I don’t think they’d fit in your Mercedes, anyway, Chris.”
He hummed under his breath and added, “Have your moving company charge my card for any expedited fees incurred.”
I glanced at the statues that’d been swathed in so much Bubble Wrap, tissue paper, and foam padding that they didn’t even resemble the general shape of a dog anymore. “I’m not—I mean, those companies usually book a few days to a week out, but I’ll ask if they have any availability.”
“The last thing I want to incur is Cynthia’s wrath,” Chris continued, like my suggestion that moving the antiques today might not be possible had simply gone unheard. “I swear she’s got something to prove with this party—as if impressing twenty pill-popping, Birkin-bag-toting mommies from the Upper East Side is worth her energy whenwedon’t even have children!But…”—and he drew that conjunction out with a weary sigh—“if this event is what’ll make her happy, I just hand over my credit card and let her do as she pleases. And I know Cynthia’s anxieties all too well. She’ll be convinced that every perceived failure of the night is because those porcelain dogs didn’t get to the house in time to beoohed andaahed at, despite her not having even known about them until last night when we were dining at Jean-Christophe.”
