“I don’t know if I should be celebrating anything when Warrick?—”
Rafe’s eyes narrow on mine, and for the second time today, I’m treated to his serious face. “I don’t want you to think about that man for another moment. Yesterday, you were terrified of that test and you aced it. What do you want to do to celebrate?”
“Eat something delicious!”
“Then it’s handy that we know a purveyor of delicious things.” Rafe knits his fingers in mine and drags me across the green to Glazed and Confused. When he shows Celeste my certificate, she squeals with delight and offers me whatever I want, on the house.
We sit down at the table under the window. Rafe nurses a mug of hot chocolate. He bends over and laps at it with his tongue before noticing that I’m hiding a smirk, and switches to lifting it to his lips. He still dips his tongue into the milk. He’s been a cat so long that he struggles to remember human things.
I think of the spellbooks still hidden under the counter in the shop, and my idea of where we can look next for how to break his curse. We’ve been so distracted with the test that I haven’t been able to try my next idea. I’m determined to remedy that today.
“—we’ve only got one coat of paint to go, and then the next job on your list is to refinish the floor and to buy some furniture,” Rafe says. “I’ve found some instructions online for building a medieval-style bar, and I think that maybe with a couple of visits to the hardware store, we might be able to cobble together something fun.”
“That’s very sweet, but today we should look into your curse. I think we can?—”
“Ssssh.” He leans forward, pressing his finger to my lips. A hum reverberates from the spot right down through my body to betweenmy thighs. Rafe’s eyes dart towards the shop door, behind me. “Don’t look behind you, but there is a very upset-looking woman coming our way, and we probably shouldn’t be talking about curses when she gets here.”
I whirl around, and sure enough, stalking across the green, her stiletto pumps sinking into the grass, is Veronika Chaplin, Warrick’s executive assistant. I’ve only met her once before, when Warrick took me to London for the opening of a new toy store that stocked the hoverboards, and we’ve spoken on the phone occasionally to arrange Warrick’s schedule. Seeing her here, in her London corporate clothes with a vicious scowl on her face, is sowrong.
“I said don’t look!” Rafe’s finger slides under my chin, jerking me back toward him. “She made that face when you turned around. I think she recognises you. She’s moving with all the determination of a ginger cat after something to knock over.”
Oh, this can’t be good.
“She’s Warrick’s EA, but I don’t understand why she’s here in the village?—”
The shop bell tinkles as the storm cloud enters.
“Veronika, hi!” I wave at her as I frantically try to hide my triple-chocolate salted caramel cheesecake behind the salt shaker. Women worried about their husbands should not be ordering triple-chocolate salted caramel anything. “What are you doing here?”
“What am Idoinghere?” she shrieks, looming over me, her usually perfectly blown-out hair a mess around her head. “I’ve driven down from London because I’m worried about Warrick. I came so I can make sure that the police are doing everything they can to find him. And what do I see when I get here but his wife, the woman who’s supposed to be loyal to a fault, the one he could never wait to get home to, is eating cake with another man.”
“This is my friend, Rafe. It’s been a difficult few days, and he’s been a great support?—”
“You’re not having a difficult few days. You’relaughing. You never laugh with Warrick. How can you be sitting here with thisoverquaffed poodle when your husband is missing? And is he wearing Warrick’s shirt?”
I shrink beneath the ferocity of her vitriol. She’s right. Warrick is out there, possibly injured at the bottom of a ditch somewhere, possibly killed by some homicidal maniac. And then I make the mistake of looking across the table at Rafe.
He stares at me intently. It’s the same look he gave me when Inspector Hayes pointed out those strange charges to our joint account.
And, just like that, Iknow.
“Why do you care so much?” I ask her. “And how do you know that’s Warrick’s shirt? It’s just a plain blue shirt – only someone with intimate knowledge of Warrick’s preferred brands would recognise it.”
“What do you mean,why do I care? My boss, a brilliant businessman and an incredibly kind and generous person, has gone missing, and the police are looking in completely the wrong place, digging through his personal accounts like he’s the criminal, when all along his wife is?—”
“How do you know the police looked at our personal account?” I ask. “Unless they’ve asked you about them. Unless you’re the person my husband was buying lingerie and hotel rooms for.”
Veronika’s lips smack together.
“Did he buy you those tits, too?” I notice her chest has grown several sizes since the last time I saw her.
“That’s a cruel, disgusting thing to say!” Veronika huffed. “You’re not the woman he thought he married, the kind of woman he needs. That’s obvious.”
“I don’t think she’s here to check on the police at all,” Rafe says to me. “I think they asked her to come because she’s a suspect. Maybe she got jealous of Warrick’s dedication to you, so she has him tied up in her secret sex dungeon. She seems like the type to have a secret sex dungeon.”
“I would never hurt Warrick,” Veronika hisses, leaning across the table and swiping her finger through the cheesecake. I stare at my plate.
“I notice you’re not denying the secret sex dungeon,” Rafe says with a conspiratorial wink at her.
