“I am. Except I tried to talk to Clarice and got soundly told off.”

“By Gregoire?”

“No, by Faith. I feel as if they’re torturing her, I guess to get the best acting out of her, but this seems cruel.” Then she said exactly what he’d thought. “Although, I suppose she agreed to it, or she wouldn’t be doing it.”

“Right. You’ll work again tomorrow?”

“Yep. I can’t wear Rune’s clothes, but she said something about loaning me a few of her scarves to tie around my head and hips.” Elle slid her palms down from her breasts to her thighs. “That’ll look good on me, don’t you think?”

He was so busy staring he forgot to answer.

She laughed throatily and greeted a couple who wandered in. “Welcome to Madame Rune’s Psychic Readings and Bookshop. Can I help you find something?”

“If you’re so psychic, shouldn’t you know what we want?” The husband was irritated, feeling foolish and out of place.

“Harry!” the wife exclaimed.

“Roberta!” he mimicked.

“I can’t know when you don’t know yourself,” Elle answered sensibly and set a stool beside the display of scientific desk toys: kinetic-art asteroids, perpetual-motion swinging steel balls, a light-up plasma ball. “When the shop’s not busy, I play with these. Why don’t you do that while I speak with your wife?”

The wife explained she didn’t really believe in all this psychic stuff, and Elle showed her the glass necklaces and stone rings and slipped her a book on how to read palms, and by the time they left, the husband had acquired three of the scientific toys. “For the grandkids,” he said, although Roberta rolled her eyes at Elle.

As they left, Elle wished them a fun time at the Gothic Spring Psychic Festival, then turned to Adam. “I didn’t think he noticed her looking at the stone-winged butterflies, but he paid for it and slipped me their address, and asked if I could wrap it for their anniversary. What a nice man! Another expensive sale.”

Adam began to think Elle would do very well at Madame Rune’s. “What time do you close?”

“Six.”

Which Adam knew because he’d looked at the hours when he walked in.

“Rune said she’d come back to help me. She already showed me the back room and the safe behind the counter, in case I sold so much in cash I needed to put the bills out of sight. There’s another safe back there for the jewelry. She keeps cheaper stock out here.” Elle showed him the sliding doors beneath the wide chestlike shelf on the side walls. “Lots of storage. She’s going to show me what to lock up and I suppose stuff like lowering the blinds—did you see? She got some installed right away.”