“And you made it into something for her, didn’t you?” Halcyon asked.

Ms. Kitty grinned. “No. I had it made into a tie tack and gave it to him.”

Marina and Halcyon burst out laughing and couldn’t stop, even when Stewart came to see what was going on. He took one look at them and retreated back into his cubbyhole. The saleswoman had been laughing as hard as they were, so he’d probably decided it was a woman thing and he didn’t want to know about it.

“I want to be you when I grow up,” Halcyon said.

Ms. Kitty shook her head. “If you want to be me, you can’t do responsible things, like grow up.”

Ms. Kitty patted Marina’s hand. “You hang in there. Any time you need to let your hair down, you come to Ms. Kitty’s. Booze is on me. I got all kinds of things in my bar that will take your mind off your troubles.”

She looked over at the saleswoman as she rose. “I’m going to go run a few errands and I’ll be back in about an hour.”

“Still want to be her,” Halcyon said as Ms. Kitty walked out.

“She is supercool,” Marina agreed.

Stewart came out of his office and over to where they sat.

“The gold on the bands is good quality,” he said. “And the diamonds are better than average, but none are huge. I would appraise the entire lot at about seven thousand. I can write up separate appraisals if you need them for insurance purposes.”

“And if we wanted to sell them?” Halcyon asked.

He shook his head. “I’m afraid I couldn’t do better than five thousand. And that’s more than you’ll get anywhere else because I’ll turn them into more up-to-date pieces. Others will have to sell them as-is and the designs are somewhat dated.”

Halcyon looked over at Marina, who nodded. Five thousand was more than they had when they’d walked in the shop.

“We’ll take it,” Halcyon said.

Dottie didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow when she saw Marina and Halcyon standing at her doorstep. Halcyon might want to be Ms. Kitty someday, but Marina really hoped she could be Dottie. The regal woman never appeared to be ruffled by anything. Not in appearance or in action. It must be awesome to exist in that state of calm. Either that, or Dottie was the best actress that had ever walked the face of the earth.

“Ladies,” Dottie said. “What a pleasant surprise. Please come in. I just made a pitcher of sweet tea and homemade chocolate chip cookies.”

“Did you know we were coming?” Halcyon asked.

Dottie laughed. “Of course not. How could I?”

“So you brew tea and bake cookies on the regular?” Halcyon asked.

“I’m old and Southern,” Dottie said. “It’s what we do.”

“That clinches it,” Halcyon said. “I’m not getting old.”

“No one visits you except me,” Marina said. “I think you’re safe.”

Halcyon did a fist pump. “Loophole!”