Chapter Four #3
“There’s no way a crystal grid can do a tenth of what I had planned.
” C3 might be able to keep thieves out, but the nuance of doing that while attracting the right customers requires more than setting up crystals in a particular order.
I pull out my phone to check the business bank account, and my chest squeezes tight.
Our cash is low, and the credit card is nearly maxed out.
I swipe into my other banking app, where I keep my personal accounts.
Bailing us out of this canceled contract is going to hurt. I don’t have many months of this left in me. Especially with our rent going up in January.
“What if we add a retail area?” Deanna suggests, not for the first time.
“I’d rather sell my kidneys.”
She sighs, fingernails tapping against the desk. “Okay then, what about increasing our online footprint. Or offering classes. You’d be good at teaching the fundamentals of magical experimentation.”
It’s not a bad idea, but it would draw attention from NACOW. So far, I’ve kept the business low profile enough that they leave us alone. Teaching other witches to buck tradition might force my mother to acknowledge my existence for the first time in five years, something I’d like to avoid.
Not that she’d personally deal with me. She has people for that.
There’s also a hurt, stubborn part of me that doesn’t want to admit defeat. “I don’t want to teach. I want this business to work the way it used to. I want to be out in the field, solving problems for people that no one else can handle.”
In our glory days, I spent all my time hopping from job to job, developing unique uses of magic. Every day was different. I felt needed and useful. I woke up excited to get to the office because I knew that I was doing the work I was put on this earth to do, even if it had cost me my entire family.
And now it’s all going up in flames.
Disappointment squeezes my chest in a painful, aching grip.
The injustice of it all settles around me like a film of stagnant energy, sticky and tacky and altogether unpleasant.
I worked so hard for this. I did everything right.
Screwing things up when I worked at NACOW was one thing.
My mother forced that job on me. I was never going to excel there.
But this? I built this business to cater to my strengths.
I’m not supposed to fail at what I’m good at.
I’m not supposed to fail when I work this hard.
Eriksons don’t let things slip, Perpetua.
My mother’s words echo in my head, surfacing one of our tenser arguments. I’d fucked up the logistics for an important NACOW ceremony while she was out of town. She cut her trip short to ensure I knew how deeply I’d disappointed her.
And then she had my father burn the grimoire full of new magic I’d invented. The grimoire I’d managed to hide for years, until I messed up so bad that my parents tore apart my room to find evidence of my failures. Years of work turned to ash in seconds.
“Pippa?” Dea’s voice draws me back to the moment, where memories of my mother’s harsh words—where my old name, Perpetua Ainsley Erikson—can’t reach me. “Do I need to start looking for a new job?”
Belonging to this family is a privilege. Not a right.
I push the past away, lock it inside the deadened corner of my heart.
“Of course not. We’ll figure this out. I will figure this out.
” Fresh worry claws its way forward. I won’t let Deanna worry.
I can’t lose her, too. “I promise, Dea. Your job is safe. Every business has ups and downs. We’ll hit an upswing again soon. ”
I sound so confident, even I almost believe it.
“Look, I’ll call Zack and see if I can get him to change his mind.
He chose us for a reason. I’ll remind him of all the facets of the service we would provide.
C3 can’t possibly offer the same.” I reach across the desk and pick up her empty granola bar wrapper.
“And then we’ll order a proper lunch and put our heads together.
There has to be something we’re missing. ”
Dea offers a half-hearted tilt of her lips, but before she can say anything, the bells above the door chime.
It’s a different tone, this one indicating an impending visitor.
That’s the other bit of magic infused in those bells.
They can pick up on the intention to enter a few seconds before the client reaches the door.
I grin. “See? New clients are already on their way in.” The bells ring again, this time announcing the actual arrival of said client. I plaster on my best customer service smile, genuinely glad to see foot traffic in here.
“Good afternoon,” I say as I turn to face the door. I’m distracted by jeans hugging snug to full hips. The brush of loose strawberry blond hair along collarbones. A too-big cashmere sweater that I swear I’ve seen on Xander before. I have to blink twice to make sure I’m not hallucinating. “Elle?”
Xander’s business partner stands on the welcome mat, tugging at the ends of her sleeves. “I was hoping we could talk.”