by Lin Stepp
An hour later, business aside, Spencer sat on the wall beside the fountain in the Mountain Laurel Village Mall. He was trying to collect his thoughts before he went into Nature’s Corner to see Zola. He wondered if Aston was right that he’d been neglecting Zola, if he hadn’t been there for her when she needed him.
An exotic dark-haired woman let herself out of Zola’s store, slamming the door behind her. Spencer found himself oddly fascinated with her gypsy dress and the way she’d painted her red lipstick around the outside of her lips as well as on them. You didn’t see that often. Her hair was dyed as black as coal and wrapped up in some kind of scarf.
She looked up, saw Spencer, and headed toward him, shaking her finger. “I’ve told her and I’ll tell you—I want Zola Devon to stay out of my business!”
Spencer must have looked confused because the woman pulled herself up straight and lifted her chin. “I am Madame Renee Dupres. I have a special inherent gifting for predicting the future and I help people with their lives.” She waved her hand in a flourish. “I’m sure you’ve heard of me. People in this area have come to me for twenty years with their problems.”
“I don’t believe we’ve met.” Spencer held out a hand. “I’m Spencer Jackson.” He wasn’t sure what else to say.
She placed her hands on her hips and leaned over until her face was nearly even with Spencer’s. “I know well enough who you are. And you’d be wise to well consider whether you want to continue a relationship with Zola Devon. She’s a woman with a confused gift.”
Spencer felt an uncomfortable prickle down his spine.
The dark-haired woman smiled at him candidly, sensing his discomfort. “I’m not a woman you should make angry, Spencer Jackson. I will be keeping you in my thoughts. You be warned.”
She swept away then before Spencer could form an answer.
He watched her walk away and then got up and went into Zola’s store. Maya and Zola were both at the counter, but no customers were in the shop at the moment.
“I just met Renee Dupres.”
Maya made a sign with her hand. “Bah! That crazy, facety woman! A botheration, half eediat and a samfi! She came in here pitching a fit and ran all our customers out. Crazy bootoo. May Jah have mercy on her. She has a dark soul and doesn’t know it.”
Spencer looked over at Zola to see her watching him carefully. “Renee threatened you, didn’t she?” Her voice was soft.
Spencer looked back on the woman’s words, trying to recall if she did. “She just seemed angry,” he said, not wanting to repeat exactly what the woman said.
Maya shook her finger in the air, obviously still annoyed. “Do you know what that woman’s real name is?” She smiled in satisfied knowing. “Mildred Renee Dupler. But she changed it to Renee Dupres to more suit the fortune-telling business. A phony and a samfi even in her name.”
Spencer grinned. He liked Maya.
“What is a samfi?” Spencer asked, enjoying Maya’s colorful Jamaican words.
“A samfi woman is a con woman,” Maya answered, grinning. “And a facety woman is a bad-mannered and nasty woman. She is that, too!”
Zola walked from behind the counter to lay a hand on Spencer’s arm. He felt an odd sense of calm come over him with the contact. “Nothing of her words will come to you, Spencer. Nothing. You pay her no mind.”
He looked at Maya. “What was she throwing a fit about in here?”
Maya put her hands on her hips. “You know that woman has been trying to draw attention to herself by saying poor Ben Lee’s daughter has been kidnapped and is being held against her will somewhere. Crazy, facety woman! She’s gotten people so upset with her nonsense that Bill Magee has had to send his officers out inquiring and looking for a kidnapper. Pah!”
Spencer leaned against the counter. “How do you know she actually hasn’t been kidnapped, Maya?”
Zola dropped her eyes.
“Hmmmph.” Maya sent Spencer a pointed look. “I thought you were a smarter man.”
Zola looked up then. “Maya, Spencer doesn’t have the confidence in my knowing that you have.”
“Well, I’m sorry for his foolishness then.” She studied Spencer. “Perhaps you are still a bootoo.”
Spencer bristled. “I’m simply trying to keep an open mind. No one really knows what happened to Seng Ryon Chen. Her disappearance has been under investigation for months and there are no factual answers.”
Maya crossed her arms. “And you’re more disposed to believe a facety, wutless, samfi woman that you are your own woman who has a good heart?”
“Zola doesn’t know what happened to Seng Ryon either, Maya.” Spencer felt annoyed over having his loyalties questioned.
Leaning over the counter, Maya said softly, “Zola says she saw for a surety that Seng Ryon has not been kidnapped and is not being held somewhere against her will. That is enough for me, Spencer Jackson. It should be enough for you.”
“Did you actually see that?” Spencer turned his attention to Zola.
She nodded. “I did.”
He considered that. “Okay. But why did you have to tell a reporter that? You didn’t have to.”
She spread her hands. “The reporter was here when the knowledge came. I was supposed to tell him.” She took a deep breath. “I didn’t know he’d make a circus of it in the paper, pitting my words against Renee’s.”
Spencer bit his tongue to keep from saying she should have expected that from the news media. However, he didn’t want to create more difficulty with Zola today. They’d had enough fights over this.
“I didn’t know all of the story,” he said, reaching for peace.
“Well, now you do,” Maya said, annoyance touching her voice. “This is not an easy time for Zola. Ben Lee came in here today, too. He gave Zola trouble, got angry and raised his voice. Foolish man.” Maya made another one of her signs in the air. “When Zola got back from Mooréa, he came in here every week insisting she should get some knowing about what happened to his girl. Now he comes in here insisting she quit saying what she knows! Eediat man!”
Zola whispered to Spencer, “That means idiot.”
“I figured that one out.” Spencer grinned.
A couple came in the door, smiling and chattering, and Spencer could see a group of tourists looking in the window, admiring the rock fountain on display.
“Maya,” he said, before things got busy. “Do you think you could handle the store if I take Zola to dinner? We’ll bring you back something.”
“Nah. You take Zola to dinner and then see she goes home.” She waved a hand dismissively. “It isn’t even her day to be working. She was here doing some inventory. Besides, she needs to come back into town tomorrow for the shower for Carole. She can come back in the store to finish inventory while Faith is working.”
Spencer noticed Zola’s face fell at mention of the shower.
Maya leaned over to touch her hand. “Are you sure it will be all right for you to go to a luncheon shower down at the Chen Palace Chinese Restaurant?”
“Of course.” Zola smiled at Maya and patted her hand.
Seeing Spencer’s confusion, Maya turned to him. “Juan Hee Chen, Seng Ryon’s husband, owns the Chen Palace. His daughter, Nina Chen, is one of Carole’s friends and she organized the shower—and of course set it at her family’s restaurant. This was long before the problem with Madame Renee began. Now I worry, with all that’s going on, that it might be a strain for Zola being there with all the Chen family tomorrow.”
“It will be fine, Maya. Don’t worry. And it’s going to be a lovely shower for Carole.”
Maya looked wistful then. “Ahhh. It’s hard to believe my little girl is getting married.” She looked at Spencer and smiled. “But Aston is a good man. They will make a good match.”
Spencer nodded in agreement.
“You two go on now.” Maya headed over to greet the customers looking around the store. “See you inna di morrow, Zolakieran.” She waved a hand at Zola in dismis
sal.
Spencer saw a smile touch Zola’s face. “See you tomorrow, too, Maya.”
Spencer opened the door for Zola as they headed out of Nature’s Corner. “What do you want to eat tonight?”
She grinned at him. “Not Chinese!”
He laughed. “What about barbeque at Bennett’s?”
“That sounds good,” she said.
Spencer took her arm as they walked across the mall courtyard, glad to be in Zola’s company again. He knew he’d been difficult lately, but there’d been a lot to come to terms with after Richmond. He hoped Zola understood.
CHAPTER 21
Zola enjoyed her dinner at Bennett’s with Spencer. He’d made an effort last night to see they had a good time, but she still felt troubled about his doubts of her knowledge related to Seng Ryon.
She sat stirring her coffee idly in her grandmother’s kitchen this morning, letting Nana’s comfortable conversation drift over her.
“Zola?” Her grandmother’s call of her name interrupted her thoughts.
“Yes, ma’am?”
Nana Etta shook her head. “I asked you a question, child, and then turned around to see you lost in woolgathering.” She sat down at the table across from Zola. “What’s on your mind, girl?”
Zola watched her grandmother begin to efficiently slice strawberries after removing their leaves and stems. Always busy hands. It was comforting and familiar to watch Nana work.
“Spencer is upset over this business with Madame Renee.” Zola snatched a freshly sliced berry before she continued. “Perhaps it’s childish, Nana, but I hoped he would believe more in my gift. I want that with a husband. It would be hard to live with someone who doubts me and dismisses me in that area.”
Nana kept to her task, listening.
Zola wrinkled her nose, thinking. “Furthermore, I’ve found it hard to understand the broody mood Spencer has fallen back into since we came back from Richmond. You’d think he would feel relieved to learn the truth about everything, be able to put the past more behind him. Be able to move on.”
She drummed her fingers on the table. “It also has hurt me that he’s shut me out of his feelings and all but avoided my company for nearly two weeks. It bothers me to think I might face times like this frequently if we marry, times when Spencer will shut himself off from me and not be willing to share his thoughts with me.”
Her grandmother looked up and caught Zola’s eye. “I notice you said if we marry, Zola. Seems to me an engaged woman shouldn’t be thinking in terms of if.”
Zola crossed her arms defensively. “Well, there have been a lot of problems lately, Nana. And it hasn’t helped anything to also experience this trouble with Madame Renee and Ben Lee right now. It’s upset Spencer.”
“It upsets me, too, child. It would upset anyone that cares for you.” Nana frowned at her. “I told you before I don’t like you getting mixed up with Madame Renee. That woman is dangerous.”
“Well, I didn’t exactly mean to get involved. That young man from the newspaper came into my store telling me about all Renee’s predictions and asking me what I thought and …”
Nana interrupted her. “And you had to go and tell him what you thought.”
Zola glared at her. “No. I had to tell him what I heard. There’s a difference. I heard very clearly right then that Renee was wrong. That her erroneous conjectures were causing Ben and his family to get up false hopes and causing the police department to be out on a wild-goose chase looking for Seng Ryon.”
“Did you see where Seng was or if she was still alive, Zola?”
Zola shook her head. “No. I didn’t get that.”
“Are you sure you were supposed to speak it when you weren’t given the rest of the understanding, child? Even those who hear from God can easily make mistakes sometimes, maybe not so much in what they hear but in whether they should tell it. Even you should realize that telling information to a newspaper reporter is asking for notoriety and instant publicity.”
Zola leaned forward to look at her grandmother intently. “It may seem foolish that I told it to a reporter, but I really believe I was supposed to, Nana.”
Nana continued slicing berries. “Well, you yourself just admitted that it might look foolish to have given such information to a reporter—so perhaps you can imagine how it must look like and feel like to Spencer. After all, the man’s not quite used to the ways of the Lord you walk in yet. He’s bound to have some difficulty coming to terms with it all.”
Zola sighed. “I might have known you would take his side.”
“Are there sides in this?” Her grandmother looked up in puzzlement. “I’m simply thinking there are different viewpoints. You can’t expect a man—or anyone, for that matter—to feel the surety you do when you get a word from the Lord like you do. After all, it’s coming up from your own spirit. Another person won’t hear the same thing unless God gives it to them as well.”
She slapped at Zola’s hand as she reached to get more berries. “Quit eating all the berries, girl—unless you slice some on your own. I’m meaning to make a strawberry pie with these today.”
Zola got up to get a knife from the kitchen drawer and rinsed a handful of fresh berries to slice up for herself.
“Have you doubted that I did the right thing, Nana?” She sat back down and began to cap the berries with her knife.
“I’ll be honest enough to say I’ve had my moments of doubt because of all the trouble that’s occurred. It’s sure stirred up a lot of ruckus and publicity. That’s not usually God’s way of doing things.”
Zola squared her shoulders. “Seems to me like the Bible has a lot of instances where trouble got stirred up.”
“Maybe.” Nana continued her work with the berries.
Zola gave up trying to argue. “I admit this has been a really difficult time. Ben Lee came in the store this week, angry and upset. That young newspaper reporter tagged along with him, enjoying every minute. He quoted Ben in the paper hollering, ‘Time will show whether you or Renee has the greatest gift.’ I hated seeing that in the newspaper, Nana.”
Nana reached over to pat her hand. “Will you be all right going to the Chen’s restaurant today, Zola, with all that’s happened?”
“It might be a little uncomfortable for me, but it would be worse if I didn’t go at all. This is Maya’s daughter, Carole, who’s getting married, Nana. The Thomas family is dear to me. That’s more important than whether I experience a little discomfort.” She stood up, knowing she needed to head back to the house to get ready for the bridal shower. “Besides, Ben won’t be there and Nina would be disappointed if I didn’t come.”
“Yes, but remember Nina’s father, Juan, Seng Ryon’s husband, will be there as will Nina’s brother Frank, his wife, Zia, and their teenage girls. They all work at the restaurant.” Nana took Zola’s hand in hers. “Promise me you’ll find a way to excuse yourself and leave early if things become difficult, girl. Don’t stay on if the situation becomes awkward or if ugliness breaks out.”
“I won’t, Nana.”
Later in the afternoon, as Zola walked out the back entrance of the Chen Palace, she found herself feeling greatly relieved that things hadn’t been awkward during the shower. The Chen family, seeming to sense her discomfort, made an effort to be especially cordial to her. The day was Carole’s, after all, and everyone wanted to be sure it proved special for her.
She heard Nina Chen’s voice behind her. “Zola, wait up.”
Zola turned around near her car in the parking lot to wait for Nina.
Nina, a pretty Asian girl with sleek, black hair, came running up to Zola, smiling. “I wanted to tell you I’m so glad you came today, Zola. All of this about Ma Ma has been so distressing. I know you only said what you felt was right when you disputed Madame Renee.”
The girl frowned. “We all felt distressed when we learned Wai Dad—that’s what we call my grandfather Ben Lee—went to that fortune-teller. It made all this unpleasantness come bac
k for us. I want you to know none of us have confidence in her words. We know she is only a woman seeking attention for herself.”
Zola gave Nina a hug. “Thanks for coming to tell me that, Nina. It means a lot. I’ve hated all this publicity for your family.”
“Well, I will let you get back to your store now—and I will get back to work myself—but I am so glad I caught you to tell you how we feel.”
Nina turned and headed toward the back door of the restaurant.
Zola stood watching her for a moment, relieved at their conversation. She saw Nina’s father—Seng Ryon’s husband, Juan—come out on the back porch to take a smoke as Nina went back inside. Zola waved at Juan, glad to learn the family didn’t foster ill will toward her.
She felt an odd tug on her leg then. Looking down in puzzlement, she could suddenly see below the pavement of the parking lot. A face drifted mistily into view. Zola clutched her heart and caught her breath raggedly as a shaft of fear shot up her spine.
“He is the one!” she heard the shadowed figure in the pavement say. Zola could see a shroudy hand point toward Juan in the doorway. “He is the one who murdered me and I want my vengeance! See that I get it. You see I get it.”
Zola felt the tug on her leg again, and thought her legs would fold up under her, she was so frightened.
Her gaze lifted to Juan’s, and she saw him scowl at her.
“Does he see it, too?” she wondered. “Does he know that I know?”
Zola feigned a smile and forced her wobbly legs to take her to her car. She got in, backed out, and started away. Looking in her car mirror, she saw that Juan had walked down from the porch to watch her car as she drove away. She saw him drop his cigarette to the ground and stub it out in irritation, an angry frown on his face.
“Oh, good heavens,” Zola said to herself, trying to calm the escalated beating of her heart. “What if he knows what I saw? Will he follow me? What in the world should I do?”
She couldn’t seem to think straight for the fear that raced through her. And her leg still felt cold and clammy where that gruesome hand had touched her.
