I parked in the small lot to the rear of the bakery and entered through the back door. The kitchen was glowing with all the lights on, and the air was heavy with the scent of yeast dough rising in the oven.
Clara was already at work when I walked in.
I buttoned myself into my white chef coat, rolled the sleeves to my elbows, and wrapped an apron around my waist.
“How was your night?” Clara asked. “Glo was determined to protect you from evildoers.”
“Glo arrived with a pizza, a guard cat, and her book of spells. Diesel showed up, we ate the pizza, I kept the cat, and I’d rather not talk about the spells.”
“She didn’t turn anyone into a mushroom, did she?”
“No.”
“Then how bad can it be?”
Pretty bad, I thought, but with any luck Shirley wo
ke up all fine and dandy this morning, wondering if she’d hallucinated the whole hideous episode.
Two hours later, there was no sign of Glo. Clara turned the CLOSED sign to OPEN and unlocked the front door.
“I’ll work the counter,” Clara said. “You can finish frosting the cupcakes.”
“Did you try calling Glo?”
“Yes. No answer.”
“She left her car at my house last night. I offered to pick her up when I came to work, but she said it was too early, and she’d catch a ride with her landlord.”
“It’s a real pain when she comes in late,” Clara said, “but at least it’s usually entertaining.”
Glo bustled into the bakery a little before nine o’clock and dropped her tote on the back counter.
“Sorry I’m late,” she said. “I missed my ride with Stanley, so I thought no biggie, I’ll just conjure up a spell and pop myself over to the bakery.”
Clara and I stopped working and looked over at Glo.
“And?” Clara said.
Glo was wearing a black leather bomber jacket, a black, stretchy T-shirt, skinny black jeans, black Converse sneakers, and a long red scarf. She unwrapped her scarf and tossed it onto her tote.
“The spell seemed easy enough,” Glo said. “It wasn’t like I needed testicles of snarf or something. I mean, it was a simple spell. And I’m sure I repeated it perfectly. I don’t know what went wrong.”
“Something went wrong?” Clara asked, looking like she didn’t want to hear the answer.
“I was supposed to fly, but I couldn’t get up in the air and moving. I think at one point I might have gotten off the ground a little, but that was it. Honestly, it was so annoying. I finally had to come to work on my bicycle.”
Clara and I did simultaneous eye rolls.
“Maybe you weren’t using the right broom,” Clara said.
Glo’s eyes went big and round. “I wasn’t using a broom at all. Do you think that could be it? The book didn’t say anything about a broom.”
Clara pulled on a disposable glove and rearranged a bread display. “Everyone knows a witch needs a broom to fly.”
“Yes, but I might not be a witch. Do you think that would make a difference? Diesel said I was a Questionable. And he said Lizzy is an Unmentionable.”
Clara looked over at me. “Is that true?”