Free The Gilly Salt Sisters by Tiffany Baker Page B

irritation the day after she and Whit returned from their honeymoon. Claire had woken happy that morning, stretching luxuriously in her marriage bed with its satin coverlet and lace pillowcases, and then she’d dressed and marched down Plover Hill and over to Herman Upton’s little store.
    “Hello, Claire-Bear,” he chimed as she stepped through the door, and then he blushed when he saw the heavy, familiar rings on her left hand—Ida’s rings. “Goodness, it’s… it’s just so hard to believe you’re all grown now,” he stammered, fiddling with his collar. “How was the honeymoon?”
    “Lovely,” Claire said, and simpered a smile. “I’m here to open an account.”
    Mr. Upton’s face brightened, and he bent down to retrieve his ledger. “Of course.” He laid the book on the counter. “Mrs. Turner—that is, Ida—had one, too, when she was still with us. Why don’t we just replace your name for hers?”
    Claire frowned. “I’d like my own, thank you very much.”
    Mr. Upton paused and examined her over the tops of his glasses. For a moment his eyes looked almost sorry, Claire thought, and then he got busy flipping pages. “Of course you would,” he said. “But naturally.”
    It was cold in the store, so Claire folded her arms close into herself and looked at the selection on the shelves. Everywhere around her were all the goods she’d grown up consuming. Boxedpotatoes. Canned chili when they could splurge on it. The soap flakes that Mama used for both laundry and dishes. And, of course, sacks of her family’s salt, huddled front and center of the store like a row of impertinent beggars. Claire scowled.
    “Just sign here,” Mr. Upton said, pointing to a blank spot at the bottom of the page. “Shall we send the bills on over to Whit?”
    “Yes, that will be fine.” Claire scribbled her new signature, her hand still unsure with the crosses and lines of her married name. Once again she was aware of Mr. Upton’s eyes examining the rings on her left hand. The diamonds looked too big on her, she knew, a nineteen-year-old local girl. She sniffed and hid her left hand, pointing at the shelf in the front of the store with her right one.
    “If you only knew what was really in that stuff,” she said, her mind spinning out the words just a beat ahead of her mouth, “you’d never put it up in front of your shop like that.”
    Mr. Upton turned a shade paler and looked nervous. He’d never really gotten comfortable with the salt, only accustomed to it. “What do you mean?” he asked, and swallowed hard.
    Claire played with the end of her long red braid. She might have been a married woman, but she still had the hairstyle of a schoolgirl. The effect must have been unsettling for Mr. Upton, who’d known her since her birth, and she was perfectly aware of that. She fluttered her eyelashes. “I never said anything until now, but let’s just say I’ve seen that salt eat right through metal over the course of a season. I’d hate to think”—and here she gave an artful little shudder—“what all might be leaching into the dirt on Salt Creek Farm. You’ve seen the piles of junk out there, not to mention the family graves.” Claire pointed at the bags, leaned forward, and lowered her voice. “What do you suppose makes my brother’s salt turn bloodred?”
    Mr. Upton’s eyes followed her finger to the bags. “But… but,” he stammered, “they need to be there. You know that.”
    Claire smiled and fiddled with her ring. “Do they? It seems like you might want to use that spot for other items, more expensive ones, for instance. Now that I’m a Turner, I bet I’ll be spendingmore money than practically anyone in this store. It seems like you’d want to make your best customer happy.”
    She watched poor Herman Upton pale, then tremble, then finally concede, his narrow shoulders slumping as he walked to the shelf and started taking down the little burlap sacks. He held each one cradled in his