Witchslapped in Westerham

by Dionne Lister

  She wrapped her hand around my upper arm. “Is she okay? When did this happen?”

  “About fifteen minutes ago. I’ve texted James, but he hasn’t answered. Beren went with them, but I didn’t want to bother him in case he was healing her. I don’t know if they haven’t answered me because they hate me or if they’re still figuring out what’s wrong with Millicent.”

  She hugged me. “Oh, honey. I’m so sorry.” She released me, and her forehead scrunched. “But why would they hate you? No one hates you.”

  I told her about Dana’s threats the other day, and then about everything that happened at the meeting. Her eyes got wider as I told her the story; then her mouth dropped open. By the time I finished, her jaw was clenched, and anger leeched from her like petrol fumes ready to ignite.

  “I mean, I know I shouldn’t have goaded her like that, but, argh… I’m so bad at stopping myself. Now Millicent could lose the baby because I’m such an idiot.”

  She shook her head. “No freaking way. It is not your fault. She’s a psychopath. She’s the one who hurt Millicent, not you. If everyone wasn’t under her influence, they’d totally be on your side. We have to figure out a way to expose what she’s doing. From what you’ve told me, and the things I’ve been learning from the secret PIB part of the police-training course, what she’s doing is illegal. She’ll go to jail. Angelica is going to be ropeable when she finds out.”

  “If she finds out.” I couldn’t help thinking things were going to get worse before they got better, but Liv had a point. Angelica wouldn’t take too kindly to being made a fool of. “Using a talent can be done quietly, as in, other witches don’t notice anything. I have no idea how to prove anything.” My shoulders slumped. “What am I doing, going against her? Am I crazy?”

  “It’s true that it seems unbelievable that Dana would dare tamper with Angelica’s mind, but Angelica’s always had your back, so has Beren, and your brother and Millicent love you. Even stupid Will cares about you—”

  I opened my mouth to dispute Will giving a crap, but Liv put her hand against my lips.

  “I don’t know what’s going on with him, but he cares. Maybe there’s another reason he’s acting the way he is. Have you ever thought of that?”

  Of course I’d hoped there was another reason, but I figured it was wishful thinking. I shrugged. “But what?”

  “We’re just going to have to find out. I’m here for you, Lil. We’ll sort out this mess together, and we’ll figure out what’s going on in Westerham. By the time we’re finished with Witchface, she’ll regret ever meeting you.” Olivia’s grin promised that Piranha was going to pay, big time.

  “You’re the best friend ever. Thanks, Liv.” I gave her a hug.

  “I know.” She snickered. “So, why don’t we get started?”

  I smiled. “Yes, let’s.”

  Chapter 4

  Now that we were trying to solve this together, Olivia was keener on asking her mum about her friend. She managed to get the lady’s number only after promising not to tell her exactly what her mother had done. She agreed to only say that her mother had been unwell. Although, if this woman was the normal tight-lipped English person, she might not want to talk to us about her experience. But we wouldn’t pry too much. We just needed to confirm she hadn’t been herself, and then we could check out the teahouse.

  Thankfully, she agreed to meet with us. Her house was a cute semi-detached brick cottage of two stories with white sash windows and a sloping red-tiled roof. There was no driveway, so we parked on the street. As we reached her front door, barking erupted from inside.

  “Maggie, Molly, hush.” The door opened. A tall, thin woman who must have been in her fifties stood holding one white Maltese terrier in each arm. Her brown hair was tied back in a loose ponytail, and she wore faded blue jeans and a white short-sleeved shirt. “Olivia, darling!” She smiled. “It’s so good to see you. It’s been too long. You look wonderful.”

  Olivia smiled. “Thanks, Mrs Fleming.”

  “Oh, call me Joan. You’re too old to be calling me Mrs Fleming. Please come in.” She stepped aside.

  “Old habits die hard.” Olivia smiled and went in before me. When I crossed the threshold, she said, “This is my friend, Lily.”

  I smiled at Mrs Fleming. “Lovely to meet you, Mrs Fleming. Thank you so much for agreeing to talk to us about yesterday.”

  Her smile faded. She shut the door and walked down the hallway and into a low-ceilinged living room. Well, I’d certainly killed the friendly mood. Unfortunately, there was no way to skirt around why we were there. What if she changed her mind about opening up to us?

  “Please sit down.” She indicated a cream leather three-seat couch. “Can I get either of you a cup of tea or something else to drink?”

  Olivia’s smile was gentle. “No, we’re fine, thanks. If you want to grab something, we’ll wait.”

  “No, that’s okay. I suppose we’d best get this over with.” She sat in the single-seat plush chair that matched the couch and shifted both dogs into her lap. “What would you like to know?”

  I was going to let Olivia start this off—Mrs Fleming obviously felt more comfortable talking to her. “I know you had morning tea with Mum two days ago. She was rather… unwell that afternoon, and I was wondering if maybe you hadn’t felt yourself either?”

  Mrs Fleming rested both hands on the dogs’ backs and massaged them. “In what way?”

  I held in a sigh. This was going to be harder than I thought. I looked at Olivia, seeking direction. She knew this woman—I didn’t. Olivia gave me a nod, which I interpreted as a “you can talk.”

  “Well, Mrs Fleming—”

  “Please call me Joan, Lily. We’re informal around here.” She tittered what must be her nervous laugh.

  “Have you watched the local news over the last couple of days?” Asking a question was a more subtle way to get to the point without having to ask something direct and confronting.

  “Yes. It’s been horrible. I haven’t left the house since that afternoon. Everyone’s going crazy. It’s just not safe anymore.”

  “We”—I glanced at Olivia, then back to Joan—“believe that someone’s put masses of hormones into the water or food here, you know, like those weightlifters who have too many steroids?”

  She blinked a few times. “Oh, you think people have been having ’roid rage?”

  “Yes, exactly. All the terrible things people are doing aren’t actually their fault.” I smiled. “I’m so sorry to ask you, but we’re trying to catch those responsible. If we find them, they’ll be held accountable for everything.” She had stopped massaging the dogs and was gripping their fur, likely holding on for dear life. I wasn’t sure I’d done enough, but we couldn’t avoid the question all day. I made my expression as gentle as possible. “Were you unusually angry that afternoon or evening?”

  One of the dogs yelped—she must have gripped a tad too hard. “Oh, darling, I’m so sorry.” She rubbed the dog’s back and kept looking at him, or was it her, while she answered. “Yes, I was. I live alone—well, not alone, alone, but my husband passed away last year. The dogs were asleep in their beds, thank goodness, because if they hadn’t been, I have no idea what they might have done to upset me, and then I might have hurt them. There’s no way I could live with myself if I did that.” She lifted one of the dogs off her lap and squished it in a hug and then sat it back on her lap again. “I did receive a phone call from the man who mows my lawns, letting me know he couldn’t make it that day. Well, I just got so angry. I couldn’t even think. I just yelled and screamed at him and told him never to come back. I even swore at him.” She looked surprised, even now, as if she couldn’t believe she’d done it.

  Olivia turned to me. “Joan never swears. Neither does my mum. I don’t think I’ve ever heard either of them swear.” I wasn’t sure if Olivia was trying to convince me or make Joan feel better.

  “You definitely don’t look like the sort of person who swears
, Joan. It sounds as if you were affected, just like everyone else.”

  She nodded. “It sounds like it, but that’s not the worst of it, I’m afraid.” She took a couple of deep breaths. “I’m ashamed of what happened next, well, all of it, really, but this…. If Leonard had been alive to see my behaviour, he would have been horrified.”

  “It’s okay. We won’t judge you. You’re helping so many people by telling us this, and we won’t tell anyone else what you tell us.” And I wouldn’t. This was just Olivia and me. I didn’t owe the PIB anything, except maybe a punch in the guts to one particular agent.

  “Well, I hung up on Mr Finch, the lawn man. Then I slammed the phone on the table and woke the dogs. Then I spied my teacup on the table, and I just… I just picked it up and smashed it against the wall.” The poor woman shook her head, unable to come to terms with what she’d done. “I imagined the wall was Mr Finch’s head. If he’d been here, I hate to think what I would have done to him. I wasn’t in control of myself.” She turned her gaze on Olivia. “What if it happens again, Liv? What if I hurt my dogs?” Her eyes shone with tears.

  Olivia stood and went to Joan, then knelt on the floor next to her chair and held her hand. “It happened to me too. I know how you feel. I haven’t had another episode, but there’s no telling when or if it will happen again. That’s why talking to you today was so important. Did you go anywhere else before or after morning tea?”

  “I stopped at the supermarket and bought biscuits and milk, but that’s it.”

  “Did you eat the biscuits that day or drink the milk?” I asked.

  “No. I opened them this morning. I feel fine right now. But didn’t you say it was the water?”

  “It might be the water, but it might be some other kind of food or drink that half of Westerham have consumed. It might even be more than one kind of food. So you didn’t go to a bakery or anything?”

  She shook her head. “So is my milk safe to drink?” She sat up straight and stared at me, obviously desperate for my answer.

  “I think so, considering you’ve had some today and you feel fine. Do you mind if I have a look at them? Maybe I can check.”

  Olivia stood and turned to look at me. As Joan shooed the dogs off her lap and stood, Olivia whispered to me, “Do you really think you can tell?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe.” Hmm, if a witch had done this—and I couldn’t imagine any other explanation—there should be the hint of magic or a magic signature somewhere, surely. The magic might fade once it had been through someone’s digestive tract, or what had Angelica suggested? That the magic was in the food rather than the person, that the food or drink or whatever it was affected the person in its altered state, rather than the magic. Gah, my head hurt. This was so confusing.

  Joan led us to the kitchen and took out the packet of biscuits and carton of milk. I called up my other sight. Nothing. Biscuits and milk had no aura. They just looked dead. No energy came off them. I picked up the biscuits and sniffed them, then flipped open the top of the milk carton and did the same—I couldn’t exactly tell her I was a witch, and I was looking at them through another plane.

  I put them back on the counter. “I can’t smell anything unusual. They seem fine to me.”

  “What about the tap water? Can you check that please?”

  Oh, dear, I’d created a monster. She was going to question everything edible in the house. Although, that wasn’t such a bad idea. It wouldn’t hurt to be thorough. I turned on the tap and looked at the water. I smiled. Silver and gold flecks glinted as the water ran into the sink. Wow. Was that because water contained living organisms? Or was it traces of magic from the source? It certainly didn’t look sinister, and if it had been the water supply, everyone would have been affected. I leant over and sniffed at the stream—keeping up appearances.

  I turned off the tap. “It’s all good. What else would you like me to look at?”

  We went through the fruit bowl first, then her tea bags, then the vegetables and butter in her fridge. Lastly, I sniffed the half a loaf of bread in the bread bin. “All clear. I’m thinking it’s probably something you ate or drank at the teahouse.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “I can’t stop drinking tea!”

  “You won’t have to. Just don’t go there for a while. And I’ve checked your tea here, so you’re free to drink that.”

  “All right. Thank you, girls. You’ve been so helpful. I feel much better now.”

  “If anything happens, though, please let us know. Take notice of where you buy things, and if you have another episode, call Olivia, and we’ll come right over.”

  She didn’t look too happy about the prospect of a reoccurrence, but she nodded. “I will. Thank you again.”

  She showed us out, and Olivia gave her a parting hug. We got in Olivia’s car, and I turned to her. “You didn’t drink or eat at that teahouse; did you?”

  “No, but Mum did, and that was the only thing they’d both done that day.”

  “If only we had access to all the interviews the police and the PIB conducted. I suppose they’ll sort it out. If there’s a pattern, they’ll find it. They have way more resources than we do.” Disappointment slid its ginormous bottom onto my happy place and squashed it. But did it really matter who figured out the culprit as long as someone did, and soon? My ego could handle not being the one.

  But what if Dana was trying to hinder the investigation? I just couldn’t work out why. “Liv? What reason could Dana have for wanting to delay fixing this mess? I’ve wracked my brain, but I can’t think of anything except she wants to be the one to crack it and get the credit.”

  “Hmm. Maybe she’s not trying to hinder the investigation. Maybe she just wanted you gone, and now she’s achieved that, the PIB will work things out quickly?”

  “Maybe, but let’s not count on it. I have a gut feeling this is going to drag on for a while.”

  “Well, then, we’d better keep going. Where do you want to go now?”

  “I guess we should go to that teahouse, check it out, maybe buy what they had and take it home, see if I can figure out if it’s tainted somehow.”

  Olivia bit her lip and stared out the windscreen for a moment. Then she turned to me. “I could be the tester. I could have a little bit and see what happens.”

  “Oh my God, no! No way, Liv. I’m not putting you through that again, or me. Plus, I need you to help me investigate. There’s not much we can do if you’re out of it for twenty-four hours.”

  “So how are you going to see if it’s tainted?”

  “The same way I checked out Mrs Fleming’s food—I’ll use my other sight.”

  “How do you know it works? You didn’t see anything weird just then.”

  “True.” I worried my bottom lip between my teeth. We had to start somewhere, though. “Look, I’m not sure if I’ll be able to see anything, but we may as well give it a try. The food may not even be tainted today. What if it was a one-day thing?”

  A shrill scream came from across the street. I jerked my head to look past Olivia and through her window. A large man was dragging a woman along the footpath, her long red hair gripped in his hand. She was bent at the waist and running to keep up with him. “Help! Help!”

  Crap.

  He was at least six foot and beefy. Even though he looked like half fat, half muscle, he could pulverise me and her at the same time with little effort. I couldn’t let him keep hurting her, but what could I do?

  I jumped out of the car and crossed the road, Liv’s worried voice following me. “Get back in the car, Lily.”

  I looked back over my shoulder. “I can’t, Liv. But don’t worry. I’ll be fine.” Whatever I was going to do, I’d better figure it out. Maybe distraction would work for a bit? “Hey, boofhead! Moron!”

  He stopped and turned. His enraged stare locked on me. My heart hammered, and the rational part of my brain begged me to turn around and get back in the car. But there was no way I was leaving this woman to get beaten and
maybe killed. She’d gripped her own hair with one hand and was trying to back out of his hold as she sobbed.

  “What did you say?”

  “I said you’re a boofhead and a moron.” My legs trembled. They wanted to collapse, but I wouldn’t let them. “I’ve called the police. They’ll be here in a minute. Let her go.”

  “Make me, cow.” He yanked her hair, and she flew towards him. Her knees slammed into the concrete. She screamed. Jesus. This had to end now.

  I imagined the golden river of power. I knew I wasn’t supposed to use it on non-witches, but this was an emergency. If I ended up in jail for this, so be it. I whispered, “Make this violent man in front of me release his captive, then buzz out his anger like a giant bumblebee.” Hmm, I had not seen that coming. The things my brain came up with….

  He released the woman’s hair, stared at his offending hand, then stared at me. He clenched his jaw and shook his head. “No!” he shouted as his hands came to his waist, his arms forming triangles or bee’s wings. “Bzzz, bzzz, bzzz,” he said and flapped his arms back and forth. I snorted. His gaze darted around and landed on the flowers in a garden two doors down from where he stood. He buzzed again and flitted over to them on tiptoes. When he got there, he dropped to his knees and shoved his nose into the happy yellow petals.

  The woman sat up and looked around. I went to her and helped her stand. Her cheeks were wet with tears, and snot coated the space between nostrils and mouth. She rubbed her head with one hand and wiped her nose with the other. “What just happened?”

  I couldn’t really answer that question, so I asked one of my own. “Do you want me to take you to the hospital or the police?”

  “I think I’m okay. Brian’s never been violent before. I don’t know what got into him.” She shuddered and took a shaky breath.