Silenced by a Spell

by Fiona Grace

  He yipped his agreement.

  She closed up the store and headed into the cold night, walking along the dark beach with Chester back home.

  It was chilly in Crag Cottage, and Lacey realized it was the first night she could light the fire.

  She got the fire going, poured herself a glass of wine, and settled into the cream couch.

  She felt like her mind was full to bursting. She’d had such a whirlwind of a day, trying to glean as much information about Alaric and the mindset of his potential killer, that she felt like it was now all sloshing around up there in a messy soup. She needed to organize it. Make sense of it.

  She grabbed her laptop. The best thing to do would be to get all her ideas out on the page. That was the best way of dealing with things that were overwhelming her.

  As her laptop fired up, Lacey noticed the exclamation point that told she had new emails.

  She saw one from her mom, marked as “urgent,” and entitled VERY IMPORTANT WEDDING DETAILS MUST READ NOW!!!”

  Lacey was about to open it when she spotted something else.

  It was an email from Madeleine, the author of the article Lacey had read about the grimoire. Lacey opened it instead and began to read.

  It was indeed the same Madeleine who’d attended her auction and won the ram’s skull.

  The Grimoire was stolen? she asked.

  Lacey typed her reply.

  Madeleine must’ve been online, because a moment later, a return email arrived from her.

  I think I know who did it.

  She’d included her phone number.

  Lacey grabbed her cell and dialed it.

  “Hello?” came the purple-haired goth girl’s timid voice.

  “It’s Lacey. What do you know?”

  “I think it was Eldritch.”

  Lacey shook her head. “It couldn’t be. Eldritch was at the Lodge on the night of the murder. He has an alibi.”

  “No. He wasn’t,” Madeleine said, firmly. “Everyone else was, since the ghost tour was cancelled. But Eldritch didn’t come.”

  Lacey thought of Ash, the mixologist, who’d confirmed Eldritch’s alibi.

  Or had he? All the goth guests dressed in black. They all had black hair. Would Ash really be able to pick out Eldritch specifically over any of the rest of his group?

  “But why Eldritch?” Lacey asked. “Why would he kill Alaric?”

  “They used to be business partners,” Madeleine explained. “They owned a—”

  “Museum,” Lacey cut in, recalling the Wilfordshire Weekly article. “The Macabre Museum in London.”

  “That’s right.”

  Lacey was stunned. She’d had no idea Eldritch and Alaric had history, that they’d run a business together. A fallout between business partners was a pretty common MO for murder. Had Lacey finally cracked the case?

  “What happened between them?” she asked Madeleine. “Why did they fall out?”

  “Because Alaric wasn’t actually a believer,” Madeleine said, sounding disdainful.

  Lacey frowned, confused. “What do you mean?”

  “He was a fraud,” Madeleine said. “He sold fake tarot readings. Conducted fake seances. He even pretended to be a psychic, and gathered quite a following for it, until someone hacked his computer and discovered he’d simply researched his attendees’ social media profiles online. He just peddled mystical stuff for the profit, and he didn’t earn himself any friends doing it. Eldritch, on the other hand. He’s the real deal. He’s a true believer. Once Alaric was exposed as a fake, Eldritch quit in order to salvage his own reputation. He opened a competing museum. They were in direct competition. They both wanted the grimoire in their collection.”

  Lacey couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Former business partners turned rivals thrown together into a competition… That was bound to be explosive! All the conditions for murder had been there. That only one man would leave Wilfordshire alive after the auction was almost a certainty.

  “Thank you, Madeleine,” Lacey said. “You’ve been really helpful.”

  With a spark of renewed vigor, Lacey realized Eldritch’s alibi wasn’t as ironclad and she’d previously believed. Her prime suspect was right back in the frame.

  She felt a wave of determination overcome her. It was time to speak to Mr. Von Raven and see just how much he stuck to his story under pressure. It was time to get him to confess.

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

  When Lacey reached the Lodge, she was glad to find Suzy on duty. She’d not had a chance to speak to her last time she was here, relying instead only on Ash the mixologist’s account of the night Eldritch claimed to have an alibi.

  She hurried over to her friend, Chester trotting at her side.

  Suzy must’ve noticed the crazed look in her eyes, but her own gaze darted furtively from Lacey to the English Shepherd beside her.

  “Lacey, what’s wrong?” she asked, sounding concerned. “What’s happened?”

  Lacey spoke rapidly. “I need to know who was here the night of Alaric’s death. Check-in logs, or sign-in books. Surveillance footage. Whatever it is you use to keep tabs on who is in or out of the premises, I need to see it.”

  Suzy’s perfectly sculpted brows turned inward in a frown. “Slow down, Lacey. I don’t understand what you’re asking of me.”

  Lacey tried to slow her frantically racing mind.

  “One of your guests claimed he was drinking in the Drawing Room the night of Alaric’s murder,” she explained. “But I have reason to believe he’s lying.”

  Suzy’s brown eyes widened with astonishment. “Which guest?”

  “Eldritch Von Raven.”

  Suzy looked stunned. She whispered under her breath, “You think he killed Alaric?” Then her voice went up an octave as she added, panicked, “You think I have a murderer staying in my B&B?”

  “That’s what I need you to help me find out,” Lacey told her.

  Suzy paced away, looking fretful. Chester tipped his head to the side and let out a whinny of curiosity as the slim young woman walked the length of the red and gold floor runner, turned on the spot, then walked all the way back. Once she reached Lacey, she fixed her big, deer-like eyes on her.

  “You do know you’re asking me to break staff and guest privacy?” she said, clearly torn by the dilemma Lacey had presented her with.

  “I know,” Lacey replied. “And I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t so important.”

  Just then, the foyer doors swished open and a couple entered. Lacey and Suzy fell silent. They gave them a polite nod as they passed by and headed into the Drawing Room. A light bulb went off in Lacey’s mind.

  “Hey,” she said to Suzy, as soon as the couple were safely out of earshot. “The Drawing Room is open to the public, isn’t it? So showing me the surveillance wouldn’t be breaking any kind of law, strictly speaking.”

  “It’s not the law I’m worried about,” Suzy replied. “It’s the ethics. I don’t want to give the Lodge a bad reputation.”

  “Well, it’s either you help me now,” Lacey said, “or Superintendent Turner and his band of merry cops come pounding on your door once they finally get up to speed with the investigation. You don’t need me to tell you which of those will damage your reputation more.”

  Lacey hated to put pressure on her friend, but that was the reality of the situation. Superintendent Turner didn’t do things by half measures. Once he realized Eldritch’s alibi was wobbly, he’d come storming in with a convoy of cops, leaving the impression in the minds of every guest staying at the Lodge that it wasn’t a safe place to be.

  Her ploy worked. Suzy gave a sharp nod, her quandary solved, albeit under duress.

  “Fine,” she said. “What do you need?”

  “Let’s start with the Drawing Room CCTV,” Lacey said. “That’s where Eldritch claimed he was the night Alaric died.”

  Suzy took her by the arm. “Come with me.”

  She led her down the corridor, Chester keeping pace be
hind them, and into the back offices. Lacey hadn’t actually set foot inside these rooms since the renovation work she’d been employed to do months ago. She was surprised to see a state of the art security system inside, quite the upgrade on the rudimentary one that had operated when it was a former care home. Before, the cameras were fixed, mounted at the corners of the room, flicking between views every six seconds. But the new system was far more sophisticated, with roving cameras and multiple concurrent views, covering pretty much every inch of the Lodge—gardens, guest parking lot, staff parking lot, kitchen, dining room, corridors, elevator, reception desk.

  Lacey whistled. “That’s quite the comprehensive system you’ve invested in, Suzy.”

  “It wasn’t me,” Suzy said, as she took a seat in front of the glowing screens. “Dad had it all installed after the mayor was shot.”

  Lacey grimaced as she recalled the terrible crime that had taken place in the Drawing Room with a hunting rifle many months ago. Wilfordshire still had a vacuum in its power structure; the beloved Mayor Fletcher’s position had not yet been filled.

  Suzy began tapping keys.

  “The problem with this thing,” she said, frowning at the computer screen, “is you need to be a computing genius to actually work it. Dad seems to forget that I run a B&B, not a multimillion-pound stately home. I can’t afford a security guard to sit in here twenty-four hours a day monitoring this thing.”

  She double-clicked on a folder, and it opened up on the computer screen to show it was full of .mpeg files, with numerical file names.

  “Aha,” Suzy said. “Found the folder. That’s a good start.”

  She began scrolling though. There were thousands of files.

  “Aren’t you supposed to delete this stuff as you go?” Lacey asked the side of her blue-lit friend’s face.

  Suzy shrugged. “Probably. But like I said, you need a computer degree to actually operate it. All I do is leave it running in the background in case of emergencies.” Her voice dropped sadly.

  “Emergencies like this…” Lacey finished for her.

  She felt it too, the gravity of the situation she’d found herself in once more. Ever since coming to Wilfordshire, she’d been surrounded by death and disaster. Misfortune seemed to follow her like a bad smell, and she felt overwhelmed by the apparent impossibility of the task ahead of her.

  Just then, she felt Chester nudge her palm with his nose. He could always tell when she was getting down and in need of support. It worked. She felt her resolve return.

  “How are we going to find the right night?” she asked.

  Suzy double-clicked on a file and a black-and-white view of the Drawing Room filled the screen.

  “Voila,” she said triumphantly.

  “This is the night?” Lacey asked, surprised her friend had actually navigated the minefield of data to pinpoint the one she was actually looking for.

  “Yup,” Suzy said, before adding, “The files are saved in date order.”

  “Ohh,” Lacey said, relieved that her friend didn’t have psychic abilities. Considering everything that was going on at the moment with the curse and grimoire, that was the last thing Lacey needed.

  “So, what did Eldritch say he was doing specifically on the night Alaric was killed?” Suzy asked, speeding up the footage that had begun at five a.m. in the morning and depicted a totally empty room.

  “He said he was in the Drawing Room drinking with his pals,” Lacey explained. “Ash confirmed the alibi, but since all the goths look pretty similar from the back, I think he might have mis-identified who was actually there that evening.”

  Suzy fast forwarded through the footage and the two women stared at it, as various staff members and guests whizzed in and out of the room in high definition.

  “There!” Lacey said, pointing at the screen. The goth group had entered. “Slow it down.”

  Suzy clicked, and the footage returned to a normal pace.

  Lacey checked the time flashing at the bottom of the screen. “Seven p.m.,” she said aloud.

  If Eldritch was with the group as he claimed, it was the perfect alibi, since it was the exact time participants for the boat tour were supposed to be congregating on the beach. The only thing was, Lacey couldn’t see him among them…

  “He’s not there,” she said.

  “Maybe he comes in later,” Suzy suggested.

  She sped up the footage again. The Drawing Room was especially busy with guests, and Lacey could easily see how Ash mis-identified the participants of the goth group. She watched as a few more members joined the others, then a couple more, the small group starting to swell and spill over to a second table.

  “Is that him?” Suzy said, suddenly, pausing the footage.

  Lacey squinted. The willowy Eldritch was indeed strolling into the Drawing Room, in the same black silky suit she’d seen him wear every other time they’d crossed paths. The only difference in his attire were his big black boots instead of the shiny black brogues.

  “That’s him all right,” Lacey said, watching as he joined the others at the table. “But he’s thirty-five minutes late.”

  “Does that give him enough time to kill Alaric?” Suzy asked, swiveling in the chair to face her.

  Lacey did the mental math. “Just about. We found Alaric not that long after seven, but he was already cold by then, so had been dead a while.”

  Suzy grimaced, her face turning pale.

  “We need to check more files,” Lacey said. “This isn’t the definitive proof I need. Thirty-five minutes is enough if he walks right in through the foyer doors and straight into the Drawing Room, but if he goes up to his room first, or to any other place on the premises first, then that gives him more credence. I don’t want to go in all guns blazing and accuse him of something if it turns out he just didn’t mention having gone to his room first.”

  “Lacey,” Suzy said with a warning edge in her tone. “I only showed you the Drawing Room because it’s open to the public, remember? The corridors, stairs, elevator, all that is staff and guests only. It’s private. I don’t want to be unethical.”

  “What about the foyer?” Lacey asked.

  Suzy narrowed her eyes. She’d clearly reached her personal limit and wasn’t going to budge.

  “You’re right,” Lacey said. “I’ll go about it the right way. I’m sorry for asking.” She turned to Chester. “Come on, boy, let’s go.”

  She heard Suzy’s sigh as she left the back office.

  Lacey walked the length of the corridor toward the exit, Chester trotting alongside her, trying to think of her next steps. Eldritch’s alibi held up—just—but it was sitting on even shakier ground than it had before. She desperately needed to test it further, since there was still a small window of time for Eldritch to commit the crime and make it back to the Lodge for his alibi.

  There had to be some way of finding the truth out once and for all.

  That’s when Lacey passed the large reception desk and noticed it was currently unmanned. Lucia was nowhere to be seen. Neither were any of the part-time relief staff she knew Suzy drafted in during busy times.

  Lacey peered into the dining hall, looking past the large tables filled with visiting tourists, and spotted Lucia attending to the guests. It looked like she was taking down an order. Lacey realized there must’ve been a problem with the drafting in of relief staff if Lucia, the manager, was on waitress duty.

  Lacey slowed her step. She glanced back over at the vacant reception desk, a plan formulating in her mind.

  Chester, noticing the change in pace, looked up at her with his curious brown eyes. His innocent, trusting little face made her feel bad about even thinking what she was thinking. But despite the immorality of it, she realized she had no choice but to do it anyway. She had to catch Eldritch.

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR

  Lacey glanced down the length of the Lodge’s main corridor, making sure the coast was clear. Noises of clinking cutlery came from behind the kitchen door, a
nd hubbub radiated from the Dining Hall. It appeared that all the staff were preoccupied by the crowds dining, leaving it wide open for Lacey to enact her plan.

  She looked down at her English Shepherd dog waiting patiently beside her feet, and put a finger to her lips.

  Right away, Chester’s eyebrows twitched upward into what could only be described as an expression of judgment. Even he could tell what she was planning to do was bad.

  “Shhh,” she said, showing him her flat palm. “Wait.”

  Chester obeyed her hand gesture by adopting his sentry pose, but he did not look happy about it.

  Lacey made a beeline for the unmanned reception desk and darted around the back of it. She rummaged through the stacks of binders until she found the one for room bookings, and opened it up. She scanned the pages, her eyes darting up on occasion to make sure the coast remained clear, her pulse fluttering rapidly as she searched for the name Eldritch Von Raven.

  “There,” she said when she spotted it. She jabbed her finger at his name. “Room 3.”

  She was about to return the folder to the pile when the name Alaric Moon jumped out at her. Her curiosity piqued, she scanned the page for a second time, slower to absorb more information.

  Alaric had been staying in Room 4, she learned. He was right next door to Eldritch. The two men had been booked into neighboring rooms.

  Had that proximity caused them to come to murderous blows? Had the grimoire lured the two old rivals to the same place at the same time, and reignited their bitter feud? Had all the conditions for a jealousy-fueled motive for murder been perfectly laid out?

  Lacey shuddered at the thought.

  Then, suddenly, she heard a noise from down the hall. She snapped back to the present moment, shutting the folder and shoving it haphazardly beneath the others stacked on the desk. She turned quickly to the vintage wooden key organizer behind the desk.

  “Forgive me, Suzy,” she whispered under her breath, as she grabbed the little bronze key for Room 3 off its hook and hurried away.

  Her heart pounded as she ran over to where Chester was standing guard. She reached him just in time to bump into someone exiting the dining room.