by Kate Krake
“Of course. Nice to see you again, Sean,” I said, shaking his offered hand. The pleasant voice and friendly smile I conjured out of my depths took more energy than I had to spare.
“Same to you, Ms. Drake,” he said.
“Call me Belinda.”
“Sure thing, Belinda,” he said. “I actually thought of you this morning. I boxed up a fresh batch of those hazelnut swirls you like so much.”
“Dear Sean,” I said wearily. “You have both won my heart and made my day in that sentence.”
“I’ll do them up special and drop them off to you later.”
“Oh, you don’t need to go to any trouble just for me. And to be honest, the way I’m feeling today, I’d be just tearing open the box and shoveling them straight into my mouth.”
“What’s up?” Lila asked. “You do look awful tired.”
“I’m okay,” I said, waving my hand as if I could wave away everything that was getting me down right then. Lila stared at me. I knew she was doing her fairy trick, and this time I welcomed it. I tried to clear the way into my mind to let her in on what I had seen last night.
She nodded. Even if she hadn’t been able to get the details, she had seen enough to know something big was up.
“I’ll come now,” she said, concern all over her.
“No, it’s your day off. You stay and enjoy yourself. Now, please excuse me. I feel if I don’t imbibe some coffee soon, I might fall away into dust.”
I would fill Lila in on every detail as soon as we were alone together, but for now, I rejoined the now-longer coffee line and left the two young lovebirds to their breakfast date.
Trying not to stare, I noted their hands resting on the table, fingers close but not quite touching. It filled me with a sweet sense tinged with sadness. I wanted to feel the same closeness, but the only man I’d had even the slightest bit of interest for in years was far too complicated and, after what I’d witnessed, far too dangerous to go near.
Neville Norton bustled through the early-morning patrons. “Belinda, I’m glad I’ve run into you.”
This was sure shaping up to be one hell of a day.
“Did you find out about… you know what?” He narrowed his eyes, lowered his voice, and looked sideways in case anyone was listening.
“I did,” I said. “I did a …” I paused, thinking that news of a spell was unlikely to go down well with Neville Norton. “I made some phone calls. It’s fine. The hedge is a yew, but it’s only poisonous if you ingest large quantities of it, or eat the seeds in the berries. You should probably put up a warning sign or something, but otherwise, you should be good to go.”
“Wonderful news,” Neville said, his harrowed look falling. “Now that that’s behind us, it’s time to finalize the proceedings for the big day’s events. Your stall is almost finished, yes? We need to know the table size and anything else we’ll need to order for you.”
“It’s um, great,” I lied. “Almost done.”
Neville cocked his eyes over the top of his glasses, staring at me like a stern headmaster. “You’re the only one we’re still waiting on.”
I bridled at his tone. “Listen, Neville. Since I did spend such a lot of time and energy on putting right a problem that could have meant the end of the entire maze, I’ve been a little busy,” I said. “And I’m also running a business. I’m swamped. You’ll have the booth on time, I promise. But in the meantime, just damn well get off my back, would you?”
The old man’s face hardened into shock. Little patches of red burned on his neck. “Well, I should have expected you would be capable of such rudeness,” he said, tiny flecks of spittle forming at the edge of his lips. “I had heard you were getting about with that churlish vet, so I guess he must be a bad influence on you.”
And there was the Blackthorn Springs rumor mill in action.
“I’m sorry, Neville,” I said. I wasn’t in the least sorry. “I have a lot of personal things going on right now, and I didn’t sleep last night. I’m just snippy. I apologize.”
“Next!” Tom Jenkins called me to the front of the line, and not a second too soon. Neville stormed out of the cafe, probably off to tell Hattie Winthrop all about what a terrible woman I was.
Let him be insulted, I thought. The only thing I needed to do right then was drink a gallon of coffee.
“Triple shot please, Tom. Big cup,” I said. Jenkins raised his eyebrows and smiled. “One torpedo coming right up. You okay, Belinda? You look like something’s really upset you?”
“You know, the usual nothing,” I said. “Town gossip, actually. Just one of the not-so-great things about living in a tiny place.”
“I hear that,” he said, pushing the coffee beans into the grinder. “Everyone’s got their noses in other people’s business, but no one ever directly asks anyone about anything. People don’t want to be rude, I guess. But isn’t it ruder to wag tongues and spread half-truths about people behind their backs? Like with you and the vet dating. Everyone’s talking about it, but I bet no one’s actually asked you to your face what’s going on between you two.”
“Everyone’s talking, huh?” I said.
“Nothing to worry about. Everyone just loves a romance.”
“You have an innocent meal with someone, and the whole town is hearing wedding bells? I assure you, Tom, there’s no romance to talk of between Conri O’Farrell and me. And you can broadcast that as far as you like.”
I paid for the coffee and walked slowly back to the store, not caring that it was nearly an hour after opening time.
By the time I unlocked the door, I was sure of two things. The first was that Tom Jenkins’s torpedo was aptly named, even if it did taste like burnt mud. The second was that he had been right. If I was going to clear my head and have any chance of regaining any sense of the normal, fairly happy existence I had been living just last week, I was going to have to confront Conri O’Farrell directly and find out once and for all what he was up to.
17
After a day of trying to figure out what I would say to Conri, I left the store right at closing time and drove straight to the veterinary clinic. It was closed. I drove to Conri’s house. If I had been fully awake and not running solely on caffeine and willpower, I might have rethought the decision to go to confront a dark magician at his home, but I was beyond desperate for answers now.
I parked across the road, approaching the door as though I was walking into a trap.
You’re doing the right thing, I thought. I wasn’t sure if the knots writhing in my stomach meant I was right, or just the opposite.
I knocked sharply. The sound sent a dog into a flurry of barking. Conri’s voice came from inside, trying to quiet the animal before he opened the door.
I sure didn’t expect the first thing I thought when I saw him to be “I have seen you completely naked.”
His expression told me I was the last person he expected or wanted to see.
He stood in the doorway, taking up most of the space. He didn’t invite me in. A huge long-eared red dog stood behind him, silent now, but still curious as to who this visitor was.
“I think we need to talk,” I said, still not able to make eye contact with him. He stepped sideways and motioned for me to come inside before closing the door behind us. He still hadn’t said a word.
The dog sniffed around my feet, obviously fascinated by the scent of Hemlock and who knew what else it could pick up on my clothes. “Russet, get back,” Conri ordered the dog.
“It’s fine, I like dogs,” I said. I patted Russet’s head, and he shied away for a moment before giving in to the affection and offering me a friendly lick in return.
Conri’s house was wide open, filled with light. I liked it instantly, though maybe it was too well decorated, something I wouldn’t have expected a man like him to be capable of without the help of a wife or girlfriend. Was that another secret he was harboring?
I followed him into the kitchen. He leaned against the side of the counter
, his arms folded, his focus on his dog. A normal person would have offered me coffee or something—at least a glass of water. But this was hardly a normal situation.
It was best to get right to it.
“Last night, in the woods,” I started.
“You’re a witch,” he said gruffly. “You never mentioned that.”
How did he get to be angry at me for keeping secrets? And what did he know about my moon ritual? It wasn’t like it was real magic. I wasn’t here to talk about my own life, though.
“And you’re a…” I trailed off, leaving a space for him to fill in the gaps.
“Very private man,” he said.
Russet, apparently satisfied he had sniffed every inch of my shoes and legs, made his way outside to the yard by way of a dog door. It flapped shut, sealing Conri and me alone together.
“You were doing magic,” I said. “I’ve seen your talisman. I know you’ve bought hex herbs from Jacques’s Nursery. And the other night, you were clearly in some kind of spell trance.”
“I have connections with the supernatural, yes,” he said. His arms were still folded, and he was staring at a random spot on the slate tiles.
“You said you wanted to get to know me better. You said you like me, or was I imagining that?”
“No,” he said morosely.
“Then I need to know who you are. I’m a very private person too. We all have our secrets. I’m not asking you to bare yours. I just want to know what I’m dealing with here before I go and get caught up in any trouble.”
“Then maybe you should walk away now,” he said.
“Is that what you want?”
Conri didn’t say anything.
“Are you a witch?”
“No,” he said with an exasperated sigh. “I’m not a witch. But you are, so you should know there are different types of magics.”
“I might not know exactly what that ritual was, but I know a dark spell when I see one,” I said.
“Oh, you do, do you?” His voice was louder now. “Well, maybe there are some things about magic you don’t know.”
I couldn’t let on how right he actually was about that.
“And what about you? What was the spell you were doing? How do I know it wasn’t some evil brew you were cooking up?”
“It was a moon cleanse, a forest bathing meditation for destressing, if you must know. It wasn’t magic.”
“And this is something you do often? What sort of dirty trouble are you caught up in that you need to cleanse like that? See? We can all get suspicious, Belinda.”
Every fiber in my body tensed as hot anger welled.
“Fine, you want honesty?” I said through clenched teeth. “I am a hot mess right now, and I’ll tell you why. I’ve got a big scary past I thought I’d left behind, knocking on my door, screwing with me, scaring me. Plus, you know Kenny Langdel? Well, he didn’t die of a stroke or a heart attack or whatever they’re saying. He was murdered with a death curse, one I’ve seen in action before. And anyone who might know something about it is happy to look the other way. It might be connected, it might not be connected. And now that I find out you’re ordering hex herbs from a witch and up to weird nude magic in the forest at night, it’s hard not to bring that into the puzzle too. So what’s a person to do?”
“Death curse?” he said, an eyebrow raised.
I nodded. “Doesn’t that bother you?”
Conri shrugged. “Not my business,” he said.
“Not your business?” I shrieked. “It is your business. Someone was killed, in your town, and you’re a suspect.”
“A suspect? So, that’s another secret, then? You’re a detective too?”
“No. I was… I mean, I’ve just been trying to find some information, just to help. Someone needs to stand up for what’s right.”
“And what are you going to do when, or if, you find this apparent killer? Which isn’t me, by the way, not that you’re going to believe that. Are you going to run out and accuse someone of murder in Main Street? Or do you only ever do that by turning up at people’s homes uninvited?”
“I’m not here to talk about my role in this,” I said.
“No, you’re here to pry into my business, but not wanting to give up any of your own.”
Russet came back into the kitchen, tracking paw prints over the tiles. He dropped something muddy on the floor between us and stared up at me, his eyes bright, smiling and wagging his tail and waiting for thanks for the gift he had brought his master and new best friend.
I stared down at the thing. It was a doll. And not just any doll by the looks of it; it was a poppet.
I bent down to pick up the dirty dolly. It was crudely sewn, patched together with bits of fabric and roughly embroidered eyes. It was clumsy, probably made quickly, but with that little stitched-on soul patch and checked shirt, there was no mistaking who it was supposed to represent.
“Got an explanation for that?” I said.
“What is it?” he asked.
“This is a poppet of Kenny Langdel,” I said. “And I would bet everything I have that this is the effigy used to seal the Mortis curse that killed him.”
I looked up at Conri. Our eyes locked.
18
“What do you want me to say?” Conri said.
“How about explaining why your dog brought something that was used to kill a man into your kitchen?”
“Dogs dig stuff up. I don’t know. I’ve never seen it before in my life.”
“You’re into black magic, you’re a furious fly-off-the-handle type. An effigy of a murder victim appears in your house and, what? That’s a coincidence?”
“That’s exactly what it is,” he yelled.
I wanted to get out. Suddenly the open house was claustrophobic, and Conri seemed all the bigger, taking up too much space too close to me. I was trapped, a rabbit in a wolf’s lair.
I hurried to the front door, still clutching the muddy doll. Russet followed, his tail wagging. Conri didn’t move to follow, but he yelled after me as I slammed the door.
“You don’t know what you’re doing, Belinda.”
He was right. I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t know what I was doing trying to catch a killer, and I didn’t know what I was doing getting mixed up with someone like him. I tossed the poppet onto the passenger-side floor of my car. I didn’t know what I was going to do with it.
I drove home on autopilot, not even aware I’d made the journey until I was there.
I fell into my chair and squeezed my eyes tight. My chest was filled with stone, my mind full of sludge.
Either Hemlock could pick up that I wasn’t in a cuddling mood, or he could smell Conri’s dog all over me, but whatever it was, he stayed on the other side of the room, watching me as if he were waiting for me to explode. Which I thought was likely.
My phone beeped in my pocket. It was a message from Henry, saying he was bringing an early supper for our Scrabble night.
I’d forgotten all about our plans. My spirits lifted a touch. The distraction might be what I needed to stop thinking about the vet. And perhaps I could ask Henry if he knew anything about him, and maybe tease out some information about Henry’s own role in this seemingly endless supernatural community of Blackthorn Springs.
Ten minutes later, a knock sounded at the back door, unexpectedly soon.
“Hey, Henry. What did you bring?” I called, moving to the door. “I’m starving.”
I pulled open the door.
“Sorry, Belladonna. Didn’t know you were expecting me to bring you dinner.”
Rowan Jackfort stepped into my kitchen. I froze.
“I don’t have any food with me, but we can go and eat out if you like.”
Hemlock shot under the credenza, where he crouched low, hissing and bristled.
Jackfort snorted a mocking laugh. “Hi, kitty. You remember me, do you?”
“Get out of my house,” I seethed. I’d had enough games.
“I did
n’t see your assistant today? Lila, is it? Is she still around? She’s smoking hot.”
“You stay away from her.”
“Give me what I want.”
“I have nothing you want. I can’t tell you where Quentin is. I don’t know.”
He reached his long arms toward my waist. I stepped away, and he moved closer again, this time grabbing me by the shoulders, wrenching me toward him.
“You’ve always got something I want.” He licked his lips.
“Get your hands off me, you creep,” I said.
I shoved my hands hard against Jackfort’s chest. It was enough to get me almost loose for a second, but he was too strong. He grabbed me again, tighter, turning me so my back was pressed against him. With one arm pinned across my chest, he held the other to my face. A surge of magic passed through me like a hot current, and I was washed underneath a wave of black nothing.
* * *
I woke. It was dark. I was lying on cold grass, wet from dew. Pain pressed my body. Fear gripped my belly. I pulled myself into an awkward sitting position.
“Hello.” Jackfort stood above me, almost a silhouette in the dim light. He grinned a sick smile.
“What… what have you…? Where are we?”
I looked around. We were surrounded by dark walls on all sides. A single low bush stood in the middle of the space where we were, a cement bench beside it. I understood. We were in the center of the hedge maze.
I wasn’t tied up, so I guessed Jackfort thought I was too meek to run from him.
“Do you think anyone in town knows what the shape of this thing means?” Jackfort said, mirth in his voice.
I shook my foggy head. It was so ridiculous, I nearly laughed. “That’s your plan, Rowan? You’re going to kill me in the middle of the ghost maze? What? You expect me to haunt it forever after that?”
“Isn’t that what the legends say about ghost mazes? I know this is a special one too. You’ll be dead soon enough from just being in the center.”
“So doesn’t that mean it’s going to kill you too?” I said.