Solving murders was beginning to become my new norm.
8
Bobby’ wife or soon to be ex-wife, I really didn’t want to know what to call her, was a nurse and was currently working, so we had to wait until she was available to talk.
“I hate hospitals,” Daniel said, cringing as he looked down at the blue and white speckled flooring.
“Why, because it smells like old people?”
“No, I love old people. They’re good listeners, they make you cookies, and they knit sweaters, what’s not to love? I hate hospitals because every time I’m in one I keep looking over my shoulder for Michael Myers,” he said, glancing over his shoulder to prove his point.
I wanted to tell him that the magic that I could do was far more terrifying than anything that horror flick slasher could. That would have sent him running for the hills. But I knew that I didn’t have to tell him because it was only a matter of time before someone in Cat’s Cradle with way too much time on their hands told him all the rumors that ran rampant about my family.
Sensing someone staring at me, I looked up and saw a nurse in sky blue scrubs that matched her eyes perfectly. “Hi, I’m Oliva. What can I help you with?” she asked with a worried expression.
“Can we talk somewhere more private?” Daniel asked.
“Yeah, of course. Follow me,” she said, fiddling with her phone as if she was waiting for a call or text.
“Expecting to hear from someone?” I asked, pointing at the phone that her eyes were glued to.
“My husband, Bobby. He’s in Cat’s Cradle. I haven’t heard from him since yesterday,” she said, her tone going from worried to angry.
She wasn’t happy with her husband, which got me to thinking she might know more about all of this than she was letting on.
“Were you aware that Bobby was filing for divorce?” I asked.
Olivia looked up at me with an amused expression before bursting into laughter. I mean, the girl was laughing so hard tears were streaming down her face. I had no clue people found divorce so funny.
“I’m sorry, I think I missed the joke,” Daniel said, stuffing his hands in his pockets and shuffling his feet awkwardly. I could tell he wasn’t used to feeling left out, and that’s how exactly he felt at that moment.
“I missed it too,” I told him, trying to make him feel better.
Oliva was still laughing, and her face was getting redder by the minute. “Is she okay? Do I need to go get a doctor?” Daniel asked, looking over his shoulder.
“Michael Myers isn’t who you need to worry about right now, Daniel. The crazy nurse is who you should keep your eyes on,” I whispered to him, nodding at Oliva who was starting to calm down.
“Bobby wasn’t filing for divorce. He went to Cat’s Cradle to break things off with Pearl. We were going through a rough patch, but things are good now. I’m confused as to what this has to do with you,” she said in an extremely uncouth tone that made me wonder what Bobby saw in her. Still, he was her husband and he owed her more than he’d given her apparently.
I didn’t have much experience with telling someone that their husband had been murdered, especially when the person I had to tell as a giggling crazy nurse. So, I didn’t say anything and waited for Daniel to tell her.
“We’re here because Bobby was murdered,” Daniel told her, watching her face closely to catch her reaction.
First, her expression was unreadable, it was blank. When her tears started streaming down her face like melted ice cream dripping down an ice cream cone, I knew it had finally sunk in, and I couldn’t help but put myself in that situation. I would, of course, never get to be in it. My curse made that impossible. Still, looking at this poor woman, I couldn’t help but blink back tears.
“Who killed him?” she asked, falling down on her knees.
“We don’t know yet, but that’s why we’re here. Where were you the night April seventeenth?” I asked, pulling out my trusty notepad and pen. Well, it was one of Daniel’s fancy pens that I swiped from his desk when he wasn’t looking. He had plenty of them, so I figured he wouldn’t miss one pen.
“I was home. Why?” she asked, looking suspiciously at Daniel and me, “Wait, do you think I killed Bobby? I loved him! I would never hurt him!”
If she was the one who did indeed kill Bobby Matthews then she deserved an Oscar for her performance. She was killing it, no pun intended.
“We’re not saying you did, Oliva. It’s just that when someone turns up murdered, we have to take a look at everyone. And everyone includes those closest to the victim,” I told her, feeling Daniel’s eyes on me, well, on his pen really.
“Why?” she asked, rankled. “Who are you to do that? Where are the police?”
They were reasonable questions, and I was happy to answer them.
“The police of Cat’s Cradle are working on this, though as you know, Daniel had a personal relationship with Bobby as well as working with him on legal matters.” I reached out to her, but she didn’t take my hand. “He just wanted to make sure his friend saw justice. I’m sure you can understand that.”
“I guess I can,” she muttered.” She looked at me for what seemed like forever after that before she spoke again. “Well, it wasn’t me. So, you can cross my name off of your list of suspects or whatever you call it,” she said, pointing at my notepad causing me to hold it close to my chest.
“That’s exactly what we call it, Olivia,” I told her, stuffing my notepad and pen into my leather briefcase/big ole purse.
Oliva’s phone started ringing in her pocket. “It’s Dr. Robins. I have to go,” she said, looking down at her phone with tears dripping down her face.
She walked away without even giving us the chance to say goodbye. “You think she did it?” Daniel asked, swinging his arm around my shoulders.
Did I? I wasn’t sure. “Part of me says yes, but the other part says that she didn’t. How about you?” I asked, twisting and turning until I was free of him.
“I don’t know who to believe. Was Pearl telling the truth when she said that Bobby was divorcing Oliva? Or was Oliva telling the truth when she said that Bobby came to Cat’s Cradle to call things off with Pearl? Do you think he was playing the both of them and they found out resulting in them teaming up and going all Carrie Underwood Two Black Cadillac’s on him?” he asked.
All three of his scenarios was a very strong possibility. They all sounded believable, but the problem was finding out which one was the real truth. They say there are two sides to every story, but in the case of who murdered Bobby Matthews there were three sides.
“Possibly,” I told him as we exited the hospital and looked for the car in the gigantic parking garage.
“Which one are you saying possibly to?” he asked.
“All of them.”
After we finally located his car, we climbed inside and started our drive back to the hotel to get our stuff, so we could go back to Cat’s Cradle. I couldn’t wait to get out of super busy Atlanta and go back to kooky Cat’s Cradle. But I had to admit I was going to miss the peace and quiet of my hotel room. I didn’t have to hear Abigail and Cade having one of blowout fights about her want to meet his parents. He kept telling her that wasn’t a good idea and of course that made her think he was embarrassed by her. For those two there wasn’t just trouble in Paradise, there was a typhoon.
“I noticed you had one of my pens. You didn’t have to steal it. I would have given you one,” he said, laughing.
“Your pen is not important right now, Daniel. What’s going to be our next move when we get back to Cat’s Cradle?”
Daniel glanced at his gold watch before answering me. “It’s going to be late when we get there, Suzie Q. So, my plan is to drop you off at your house and then go to my house and go to sleep. What you do with your time is up to you.”
I was going to use my time to try to get closer to figuring out what happened to Bobby Matthews and if Daniel was going to sleep, I would do it without him.
I didn’t need him, I had a whole team of witches.
9
I had never been happier to sit at in the living room with my family than I was the night I returned home from my road trip to Atlanta. “Did you put a love spell on Mason Blanchard?” Grandma Misty asked, flipping through a copy of Witches Weekly, her favorite magazine.
It was like Gossip Girl, but for witches. Every week it appeared out of thin air and landed on the glass coffee table in front of the couch. Like those celebrity magazines they always put their biggest story on the cover, and as I looked closer, I saw that Abigail had made the cover. It wasn’t her first time on the cover.
“Why would you think that?” I asked, trying to read the headline on the front of the magazine.
“When you left with Daniel he sat on the front step like a lost puppy. He fell asleep on the porch. I was going to wake him up, but Dale pulled up and beat me to it. Abigail thought it would be funny to take her anger out on poor Mason,” Grandma Misty said, tossing the magazine on the table.
Picking up the magazine, I scanned over the front cover. It read ‘Abigail Norwood heartbroken after Cade Blackwater’s family forbids him from seeing her! More details inside!’
“The Blackwater’s finally pulled the plug on the relationship?” I asked Grandma Misty, showing her the cover that was complete with a picture of Cade and Abigail with a huge yellow split down the middle.
“His parents got back from visiting family in Alabama and found that he was dating an infamous Norwood. They made him break up with her because they said no son of theirs was going to spend his life with someone who has a curse hanging over their head.”
That was harsh. I had never met Cade’s parents, but they sounded like awful people.
“Aw, man, it’s a shame they don’t like girls with curses because I saw a picture of grandpa Blackwater the last time I was at their house and I was thinking about asking him out on a date,” I said, pretending to be defeated, “Where is Abby?”
Abigail pretended to not care what people thought about her, but she wanted to be accepted more than anything. She was sour and snarky on the outside, but she was like any other girl on the inside. There was a heart in there somewhere. I wasn’t sure where, but I knew it was there because she couldn’t live without a heart.
“She’s pretending like she’s holding it together, but I heard her bawling her eyes out in the library,” Grandma Misty said, getting up from the couch.
“I’m going to go check on her,” I told her, heading to the library in search of my heartbroken sister.
“Okay, Honey, I’ll make us some tea,” she said, strolling to the kitchen.
Grandma Misty thought her chamomile tea could have fixed anything. She always brewed it like a potion, she even used Aunt Tilly’s black cauldron.
Coming to a stop in front of the library door, I listened for Abigail’s sobbing but only heard her muttering. “Abby, can I come in?” I asked, knocking on the door.
She didn’t answer, so I tried to open the door only to find out it was locked. Waving my hand in front of the door, it flew open.
“Are you trying to tear the door from the hinges, Supergirl?” Abigail snapped, flipping through a spell book.
I ignored her and the rude tone of her voice. She was hurting, and I was going to be there for her. “What are you looking for?” I asked, looking over her shoulder at the book in her hands.
“A spell,” she said in a clipped tone that told me she didn’t want to talk about it, but too bad for her I did.
“Oh, really? I thought you were looking through the big brown spell book for Grandma Misty’s sugar cookie recipe.”
She didn’t answer me because she thought if she ignored me long enough I would leave. She couldn’t have been more wrong. It was like she had forgotten that I was a lawyer. I got paid to annoy people, and I was pretty good at it if I had to say so myself.
“What kind of spell are you searching for?” I asked, hoping to get an answer that time, “A love spell?”
“No, I would never use a love spell because that love isn’t real and besides a love spell wouldn’t work on Cade. The minute he held my hand or kissed my cheek he would be able to tell what I had done,” she said, rolling her eyes.
She was right. I had forgotten all about Cade’s special gift. “So, what spell are you looking for then?”
“A spell for lice. Does that even exist?” she asked, tossing the book she was looking through to the side and picking up a new one.
“I’ve never heard of a spell that gives someone lice,” I told her, taking the spell book from her hands, “Let’s go sit and talk. Grandma Misty is making some tea.”
“That tea is so gross,” she said, taking my hand as we walked to the kitchen.
“I know, but just drink it. You know how moody Grandma Misty gets when we don’t drink it.”
“I know, I know,” she said, throwing her free hand up in defeat.
The smell of the tea hit me in the face and almost knocked me down. She got a little too excited with the chamomile that day.
“What on earth that horrible smell?” Earl boomed, walking in the room and waving his hand in front of his face dramatically.
It didn’t smell that bad I thought to myself as I took another whiff. Okay, it was as bad as Earl had let on. It smelled like sweaty shoes with a hint of honey.
“Grandma Misty’s famous chamomile tea. She thinks one sip of it can make everything right in the world,” Christopher said, leaning against the door frame.
“Well, well, look what just flew in,” Abigail said, pushing away the cup of tea Grandma Misty placed in front of her.
“I’m going let your rudeness and snarky comments go this time because you’re using them as a defense mechanism, so I’ll let you get away with it today,” he said, taking a seat next to Abigail, “How are you holding up? I know that you really liked him.”
Abigail stared down at the white lace table cloth that Sadie bought Grandma Misty six years earlier. It looked like it was brand new thank to the stain resistant spell Grandma Misty placed on it, but because Earl was there all of the spells in the house were no longer intact.
Grandma Misty’s eyes were glued to her precious tablecloth. “Yeah, well, that doesn’t matter now does it? I should have known that he was too perfect. He was too handsome, too smart, and too kind. I should have known that he had a flaw somewhere. I just didn’t think that he was a twenty-five-year-old momma’s boy who couldn’t make decisions for himself,” she spewed, clenching her fist into balls and squeezing as hard as she could.
“Don’t hold back, little sis, let us know how you really feel about the dude. And Abby maybe you should cut him a break, I’ve heard that Vivien Blackwater is a real witch,” Christopher said, earning a smack on the back of the head from Grandma Misty.
“Christopher Norwood, you know better than to talk like that in front our guest,” she said, pointing to Earl.
“Oh, he’s fine,” Earl said, propping his dirty boots on Grandma Misty’s table smearing dirt all over the lace tablecloth in the process.
I had the feeling I was going to be investigating the Earl’s murder in the not so distant future.
10
Daniel and I watched as Abigail terrorized the new receptionist, Hayley, who had just gotten engaged. “Love is a lie, Hayley. He’ll probably leave you when his mother tells him that she doesn’t like you after only meeting you one time,” Abigail said, running her hands through her hair that she had perfectly tousled into beach waves.
She was very dressed up for ten o’clock in the morning, and I figured that had something to do with the Blackwater twins coming to Cat’s Cradle to give me a hand with my investigation. Daniel didn’t know that we were actually all witches and warlocks, so all of the twins work would be done behind the scenes.
“His mother is d-dead,” Hayley said, looking past Abigail for help.
“Lucky you,” Abigail said, checking her dress ank
le boots in the glass that surrounded Daniel’s office.
“I didn’t know she was so scary,” Daniel whispered so he didn’t have to deal with Abigail’s wrath and I didn’t blame him one bit.
“Oh, yeah, she’s crazy. You didn’t know that? That’s like common knowledge around these parts.”
He just shook his head as he watched Abigail dig through her purse until she found a picture of her with Cade. They were smiling from ear to ear and were radiating happiness. Well, until she ripped it in half and let it hit the floor.
“I liked that picture,” a man’s voice said from the doorway.
Tearing my eyes away from Abigail, I saw that the Blackwater twins had arrived. Cade looked down at the ruined picture while his brother snickered.
“Cade has always been the heartbreaker out of us,” Cole said, leaning down to picture up the pieces of the picture that laid across the floor, “I would tell you to take it and tape it back together, but I don’t think mom would like it too much.”
“Shut up, Cole. Hey, Abigail and Malady. I’m sorry I’ve forgotten your name,” Cade said, holding his hand out for Daniel to shake it.
“Daniel Price. I’ve heard about you, Cade.”
“Good things?” Cade asked, looking at Abigail out of the corner of his eye.
“Do you want me to lie or tell the truth?” Daniel asked.
“Lie,” he said, sighing.
“Well, in that case, everything I’ve heard about you has been great. Nothing bad at all, and Abigail definitely didn’t call you a momma’s boy who couldn’t make decisions for himself,” Daniel said, giving Cade a look full of sympathy.
“Abby, I had no idea you were a savage,” Cole said, enjoying his twin brother’s torment a little too much.
Cade looked at his brother like he wanted to ring his neck. “Whose side are you on?” Cade asked.
“You of course,” Cole said told his brother before pointing and mouthing ‘you’ to Abby when Cade turned his head.
Cursed on the Second Date: A Witchy Cozy Mystery (Cursed Coven Cozies Book 2) Page 6