Witching for the Best

by Samantha Silver

  “I thought bingo was basically a game of luck. Like gambling,” Luna said, confused.

  “Exactly. That’s what I thought, too. And that’s how it’s supposed to work.”

  “But it didn’t?”

  I shook my head. “Nope. Not for Susanna. She won so big and so often that people think she had to have been cheating.”

  “You can cheat at bingo?” she shot back, genuinely shocked. “Well, color me surprised. That just makes the whole game seem much, much more interesting to me.”

  “Yeah. It’s complicated, though. But Susanna was clever. I mean, I saw her several times growing up. She was kind of friends with my mom, and I met her at Elisa’s house a few times, too. She was smart as a whip. If anyone could successfully cheat at bingo, I bet it was her.”

  “So our victim was a serial cheater,” Luna surmised.

  “Yeah. I mean, unless she just happened to be the luckiest woman in the world, there’s no other explanation, is there?” I said.

  “And considering the fact that her body was just found floating in the water, I would have to say that it probably wasn’t her luck that helped her win,” she said morbidly.

  “Exactly. Okay. So, here’s the next step,” I began, lowering my voice even further. “We’re going to explore some of the Senior’s Center. There’s a lot more to the building complex than just the bingo hall. And there are some questionable people I would love to track down.”

  “Alrighty then. Let’s go,” Luna said, nudging me with her forehead.

  I turned and walked past the front desk again, looking for a directory sign. There was a sort of map printed on the wall, but it wasn’t an ordinary map like one might find in a non-magical mall. No, this was much more. It was interactive. Mobile. On the map, I could see the whole complex laid out, complete with a living, breathing, moving population of elder residents and younger caretakers. The Senior’s Center was more complicated and labyrinthine than I’d previously thought. From the outside, the building looked pretty imposing, sure. A massive structure made of much more modern material than the majority of houses and public buildings here in Moonlight Cove. But I hadn’t realized until now just how many rooms this place boasted. Multiple rec rooms. A swimming pool. A sauna. Two in-house theaters. The bingo hall, of course. Out back, there were tennis courts, a broom-riding range, and even a dueling circle. I wondered how often that got used.

  It was weird to picture two elderly people firing off offensive spells at each other for fun. Dueling was a young witch’s or wizard’s sport, or so I’d always imagined. But then again, after the showdown in the bingo hall, I was starting to rethink my mental image of older folks. They might have moved a little more slowly than us youngsters, but they were equally capable of spite, passion, and ferocity. Possibly, even more so.

  Luna and I wandered down the hallway, slowly meandering, looking at the photos on the walls, the paintings and sculptures created by local artists. Moonlight Cove was a pretty artistic little town, especially considering how small it was. It was cool to see that the Senior’s Center employed local artists.

  “Giving back to the local art scene and economy,” I noted. “Cool.”

  “Ugh, humans have no idea what real art is,” Luna commented snobbishly.

  “Well, excuse me, Picasso. What do you consider art?” I asked, amused.

  “You wouldn’t get it, anyway,” she said cryptically. I decided to leave it at that.

  “Where are we going, anyway?” she asked. I shrugged.

  “I couldn’t see any names on that map back there. Just moving bodies. I guess they want to protect people’s privacy to some extent. Having their names right there on the map is a little invasive,” I reasoned. “So I’m not really sure what I’m looking for.”

  “Did you really not notice the fight going on in Rec Room 3?” she scoffed.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked her, stopping in place.

  “Yeah. While you were being an oblivious human, as usual, I was actually paying attention. They may not give names, but there were definitely three moving dots on the map that were moving erratically. Aggressively,” she explained.

  “What? Why didn’t you mention it before?”

  “I figured you saw it and didn’t think it was important. Wow, humans are so dumb sometimes,” she said, rolling her big green eyes.

  “Well, crap. We need to get to that rec room then. Did you notice where it’s located?”

  “Third floor,” she said. “There’s an elevator at the end of this hallway once you hook to the right,” she recounted in perfect detail.

  “Wow, do you have a photographic memory, Luna?” I asked, impressed. I started moving quickly down the hall, taking a right and arriving at the elevator. I pressed the button and waited for it to come down to our floor.

  “No, I’m just a cat,” she said simply. “I observe stuff. It’s kind of our thing.”

  “I should’ve been taking you along with me from the start, it seems,” I said. I could feel her puffing up proudly. The elevator dinged and the doors parted. We stepped inside and I hit the button for the third floor. As we rose up, the walls turned from a flat, smooth metal-gray to a room of moving pictures. Music played softly as the chirping of birds and buzzing of bees filled our ears. The walls of the elevator turned into a beautiful, pastoral scene complete with green, rolling hills and a field of bright purple lavender. In the distance, mountains loomed majestically. After the initial unease of the shifting environment passed, I felt a sense of calm come over me. It was pretty nice, I had to admit. Even the air smelled like the fresh air of an open field. Lavender and pine, the faint scent of rain. It was lovely. Whoever designed the enchantment at work here was a skilled witch or wizard. That took serious commitment and imagination. When the elevator dinged to announce we had arrived on the third floor, I was almost disappointed. I didn’t want to leave the comfort of the fields. But as soon as the elevator stopped moving, the walls morphed back into plain gray steel again.

  The doors opened and we walked out into another hallway.

  “Well, that was interesting,” Luna commented.

  “Really interesting. Kind of nice, actually,” I admitted.

  “Good magic at work there,” she said. I nodded.

  “Very good magic,” I agreed softly. As we walked down the hall, we suddenly both became aware of some shouting further down the way. We exchanged concerned expressions and I broke into a run. There was a door to the left marked REC ROOM 3, and we could hear shouting and scuffling from inside. I quickly pushed open the door to find a very intense scene unfolding right there in the middle of the foosball and ping-pong tables.

  “I know what you did, Tony!” shouted an elderly man, shaking his fist. “I know you killed her, you bastard! And soon everybody else will find out, too. They’ll find out just what kind of a man you are!”

  “Dad, calm down,” urged a younger man who was holding him back, only somewhat successfully. The young guy did a double take at the sight of Luna and me, his face going pale. I had a feeling he didn’t want anyone to see what was happening here.

  “Yeah, listen to your son, Elton!” exclaimed the other older man. From his fancy clothes – this was the first time I’d seen someone wearing a full three-piece suit in town - and by the dignified way he held himself, I could hazard a pretty solid guess about who this guy was: Tony Byrd.

  “You leave my son out of this!” the man called Elton cried. “Don’t you say a word about my family. You treacherous old slug!”

  “Oh, come now, Kolbeck. Just let it go, man. You’re making a scene,” Tony answered in a smooth, level voice. I could tell that the calmer Tony was, the angrier it made Elton.

  “No! I want a scene! I want the whole town to know what you did to my Susanna! Don’t you dare think for a second I’ll let you get away with this,” snarled Elton, tears in his eyes.

  Suddenly, Luna bounded off my shoulder and landed gracefully on the floor. She went running acr
oss the room to stand in the middle of the argument, positioned between the men.

  “Luna!” I hissed, my eyes going wide. What in the name of the moon was she doing? She was going to get hurt if she didn’t stay out of the way!

  She glanced back at me for just a millisecond, just long enough to give me a subtle little wink. Then she pricked up all the fluffy black fur on her spine and tail to make herself bigger and scarier - which wasn’t saying much, because for all her sass and sarcasm, there was really nothing physically intimidating about my familiar.

  But then I saw the look on Tony’s face, the color draining from his cheeks as his eyes went round. He backed up several steps, nearly tripping in his haste to get farther away from Luna. Oh, that’s what she was doing. Somehow, she had sensed that Tony was afraid of cats!

  Tony looked up from his horror to give a flashing, furious look toward Elton and his struggling son. “Not another word, Kolbeck. I didn’t touch Susanna, and I don’t want you running your mouth around town that I did. Get over yourself, man. Do your grieving, but leave my name out of it! Or there will be hell to pay,” he threatened through gritted teeth. Then he stormed out of the room, leaving a wide berth between Luna and himself. The door slammed behind him, and Elton Kolbeck all but collapsed in a fit of tears into his son’s strong arms.

  “Thank you for breaking it up,” his son said to me quietly as he patted his father’s back.

  “Don’t mention it,” I said, shrugging. After all, it wasn’t me who had done anything. It was all Luna. She trotted triumphantly back over to me and I gave her a nod of approval. Meanwhile, Elton was still sobbing.

  “He killed my Susanna. I just know it,” he whimpered. “Ryan, I know it.”

  “Dad, come on. You’ve got to pull yourself together. She’s gone. No amount of shouting and accusing will bring her back,” Ryan said softly.

  “No! I won’t just sit back and let her killer go free. Even if he’s the richest man in town, I won’t let my sweet Su go without a fight!” he retorted, wiping his eyes.

  It was a sad sight, the two of them. Ryan Kolbeck was fit and muscular, with the kind of broad, calloused hands that come from a lifetime of hard, manual labor. His clothes were stained with spots of what looked like dirt and oil. My witchy instinct, or perhaps just old-fashioned context clues, told me he was a mechanic of some sort. Elton looked just like him but older and wider, his face weathered and sagging with grief. Ryan walked over to me and stretched out his hand for me to shake. His arms were dotted with grease and scratches.

  “Ryan Kolbeck,” he said. “This is my father, if you couldn’t guess that. He’s been through a lot today, I’m sorry about this.”

  I shook his hand with a faint smile. “I’m Artemis Mani. I’m the one they called in to recover Susanna’s body. I’m so sorry for your loss, Elton,” I said, leaning around to make eye contact with him. He nodded slowly.

  “Thank you for helping bring her in. She was my everything, Susanna. The sweetest, smartest, most beautiful woman I ever knew,” Elton wept. Ryan stiffened slightly in front of me.

  “Well, she was alright, but she couldn’t hold a candle to my mother,” Ryan muttered under his breath. I was a little surprised at the outburst, however soft it was, but then, tensions were clearly running high here today.

  A minute later, Ryan spoke again. “I come here to visit my dad every week. We go out and get some real fresh air, not just that fake stuff in the elevator. We walk through the park, we ride brooms, we go out on my boat, or sometimes we just go to The Magic Bean and have a coffee. My dad, he’s not usually like this. He’s a tough guy, but as soon as he caught wind of what happened to that woman, he’s just been a complete mess.”

  I nodded. “Of course. Anyone would be upset in this situation. Now, Elton, I know this might be kind of hard to talk about, but do you know of anyone in the world who might have wanted to hurt Susanna?”

  He looked up at me with fire in his tearful eyes. “That Tony Byrd. He’s the only one I can think of. Everybody else loved her. She was a wonderful person.”

  Ryan nodded slowly. “You know, now that I think of it, Tony did have that spat with her a few days ago, right? Is that why you were accusing him of killing her?”

  Elton nodded vigorously. “Yes. He was yelling at her about getting special treatment here or something. That man’s such a spoiled old playboy, he can’t stand not being the most well-liked person in the room. But everybody liked Susanna, and not for her money like with Tony. People only put up with him because he’s rich. But Su? She had a real spark. And Tony, he just couldn’t stand that. He thinks he runs this place. But he’s retired. He’s an old man, a resident here just like the rest of us, but that’s never enough for him. He has to be number one. I bet he just couldn’t stand that everyone genuinely liked Susanna, and that’s why he killed her.”

  Chapter 8

  The Senior’s Center ended up being a little more of a labyrinth than I gave it credit for. Trying to retrace my footsteps and get to the reception desk, I ended up taking a route that I was pretty sure wound up even further away from where I’d been before, and after dodging a few more old ladies who started shuffling my way, - I had no intention of being paired up with their grandsons - I pushed through a glass door to the outside and paced around the building.

  As I did, Luna bounded up ahead of me of me, rubbing up against my leg and nearly tripping me.

  “Hey! When are we stopping for lunch?” she asked.

  “We’re right in the middle of doing things!” I said back down to her with a frown.

  “Sleuthing is hard work!” Luna protested. “I’m half-starved already. Do you think they have pet-friendly to-go restaurants yet? You keep me locked up so much, I don’t know what kind of technological breakthroughs the wide world outside is making.”

  I rolled my eyes.

  “I’ll take that as a no. What’s next, then?”

  “Find a loose end,” I said, heading toward the glass doors to the reception area and hoping nobody noticed how hopelessly lost I’d just gotten.

  “Yikes, are we doing hitman work now?”

  “What? No, not that kind of tying up loose ends,” I said with a shake of my head. “This guy stormed off when I was talking to a couple of people just now, and I need to find him.”

  I’d had just about enough of these old people getting away from me so easily.

  Inside the reception room, a woman in her thirties with tight, curly hair was busy writing something on a pad of paper. When I got closer, I saw that it was just a crossword. I cleared my throat, and she slowly peered up over her glasses at me.

  “Can I help you, sugar?” she asked, a thick Texan accent in her voice.

  “Maybe,” I said, putting my hands on the tall desk and trying to look as unproblematic as possible. “I’m trying to find Tony Byrd.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Oh! Are you here from the law office?”

  “No, ma’am,” I said, though I couldn’t hide the surprise on my face. “I’m here on my own, just wanted to pay him a visit.”

  “Oh, sweet pea,” she said with a smile. “What on earth could a nice girl like you want with tha- with Mr. Byrd?”

  “Well,” I started, my mind racing to come up with something. “We were talking in the game room a few minutes ago, but he had to go take care of something suddenly, and I got a little turned around.”

  “You don’t say? Oh, don’t you worry about that, I get turned around in this place all the time, and I’ve been here almost a year,” she said with a friendly smile. “Mr. Byrd’s in rooms 321, 322, and 323. They’re sort of all the same, but we haven’t carried out all the renovations he’s been talking about just yet.”

  I nodded, pursing my lips and deciding to press my luck a little further with her. “Ahhh, gotcha. Is that why you’re expecting a lawyer? Something about property rights in, um, changing around the homes here?”

  “Oh, mercy, no,” she laughed, rolling her eyes and leaning
forward on her desk to lower her voice. “Mr. Byrd used to own this place, I’m sure you know. He kind of still does, even though his children are technically in control now. He can do whatever he wants with the place just about any time he wants.”

  The tone in her voice and smirk on her face told me what her thoughts on Mr. Byrd’s exercise of authority were.

  “That must be a bit of a strain,” I said with an understanding smile. “Here I thought some of my guests could be demanding.”

  “Mm-hmm,” she said, checking her nails. “But no, it was Susanna who was getting her lawyer over here.”

  Now this was the kind of info I was after.

  “Really?” I asked, tilting my head curiously. “That sounds serious. I heard there was some disagreement over special treatment. Was it about that?”

  “Oh, sugar,” she said, giggling, “the people around here are petty, but they’re not that petty. I don’t know why Susanna had a lawyer over here.” She sighed, frowning and looking at me with the most piteous eyes I’d ever seen from a receptionist. “But I suppose it doesn’t matter now, bless her soul. I still can’t believe what happened.”

  “Me either,” I said with a sympathetic nod. “I’m still trying to get a few things sorted out about that. So, do you think there was anything to what Mr. Byrd has been saying about Susanna?”

  “Lord have mercy,” she said with a roll of her eyes and a knowing smile. She cast a quick glance around before shaking her head and mouthing “No.” Whispering, she went on, “After one of those bingo games one night, she was just worn out and asked one of the nurses for a little extra with dinner. He gave it to her, of course, and Mr. Byrd just happened to see the nurse with the food going into Susanna’s room, and heaven help us, we haven’t heard the end of it.” She shook her head. “I almost want to force him into one of those bingo games to humble him a little.”

  I was starting to think that might not have been a bad idea.