“Is it really?” Cat asked, and I nodded.
“Yeah, at four. I overheard someone in the Mexican restaurant at lunch talking about it.”
“Good, then it’s settled. We’ll do that instead,” Cat said.
Just then, Peaches came into the bookshop.
“Good morning, sunshine,” Cat teased, and Peaches stuck her tongue out at her sister.
“For your information, sister dear, I was up all night with our Dear Aunt, having an important conversation.”
“Oh?” I asked, and Peaches smiled.
“I want in. On the whole fight against The Others.”
“Really?” Cat asked.
“What made you change your mind?” I chimed in.
“I was up all night talking to Aunt Francine,” Peaches explained. “We spoke about my worries, and why I didn’t want to come back. We spoke about her, and how the Others came after her, and how she died to avoid having her soul taken. We spoke about a lot of things, and I think in the end I realized, the two of you are right. What’s the point in living in fear all the time? It’s not really living if you’re trapped somewhere you don’t want to be, is it? So yeah, I’ll join the two of you. I’d rather risk having my soul taken by the Others than spend the rest of my life looking over my shoulder or hiding away somewhere I don’t want to be.”
Cat made her way over to her sister and wrapped her up in a big hug. I made my way over toward them and joined in. I had never felt so much part of a family before.
“So when do we do it?” Cat asked.
“I vote for tonight,” I said. “I want this over and done with. I want to be able to go out again without having to worry about the Others. I want them gone, I want them out of our lives, and I want revenge for my mom and for Aunt Francine.”
Peaches nodded. “I agree. Not only do I agree with everything that you’ve said, but I want to get this over with before I change my mind.”
Cat grinned. “Well, you don’t have to tell me twice. Let’s go kick some creepy weird soul sucking creature butt.”
Before we could take on the Others, however, we still had to go to the funeral and find out what we could about Vanessa’s last few days.
I hadn’t overheard at the restaurant where the funeral was taking place, but it didn’t take very long for Cat and I to figure out that it was at the local Catholic Church. We arrived there around 10 to 4, and found a decent handful of mourners milling around outside, getting ready to enter the church for the service. Cat and I split up, having agreed beforehand that as we had originally planned, Cat would talk to Polly and I would talk to Kyle.
I found Kyle in the church, standing by himself against one of the stone walls, looking out at the casket laid out at the front of the church. A large portrait of Vanessa, sitting on the beach with a huge smile on her face as the sun set behind her, was framed above the casket.
As I made my way toward him, Kyle looked up and gave me a sad smile.
“Thanks for coming,” he started. “It’s nice to see how many people cared about Vanessa.”
“Of course,” I replied softly. “Listen, I was meaning to ask you, how did Vanessa seem in the few days before she died?”
“Like, was she happy?” Kyle asked.
“Yeah, exactly. Was she happy? Was she making plans for the future? Did anything seem odd about her?”
“Well, now that you mention it, she did seem a little bit weird,” Kyle said. “Like, she didn’t seem to be as enthusiastic about planning the wedding as she had been. But, at the same time, she was still definitely happy, and still definitely thinking about the future. She and Polly had planned to go to Coachella next year, and she couldn’t stop talking about that. She kept telling me about how fun of a trip it was going to be, and how the two of them were going to have a blast. It was great seeing her being so happy about something,” Kyle added, as he fought back emotion. It definitely still wasn’t easy for him to talk about his fiancée.
“Thank you, Kyle,” I told him. “That really helps.”
Kyle looked up at me sadly. “Chief Griffin told me the medical examiner has declared her death a suicide.” His voice was hollow. “It wasn’t, though. I know it wasn’t. She might have been acting a little bit stranger than usual, but I know that my Ness didn’t kill herself. She was talking about the future. And maybe she was feeling a little bit nervous about the wedding, you know? But she was so looking forward to that trip to Coachella with Polly next year. And even though I’d been having a bit of trouble getting construction gigs, Vanessa would always tell me that it would be fine, that soon I wouldn’t have to worry about that anymore.”
“Do you know what she meant by that?” I asked, my brow furrowing, and Kyle shrugged.
“I figured she meant I’d find something more permanent. But I swear, she wouldn’t have killed herself.”
I nodded slowly. It certainly didn’t sound like Vanessa was planning on committing suicide. So who killed her, and why?
Chapter 18
I made my way back out of the church, and as I passed the entrance hall, I noticed a table set up where a number of photos of Vanessa had been printed. Her old high school yearbook was on the table, too.
I picked it up out of curiosity and began flipping through it. There were tons of photos that didn’t feature Vanessa, of course. But there she was, unmistakably, in the group photo of the girls’ basketball team. That was interesting; I hadn’t picked her as being a basketball kind of person.
In fact, the more I flipped through the book, the more I began to recognize people: there was Polly, showing off an art project that had won some sort of state prize, Vicky dressed as a 50s housewife as part of a Glee Club performance, a young Iris–she had to have been in the ninth grade at the most–posing with her downhill mountain bike, a huge grin on her face, and Kyle standing with his guitar as part of the band.
My heart went out for Polly and Kyle as I looked at the pictures. They seemed so happy, so carefree. None of them knew that around ten years later one of them would have been–what, poisoned? Decided to take her own life? I was definitely leaning toward the former, but Chase still had evidence that it was Vanessa who had ordered the cyanide.
I met back up with Cat after the funeral, where Polly and Kyle had both spoken about their love for their friend and fiancé, respectively. It had been a somber affair, to be sure. I also noted that even Iris had shown up, and I saw Polly shoot her a grateful smile at one point.
“So what did Polly have to say about Vanessa?”
“She was super excited about their trip to Coachella next year, and wouldn’t stop talking about it,” Cat said. “The morning that she died, Vanessa was texting Polly links to Airbnbs they could stay at that looked super amazing. She wasn’t lying; she showed me the texts.”
I nodded. “That fits in with what I’ve learned as well. Kyle says that while Vanessa didn’t seem as excited about planning the wedding as she had been, she was definitely excited about that trip. He chalked up the wedding thing as just nerves, but I don’t know what we should discount and what we shouldn’t, at this point,” I sighed.
“I know,” Cat replied, running a hand through her hair. “It’s like everything in this case is completely backwards. Nothing makes sense at all.”
When I got to the bookshop that afternoon, Archibald was floating in circles, obviously waiting for me.
“Again! What is it that you spend all your time doing?” he asked.
“Finding a murderer,” I replied. “Trust me, there will be lots of time for me to publish your book when this case is over.” I felt a pang of guilt, and to be honest, fear, when I realized that might not actually be the truth. After all, that night was the big night. Peaches, Cat and I were going to try to draw out the Others at last, and we were going to try and defeat them, once and for all.
“Well, I promise you, that book is going to be worth killing over,” Archibald said pompously, and I shot him a look.
“I hope not
; there have been enough murders around here recently.”
Just then, my phone buzzed. As I pulled it out of my pocket, I saw a text from Chase.
How was the funeral?
The pang of guilt in my chest got stronger, but then, so did the fear one. What if we failed? What if we died tonight? Or worse. What would Chase think? Would he even know? Would anyone tell him?
No, I couldn’t do this to Chase. Sure, we’d only been seeing each other for a few months, but I really felt a connection with him. I felt something I’d never felt with anyone else before. I felt something real, and I had a feeling he felt the same way. No, it wouldn’t be fair to him to just go without saying anything.
How did you know I went to the funeral?
I know you that well.
It was illuminating. Tell you over dinner?
Sure. Pickles’?
See you there at seven.
I put the phone away and sighed. I really, really hoped this wasn’t going to be our last date ever.
“Hello!” Archibald said, waving his half-opaque hands in front of my face, completely ruining the moment. “Is my book published yet?”
I let out a sigh. “Let me go have a look,” I told him. I grabbed the iPad, and was pleasantly surprised to find that the person I had paid $20 to on Fiverr to make me a decent-looking cover had come through.
“What do you think?” I asked, holding up the iPad to Archibald, who looked at it carefully for a few moments. I had asked the artist to make a faux-leather cover, and he had come through in the best possible way. The book’s cover was a dark tan with a slight reddish tinge, with an elaborate floral border. In the middle, in small, gold serif text, was the title.
It was actually really classy looking.
Archibald’s face took on a strange expression, and I found myself a little bit confused. To be honest, I thought he hated it at first, and then I realized what it was.
“Are you… trying to stop from crying?” I asked, astounded.
“Of course not,” Archibald replied, his voice cracking slightly.
“Oh my God! You’re… you’re touched by this,” I said, the realization dawning upon me. “It’s a Christmas miracle!”
Ok, it was nowhere near Christmas. But it was basically a miracle. Cantankerous old Archibald was actually touched by how his e-book looked.
“Let me upload this for you,” I said, opening Amazon. I had gone through a tutorial that showed me how to upload an e-book for publication, and after about twenty minutes, I was finished. Amazon told me that the book was in review for publication, and that it would be live sometime in the next seventy-two hours.
“There,” I said. “Now your works will eventually be out there for the whole world to see. Although, I’m going to be the one getting the money from sales, seeing as you don’t exactly have a social security number or a bank account.”
“I thank you, on behalf of your future children who will not have to work a day in their lives thanks to me,” Archibald said. “Obviously, this collection of poems will rocket up to the top of the bestsellers list.”
“Let’s not get our hopes up too high here, Archibald,” I replied, raising an eyebrow. “I don’t know what things were like in nineteenth century England, but in this day and age, people are more into books like Harry Potter and Big Little Lies than reading poetry.”
“Well, I think you will find that my poetry is so enticing that it will single-handedly change the reading habits of a generation.”
I tried to resist rolling my eyes, thinking that for Archibald, this must have been the first really exciting thing that had happened to him in the last two hundred years that really involved him.
“Well, I hope it does as well for you as you hope. Now, I’m going to go get ready for dinner.”
That night at exactly seven o’clock I was led over to a small table at Pickles’, where I waited impatiently for Chase to show up. He sauntered up to me about five minutes later and sat down.
“Hey, sorry I’m late. Got a bit behind at work.”
“No problem,” I said, forcing a smile. My heart beat in my chest. Was this the last time I was ever going to see those gorgeous eyes glittering in my direction? Was he ever going to shoot me one of those amazing grins again?
“So how did your day go?” Chase asked.
“Oh, it was fairly boring.” I couldn’t exactly tell him that I’d been trying to make a book of poems for a ghost who had lived two hundred years ago and was trying to figure out how to self-publish it. “The bookstore was busy enough. We’re still getting a decent number of visitors who are trying to find out exactly where the murder took place, so I’ve got my hands full trying to keep them out and helping out the people who are actually looking for something to read.”
“That’s annoying,” Chase said. “I definitely feel your pain there. Every time there’s a murder here there’s always an uptick in people who visit the station to see if their missing wallet or phone has been handed in, and while they’re there just so happen to ask if there’s any new information that we can tell them about the murder.”
“People actually do that?” I asked, my mouth dropping open.
“All the time,” Chase said. “It’s a bit macabre, really.”
That was exactly what I thought about the people in the bookstore.
As the conversation continued, I realized as I spoke to Chase that there was nothing more in the world that I wanted than to be able to spend more time with him.
Yeah, I was in love with Chase Griffin. There was absolutely no denying it.
My heart hurt at the thought that this might be our last dinner together.
“Hey, is everything ok?” Chase finally asked me after Michelle came back with our pizza. “You seem, I dunno, a little bit distracted.”
“I’m ok,” I said to Chase with a smile. “But listen, I want you to know that no matter what, I love you, ok?”
“I love you, too,” he replied without missing a beat. My heart soared to hear those words, but at the same time, I felt so bad knowing that he was going to hurt if tonight went badly.
“Are you sure everything’s ok?”
“Yeah. I mean, yeah, it will be. I just wanted you to know how I felt, ok?”
“Of course. I feel the same way. I’m really glad you came into my life, Alice.”
Chapter 19
I left dinner with Chase feeling hollow and empty. Still, I reminded myself that if we didn’t do this, I was going to spend my whole life looking behind me, always worried that the Others were going to come at some point, never able to truly be free.
This absolutely had to happen.
Cat came over just after midnight, finding Peaches and I waiting for her in the bookshop. Her face was definitely as grim as mine felt.
“Are we ready to do this?” she asked, and the two of us nodded. I personally didn’t trust myself to speak.
“Okay,” I said. “Cat and I have a little bit of experience with this, so Peaches, this is how things work best: we’ll set up a spell so that we can all communicate telepathically, that way no matter how far away from one another we are, we’ll be able to talk. We’ll all head off in different directions, since the Others are more likely to come and find us if we are alone.”
“I was thinking,” Cat said. “You’re the one they hate the most. You’re also the most powerful of the three of us. If we send you out as bait, they’re more likely to send out either more of them, or a more powerful one of them.”
My stomach dropped in my gut, but I had to admit, what Cat said made sense. I nodded slowly as I digested her words.
“Yeah, I think that’s a good idea,” I said. “That way, you and Peaches can stay in the bookshop, and then as soon as I call for help, you can come and join me.”
“Are you sure?” Peaches asked. “That sounds incredibly dangerous.”
“What we’re doing is incredibly dangerous,” I said. “But there are no other options. And Cat is right; they
really do hate me, and if I go out there alone, they’re more likely to send out the whole army. That’s what we want. We’ve destroyed them one at a time before, but we need to really draw them out and destroy them all once and for all.”
As much as I knew what I was saying was correct, I still couldn’t stop the feeling of nausea rising up inside of me. This was still going to be incredibly dangerous.
After we hashed out a few more details, we were finally ready to go. The three of us stood in a circle, and let Cat take the reins when it came to the telepathic spell, since she was the one who had figured out how it worked in the first place, and was better at it than the rest of us.
I held both my cousin’s hands and closed my eyes as I let the energy build up inside of me that Cat passed through me. Suddenly, I felt a jolt, and as I opened my eyes, I heard Cat’s voice in my head.
“Did it work?”
Seeing as her mouth hadn’t moved an inch, I nodded.
“Wow, that’s cool,” Peaches said, her eyes widening.
“See what you miss when you don’t hang out with Cat and I?” I asked with a grin.
Peaches shook her head. “You guys are both so good at magic. I really hope I don’t screw anything up.”
I put a hand on her shoulder. “You’re not going to Peaches. Don’t worry.”
“Alice is right. You don’t need to worry; even just having you there, blending your magical powers with us, is going to help. Your magic might not do exactly what you want it to all the time, but the fact is, you have power of your own all the same. That power is what’s going to defeat the Others.”
“Right. Now, it’s time for me to go,” I said. “I’m going to take the trail from the entrance across the street, and head left. I’ll keep walking until they find me.”
“Okay,” Cat said with a curt nod. “I have my broom, so as soon as you need us, let us know and we’ll be on our way.”
Pride and Premeditation: A Cozy Mystery (Magical Bookshop Mystery Book 5) Page 10