An Artistic Homicide (Lainswich Witches Book 11)

by Raven Snow

  “Ben?” Nathan repeated, looking from Rowen to Rose. “Who’s that?”

  “The Chief of Police,” explained Rowen. “He’s Rose’s boyfriend, so that comes in handy. It really helps us follow leads like this.”

  “Hold on.” Nathan looked around the circle. “You’re kidding, right? One of you is moving this thing.”

  “Well, there’s some debate about how it works,” said Rose. “It’s hard to say whether the ghost is moving the planchette or if the ghost is influencing people to move it. I’ve seen plenty of evidence that supports things both ways. On the other hand, I’ve never seen my cousins deliberately try to mislead someone with the Ouija board.”

  “This is ridiculous. I didn’t hurt anyone.” Nathan took his hands from the board and looked around the circle as if waiting for backup. No one gave him any. He stood. “This was funny at first, but it’s getting insane. This whole town is insane.”

  “Maybe,” Rowen conceded. “But my cousins and I have a pretty good track record in sorting out that insanity.”

  “That’s enough for me.” Nathan stood. “You guys have fun with… whatever this insanity is.”

  “Where can I find you? I mean, I might have to pass that information on to the police, so I probably need to know.” Nathan ignored Rowen and kept walking. “I guess I can always just ask those uncles of yours,” she added.

  Nathan disappeared around the counter. Rowen heard the front door open and shut. At least she had been able to get rid of him. That was a small blessing.

  “You didn’t make the Ouija board say that on purpose, did you?” asked Rose, lowering her voice even though all of them were now alone.

  “Of course not.” Rowen was offended that she even had to ask. “I wouldn’t do that sort of thing.”

  “So, is Nathan really the murderer?” asked Willow. “Should we have let him go?”

  “I’m not sure how we could have kept him here. That’s not really our job or something we can legally do.” Rowen had thought that went without saying. “But I’m not convinced Dayveed is telling us the whole truth. It’s likely that it being Nathan would make a better story than what really happened. Either that or he wants to mislead everyone while still keeping mystery alive. Having that mystery keeps interest going in his work.”

  “So, if Nathan didn’t do it, who did?” asked Willow.

  The planchette began to move again, even though they weren’t directly addressing Dayveed. “N-A-T-H-A-N.”

  “Are you sure about that?” asked Rowen. “Can you show me?”

  The board didn’t respond at first. “H-O-W?” it asked, finally.

  “Just open yourself up and try to show me.” Rowen wasn’t sure of an easier way to explain it. She tried anyway. “You know all that energy you have around you right now? Use some of that around me. Picture what happened to you, and I may be able to pick up on that. It’s worth a try if you’re feeling up to it.”

  At first, there was no change in the air around Rowen. She began to grow nervous that he had simply left without mentioning anything about it. That certainly wouldn’t be unlike him. Then, all at once, a burst of energy hit her hard. When Rowen closed her eyes, she saw a wavering image of Dayveed being assaulted by Nathan. Dayveed was falling forward, Nathan’s hands were around his throat. The whole thing was dynamic and brutal, like some sort of biblical painting. Rowen took a long, hard look at the image. The longer she stared at the thing, the more certain she became that Tina was correct. Dayveed was lying to them.

  “This isn’t the mental image I got back in the place where you died,” said Rowen. “It’s close, but this is manufactured. If anything, it’s a bit too close in that it shouldn’t be in third person. If this memory is truly your own and not manufactured, it should be in first person. Whatever it is you’re showing me now came out of your imagination.”

  The planchette slid to, “NO.” Rowen didn’t believe it for a second. “Nice try, but I think I’ve got you figured out. Getting murdered didn’t bother you so much once it was over and done with. You can’t change the past, right? All you could do was make sure that your art lived on in your stead. You wanted to leave behind a legacy. It was crucial that your art still become famous— Or, maybe infamous in this case. You were willing to lie about what happened to further your own reputation.”

  The planchette remained still. Rowen continued, feeling more confident than ever that she was correct in this new theory of hers. “You didn’t want anyone to know it was a woman who killed you. You’re afraid that would make you sound weak. You think people would laugh at your art and the tale of the artist behind it if they knew.”

  “That’s sexist,” grumbled Willow. “Women can totally murder people. I could totally murder a man in cold blood.”

  Rowen shot her cousin a look. Now wasn’t the time for that sort of statement. “It was Karen, wasn’t it?” Rowen asked. She felt a sharp change in the atmosphere. A chill ran down her spine. Dayveed was angry. He was angry because she had guessed correctly. “That doesn’t make you weak,” said Rowen, feeling some sympathy for the guy. Even if the ghost was a sexist pain in her butt, he had still been murdered at the start of what could have been a promising career. His future had been unfairly stolen from him. It was difficult not to feel some kind of remorse for that. “If what I’ve seen is right, she caught you off guard. It looks like your death was an accident. The two of you had personalities like water and oil. You couldn’t have gotten along. You spoke to one another. Things got heated, and she shoved you. You got caught off guard, fell, and cracked your head against your own statue. That’s a pretty lousy way to go, Dayveed. I’m sorry.”

  Dayveed still didn’t have anything to say. The air grew cool, but it was difficult to tell what that meant. If Rowen had to guess, she would say that he was angry. “How do we prove this?” asked Willow.

  The planchette began to move again. “Y-O-U C-A-N-T,” it read. The energy around the board became giddy, like Dayveed was relieved.

  “I guess I can tell Ben what we figured out,” said Rose. “I’m not sure if he’ll actually be able to do anything about it. It’s not like we have solid evidence. It doesn’t seem like she left behind any or they would have caught her by now.”

  Rowen nodded in agreement. “She hid things well. She even drew that pentagram to try and throw people off. She knew what she was doing. Maybe it’s because she works at the police station. She knew exactly what needed to be done in order to not get caught.” Rowen tried to appeal to Dayveed next. If anyone could help them with this, he could. Of course, he would have to be willing. “Is there any evidence you can point us toward? We’re just trying to help here. Do you really want your murderer to get away with what she did?”

  Dayveed didn’t say anything. There was an annoyed sort of energy emanating from somewhere nearby. He didn’t want to keep talking about this.

  “Your killer’s artwork is hanging up right next to yours. Don’t you think that cheapens it? Should she be allowed to be featured in the same gallery as you?”

  The energy around the Ouija board left. A few seconds later the walls shook violently and a single painting fell from where it was mounted. Everyone jumped. “I’m guessing that was Karen’s piece,” said Willow, breathless.

  The door to the stockroom opened and the janitor peeked out. The shaking must have caught his attention. How could it not? He took one look at the women sitting around the Ouija board and frowned. “Don’t go summoning any demons into the place. I’ve still gotta work here for one more night.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Rowen. “Actually, I think we’ve gotten all we came here for. We’ll get out of your hair.”

  The janitor followed them all out, locking the door behind them. “Did we really get all we came here for?” asked Rose.

  “Because it doesn’t feel like we got a whole lot of anything we can actually do something with,” added Willow. “Even the police don’t have any proof. If they did, they would have done something
by now. Right?” She looked at Rose.

  Rose nodded. “I think so. I would have heard something about it from Ben anyway. To hear him tell it, they don’t have any solid suspects on their hands at all.”

  Rowen nodded. She had already figured all of that. This was where it really started to get tricky. Tricky, but not impossible. “We’ll just have to talk with Karen ourselves.” She looked around at the people gathered before her. “Well, not all of us, obviously. Just me and, like, one other person.”

  “Let me go,” said Tina, surprising everyone there. “What?” she looked around at everyone who was giving her odd looks. “Karen doesn’t really like you guys, right? She barely knows me.”

  She did have a point. “Alright. I guess we can do that.” She looked at Rose. “Do you want to call ahead and tell Ben we’re coming?”

  “Absolutely not,” Rose said reflexively. “The less he knows about us investigating this stuff, the better. That way he has plausible deniability when we inevitably do something stupid.”

  Rowen began to object to that, but how could she? Rose was right. “Fair enough.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Rowen considered calling ahead to ask Karen if she was okay with a follow up interview. She decided against it. Better she didn’t give her the chance to back out. Better she just blindsided her with this stuff and made it as awkward as possible to refuse. “I appreciate the help,” she told Tina as they drove. It wasn’t wholly true. She wasn’t sure how much help she would actually be. Even so, it seemed important to thank her for it. It was the thought that counted.

  “Oh, no problem,” Tina assured her. “It’s the least I can do. You Greensmiths get a bad rap. I should know. I used to gossip about it… I think Karen and I can bond over that. I dunno. We’ll see, I guess.”

  Rowen arrived at the police station and parked out front. “You ready?” she asked Tina.

  “Yeah, sure. Why not?” Tina got out of the car and followed Rowen across the parking lot. Together, they headed inside.

  “Hi there,” said Karen. She was sitting behind the reception desk, wearing a pink pant suit and staring at her computer. “Can I help y-” She stopped when she looked up and saw who it was. “Should I give Ben a call?”

  “No,” Rowen said quickly. She agreed with Rose. It was better that Ben was involved with this as little as possible until they had something more substantial. “We’re actually here to have a chat with you again.”

  “With me?” Karen raised an eyebrow, suddenly suspicious. “What about?”

  “This and that,” said Rowen, attempting to put on her warmest smile. “There were a few questions we missed the last time you had an interview with us.”

  “Like what?” asked Karen.

  “This and that,” Rowen said again. “Didn’t you get our call yesterday?”

  “You called? I didn’t get a call.”

  “Weird.” Rowen looked at Tina who shrugged. “We called and said we were going to swing by and ask a few follow-up questions around lunch time if that was all right. We didn’t get a call back from you, so I just figured it was fine. Is it not?”

  Karen looked back at her computer screen. “Well, I’m sort of busy with, you know, work.”

  “We won’t take up very much of your time,” Rowen assured her. “You’ve got to take a lunch at some point anyway, right? We can ask our questions over that. It’ll be our treat. Wherever you want to go.”

  “I wasn’t going to take my lunch for another thirty minutes or so.” Karen was clearly making an effort to run them off. Rowen chose to ignore that.

  “We can wait,” she offered. “I don’t have anything else I need to be doing today, honestly. I’m only assigned to your article. Until I have the material to do that, I don’t have a whole lot to do with myself.”

  “I’m just tagging along for lunch,” said Tina with a shrug. “Plus, she told me she was interviewing you today, and I really wanted to tag along.”

  Karen perked up at what had the potential to be praise. “Oh?” she prompted.

  “I went to the art gallery twice,” said Tina. “I loved your piece there. It was definitely my favorite. I’ve always wanted to be an artist, but I never had that kind of talent. I mean, is it something you learn or are you just sort of born with it?”

  “Well… People tell me it’s a learned ability, but I really don’t feel like it’s something just anyone can do.”

  Rowen pulled a pencil and pad from her purse. She started scribbling down gibberish. “Do you mind if I quote you on that?”

  “Not at all.” Karen looked at the clock again. “I guess I have time for a quick lunch.” She stood, pulling her purse up over her shoulder. “How about the café on Fifth?”

  “Sounds great,” said Rowen.

  “Oh, I love that place,” added Tina.

  “All right. Let me just go tell someone I’m heading to lunch early. I’ll meet you there.”

  ***

  The café they got together with Karen at was the kind of place people with laptops and sketch pads congregated at to write or draw or study. Rowen never really got the appeal. Wasn’t it a lot easier to do those sorts of things at home?

  “I came here a lot when I was working on my gallery piece,” Karen explained, taking a seat.

  Tina nodded like she was incredibly fascinated, drinking all this information in. “So you got a lot of inspiration from here, huh?”

  “I guess you could say that.” Karen took a sip of her coffee drink while they waited on their food.

  “Do you have any project you’re working on now?” asked Tina, lowering her voice like that sort of information would be the kind of news that attracted attention from people passing by.

  The self-satisfied look slipped from Karen’s face. She looked down at her drink. “I have a few ideas on the backburner, but I’m not… I’m not necessarily working on anything right now, per se.”

  “Is there a reason for that?” asked Rowen, pulling a tape recorder from her purse. “You don’t mind if I record us talking, do you?”

  Karen eyed the tape recorder. There was a pause when she opened her mouth, like she was seriously considering telling Rowen no. “I guess not,” she said, finally.

  “How did last night go for you and your work?” asked Rowen.

  “Oh, you know.” Karen gave a shrug, like she wanted Rowen to infer what she meant just from that.

  “I don’t really. Can you put it into your own words?” Rowen slid the tape recorder a little closer to her.

  “Well, having my work featured in a gallery has been a long time coming. It’s a good feeling knowing how many people are seeing it.”

  “And has it garnered any bids yet?” asked Rowen.

  “One or two, I think.” Karen said in a tone of voice that made Rowen a tad skeptical. She was speaking so hesitantly, it was entirely likely she had received no bids at all.

  Rowen wanted to get to the hard-hitting questions, but she had to arrive there organically. She couldn’t just come out of the gate swinging with Karen. If she guessed correctly, Karen was the sort to end the interview all together and stomp off. Rowen didn’t want that. “That’s good. I hope you keep getting bids tonight. You deserve it. Any other positives you’ve run into these past couple of days?”

  “Not too many other than that.” Karen took another sip of her drink. “But I guess that’s to be expected. I figure I’m doing all right for someone who’s been hexed.”

  Those words wiped the smile from Rowen’s face. She had expected her to take the conversation in this direction. She hadn’t known when, though. The word had just sort of gone off like a forgotten bomb. “I’m really sorry about that. I don’t know what she was thinking.”

  Karen waved a hand like she was pardoning her. “She was just trying to get ahead. Assuming you believe in that sort of thing. I’d say that hex of hers has gone full circle. Not that I believe in hexes, mind you. I feel reasonably confident Dayveed just ran into some very ba
d luck.”

  “Are you sure there wasn’t anything that happened to you?” asked Tina, forcing her way back into the conversation.

  “Not that I noticed.” Karen shrugged, sitting up straighter in her chair. “But, like I said, I don’t actually believe in those kinds of things.”

  “Well, I do,” said Rowen. “But maybe I’m just biased given the family I’m from… Are you sure you didn’t experience anything? It can be very subtle. A hex can influence you in ways that you wouldn’t expect.”

  Karen’s gaze grew a bit distant, like there was something she was considering. It didn’t seem like she wanted to say it out loud. “I can’t think of anything out of the ordinary that happened to me,” she said at last.

  “Did anything happen to Dayveed that you noticed?” asked Tina before Rowen could stop her.

  “Well, he got murdered,” said Karen, bluntly and with a nervous laugh.

  “Yeah, geez, I guess that is a pretty big one.” It felt like Tina had taken a page out of Willow and Peony’s book. She was putting on an act of obliviousness to say what she wanted without completely offending anyone. Rowen was thankful she had brought her along. “Did anything happen to him before that? Do you think his hex could have made someone mad at him?”

  Karen raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

  Tina shrugged. “Like maybe it prompted someone to kill him.”

  “I wouldn’t know,” said Karen. “I didn’t spend a whole lot of time around the guy.”

  “Really?” asked Rowen. “There were only three artists being shown at that gallery. I’d be surprised if you didn’t run into him a few times, at least.”

  “I did a couple of times, I guess. I’m not sure what that has to do with anything.”

  “Just wondering.” Rowen assumed a quieter, more serious tone. “This stuff hits pretty close to home, you know? You might not believe in hexes, but I do. If Peony had anything to do with that poor man’s death, I want to know about it.” That seemed to put Karen at ease a bit. She became a little less stiff and stopped eyeing the recorder nearly as much. “So, did you notice anything?” Rowen pressed on. “Did he mention that he was having a particularly bad day? Did he seem more clumsy than usual?”