by Tegan Maher
As I suspected, Hunter didn't finish up with the paperwork until late and decided to go home rather than come over. I was slipping the last batch of banana-nut muffins in the oven when somebody knocked on the door. We lived far enough out that we didn't get random salespeople, so the door was usually open as long as somebody was up. Since it was after midnight and there was a murderer on the loose, I'd locked it.
When I peeked out the window, I was surprised to see Camille standing there a worried frown creasing her forehead. I swung it open.
"Hey, girl. Come on in," I said, stepping back so she could pass. "You're out and about late."
She knew I was a night owl, a leftover habit from my days of working the evening shift at Bobbie Sues, so it wasn't uncommon for her to stop by if she had something on her mind. We hadn't started off on the right foot, but over the last year or so, we'd built a friendship.
"I know," she said, stepping in and kicking off her boots. "I just finished with an emergency meeting at the council." Camille was the head of the Magical Oversight Committee for the regional witch's council, so it was her responsibility to deal with people who had problems controlling their magic or, rarely, witches who misused their abilities.
"Emergency meeting?" I asked as I led her into the kitchen. "What's so important that it merited a midnight get-together?"
"We've had more grimoires stolen," Camille said, taking a seat at the table and massaging her temples. "Except this time, there was a witch killed. She was one of the ones who helped your aunts and mom squash the rebellion."
Way back when we were little, Addy, my Aunt Beth, and my mom had been the ones to suggest a local regional council because witches were sneaking in little infractions with no repercussions, and if somebody had a concern, it often took months for the national council to address it. It wasn't a decision they'd made lightly, and there was a faction of witches who'd staged a rebellion in order to maintain their autonomy. And—you guessed it—they were the ones slipping in no-nos under the radar.
The Flynn witches, along with a handful of other local "good" witches took them down, but not before they damaged Aunt Beth's magic and inadvertently blocked Shelby's, who was in the line of fire when they cast the spell at Beth.
"Do you think it's somebody left over from then?" I asked.
She shook her head. "No, it can't be. We tracked all of them down, and they've all died since then. There's not a single one of them left, and none of them had kids to pass the crazy gene to."
That figured because nothing was ever that easy.
"So then who?" I asked.
"No clue," she replied. "We don't even have anybody on the books who we think may do something like that."
I handed her a glass of wine and a strawberry turnover, her personal favorite since she'd joined the dark side and expanded her diet beyond salads and quinoa. "What are you gonna do?"
"I have to go to Atlanta and investigate," she said around a bite of pastry. "I don't want to leave this to somebody else, especially considering we're not sure who's involved. I hate to think it could be anyone on the council, but it's not worth the risk."
"Oh. When do you have to leave?"
"As soon as I leave here," she replied. "Emma's staying the night with Becki tonight, but I was wondering if she could stay here while I'm gone." Emma was her daughter, and she and Becki were Shelby's two best friends.
"Of course," I said. "Do you have any idea how long you'll be gone?"
It wasn't unusual for Camille to ask us to look after Emma; given her job, she worried about leaving her alone even though she was seventeen. And not to blow the Flynn's horn, but Raeann and I, along with Shelby since she'd gotten her powers unblocked, were the most powerful witches in the region. Emma was no slouch, either, so she was about as safe with us as she could be anywhere. She was at the farm half the time, anyway.
"Until I catch them or run clear out of leads," she replied, catching a blob of strawberry filling before it landed in her lap. "Girl, these things are delicious but messy."
I laughed. "So are salads, but they're not nearly as fun. Seriously, though, do you have any leads at all?"
She shook her head. "Nope, none. Other than a faint magical signature left over from the spell that she used to kill Mariah."
"Mariah? Isn't she the one who developed the binding spell the council uses?" For a witch, having her magic bound was the worst punishment besides life in prison. They only used it in the worst of cases, because there was no turning back afterward. The spell was so complicated that it was impossible to break, and there was no counterspell for it.
"Yeah, and many of the other spells she had in that grimoire were almost as powerful. Most of them were defense spells, but in the wrong hands, they could do a lot of damage before we could break through them to take them down."
I'd never really thought of defensive spells as being dark, but when she put it that way, I had to revise my thinking. A witch who didn't have such a great offense could be a force to be reckoned with if she knew the right defensive magic. Give it to a witch who had some mojo and was bent on doing harm, and that was a recipe for disaster.
I had a feeling Camille was gonna need backup, but she knew more about the situation than I did, and likely had help going with her. Still, I worried. "If you need us, just pick up the phone. I'm no professional, but it sounds like this could get serious."
She gave me a tired smile. "I'm hoping to nip it in the bud before it has a chance to get that far. Don't worry though—if it gets to that point, I'll be the first one to sound the alarm. I haven't lived over a century by being reckless, especially in my line of work."
She finished off her pastry and chased it with the last of her wine, then stood. "I'm beat, and you have to be, too. I'm going home to get some rest so I can get an early start in the morning. Call if you need anything." She paused and her face was troubled. "But, if you do, please mask your number. I don't want them to know where Emma is."
I gave her a hug. "Don't worry about us. We'll make sure she's not left alone, and woe be to anybody who tries to harm a hair on her head. I promise."
After she left, I pulled the muffins out of the oven, then swished a hand to set the dishrag and broom in motion. I was too tired to clean, and I needed to come up with a plan just in case things went south.
CHAPTER SIX
SINCE RAEANN WAS CLEAR out of pastries rather than just low, that meant I had to be to Brew by six the next morning so she'd have them when she opened. It was supposed to be my morning to feed the horses, but when Gabi had gotten home the night before, we'd traded. I was grateful; just a few months before, I'd have been up at five because there wouldn't have been anybody to trade with.
We'd gone to high school together but had lost touch over the years. When she'd moved back to town, she'd decided to board her horse, Mayhem, at the farm. Her ex-boyfriend ended up face-down in a pile of horse manure in Mayhem's stall shortly after, which is a story in its own right, but the result was that Gabi moved into one of our spare bedrooms and traded most of her rent and board out by helping Shelby and me with the horses. As far as I was concerned, it was a good trade, especially on mornings like this.
Before I left, I scrawled a note on an envelope and stuck it to the chocolate syrup, where Shelby was sure to find it when she made her morning chocolate milk. I needed to let her know that Emma was coming if she hadn't already talked to her at that point, and to tell her they needed to stick together.
If I'd learned anything over the past year, it was that it paid to be cautious and that there was safety in numbers. We'd weathered more than one attack, either magical or mundane, and each time we'd come out on top because we'd stuck together. Of course, it would be even better not to wander into the sites of crazy people to begin with, but c'est la vie.
I trudged through the door of Brew at a twenty to six, just in time to have a cup of coffee and something to eat before we met the masses. Early mornings were hit or miss, but there was always
a handful of regulars that showed up every morning at six on the dot.
Rae was one of those horrible morning people who hit the floor with a smile and a spring in her step. I was not. She took the pastries from me and motioned toward a cup of coffee sitting on the counter.
"Loca Mocha, triple shot, extra whip," she said. My favorite.
"You're a peach," I told her, grasping the cup of gold. I swooshed my hand and opened the pastry case for her.
After pulling out a couple blueberry muffins, she muttered a few words, and the pastries began floating from the box, lining themselves up in neat rows in the case. Once she set them in motion, she grabbed the muffins and her cup off the counter and joined me.
"Camille came to see me last night," I said after taking a few sips of my coffee.
Rae pulled some of the sugary top off her muffin and plunked it into her mouth. "What for?"
I explained the reason for Camille's visit, and Rae looked thoughtful. "And she has no idea who's behind it, or why they're doing it?"
"Nope," I replied, tearing into my own breakfast. "All she has is the magical signature, but if she doesn't have anybody to match it to, it's worthless."
Rae waved a hand. "It's probably one of those backwoods feuds. You know they crop up every few decades. I haven't heard so much as a whisper of discontent at any of the gatherings or from anybody Mom sells herbs to."
Despite her damaged magic—which Addy suspected may be mostly psychological—Aunt Beth was a whiz in the garden and one of the most knowledgeable, talented earth witches in the region. Maybe in the country. She sold potions, herbs, and blends to all sorts of people, both witches and regular folks alike. She had a lot of connections, and if she hadn't heard anything, then there either wasn't anything to hear or whoever was plotting was doing a bang-up job of keeping it under wraps. I fervently hoped it was the former.
"Back to our biggest problem, though," Rae said. "What about the murder last night? Did Hunter find anything?"
"Nothing good," I replied, chasing down a bite of muffin. "There wasn't anything that screamed out her murderer's name. He's waiting to hear back from the lab, I guess."
Rae was quiet for a few seconds, then cast an eye at the clock. We still had ten minutes. "What about Coralee?"
I shrugged. "She doesn't have an alibi because she sent Alyse home early, and Belle was doing something with Addy. Not that Belle could have cleared her, anyway. At this point, I'm hoping the coroner or the lab finds something that sends them looking in another direction. They don't have anything on Coralee other than the fight."
"Well, that and the fact that the woman was stabbed right behind the Clip N Curl with a pair of hair scissors," she said.
"Yeah, that doesn't exactly help her case," I agreed. "But it doesn't convict her, either."
Rae wadded up her napkin and finished her coffee. "You know what we need to do?"
"What?" My brain still wasn't firing on all cylinders, but I was getting there.
"We need to find somebody who has it out for Coralee," she said. "And we need to find out more about this Loretta woman. Do you even know her?"
"Nope," I replied, getting up to make myself another coffee before we unlocked the doors. "I've never seen her in my life."
"Me neither," Rae said, tapping her cup in thought. "We need to find out what we can about her. You know as well as I do, people aren't going to be willing to dish with Hunter. Facts, yes. Good gossip, no. And I have a feeling this is going to take a little more than cold hard facts if we're gonna clear Coralee."
She had a point. Human behavior was tricky. If I'd learned anything about murder, it was that you couldn't rule anybody out just because they didn't seem like the killin' kind. There was no such thing as the face of a murderer because when it came down to brass tacks, everybody had a breaking point, and Loretta had pushed somebody beyond theirs. That's who we needed to find.
CHAPTER SEVEN
RAE'S SECOND EMPLOYEE, a witch named Levana, came in at seven, so I was able to leave it to them. She'd been working there long enough that I was confident that no matter how busy they got, the two of them could handle it. Just in case, I told Raeann to call if she needed me.
The weather had turned crappy again. The wind was blowing and it was spitting freezing rain. I pulled my beanie down to cover my ears and huddled into my coat, then made a run for it to my truck. I usually just drove up the alley and parked behind my shop, but something about seeing the spot where the woman had been stabbed gave me the willies. Instead, I cut out onto Main Street and pulled right in front of the store. I figured with the weather the way it was, I wasn't likely to get any browsers, and I didn't have any appointments scheduled, so it wasn't like I was losing business by taking up the space.
I'd expected Coralee to be closed, but her neon light was on, and the place was lit up like a Christmas tree. I decided to poke my head in to see how she was doing.
"Hey girl," I said, grateful for the warm blast of air when I stepped through the door. "You're open early. How are you doing?"
"Not bad," she said, looking over her readers at me. "I just figured I'd come in early and work on the books."
She never did that on purpose, at least not until the end of the quarter. "Ah. Couldn't sleep, huh?"
She tossed her pencil down, leaned back in her swivel chair, and sighed. "Not a wink. I mean, I couldn't stand Loretta, but she wasn't worth the effort it woulda taken to kill her. If I were finally gonna snap and kill somebody, I'd make sure it was worth wearin' stripes for the rest of my life. And she wasn't."
I pulled up another chair and sat down beside her. "Do you have any idea who may have thought it was worth the effort? Either to see her dead or to set you up?"
"I have no idea," she said. "The woman's lived in Atlanta for the last twenty years. I don't even know why she's here. Shoot, it took me a second to even recognize her."
Great. So we were exactly nowhere yet. "What about before then? Maybe somebody else did recognize her, and wasn't too happy to see her."
"Obviously," she replied, her knee bouncing a little. "But damned if I know who. She was a jerk back in high school, but it's not like you stab somebody twenty years after they mean-girled you in front of your sophomore crush."
True. If that were the case, I'd have killed Olivia Anderson and Katie Belle, two of my long-time enemies, a long time ago.
I leaned back in my chair, hands behind my head. "So we're probably looking for something that happened more recently."
"I'd think so, but then again, I'd have never thought she'd turn up dead to begin with."
Something occurred to me that may help us narrow it down. "Were they your scissors?"
She shook her head. "Nope. That's the first thing I checked, just to make sure my fingerprints weren't gonna turn up on them."
"What about Alyse's?"
"Nope, not hers, either. I just went through hers and they're all there." She looked me in the eye. "Noelle, what am I gonna do if they end up arrestin' me? I've never been to jail, and I have the shop to look after. What'll happen to Belle and Alyse if I'm not here?"
She dropped her head in her hands. I rolled my chair closer to her and put my hand on her shoulder. "Hey! None of that. We're going to straighten everything out. Hunter's excellent at his job and he knows you didn't do this. Don't you even worry about that."
Sniffing, she hugged me. "Thanks, sugar. It's just scary. I mean, it could all go down the tubes, and there's nothing I could do about it."
I hugged her back, feeling a little odd because usually, she was the one doing the comforting. "I won't let that happen. I promise."
She pushed back and stood up, squaring her shoulders. "That's settled then. On to problems I can do something about. Like Lila Kettering's hair. That girl's a hot mess. She's gone and dyed it purple and now wants her blonde back." Coralee heaved a put-upon sigh and shook her head. "The things people do."
Indeed. I left her to prepare for her first appointment, ho
ping I could make good on my promise. The weight that had already been on my shoulders now felt about a thousand times heavier.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I NO SOONER MADE IT to Reimagined than Erol dive-bombed me, asking a thousand questions at once. "I heard Coralee's gonna be arrested and go to prison. What are you gonna do? What does Hunter know so far? Did that Loretta woman deserve it? Belle's been gone since last night, and nobody else knows anything."
I held up my hands. "Whoa, there, Trigger. Let me at least take off my coat and put my purse away."
While I was behind the counter, I pulled out the Goldfish box and shook a few crackers out for Norman and Sammie. I was shocked when Sammie came forward and took one from my hand without so much as a pause, then looked up at me and gave me the same toothy grin Norm always did. She'd been coming around to the idea of living with people, but that was the first time she'd taken it from my hand. Usually, she hung back and waited for me to put them on the counter.
"Hey, girlfriend," I said and smiled back at her. "Very cool! Here, have another one."
"When you're done messin' around," Erol said, his tone stern, "I'd like to know why our friend is goin' to prison, and what you aim to do about it."
I scowled at him. "Don't get your panties in a wad. I'm getting to it. First, she's not even a suspect yet," I said as I made my way to the kitchen.
"But you and I both know she's at the top of the list. They may not have arrested her yet, but c'mon. A five-year-old can string together the pieces here. Shoot, if I didn't know Coralee myself, I'd say it's a slam dunk."
"I know," I said, "it doesn't look good, but if the way Loretta acted toward Coralee is any indication, I'm sure we won't have any problem finding somebody else, or several somebody elses, that wanted to wring her neck, too."