“What are you doing?” A voice behind us said.
I whipped around to see that Keri and Ellen had wandered over.
Vin turned to them. “Did you two design this?” He hooked a thumb over his shoulder back to the display.
Keri rolled her eyes. “No, that is the one thing that Felicia Bleu did herself. You know, I really think you guys need to pay us more than our quote. Felicia dropped basically this entire project in our laps.”
“Not now, Keri.” Ellen placed a hand on Keri’s arm.
“Yes, now. If we don’t say something now, we will never get this fixed. You agreed with me.”
Ellen blew out a sigh. “Fine. We don’t think Felicia is who she says she is. She didn’t seem to know anything, and I called some friends that worked with her in Sweden, and some things just aren’t adding up.”
This could be the answer to my question of who was behind this. I ripped off my veil.
“You!” Keri glared.
“Hey, sorry, but this is important. Where is Felicia?”
She shrugged. “No clue. Maybe she left with everyone else.”
I could figure out the details later. We had only minutes till midnight. “We have to get inside without crushing it.” I didn’t have any spells at my disposal that would work. “Vin?”
“Maybe, but it needs a potion to work. I don’t have anything that can be done freehand.”
Keri smirked. “We do. It’s one of the cake-reveal spells we use. It will shatter the glass without hurting what’s inside. It uses sound, so instead of a potion, it uses an incantation.”
“Great! Wonderful! Do it!” The seconds were ticking down.
“Thousand dollars.”
“Fine, sure, whatever.” I was leaning over so much I was practically toppling over.
Keri crossed her arms. “Maybe I don’t feel like it, rich girl. Maybe I should charge you five thousand. Or ten? I need to think about it.”
“No time! It’s almost midnight.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
I sighed. “The luck pumpkin is in there. The real one. The one I blew up was a replica. Someone, I think Felicia or maybe someone pretending to be Felicia, made a bad copy of the luck pumpkin and hid the real one inside here. Magic can get in but can’t get out.”
“Why would someone do that?”
A voice behind me replied, “To get all the luck. Why, it’s quite a clever plan. The magic needs to get in to set off the spell, but if the magic is trapped inside with a person, they would get all the good luck that thousands of mages had been storing away all week.”
I turned around to face my mom. “You’re back.”
“And judging by the voice messages on my phone, I’ve missed a lot. Are you sure the pumpkin is in there?”
Olivia hovered behind her, arms crossed, with a watchful eye on us.
I waffled for a second. All I had was my logic, but I had to trust myself. “Yes, it is the only thing that makes sense.”
My mother checked her watch. “Two minutes left.” She turned to Keri. “If you think you can break in, you better get started. There are only about thirty people left. I think you will find the luck you receive to be more than worth the effort.”
Keri’s smirk slid off her face. “It normally takes five minutes for this spell. I’m not sure if I can do it in time.”
“Hurry!” I shouted.
A crowd had formed around us of the few people that were still at the party. Raymond was watching me with interest, and the bottom of my stomach dropped out as if I were on a rollercoaster.
Keri closed her eyes, touched the display, and started to sing an impossibly high note.
Mom turned to Vin. “If you have a spell to contain a mage, get it ready.”
He nodded. “On it.”
The seconds ticked on, and the note Keri held continued even after her mouth closed. Perspiration trickled down her forehead, and she went pale.
“One minute, dear,” my mom whispered.
The magic in the room pressed into my skin and raised goose bumps on my arms, when suddenly the display shattered. For a moment, the frosted glass webbed with cracks and held its shape, before falling straight to the ground.
In the center of the shattered glass pile were the gigantic luck pumpkin and a woman. Though the haircut and clothing were the same as Felicia Bleu, the face no longer matched the woman I had met earlier.
She let out a scream and started to gather magic around her, then a clear bubble snapped around her. Her muffled scream barely eked out, and she pounded against the sides with her fist.
“Very nice spell, Vin.” Mom patted him on the back.
Olivia muttered, “I can’t believe Vanessa was right.”
I checked my phone. “Fifteen seconds, everyone. Grab your partner for the kiss.” I was walking on air. The hero of the night. And most of all, I felt a deep sense of personal satisfaction at a job well done. If only I could do this every day.
A strong hand grabbed my shoulder and slowly turned me around. Raymond smiled down at me. “I do believe you won the bet after all.”
I smiled and wrapped my arms around his neck. As the crowd counted down to midnight, I stood on my toes and craned my face toward his.
“Three, two, one…”
Vin grabbed me from behind and pulled me off Raymond. “Not until you’re fifty. I told you that already.” He planted a big kiss on the top of my head as Raymond chuckled then grabbed Keri into his arms and bent her over like Prince Charming.
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Nikki Haverstock is a writer who lives on a cattle ranch high in the Rocky Mountains. She has studied comedy writing at Second City and has published 9 cozy mysteries that are heavy on the humor.
Before fleeing the city, she hosted a competitive archery reality show, traveled the world to study volcanoes, taught archery and computer science at a university and now works on her family’s ranch herding cattle. Nikki has more college degrees than she has sense and hopefully one day she will put one to work.
Nikki likes to write comedy pieces that focus on the everyday humor of one-uppers, annoying family members and strange behavior of the ultra-rich. She tried stand up but the cattle weren’t impressed.
© 2017 by Ranch Dog Entertainment, LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other ele
ctronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
The Case of the Exploding Luck Pumpkin_Casino Witch Mystery Short Story Page 4