by Gina LaManna
Tarryn cocked her head to the side, but we didn’t get to finish the conversation because the on-air light blinked again.
“We’re back,” I said. “Unfortunately, it’s time to say goodbye to our guest, Tarryn Southland. Any last parting words, Tarryn?”
“Sure,” she said, purring into the microphone. “I just want to send my condolences to Mary’s family and all who were close to her.”
“Of course, and that’s —.”
“And that I wish people would stop exploiting her murder to raise their show’s ratings,” she said, her eyes darkening as she stared at me. “Lastly, for anyone using Elemental Beauty products, I recommend you stop at once.”
I gestured wildly for Leonard to cut back to music, but he was too stunned to move. There was nothing I could do except halfheartedly attempt to interrupt Tarryn. That was a fine line, however, since cutting her off completely would look incredibly rude and paint me in a horrible light.
“Their new line is a ruse, and it will make your skin break out in hives,” Tarryn finished. “There, I think that’s all. Thanks for your time, Evian.”
She stood and stormed out of the studio.
Finally, after a horrid three seconds of dead air, Leonard flailed to hit the button.
Calypso music filled the airwaves once more.
Fourteen
“Ratings are through the charts!” Leonard yelled into the phone the second I picked up my landline. “I’ve been replaying your segment with Tarryn on a loop and every time we pick up more listeners. It’s as if people want to hear you get wrecked!”
“I didn’t get wrecked by her,” I said. “She just expressed her opinions.”
“Uh, sure. Whatever you want to call it. Each time around we get more listeners. I’ll bet you half the island has heard this segment, and the other half is talking about it. We’re going to be the number one show in Eternal Springs!”
“I don’t know how we could beat Mitzi’s show.”
“But people actually want to listen to us this time. They’re not just flicking the radio on because there’s no other option and they’re forced to listen to HEX 66.6.”
“Gee whiz. Exciting.”
“We need more conflict on the show. I want to get some controversial guests. Maybe I can get two of the beauty contestants onto the show to really rip into one another. You know, air all that dirty laundry for the public to hear?”
“I don’t really think that’s the best way to go about drumming up listeners.”
“But the drama?”
“Why can’t we report on the weather and traffic and important issues? Mary’s murder is an important issue. That’s why I invited Tarryn on in the first place.”
“Screw important, I want the cat fights! Did you meet anyone at the Beauty Cottage who seemed inclined to put up a good fight? Maybe one of the more jealous gals or ... oh, I know! Someone who really hated Tarryn?”
“None of them seem to hate each other at all. In fact, they’re friends,” I told Leonard. “You’re frustrating. Bye.”
“Don’t you think it’s odd?” The curious tone in his voice stopped me from hanging up
“What’s odd?”
“That they’re all so friendly.” Leonard’s question was surprisingly insightful. “I mean, I don’t think of beauty pageants as Miss buddy-buddy girl-time. It’s a competition! Women can get emotional.”
“Watch your step, buddy.”
“I’m not talking about any woman in particular,” he said. “And I suppose guys could get emotional too in the same situation. Humans are competitive — they want to win, especially if there’s a prize on the line. What’s the prize for winning?”
“Ten thousand dollars and, of course, the intangible fame from taking first place.”
“Exactly. Don’t you think that could be a motive worth killing over?”
“I don’t know. Ten grand is a lot of money, but not exactly a life-altering sum.”
“No, but throw in the residuals from the fame, the free samples, the endorsement deals ... .” He paused to let his theories sink in. “And that’s not the end of it — I mean, the emotional side of it. I’m not talking about women only — men feel competitive and envious. Jealousy is a strong motivator.”
He did have a point. Male or female, beauty contestants or not, I’d rarely stepped into a house full of people and found that one-hundred percent of them liked one another. Surely some of them had been fibbing, even downright lying, about their feelings toward Mary. But who?
Had it been Tarryn, and was she now overcompensating to prove she’d been friends with the deceased? Or someone quieter like Billie Jo, who loved to be the center of attention — always answering the door and taking charge — but didn’t have a trophy to her name?
I was still thinking when Leonard gave a disinterested yawn. His attention span waned at the slightest bit of dead air.
“Well, when you find out who had a bone to pick with Mary, invite her on the show, will you?” he suggested. “It’ll be good for both of us. And you can’t tell me one of them won’t be coming forward what with all the attention Tarryn just got on air. They’ll be clamoring to be interviewed by you, Evian. Take it and run with it. Might be the only chance you’ll get.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Bye. See you tomorrow. Stir up some trouble.”
With those sage words, I hung up the phone and blew out a sigh of exasperation. I’d run home immediately after the show and told myself it was because I was respecting my deal with Kenna and Zola — and not because I didn’t want to be seen in public after the fleecing I’d gotten from Tarryn.
I was deep into pretending I wasn’t embarrassed. As I began looking for Paul, who had yet to surface since I’d returned home, I wondered if Tarryn was right. Was I exploiting people during a challenging time just to up show ratings?
“Where are you?” I muttered, as I knelt to check under the table. “Come out of your hiding spot, Paul. I’m in no mood.”
It’s my job, I told myself, still lost in thought as I scoured the rest of the house. Skye was doing the same thing. Heck, cops did a similar thing. They looked into crimes and sometimes had to report to the media. I was basically an untrained, uncertified cop who had zero qualifications. Yeah, right.
“Paul!” I shouted. “I give up. If you don’t come out soon, I’ll have you declared dead!”
A distinctly toad-like groan came from my room.
“Oh, no you didn’t,” I said. “What did I tell you about sleeping in my bed? Gross! I don’t want toad germs all over my covers. No margarita baths for you for a month.”
Paul croaked again, sounding genuinely in pain. I moved down the hall, more concerned with each step. It wasn’t like Paul to revert to his native language. He considered himself much too posh to grunt around like the rest of his kind. He preferred bon bons and margaritas, after all.
“What’s wrong?” I pulled the covers back to reveal Paul perched on a small, fluffy pink pillow that would definitely have to be tossed out now. Even as I found him, I began pulling the sheets off the bed and throwing them toward the hamper. “Why’d you come hide out in here?”
I saw it, he told me. I saw the thing.
“What thing?”
The thing that’s been eating your plants. Devouring them. It’s disgusting. Filthy and huge.
“What was it?”
I don’t know. It looked like some gigantic slug!
“I don’t mean to be rude, but you sound insane. Bertha stares out her window at this house all day long. Surely if there were a giant gastropod on my lawn she would’ve called the police. Or me! She’d at least call me!”
She couldn’t see it. It’s from the other realm.
“People can still see creatures from the other realm.”
Some of them, yes, but this one ... . Paul shuddered. I don’t know what he — er, it —was. It shimmered. At one point, Bertha stared right at him. She didn’t so much as flinch.
“Well, where’d it go? I didn’t see anything when I got home.”
I didn’t stick around to find out.
“Some giant sludge monster — invisible to the human eyes — is ruining my garden?” I raised my eyebrows. “You’re sure.”
It’s an ugly, horrifying thing.
“Paul, I’m sorry, but I haven’t heard of anything like this before. You have to admit it sounds bizarre.”
It’s more believable than all your plants suddenly just up and wilting. Zola couldn’t figure out what was wrong with any of them, and she’s an earth witch.
“Fine, fine,” I said. “I’ll go check. But for the record, I think you’re still being paranoid. Not that I blame you. Having a murderer on the loose is enough to make even the bravest of us scared.”
I’m not brave — I’m too pretty to be brave.
“Right. Now, hop off,” I said. “Back to your own bed. Even if this sludge monster is real, it wouldn’t come through our doors. Go on, I have to wash everything now.”
Once I’d begun the process of bleaching my sheets, I returned downstairs to apologize to Paul. After all, he was my familiar, and hurting his feelings wouldn’t get either of us anywhere. Who knew? Maybe he had seen something and was exaggerating. After all, the trees had hinted that the portal had opened and something was amiss.
My journey to the porch was interrupted when I found three sets of legs stretched across the ottoman in front of my couch. Turning, I found Skye, Kenna and Zola sitting in my living room. Apparently they’d let themselves in and made themselves comfortable. Zola held a cup of tea while Skye had scored a soda from the fridge. Kenna sat with her arms crossed, fuming.
“Looks like I’m in trouble, huh?” I asked. “To what do I owe the honor of this visit?”
“You need a better guard dog,” Skye said. “Paul let us walk right on by.”
“I don’t keep him for his guard capabilities.” I sniffed, feeling defensive. “Paul is the sensitive type, anyway, and he’s been having a rough day.”
“I thought we had a deal.” Kenna leaned forward on the couch. “I went through all this effort to wrangle Zola into helping you with your stupid plants, and what did you do? You drew more attention to the case than ever before. And now I’m stuck using Zola to do the flowers for the beauty pageant and the funeral, and you’re not holding up your end of the bargain.”
“You say that like it’s a hardship,” Zola shot back. “You know I have the best floral arrangements on the island. You’re lucky I offered to help; otherwise Mrs. Maybell would have set you up with a bunch of dead roses again.”
“Why are the two of you fighting?” Skye asked them. “We came here to gang up on Evian.”
“Look, I didn’t plan on Tarryn coming into the interview and reacting the way she did,” I said. “She seemed genuinely upset, and I thought she only wanted to say a few kind words about Mary. That’s within the scope of my job.”
“So you didn’t go around asking questions?” Kenna raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t head over to the Beauty Cottage and pester the girls there until someone agreed to come on the show?”
“I didn’t pester anyone.”
“But you went over there,” she persisted, “and you continued to ask questions. After we’d explicitly agreed you wouldn’t do that.”
“If we want to get technical, then Zola was supposed to solve the problem with my yard, or at least diagnose it!” I said. “So technically, nobody’s end of the bargain has been upheld.”
“It’s not my fault I don’t know what the heck you put in your dirt,” Zola said. “Did you buy the cheapest fertilizer you could find or something? Or did Swoops lose control of his bowels again?”
“Swoops is fine,” Skye said of her mischievous bat familiar. “Anyway, bat droppings are conducive to growing healthy plants. It’s common knowledge.”
“Not in his quantities,” Zola muttered. “He smothers the poor plants.”
“You know it’s coming from the portal. It’s nothing I or Swoops or anyone else did.” I stepped further into the room and faced the three of them. “Actually, I was laying off the investigation. Instead, I was trying to find out why all my plants are dying and took a walk in the woods. Guess what the trees think?”
Zola bit her lip. “The trees are worried?”
“Well, most of them are still sarcastic, but the big one in the middle —.”
“Charles?”
“I don’t know his name, but sure, we can call him Charles.” I met the other girls’ gazes evenly. “He seems to think that something has escaped from the portal. Which never would have happened if you all had been paying attention thirteen years ago! We might all be off this island if that were the case!”
“Hey now,” Kenna warned. “That wasn’t my fault.”
“It wasn’t mine!” Zola chirped. “I was watching.”
“We were all on duty,” Skye said. “And I was paying attention, so it had to be one of you.”
“Apparently we all agree to disagree,” I said. “And if you came here to lecture me, you can head out. I have things to do. I have a monster to find, a murder to solve and a toad to comfort.”
“What’s wrong with Paul?” Zola’s eyes narrowed. She’s always had a fond spot for the toad, though she’d deny it if asked. “Is he ill?”
“Scared. He thinks he saw ... .” I cleared my throat, feeling ridiculous. “A giant slug.”
“Bertha would’ve called the cops,” Kenna scoffed. “She spies on you like a stalker. Lucky for her she didn’t get a more interesting neighbor or she’d have a heart attack.”
“Hey!” I snapped. “I think that was an insult. I’m not that boring.”
“Good job; you learned to recognize an insult. That’s the first step,” Skye said. “Bravo.”
“Fine — I’m going,” Kenna said. “You won’t listen to reason anyway.”
“What about the portal monster?” I asked. “Shouldn’t we all find it together? We were all on duty the night things got busted open in the first place.”
“Do you really expect us to believe Paul saw a sludge monster?” Kenna stood. “The toad is scared of his shadow. It was probably a branch waving in the dark.”
“What else could it be?” Though I’d wondered the same thing, I felt the need to defend my toad’s honor. “Zola hasn’t seen anything like this before and the trees are talking about supernatural sludge, so I think we have to consider that something has slipped out of the portal. It’s happened before.”
“Well, whatever it is has a target on your back, not ours,” Kenna pointed out. “Why’s it affecting only your yard?”
“I don’t know all the answers,” I said. “I think we should look into it further.”
“Sure. When you have proof that your toad isn’t lying,” Skye said, “then call us over and we’ll rescue you from the giant slug.”
I couldn’t say I blamed them. It was a bit of a stretch to believe Paul’s story about an invisible-to-humans monster that happened to pop up while I’d been away. Paul had probably panicked at being caught sleeping in my bed and made up the first story he thought of to avoid getting in trouble.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll look around and let you know. Now, if you don’t mind, I have work to do.”
My three sister witches filed out of the room, depositing their mugs and cans and beverage supplies on the counter. I let them out and locked the door after them.
“Nobody believes you, Paul,” I said to the toad, who was pretending to snore in his bed. “You have to admit, it’s pretty weird.”
You don’t think I know it’s weird? Of course I know I sound like a crazy old toad. But I know what I saw, Evian. Trust me.
I sighed. “Oddly enough, I don’t have any better option. I don’t know where to start: hunting paranormal monsters or tracking down a human killer?”
Good riddance to both. Paul shuddered. I’m staying in bed.
Fifteen
I opted for the murderer. Somehow, it seemed more appealing to track down a killer than a giant slug.
That’s the very thought that had me concerned as I grabbed my purse and headed down the front steps. But the universe had a different idea. Apparently leaving my house wasn’t on the agenda for today, seeing as I was continually interrupted with each consecutive effort.
“Evian!” Mason greeted me with a shy smile. His shoulders were slumped forward and a pinched look of discomfort tainted his otherwise friendly demeanor. “I thought I might find you here.”
“It is my house, after all.”
He gave a short laugh. “Yeah, well. I just came by to say, well ... .”
“Did you hear the segment on the radio?” I asked, shifting my weight on the front steps. “It’s fine if you did. Come to make fun of me for it?”
“I’d never do that, Evian. I came to say I’m sorry for how things shook out.”
“It’s just part of the job.”
“That’s not the only reason I’m here.”
I locked the door behind me, feigning disinterest. “Really? Sorry, but I’m running out somewhere, so I can’t talk long.”
He stepped closer. “Off to look for the Elemental Beauty vendor?”
Surprise registered on my face so quickly there was no chance of hiding it. “How’d you know?”
“I feel like I’ve gotten to know you pretty well over the last few weeks,” he said with a grin. “I figured one little radio segment wouldn’t stop you from investigating. If anything, I thought it might prompt you to look harder.”
“Aren’t you the next Sherlock?” I folded my arms across my chest, cautiously waiting. “Well? What about it?”
“I have it on good authority that the name of Elemental Beauty’s vendor is Darren Whiting. He was the one scheduled for the day Mary was murdered.”
“How’d you get that information?”
“Hanging out at the coffee shop during what might be the most gossip-filled week of Eternal Springs’s history has its pros.”