by Bailey Cates
I shuddered. No wonder he’d been so upset when it happened. It was a horrible feeling of being out of control.
A pickup truck pulled up behind me, and a woman got out. “You okay there?”
“Fine,” I called, waving at her.
She looked puzzled, but I just smiled and started the car. As I put it in gear and pulled away, I realized my phone was ringing in the backseat.
Then I remembered the whistle. Both of them. The one on my phone right after I’d left the Black compound—and the one that I’d heard a split second before Orla had stepped in front of a moving car.
I began to shudder. Someone had just tried to kill me.
And I thought I knew how.
The same way that person had killed Orla Black.
The phone stopped, then began ringing again. Stopped and began again. Finally, I pulled into a parking space and reached for it. There was no way on the good green earth that I was going to answer a number I didn’t know again, but I could at least see if it was the same one.
It was Declan. He’d called a dozen times. The first six I hadn’t even heard. Quickly, I answered.
“Katie!” he shouted. “OhmygodKatieareyouokay?”
“I’m okay,” I said.
“I’ve been trying to call you. Connell . . . Dang it, you scared the bejesus out of me!”
“Me or Connell?” I asked, achieving a wry tone despite the adrenaline hangover that was starting to set in. It felt like half my blood had been replaced with something thinner, and more caustic—like lighter fluid.
“Well, Connell to start with,” Declan said. “Are you telling me nothing unusual has happened in the last half hour?”
“Oh, no. I wouldn’t say that at all. Someone tried to kill me.”
A beat, then: “Katie! Damn it!” I heard him take a deep breath, and when he spoke again, he was calmer. “You’re all right?”
“I’m all right.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m in my car, driving back to the Honeybee.”
“But you’re safe?”
“Yes,” I assured him. “I’m pretty tough. Besides, no hypnotist can go up against me, Mungo, and Nonna and win.” I didn’t mention how close it had been, though.
Six inches.
“Nonna? Hypnotist?”
“Yeah—at least I think so. I almost drove into the Talmadge Bridge abutment, but Mungo stopped me.” I smiled down at my familiar. He licked my hand.
“Almost . . . drove . . . into . . .” he spluttered.
“I think I was hypnotized,” I said. “And I think Orla was, too. Only in her case, it worked.”
“Who did it?” he demanded.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I’m kind of shaken up, but maybe I’ll be able to put it together later.” As I said it, I realized I was missing a chunk of time between when John had invited me to leave Fern’s house and when I’d gotten into my car. That made me glance at my watch. Surprised, I said, “It’s already four?”
“Just come home, Katie. Or I can come get you.”
“Nah, I need to go back to work and help close up the bakery. Besides, Lucy and Ben will be wondering what happened to me.”
That was going to be an interesting conversation.
Declan grumbled, but I told him I’d see him at the usual time and said good-bye.
Chapter 17
Lucy met me at the door of the Honeybee. “Declan called.”
I groaned.
She shook her head. “I can’t believe you drove here, but now that you have, I’m taking you home.”
“But—”
“No argument. Cookie is here and can help Ben close. She remembers how.”
Lucy took me by the arm and led me back to the office, where she sat me down in the computer chair. She said, “Jaida’s coming back. She’s going to drive my car, and we’ll take yours. Ben will take Honeybee home.”
“Now, come on,” I protested. “I can drive myself home, for Pete’s sake.”
My aunt stood back and looked me up and down. “You are pale and sweating, and your hands are shaking. Declan said you might have been hypnotized?” She put her hands on her hips. “Now, how do you know the effect has worn off?”
The truth was, I didn’t. The thought was less than comforting.
“I want to know exactly what happened, and then I’m going to make you a relaxing tea and put you to bed.”
I had to admit that sounded like heaven.
“What’s this?” she exclaimed, grabbing my hand. Mungo, who had followed us, ducked his head and looked up at her with apologetic brown eyes.
“It’s nothing.” I pulled my hand back. “Mungo had to do it, and he feels bad enough about it. Please, Lucy.”
Her features softened, and she bent to give him a pat. “Good boy, Mungo.” She straightened. “There have been a few times I’ve wanted to bite her, too.” Amusement flickered behind her eyes. “Just a little.”
My familiar and I both blinked, and then I laughed. It released a ton of tension and made me feel a lot better. Did I mention that my aunt possessed a toughness that not very many people got to see?
Ten minutes later, Lucy had loaded up ingredients for her magical tea—literally, I imagined—and Jaida was back. Lucy took over the wheel of the Bug, while Jaida handled my aunt’s baby blue 1964 Thunderbird behind us.
Declan was waiting on the front porch when we got home, still in muddy gardening clothes and with a full day’s worth of scruffy beard on his chin. I’d never been happier to see him.
Until he held out his cell. “It’s your mother.”
I could hear her voice through the speaker. “Katie? Katie, why didn’t you answer your phone? Katie?”
Groaning, I took it from him and put it to my ear. “Hello, Mama. I’m sorry I didn’t answer. I didn’t hear it ring.”
Lucy made a sympathetic face before she and Jaida went inside. Declan leaned against the doorframe, unabashedly listening.
“Something happened,” Mama stated without benefit of greeting. “What was it?”
I sighed and sank down on the top step. Mungo trotted over and leaned against my knee. “Nonna?” I asked.
“What? Are you asking if she told me . . . no. I just . . .” She trailed off. When she spoke again, her voice was calmer. “I had a feeling. It’s a mother thing. You’ll understand when you have kids. But you’re obviously all right. You are, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“But it must have been bad if you think my mother would have contacted me from beyond the grave.”
“Well, she kind of helped me out of a situation this afternoon. I thought she might have passed that on.”
“Oh, my Lord,” my mother muttered away from the phone. “I have to sit down, Skylar. I told you something was wrong. Mother was even involved.”
“Katie?” My dad’s voice was calm and reasonable. “I’m guessing that you’re neck-deep in another one of your magical murder investigations.”
“It sounds like something from a children’s book when you put it that way,” I said.
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes.’ Do you want to tell us what happened? I’ll put you on speaker.”
So I repeated my story yet again, trying to smooth the edges of actual danger from my narrative. Then I had to give them at least a little context, so I had to explain what had happened to Orla.
When I was done, my dad said, “Hypnotized? I sure don’t like the sound of that.”
“Neither do I!” Mama said.
“I think you need to track down a real hypnotherapist and have them remove any posthypnotic suggestions that might be lingering in your psyche,” my dad said.
Still standing in the doorway, Declan nodded his agreement.
“And I think you’d better call Dete
ctive Quinn and tell him what happened,” my mother said. “Then he can march right over to those people and arrest someone.”
“I don’t think it works quite that way,” I said. “For one thing, he’s a homicide detective.”
“Well, you think that woman who was hit by a car was murdered, so why isn’t he investigating that?”
“Because he doesn’t think she was murdered. It’s complicated, Mama.”
“It’s not right—” she began, but my father broke in.
“Declan said that Lucy brought you home, Katie. Is she still there?”
“Yes, along with my friend Jaida.”
“Mary Jane,” he said to my mother, “how about if we let Katie recover from her ordeal this afternoon? She’s in good hands.”
“Oh, all right. Katie, will you call me if anything else happens?”
“Anything?” I asked in a teasing voice.
“Well, anything I should know about. And have you two set the date for the wedding yet?”
“Not yet, Mama.”
“We have a lot of planning to do, and it’s difficult to start when we don’t even know what the weather might be like.”
“Okay, Mama. We’ll get right on that.”
A pause, then: “I know you’re teasing me. That’s okay. I’m just worried about you.”
“I know. But I’m okay. Really. I love you. Good-bye.”
Lucy and Jaida were working in the kitchen. I saw the vapor curling from the spout of the kettle, then heard a muttered chant that included the words heal, banish, calm, and mote. They were making their own potion, it seemed.
Ambivalent about all the attention, I dutifully changed into a pair of soft cotton pajamas, though it seemed silly when it was still going to be light for a couple of hours. Jaida settled me on the couch with an afghan while Declan whipped up a cheese omelet. As soon as the smell hit my nose, I realized how famished I was. He brought it to me on a tray like I was some kind of queen, and I polished it off with very unregal fervor, along with two pieces of thick sourdough toast spread with spiced peach jam.
When I was finished, Lucy brought in a steaming cup of liquid and set it on the end table by the couch. “Drink this.”
“Oh, gosh,” I protested. “I’m not sick, you know. Just had a little scare. I’m fine.” To prove my point, I threw off the afghan and stood.
“Sit down and drink that tea,” Lucy said in a tone that brooked no argument.
I sat. “Tea? Or potion?”
“I know what an insomniac you are. That tea will help you sleep. And when you sleep, you recover.” She and Jaida exchanged a look. “We added a little something to it.”
“Like what?” Declan asked, alarmed.
Jaida smiled and said, “Potions are spells in liquid form, you know. That’s simply a tea made of angelica, caraway, passionflower, and agrimony. Those are all herbs to help Katie relax and sleep. We just added a little, you know, oomph to the mixture.”
He frowned. “That’s all well and good, I suppose. Katie probably does need to sleep, but not until later, okay? I agree with her dad. We need to find out whether she’s still under some kind of hypnotic influence.”
The two witches nodded. Lucy said, “What did you have in mind?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Look in the phone book under hypnosis?”
I snorted. “That sounds like a good way to waste money. Isn’t there some kind of professional organization or vetting board for hypnotists?”
Declan said, “Drink your tea—or potion or whatever it is. I’ll do some research while you sleep.”
I lifted the cup to my lips, but didn’t drink. I set it back down. “I don’t really feel like sleeping right now. It’s not even seven o’clock.”
Lucy sat down beside me. “Don’t be afraid. Nothing bad will happen while you’re asleep.”
“Is that what you’re worried about? That you’ll wake up and try it again?” Declan asked.
A sudden shudder made the cup shake in my fingers. “Maybe. It felt kind of like I was sleepwalking.”
He came and sat on my other side. “I’m not leaving your side. And I promise I won’t let anything happen to you.”
I smiled up at him. “That’s good enough for me.” I was raising the cup to my lips when my phone buzzed on the coffee table. I put the cup down and reached for it.
“It can’t be anything important,” Lucy began to protest.
“Hello, Detective Quinn,” I said.
Her eyes grew wide.
I stood and walked to the front window, feeling three pairs of eyes on my back. “What can I do for you?”
“For one thing, you can tell me why I received two phone calls about you in the last four hours, Lightfoot.”
“Can’t begin to guess,” I said. “Perhaps if you told me who the calls were from.”
“The first one was from John Black. He’s— Well, you already know who he is, don’t you?”
I didn’t say anything.
“Of course you do, because that’s why he called. Apparently, you’ve been sticking your nose into his sister-in-law’s accident.”
“It wasn’t an accident,” I said.
“Yes, it was!” he shouted.
I held the phone away from my ear and looked over my shoulder. Declan, Lucy, and Jaida were lined on the sofa like spectators on a bleacher seat, watching me with undisguised curiosity.
I heard him take a deep breath. “Ms. Black’s death has been determined to be an accident,” he said as if he hadn’t just yelled at me. “And her brother-in-law doesn’t want you harassing their family in their time of grief. I think you can sympathize with that, can’t you?”
“Of course.”
“They’re making arrangements for a funeral, getting ready to say good-bye—you understand?”
“Isn’t there a rule in sales that you should stop selling when you hear yes?”
“I do believe there is. But sometimes a salesman is trying to get through to someone who says yes just to stop the salesman from saying more. So I’m going to add one last thing—if you don’t stop asking personal questions about the Black family, John Black is going to take out a restraining order on you.”
“Great,” I said. “You said you got two calls. Who else?”
“Your mother.”
I winced.
“Mere minutes ago.” He didn’t sound very happy about it, either.
“Really? Whatever for?” As if I didn’t know.
“Because she thinks I am neglecting my duty as an officer of the law. And she thinks that because I’m not investigating some murder that didn’t even happen. She thinks that because her daughter told her there had been a murder, and that same daughter told her that she’d been investigating it without my help.”
“I see.” I turned and leaned my hip against the windowsill. “My mother can be quite, er, protective.”
Lucy’s eyes laughed as she realized her sister had called Quinn to complain. I, on the other hand, wanted to crawl under the carriage house and hide.
“Actually, I’d call it something else,” Quinn said. “Now, she said someone tried to kill you in the course of this so-called ‘investigation’ of yours. Is that true?”
“Yes.”
There was a long moment of silence, then: “What happened?”
“I almost drove into a bridge support at full speed.”
“You what?”
“That’s right. I barely managed not to.”
“Your brakes went out?”
“No, my brakes are fine. Thank God. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to stop when I did. But I think that’s what happened to Orla.”
“Okay, hang on. Back up. First of all, are you feeling like you want to harm yourself right now?”
“No! I’ve never
felt that way.”
“Are you alone?”
“No, again. Declan, Lucy, and Jaida are sitting right here. Now listen to me, okay? Right before Orla Black stepped in front of that oncoming car on Broughton Street, I heard a sharp, loud whistle. Mungo heard it, too. He went crazy barking.”
“A whistle,” Quinn said, his voice dripping with skepticism.
“Yes, a whistle. Like some people can do with two fingers at the corners of their mouth? I’ve always wished I could do that. Anyway, before I almost drove into that hunk of concrete, I got a phone call from a number I didn’t recognize. When I answered, the only sound was a loud whistle just like the one I heard before Orla died. After I heard it, it was like I was out of my mind. I mean, I was there, but not there. Driving way too fast, on a route that didn’t take me to where I was supposed to be going, and if Mungo hadn’t bitten me, I probably would have crashed my car.” I took a deep breath. “Quinn, I think I was hypnotized, and so was Orla Black. Furthermore, I think perhaps John Black himself did it, to stop me from looking into their family secrets. If it wasn’t him, I bet he knows which of them did it.”
Another silence, then: “Mungo bit you?”
“Quinn!”
He sighed. “That’s all well and good, and certainly along the lines of some of the other bizarre things you’ve thrown at me. But you can’t just hypnotize someone to kill themselves.”
“How would you know?” My tone was bitter.
“Katie, you actually didn’t run into anything, did you?”
“No, but—”
“So you’re fine.”
“Yes, but—”
“Okay, then this is what we are going to do, understand? You’re going to text me the phone number of this whistle call you claim to have received. God, I can’t believe I’m investigating a prank call, but at least you can tell that ‘protective’ mother of yours that I’m helping you if she asks. And you are going to stop doing whatever you are doing to make people mad.”
“So you think I brought this on myself?”
“I don’t think there is a ‘this.’ I just know how you are.”
This time my hand was shaking from anger rather than fear. “Thanks a lot.” I gritted my teeth. “Can you tell me if there is a hypnotist that the police department uses?”