by Nova Nelson
“Yeah, that could be fun,” I said as coolly as possible.
“Unless you’re more of a Lyre Lounge girl,” he added quickly, and I could tell from the controlled tone that he was hoping I wasn’t.
“No. I used to be that kind of person, but not anymore. Sheehan’s sounds great.”
He sighed, kicked his legs out, and draped an arm over the back of the swing. My breath caught in my chest when I felt it brush against my shoulders. He leaned slightly back from me, inspecting me. Then slowly his palm found my shoulder farthest from him. “I can’t tell you how much I’ve wondered about who you were before you came to Eastwind, Nora.”
“Really?”
He nodded, his gaze no longer searching my face, now locked onto my eyes. “Yeah. You’re so different from all the other witches in Eastwind. Honestly, you’re not like any other woman I’ve ever met. You’re strong, independent, you manage to keep all the customers happy while not taking an ounce of nonsense from anyone. And no matter how hard I try, I can’t get a read on you.”
“Are you telling me I’m mysterious?” I said playfully.
“I guess I am.” He pulled his legs in and sat up straight, moving slightly closer to me on the swing. “I have to say, though, I love a good mystery.”
A freezing jolt ran down my spine right as his grip tightened on my shoulder and he leaned in, but no matter how hard I pretended the cause of it was my long-standing crush on Tanner amounting to something physical—finally!—I knew that wasn’t the culprit.
“Oh, for fang’s sake,” I said when I caught sight of her. She hovered a foot off the ground just to the left of where Tanner sat in the swing.
“Huh?” he said, scooting away from me and quickly removing his arm from around my shoulder.
“No, sorry, it’s not you,” I said hastily, my eyes darting back and forth from his concerned face to her semi-transparent air of entitlement.
“You’re Nora, right?” the ghost said.
“Yeah, just wait one minute, though, would you?” I replied.
Tanner whirled around to see who I was addressing. When he looked back to me, he appeared deflated. “Ghost?” he asked.
I cringed apologetically “Yeah, sorry.”
“The same one from earlier today?”
“No. New one. I don’t recognize her.”
“I’m Heather Lovelace,” she said politely. “How do you do?”
I held up a hand to silence her. “Slow your roll.”
“Who is she?” asked Tanner.
“Heather Lovelace?”
His jaw dropped. “Did you say Lovelace?”
I nodded. “That’s what she said her name was, at least.”
“As in the old Lovelace family out in Hightower Gardens?”
“Uhh …” I looked from one to the other and it clicked. “I was right.”
“Huh?” said Heather and Tanner.
“You didn’t kill yourself, did you, Heather?”
She gasped, offended by the mere suggestion of it, then shook her head.
“I knew it!” I said. Not that there was much cause for celebration. After all, Heather was still dead and I’d just missed my big moment with Tanner.
But still. I couldn’t wait to rub this in Stu Manchester’s face.
“I guess I better get Monster and head home,” he said, standing.
“But— I mean … I—”
He gave me a look of come on now and I sighed, my head drooping as I accepted my fate.
“Yeah,” I said. “This will probably take a while.”
I led them inside. Ruby had already gone upstairs, and once Tanner had gently woken up Monster and had her cradled in his arms for the walk home, he said, “We’ll figure out a night for Sheehan’s. Maybe sometime this week?”
I managed a small grin. All hope was not lost with him. “Sounds good,” I said.
As I held the door open, he paused at the threshold. “Night, Nora. Tell Ruby I said thanks for the wonderful meal and company. I’ll see you in the morning.” Then he leaned forward slowly, and I shut my eyes, hoping for the best.
But alas, the kiss landed on my cheek, and I suppressed a small whine that threatened to squeeze free. “Night,” I said, masking my disappointment, and watched him until he disappeared at the end of the block.
With a deep intake of air, I shut the door and turned to the parlor, where the ghost hovered by the fire, staring impatiently at her see-through nails.
“Okay, Heather,” I said. “This better be good.”
Chapter Three
Ruby had changed into her nightgown while Tanner and I were outside. No doubt she’d expected our time together would last longer than it did.
Through her thick wooden bedroom door, I could just make out grumbling when I tapped lightly and told her that there’d been a slight change in plans, and our presence was now needed downstairs by one of the Lovelace pack.
“She didn’t visit me,” Ruby said, her hand remaining on the door handle. “Why should I have to get out of bed?”
I tilted my head to the side but didn’t say anything. She knew I wasn’t ready to take these cases on my own, but I didn’t want to say it.
With a sharp exhale, she pulled her loose robe around her and said, “Fine. I’ll start some ash bark tea.”
Ash bark tea wasn’t my favorite blend so far as taste went—it was a little too bitter—but it was specially brewed to keep one clear-minded without adding the jittery energy that caffeine provided. It was Ruby’s go-to for conversations with ghosts.
And over the past four months, we’d had our fair share of those at the parlor table. All but one—Bruce Saxon—simply needed someone to talk to. Dying could be traumatic business, and I’d be surprised if anyone could pass through it gracefully and without issues to work through first.
So Ruby and I sat and listened, mostly. The dead weren’t all that different from the living in that respect; everyone just wanted to be heard.
Heather Lovelace needed a little more than just a shoulder to cry on, though.
“Tell me about the last thing you remember,” I said. While Ruby might be there to oversee and jump in where I missed an obvious question, we had an unspoken agreement that I would take the lead. It was part of my training.
Heather had managed to carry an air of superiority with her into the afterlife. Without her reputation preceding her, I would have been able to guess that not only did she die rich, but she’d been born rich, too. Ghosts usually wore either the outfit they had on when they died or their favorite outfit, the one they thought was most “them.” I assumed Heather’s was the latter, since the designer jeans and leather jacket were hardly appropriate for the June heat, and since she’d died in her sleep, having had on a leather jacket seems unlikely. It was a strange outfit, overall, especially for someone who dripped old money with every casual flick of her wrist and upward tilt of her nose. She looked like a hopelessly wealthy person trying very hard to pass for a biker … while remaining unwilling to sacrifice designer tastes.
Heather shrugged. “Falling asleep. I just remember lying in bed, the room was spinning a little bit, and then I was out.”
“And now you’re here,” I said, logging all details, as sparse as they were, to memory. “Are you aware how you died?”
She shook her head, small tracers of smoky ectoplasm flowing around her as she did.
“And to be clear, you didn’t kill yourself?” I asked. It sounded so callous, and she flinched slightly.
“No, I didn’t. I had no reason to.”
“So, what do you think happened?”
“I think I was murdered,” she said flatly. “I think someone must’ve snuck in and killed me while I slept.”
She didn’t know. I hated to be the one to break it to her, but there was no point in sugarcoating things now. She was dead, and she wasn’t coming back to life. The only way she was going anywhere was if I sent her to the great beyond, whatever that was exactly. And I wouldn�
��t get her there by tiptoeing around the truth and allowing her to remain ignorant.
“It was silver,” I said. “You died of silver poisoning.”
Her confusion was obvious. “So, someone force-fed me silver while I slept?”
“I can’t say.”
“Oh,” she said, holding a hand to her heart, her eyes staring vacantly at the tabletop. “That’s awful … silver poisoning is a terrible way to go.” She looked up at me. “Who found me?”
It was a concern many of the dead had.
“Not sure,” I said. “Deputy Manchester is convinced it was suicide, though. So unless I can convince him otherwise, your killer will walk free. Any idea of who might have wanted you dead?”
Ruby had taught me the importance of asking this question … as well as how little stock to put in the answer. When ghosts hadn’t glimpsed their murderers, it was usually for a good reason. Usually, it was because the killer was a friend who needed to remain outside of suspicion to everyone; even the victim. Crimes of passion were usually big, bold, and, at least deep down, expected by the victim, even if only for a few seconds before they occurred.
I know. Dark, right? But this is murder and death we’re talking about. That’s kind of the whole thing.
“No idea,” she said. “I never had it out with anyone. I’m not aware of anyone who might want me dead.”
“You had money, right?”
Heather nodded.
“Lots of it? Enough to hire someone to cook your meals?”
She nodded again. “Well, of course. Reatta has four little witches to put through school, so I offered her a job and she jumped at the opportunity.”
I had no idea how much witch school cost, but if it was anywhere near private school back home, Heather had to be paying Reatta a hefty check each month for her to afford it. “You and Reatta get along?”
“Yes. Do you actually suspect that she might’ve poisoned my food?” Her eyes were round moons, and I got the sense they had been deep blue before she died, but I couldn’t pinpoint how I guessed that.
“I don’t know. Did you and she have any bad blood?”
“No!” Heather said firmly. “She’s worked for me for years. She was practically family!”
Family who did all your cooking, was a lower class, and probably didn’t get to eat at the same table with you, I thought. Would Reatta say the same thing, that she felt like Heather’s family?
“Okay, that’s fine,” I said. “I believe you.”
I did not.
“Were you married, Heather?” I asked.
“Yes.” She brought a hand to her mouth and shook her head mournfully. “Oh, I’m so worried about him. Lucent is a good man, but he’s never been particularly good about taking care of himself.”
“The two of you had a good relationship?”
“Oh yes,” she said.
“Any chance you had a disagreement in the past couple days that could have—”
“No,” she said firmly. “Lucent would never, and I mean never harm a hair on my head. He could get worked up about things, but never was his aggression directed at me.”
“I understand.”
Yep, I would for sure be having a little chat with Lucent Lovelace.
“Why don’t you walk us through your last day, dear?” Ruby said, taking us back a few steps in the process.
I supposed I was jumping the gun a little bit, already searching for suspects before I had the larger picture of Heather’s life and her last day on earth.
“Well, let’s see.” She raised a ghostly hand to her chin, rubbing it thoughtfully as she stared up at one of the many baubles hanging from Ruby’s parlor ceiling. “I woke up at my usual time of eight o’clock, slipped on my robe and wandered downstairs for breakfast. Lucent was already down there, which was a bit abnormal.”
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“He usually sleeps in. Doesn’t have to be at work until the early afternoon, now that they’ve cut his hours back. It was a blow to his ego, being the only one of all the employees to have his hours cut to part-time, and he’s been a bit depressed lately, sleeping in, moping around, spending time at Sheehan’s Pub after work every day. Oh, I realize that doesn’t paint him in a positive light. I hope you understand that he’s just going through a rough patch. He’s been through them before and always came out just fine on the other side. It’s nothing, really.”
“You eat breakfast at home?” I asked.
She nodded. “I always do. Lucent was already eating by the time I sat down and Reatta was cleaning up in the back already.”
“You didn’t see her?”
“No.”
“And you’re sure she was the one who cooked your breakfast?”
She laughed. “Well, it certainly wasn’t Lucent! Like I said, the man can hardly take care of himself. I can’t imagine him, in the state he was in, waking up early and preparing a large well-rounded breakfast for the two of us.”
“After breakfast, what did you do?”
She listed it off routinely. “Went upstairs, showered, spent a bit of time on my beauty regimen—you don’t stay looking this young by accident.”
I refrained from pointing out that she didn’t look young so much as dead. A lot of good her anti-aging creams did her.
“Once my hair and skin were sufficiently moisturized and rejuvenated,” she continued. “I dressed for errands. There was some fabric I’d had my eye on for a while. Wanted to make a chic asymmetrical blouse from it. Then I figured I’d get myself something to eat at the emporium and head over to the spa for a bit of relaxation.”
I must’ve made a face that showed how confused I was for her need for relaxation. Wasn’t her entire day one relaxing activity after the next?
She explained, “Having Lucent sulking around so much left my nerves frayed. He was so broody. Like I said, he was never aggressive toward me, but, well—I hate to even say this—he was being passive-aggressive. Making snide comments about how I emasculated him and so on. I never did anything of the kind. I simply encouraged him to go out and find more work.”
“And what did you do for work?” I asked.
“Me?” She giggled. “Oh, I don’t work. I don’t have to. I’m a Lovelace.”
“Isn’t Lucent also a Lovelace?”
“Sure, but not by birth, of course. He used to be a Scandrick.” She crinkled her nose. “Not exactly high stock in the werewolf community.”
Ah, right. I’d almost forgotten. Werewolves were a matriarchal society. The men took the last names of their wives. Heather hadn’t married in, Lucent had.
“Did Lucent want to work?”
“He insisted upon it.”
“And he didn’t insist on you working?”
“Oh, no, no, no …” she said, shaking her head slowly. “He would have sold himself into slavery before asking me to get a job. He knew the lifestyle I was accustomed to, and he was determined to allow me to keep it, even after I’d married down.”
While it was fascinating to see the inner workings of an unhealthy marriage (at least as far as I could tell), we were getting off track. “So, you went shopping, hit the emporium, and went to the spa?”
“No,” she said. “That was my plan, but it didn’t work out. As I was walking to the tailor’s, the dizziness set back in again.”
“Again?” I asked.
“Mm-hm. I’d been getting dizzy in the mornings and late evenings for about a week.”
“I apologize for asking such a personal question, Heather, but any chance you were pregnant?”
She brushed it off with a swipe of her hand. “No. Lucent and I weren’t even considering having kids. Not until he could get a better job.”
“Okay, but accidents happen. Maybe you were pregnant without meaning to be?”
Her eyes jumped to Ruby for help. “I don’t understand.”
Ruby leaned across the table toward me. “It doesn’t work like that here. Much better contraception. Hasn’t
been an accidental pregnancy in forty years.”
“Ah.” And there I went, putting on full display that I had not had occasion to look into contraception since coming to Eastwind. I tried to recover quickly. “So you were dizzy and skipped shopping.”
“Yes. I wasn’t far from the Pixie Mixie, though, so I stopped by to get something for the dizziness. The clerk, Kayleigh, instructed me to take it with food, so I went to the emporium and grabbed a bite from my favorite sandwich shop.”
“Did that help?”
She smiled. “Oh yes. It certainly seemed to. I wasn’t dizzy again until later that night.”
“Where’d you go after the emporium?”
“Straight to the spa!” she said like it was the obvious and responsible thing to do. “My mother’s birthday was … today, actually.”
“That’s unfortunate,” I said.
She shrugged. “Only a little. She and I almost never spoke. I was dead to her long before I died. Doesn’t matter. I sent her a birthday gift every year whether we’d spoken or not—being the bigger woman was the best way to get under her skin. My plan had been to pick up something while I was shopping for clothes, but when that didn’t happen, I realized that the spa would also be a great place to find a gift. They custom-make all kinds of delicious creams and masks. They’ll even let you pick your scents and mix it up especially for you. It’s one of my favorite things, picking out new indulgent beauty products. The face cream they’d mixed for me before was so incredible, I thought it might even be fit for my pretentious mother. I decided to grab one for her on my way out after a full relaxation package.”
I tried not to think too hard about how pretentious Mrs. Lovelace had to be for Heather to call her pretentious. “Sounds wonderful,” I said, feeling like my head might explode if I had to listen to a dead woman drone on about skin care any longer. “After the spa, where did you go?”
“Home,” she said quickly. “Showered off some of the spa oils, read a book, ate dinner, and then the dizziness was back, so I took some of the mixture from the apothecary and went to bed. Then I never woke up.”
“And who cooked your dinner?”
“Reatta, of course, but we’re not starting with her again, are we?”