by Meg Muldoon
I looked up.
Louisiana?
“She said that she had something important to talk to you about. And then she kind of implied that you two were old friends from high school. But like I said, she looked to be about Sapphire’s age. None of it made any sense.”
An old friend from high school? I had exactly one of those, and she was currently employed by the Broomfield Bay PD.
“She said she wanted to wait in the kitchen for you. But I said we were still closed and that she could come back when you got here. I didn’t exactly get a good feeling from her. She could have been a thief or something.”
“She didn’t leave her name?”
“No. She just said she’d be back. But I did see the car she drove away in. It was a sweet ride. A beautiful car. Something the joker from the Batman movies might speed around in.”
Héctor always did like nice cars. On his days off, he and his girlfriend fixed up old ones in their spare time. He’d even helped Aunt Viv out when her aging VW Bug had problems with its transmission. It saved her a ton of money, and forever endeared Héctor to her.
“Anyway, the whole thing felt strange to me,” Héctor continued.
Hmm…
None of it rang a bell. I didn’t know anyone from Louisiana, and I didn’t know anyone with a nice car like that.
I shrugged.
“Maybe she really was a reporter trying to get the inside scoop. Some of them are sneaky like that.”
“Yeah. I guess I could see that,” Héctor said. “Anyway, I just thought I’d let you know—”
The double doors suddenly flung open.
A blur of a man in a black wool turtleneck and a newsboy cap came flying through the kitchen like an angry bat out of a cave.
“Ginger Marie Westbrook! I can’t wait any longer!”
Chapter 34
Christopher threw himself down onto one of the kitchen barstools in a huff.
“I better get back out there,” Héctor said.
“Thanks so much, Héctor,” I said, ignoring the impatient and unhappy man who had just taken a ginger brownie off the cake stand in the middle of the kitchen island and was shoving it in his mouth like a college freshman before finals.
I turned toward my rude guest about to say something, but was interrupted.
“I know you have a lot on your plate right now with your aunt’s murder charge and all,” he said, his words muffled with cakey brownie. “But, Ginger… I’m in love with Lilliana and she still wants nothing to do with me. Your elixir is taking forever to make! I’m going to go crazy if I have to live another day like this!”
I kept silent as I checked on the cake in the oven, trying to ignore the anger that was rising up at the back of my throat.
“I sent her that bouquet of flowers you suggested with a nice little note,” Christopher continued. “And you know what she did? She sent them back and said she hates roses. Allergic or something. And she said she’s too busy to go to dinner with me. I hate to say it, but maybe you can’t do this anymore, Ginger. Maybe the big ‘D’ has made you bitter about love, and you’ve lost your touch.
“Maybe you’re a witch has-been!”
My cheeks were burning with rage.
Enough was enough.
I walked up to him.
“Do you have any idea what I’ve been through in the last 48 hours, Christopher? Any idea at all? I don’t hear a peep from you about any of it until now, when you come in here, blaming me for your love problems.”
He stopped chewing, his jaw hanging open in midair.
“What kind of friend does that!?” I said.
Suddenly all the rage I’d been feeling over the past few days at the city, at the police, at my aunt herself for being so foolish, at Steve for not calling, and now at Christopher for being so selfish was swirling around me like a hurricane.
“I mean, I swear Christopher, I don’t know how a person can be so self-involved! And for the life of me, I don’t know what you see in that Lilliana. If you ask me, she’s a bitter, nasty, rude woman who would make your life even more miserable than it is right now. And like it or not, no amount of magic is going to change that. So you’ll just have to get over her, and take the heartbreak just like everyone else in the world!”
I felt it.
Like a pot left on the stove for too long, the emotions boiled up and over the sides.
The anger inside had reached its limit, just like that night here all those years ago when Eddie told me about going to Boston.
Christopher’s face darkened.
A crazed look drifted across his eyes.
A look I’d never seen in him before.
As though he might explode.
“Christopher, no—”
But he couldn’t hear me.
Christopher reached out, grabbed the glass cake stand of brownies, and slammed it down on the wood floor.
Broken glass and bits of chocolate went flying everywhere.
I let out a loud gasp, and the talking from out in the dining room suddenly hushed.
A second later, Héctor came running through the swinging doors.
“Ginger, you okay?”
Héctor’s voice seemed to break the spell.
The mad expression on Christopher’s face passed, as did the crazed intensity in his eyes. Now, he looked completely bewildered, as if he didn’t know where he was or who he was.
His eyes fell on the shattered glass shards and brownie on the floor, and his face turned the color of buttermilk.
“Christopher, it’s okay—”
“What hap…???” he started saying.
His face twisted in an expression of pure terror.
What had I done?
“Oh, man. Christopher, I—”
But he didn’t stick around to hear anything more.
He started shrieking and ran out of the kitchen as fast as his stubby legs would carry him.
Chapter 35
After Christopher ran away, I tried to get a hold of him on the phone, but he wouldn’t pick up. He wouldn’t answer my texts either, or the knock on his flower shop window when I stopped over on my way back home. A “closed” sign was up on the door, and the lights were all turned off.
It was the first time in three years, other than Sundays, that Christopher had actually closed his shop.
I finally gave up and headed home. As I was walking along the beach, my phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Will you accept the charges from the Brandon Bay County Jail?”
“Yes,” I said breathlessly.
There was a long pause before a distant-sounding voice came over the speaker.
“Ginger Marie? You there, hon?”
A wave of relief rushed through me.
“Aunt Viv, are you okay!? Is everything all right in there?”
We’d hardly got any time to talk at the arraignment earlier that morning.
There was silence, and for a second I began to fear the worst.
What if jail was too hard for Aunt Viv? What if she was getting picked on by the other inmates? What if—
“Ginger, honey, it’s been swell in here!” she said. “Absolutely wonderful. The guards are all sweethearts, and I’ve already made some new friends. And I’ve even got a window in my cell. Can you believe my luck?!”
I closed my eyes and rubbed my forehead.
This was a clear sign.
Aunt Viv had snapped.
But maybe she was just trying to put on a brave front.
“It’s alright if things aren’t okay, Aunt Viv,” I said. “You can tell me. I just need to make sure you’re safe. And if you’re not, then I—”
“I’m just peachy, sugar!” she said, cutting me off. “I mean, there are some comforts I’m missing about home. You, for instance. And the food here really could be improved. And of course I miss all my Stevie Nicks records. But you know, the funny thing about that is my window faces a gas station, and wouldn’t you know it, the
y’ve got the radio tuned to the 70s rock station and all my favorite songs come drifting in through the window! And aside from that luck, Trisha in cell block D said that I could borrow her boom box sometime in exchange for a spell to make her baby daddy be nicer to her. I told her she’d have to wait since I don’t have all my usual herbs and ingredients in here, but in the meantime I—”
“Aunt Viv,” I said, cutting her ramblings short.
I didn’t know how much time she had to talk.
“What is it, honeybuns?”
“We need to get you a lawyer, a good one, and I don’t care what you say. These charges are serious, you understand? Murder. You’re innocent, Aunt Viv. A good lawyer will prove that.”
“Well, you do what you want, hon, if it makes you feel better. But it’s only going to be a big waste of money. I’m telling you, Ginger Marie, everything will work itself out just fine without one of those money drainers.”
“How can you say that everything’s going to work itself out fine when you’re sitting in jail for murdering the mayor?!”
“I just know it will,” she said. “Ooh, before I forget, I had a visitor earlier this morning. Want to know who?”
I was in no mood for playing a guess-who-visited-me-in-jail game with her.
“I’ll just tell you,” she said, finally. “Special Investigator Bill Graybeal, that’s who. He said he wanted to talk to me about the case, but I knew better. He can’t fool me, that one. I knew why he was really here. Oh, Ginger. Hallelujah! The curse has lifted!”
Maybe she could plead insanity. I’d always heard that plea never worked, but anyone in their right mind could see that Aunt Viv clearly wasn’t in hers.
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“One more minute,” I heard a gruff voice say somewhere in the background.
“Oh, shoot. My time’s almost up. I’m afraid I’ll have to explain it all to you later. But let’s just say that I did something stupid when I was young that I’ve been paying for ever since. But now, after all of this time, I’m finally free of it.”
What was she talking about?
“Get the lawyer if it makes you feel better,” she said. “But don’t spend too much. We’ve got to paint the house, remember? And whatever you do, do not sell the Victorian or let those blood-sucking Historical Society vampires take it. That’s all I ask.”
“But Aunt Viv—”
“Time’s up, Westbrook,” the gruff voice said again.
“I better get, Ginger Marie. And for goodness sakes, don’t worry so much!”
“Aunt Viv, wait—”
“Tootle-loo, darlin.’”
Then there was silence.
I hung up the phone and immediately put in a call to the state’s best defense attorney.
Chapter 36
Eddie was waiting for me under the Victorian’s covered porch, and for a moment I flashed back to that magical day that felt like a lifetime ago.
It was a sparkling blue afternoon near the summer solstice, just like now. A gentle, salty wind was blowing in off the sea. Aunt Viv said her mother talked about these kinds of winds. She always said they were special, bringing surprise love and romance. When winds like that blew, she said people grew kinder, became more loving, and were gentler to each other. Couples who had done nothing but fight all winter and spring were suddenly offering up flowers and chocolate truffles and whispering apologies.
And if you were single, you were especially lucky. According to my grandmother, one of these winds could easily bring you the person of your heart’s desire.
Maybe even your one true love.
But when I was a teenager, whenever Aunt Viv started talking about magic winds, I tuned her out. I thought it was an old wives’ tale. I didn’t believe.
Until that day when I saw Eddie Cross standing on the porch.
I was 16 years old and it was the first week of summer vacation. I’d spent every day in the café with Aunt Viv, sweating in the back of the bakery and working hard, long hours to help her with the tourist season. And though most teens would have hated to spend their summer break cooped up in a hot kitchen with their aunt, I could think of nothing better. I’d been dying to learn some of her secrets – like how she made cakes stay so moist, and the combination of spices in her ginger snaps. And how she made everything taste so delicious all the time.
We closed the café for the day and headed back to the old Victorian just as the sun was sliding down toward the ocean, casting everything in a golden haze. That magic breeze was blowing strong, winding through lilac shrubs and rose bushes, causing the buds to burst open.
I remember getting out of the car, grabbing the box of blueberry ginger bars that Aunt Viv had us bring home for a neighbor, when I noticed someone standing on the porch holding a bouquet of purple tulips.
Up until then, Eddie Cross and I had just been summer friends. Friends that couldn’t wait to see each other when school got out. Friends who found each other every day in the morning, and stayed together until the sun went down at night. Friends that loved fishing from shore, riding bikes along the pier, body surfing, searching for glass balls and agates, and telling ghost stories around big bonfires. And each September when Eddie went back to the city with his folks and we had to say goodbye, it was always sad. But then school would start up, and I wouldn’t think all that much about him until the next summer.
But that day in June when I saw Eddie on the porch, something inside bloomed.
We weren’t just friends anymore.
I dropped the pastry box and ran past Aunt Viv, up the steps and into Eddie’s arms.
He hugged me like we were lost lovers.
When I looked up at him, the world around us fell away.
Both of us thunderstruck, unable to move.
Both of us unable to speak.
Both of us unable to do anything except stare deeply into each other’s eyes.
“I’ve missed you so much, Ginger.”
He gave me the purple tulips and our hands brushed. Electricity, as strong as a live wire, crackled in the air around us.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath of the tulips. They had no scent, but they smelled better than any flower I’d ever smelled before.
“These are beautiful.”
“They’re nothing compared to you,” he said, gazing deep into my eyes.
His cheeks turned red, a big Eddie Cross smile on his face.
“Nothing’s as beautiful as you.”
I’d never known love before.
Not until that moment.
I kissed him, and the world around us caught fire.
Chapter 37
But those magic winds didn’t last long.
I sighed, thinking about how that old porch was still the same after all these years, but how everything else had changed.
Today, I was a nearly-divorced thirty-something witch still living in a small town, and Eddie was a reporter who never did get that chance to show off his baseball skills to college coaches or the pros or anybody.
Today, we were just two old acquaintances trying to save my aunt from being locked away for the rest of her life.
We walked in the kitchen, coming in through the back of the house since the front door was boarded up. We tried to make a path between all the pots and pans lying on the floor, and all the spoons and forks and knives and corkscrews and dishtowels and cookie sheets. Cupboards were open, plates smashed in the sink, blender jars and parts of the food processor were strewn about.
The kitchen was bad.
But the living room was even worse.
Heads would roll when Aunt Viv found out about her records. And while I was pretty sure she wasn’t a murderer now, all that could change when she found out that someone had broken into her house and smashed her Stevie Nicks collection.
Though I had already seen the destruction the afternoon before, it wasn’t any easier to stomach.
“Why, why…” I said, my throat tightening
around my words. “Why would anyone do this?”
Eddie scanned the room.
“It seems to me like they were looking for something,” he said.
“Looking for something? What would they be looking for?”
He shrugged.
“Is the rest of the house this bad?” he asked.
“It’s a little better upstairs. But not much.”
He tossed his messenger bag on the sofa.
“Well, I guess we better get to it,” he said.
He rolled up his sleeves and turned over a chair, and then another.
We began sprucing up the living room and kitchen as best we could.
***
“Okay, this is what I have so far,” Eddie said looking at his notes and finishing the last bite of his sandwich.
I was glad to have found the brie, tomato, basil, and French bread that Aunt Viv always kept on hand untouched by the intruder.
We were in the kitchen, trying to figure out how to find the real killer. Eddie had set up his computer on the granite countertop and brought out his notepad.
“I’ve done some digging around in Penelope Ashby’s past,” Eddie continued. “I didn’t come up with too much, but I think it’s strange how none of the cops have even considered her ex-husband as a suspect. Usually, that’s the first person you investigate. The cops should have brought him in for questioning at the very least. Do you know anything about Jerry Ashby, Ginger? Anything at all?”
“Not too much,” I said. “I know that he was Aunt Viv’s high school sweetheart, and then Penelope stole him from her when they were in their early 20s. Aunt Viv never forgave her for it, and that’s where all the bad blood started between them.”
“So Jerry would know about their feud, right? And that would make your aunt an easy target to pin a murder on.”
“I guess so. But he’s never struck me as the murdering type.”
Locals considered Jerry to be something of a pushover