I smiled. “It tastes better than it looks. I promise.”
She laughed softly. “Sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“Cass, don’t apologize.” I sat down on the upholstered chair at the head of the table that was beside the chair Cassie had selected. “So, how did the argument with Peg end?”
“It didn’t really. I got mad, told her she was off her rocker, and stormed out. That’s why I wasn’t there this morning for opening. My alarm went off, just like normal, but I silenced it. I figured if I was going to get fired anyways, why bother? But then my backup alarm went off and I gave myself a pep talk to go and prove her wrong. I need that job, even if it barely pays the bills. It’s better than nothing.”
I nodded, that explained why I was the first to arrive at the shop. “Well, be glad you didn’t. It wasn’t pretty…”
Cassie frowned. “I’m sorry, Holly. You shouldn’t have had to deal with that all alone. Gosh, what a disaster.”
“Majorly.” I took a sip of tea, the bitterness of the herbs balanced out with the dose of honey into a pleasant, mild flavor that warmed me through and made me want to crawl back into my bed. “How did Chief Lincoln find out about the argument though?”
Cassie’s cheeks went red. “The conversation wasn’t exactly private…”
I arched a brow at her.
“It started back in her office, but kind of spilled out and everyone in the shop at the time heard the worst parts.”
“Oh, no…” I winced.
“Yeah, not my finest hour. I can’t even remember the last time I was that worked up!”
I reached over and set my hand on top of hers. “I’m sure this will get cleared up. Sure, you had a bad day, but who doesn’t? Everyone has conflict and arguments sometimes. No one in this town could actually think you murdered Peg.”
“Thanks, Holly.”
I smiled. “Besides, by that logic, the killer was Gretta. Her and Peg argue every other day.”
Cassie laughed but then covered her mouth, her eyes going wide. “Oh, I shouldn’t laugh. I mean, she’s dead.”
“True. Sorry.”
“But you’re probably right,” she added, her smile returning slightly.
“By next week, no one will even remember the argument between you and Peg. The gossip mill around here is relentless, but at least they cycle through things pretty quickly.”
“Yeah, but a murder? Nothing like that has happened here as far back as I can remember. I can’t imagine everyone moving on anytime soon. This is going to have some sticking power.”
“The police will find the clues and scratch your name off their list.”
Cassie fidgeted with the gilded handle of her tea cup. Her eyes circling the rim as she spun it around. “I hope you’re right.”
“Don’t worry, Cass. We’re going to figure this out. Besides, it sounds like you and Chief Lincoln have some history. I’m sure he knows this wasn’t you.”
Cassie nodded but her eyes were still filled with angst. “We went to school together. He was a couple of years older than me. He invited me to his senior prom actually, when I was still a sophomore.”
My eyebrows shot up. “Oh, really?”
As a witch, I hadn’t gone to traditional school and witch school didn’t have things like prom. But, I’d watched enough sitcoms to know it was a big, big deal.
“Yeah. I turned him down though…”
I bit back a laugh. “Why?”
“I had a crush on his friend, Mark, and didn’t want him to think I was with Jeffery.”
“Drama, drama,” I teased, offering her a warm smile.
“That’s high school for you.”
“Right.” I nodded, looking away as if conjuring my own school memories from the recesses of my mind. When I was a teenager, I was far more concerned with perfecting my summoning spells and making sure my potion kit was properly stocked than proms and student body elections.
“So, what do you think I should do?” Cassie asked, her small voice drawing me back to the manor’s bright kitchen.
“I know someone who can give me some advice if it gets that far,” I offered, drumming my fingers on the table.
“Really?” Cassie’s eyes brightened and she perked up in her seat. “That would be great, Holly. I knew you’d know what to do. You’re the best!”
I smiled and took a deep sip from the dainty tea cup, drawing in as much of the calming tea blend as I could.
There was someone who would help me if I got desperate enough.
And for me to go seeking out Nick Rivers, I would have to be pretty darn desperate.
CHAPTER EIGHT
“GOOD AFTERNOON, gorgeous.” Adam bounded down the stairs as I was seeing Cassie out of the manor. She turned back and peeked around the door at his greeting and her cheeks flushed. “Oh, hello, Cassie.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ll call you later, Cass.”
I found it was best to ignore Adam, especially when he went into full-on flirt mode. Which, happened to be ninety percent of the time. If he wasn’t eating or sleeping, he was flirting or in pursuit of his next target. As far as I could tell, he was harmless. Sometimes I wondered if he even realized he was doing it. Shifters had a reputation for being shameless flirts. But considering that I’d never seen Adam bring a girlfriend home for the night, I wasn’t sure how often he backed up his words with action. The stars above knew he could have any woman he wanted.
Well, except for me.
Adam personified tall, dark, and handsome. He was at least six foot two, with broad, strong shoulders that made any t-shirt look good. He had dark, almost black hair that he kept cut short. His eyes were just as dark but usually illuminated with a glint of mischief that accompanied a wicked, half-cocked grin that was hard to ignore. His square jaw was often coated with dark scruff that completed his bad boy persona to perfection.
He was definitely six plus feet of sheer trouble.
Cassie looked about ready to swoon. I caught her eye and she blushed all the more. “Thanks, Holly. Bye, Adam!”
He raised a hand, flashed his signature smile, and she faltered, nearly stumbling over the threshold. She giggled to herself as she course corrected and crossed the front porch. Adam chuckled behind me and I rolled my eyes as I closed the door. “Don’t congratulate yourself too hard, over there, Adam. I’ve recently realized that Cassie has shockingly low standards.”
“You’re grumpy,” he pouted, crossing his arms as I spun around and started for the kitchen.
“I’m not grumpy.” I could hear Adam on my heels but didn’t stop to address him.
“What’s wrong?” he asked as we both went through the swinging door into the kitchen. “If you’re not grumpy, then what is it? You seem…tense.”
I pursed my lips and pivoted on my heel, swirling around to face him. “Gee, I wonder why. It’s not like I found a dead body this morning or anything!”
“Dead body?” Adam cocked his head then smiled. “Did Lacey get a hold of that paranormal investigator guy you told us about?”
I shivered at the dark thought. “No. He’s alive and well. Probably still lurking around the crime scene like a dog begging for table scraps.”
“That’s offensive,” he retorted, stalking across the kitchen to the floor to ceiling wall of cabinets that made up the pantry.
I squeezed my eyes shut. Right, Adam technically was a dog. “Sorry, you know what I meant.”
“I get it, you’re not a dog person. At least, not yet,” he turned his head and waggled his eyebrows at me.
I scoffed and went back to refreshing my cup of tea. I clearly needed a second dose.
“It’s more that Boots isn’t a fan,” I explained.
Adam chuckled and I relaxed slightly. As much as he could drive me crazy, I didn’t want him to think I was trying to be mean to him. “So who bit the dust?”
I bristled. “Do you have to say it like that?”
He huffed a sigh and turned back to face me, a ju
mbo-sized jar of peanut butter in his hand. “Fine. Who died?”
“Peg Holloway,” I replied, lowering back into my seat at the table, my tea cup steaming from the new water I’d added.
“What?” His grin dropped away instantly. His eyes flashed with concern. “Really?”
“Yeah.” I nodded and set my fresh cup of tea back on the table. “I got to work this morning and found her in the alley behind the shop. Dead.”
“How?”
“I don’t know exactly, but it looked like she’d been hit on the head and there were broken bottles of flavor syrups all over the ground by her car.”
“Let me guess, peppermint?”
The clothes I’d been wearing at the crime scene were buried in the hamper in my room. How could Adam still smell it on me? “Ugh. Do I still smell?”
“Little bit.” Adam strolled across the kitchen and took a spoon from the drawer. “I wasn’t going to say anything, but since you brought it up. It’s probably in your hair.”
I lifted the end of my ponytail to my nose and breathed deeply. Yep, peppermint. I rolled my eyes and flopped back in my chair. Great. “I need to practice some kind of cleaning charm…”
“It’s just because I’m a shifter, Holls. No one else probably noticed.” Adam laughed softly and popped the lid from the jar in his hands. He dug in with a spoon and came up with the biggest glob of peanut butter I’d ever seen. I marveled as Adam worked his mouth around the towering bite.
I grimaced as he swallowed it down. “How can you eat it like that? I’d feel like I was suffocating.”
Death by peanut butter…I supposed there were worse ways to go.
“I like peanut butter.” Adam shrugged.
“I think your feelings are a little stronger than that,” I teased, grateful for the infusion of levity to the somber conversation. Adam was always good for a laugh. Mostly at his expense. But he was a good sport.
“Don’t be too jealous, gorgeous.” He smirked and flashed me a wink.
I scoffed but couldn’t hold back a laugh. “You really are something else.”
He chuckled and fished out another massive bite of peanut butter. He paused, considering the glob on the end of his spoon. “Well at least the murder case gets one problem off of our plate,” he said before stuffing the spoon into his mouth.
I cringed. “You mean besides earning me an extra day off?”
He laughed. “That too. I actually meant keeping the paranormal investigator out of our business. You said he’s trying to get in on this new case.”
“Oh. Right. I suppose so.” I nodded slowly but then shifted my eyes back to Adam. “But something tells me he’s not gone for good. It’s not like Chief Lincoln is going to let him anywhere near the crime scene.”
Adam snorted. “Ain’t that the truth. That man gives new meaning to the term persnickety.”
“You just don’t like him because he comes out to scare you off when you’re invading the dumpster behind McNally’s.”
“Hey, dogs gotta eat.” He shrugged, unconcerned. That was the other thing about Adam, he radiated confidence and didn’t care what anyone else thought about him. He owned who he was and made it look good. “McNally’s has the best dumpster in town. I can’t help it.”
I laughed. “I know. Well…no, actually, I don’t. But I get the gist.”
Adam had tried to explain shifting to me on multiple occasions. Most shifters regarded their ability with a certain amount of secrecy. Not Adam. Adam was loud and proud. He’d tell you anything about anything. The only problem was knowing whether he actually knew what he was talking about, or if it was all hot air. But when it came to shifter magic, I trusted his first-hand experience. According to him, shifters weren’t like werewolves where the change was inevitable, a monthly curse. Shifters could change at will. I’d asked him why shifters change at all. Why not just live a normal life. Most werewolves I’d talked to said they wished they could control their power, harness it, and make it more like shifting. Not that they would ever say it exactly that way. They would never want to come across as jealous of shifters. In any case, Adam had explained that with shifters, the magic builds up inside and eventually needs to be channeled into shifting.
Apparently it was also quite fun. Adam liked to shift on a regular basis to stretch his legs, run through the woods, and be wild and free. However, after a long night of running the woods, he usually wound up in town, dumpster diving his way through the best leftovers that Beechwood Harbor had to offer.
“Obviously, you wouldn’t eat out of a dumpster if it was by choice,” I paused to consider him. “At least, I don’t think you would.”
Adam laughed and screwed the cap back on the peanut butter jar. “It’s a helluva lot cheaper that way,” he said, flashing me a mischievous grin.
I grimaced. “I think I’ll stick to take out.”
“Suit yourself.” He pushed up from his chair and went to put the peanut butter back in the cabinet. He tossed a glance over his shoulder. “What was Cassie doing here this afternoon? Was she coming to see me now that she has the day off?”
I rolled my eyes and gulped down some more tea. “No, surprisingly enough, she was not. She’s worried that she’s going to be roped into the investigation.”
“Of the murder?” Adam screwed up his face in an almost comical expression of bewilderment.
“She’s just being paranoid. Which is exactly what I told her.”
Adam stashed the peanut butter back in the cupboard—his tidiness was his one redeeming quality—and came to sit beside me at the farmhouse style table. “Why would she even think that? I mean, I don’t know her that well, usually because she gets all shy and flustered around me,” he sat back in his chair and puffed his chest out. “I tend to have that effect.”
“Adam…”
He laughed. “Just sayin’. Seriously though, I can’t imagine someone like her ever being accused of hurting anyone, let alone murdering them.”
“Yeah, me either, but I guess she and Peg had a loud argument last night. Peg accused her of stealing from the till.”
“Ouch.”
I nodded. “From what she said, it wasn’t pretty. But I don’t think that’s enough to flag her as a suspect. I’m sure the questions were just protocol. You know, part of the investigation. Shake every tree.” I shrugged. “Besides, she’s got someone on the inside who will watch her back.”
“What do you mean?”
I jolted, realizing that I’d said the last part out loud. It hadn’t been meant for him. “Oh, nothing really. I just didn’t realize that she and Chief Lincoln have known each other since grade school.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Apparently a little bit of an unrequited romance on the Chief’s part in their later years.”
“Double ouch.”
I laughed. “That was a while ago. They seemed perfectly fine today. I’m sure Chief Lincoln will figure this case out soon and it will blow over.”
“Hopefully.” Adam leaned back in his chair, mulling over everything I’d explained.
The kitchen door banged open and Lacey stalked into the room. “What is that stench?”
I winced and spun around in my seat. “Good morning, Princess of Darkness,” Adam purred at Lacey’s entrance. “It’s a little early for you, isn’t it?”
“With all the banging on the door, it was hard to stay asleep!” Lacey glared at him then shifted her angry stare to me. “What have you been doing in here? I can smell the magic.”
“No you can’t,” I retorted before drinking down the rest of my tea. It was time to go.
“I smell something,” she growled, stalking across the kitchen to the fridge.
“Peppermint?” Adam offered, smirking over at me.
I sighed. “I made tea. That’s all, Lacey.”
“Magic tea…” she corrected, wrinkling her nose.
“Fine! You caught me, Lacey! A witch just made magical tea. Someone call the Haven Harold to come
run an exclusive.”
Adam smirked at me and looked down at the remnants in the bottom of my cup. “Was it really? I wonder why I didn’t pick up on that.”
“Because you’re useless?” Lacey offered as she closed the fridge, her hand wrapped around a white can with a gold label on the outside. She cracked the can open, crossed over to the china cabinet, and retrieved a crystal goblet. Lacey had expensive taste. She poured the contents of the can into the goblet, filling it with a thick, ruby red liquid. Synthetic blood to satiate vamps and the like without harm to humans. Lacey was partial to the O positive blend.
Adam narrowed his eyes at her and then hopped up from the table. “I’d love to stay and chat, Holly, but you know how I hate feeding time in the bat cave.”
Lacey bared her fangs at him and he hustled from the room, his currently concealed tail between his legs. He loved to stir Lacey up but often bailed before things got really ugly. Their all-out verbal brawls were only a once a week thing. Everything else was tame in comparison.
Thankfully. Otherwise I’d have begged Harvey for a new residence a long time ago.
I cringed at the reminder that Harvey was likely to pop up to ask questions with a murder in town. Harvey Colepepper was the agent assigned to me through the Supernatural Protection Agency—SPA—and was responsible for keeping me safe and keeping others safe from me. Although, most of the time that translated into needless babysitting. However, as SPA watched over all kinds of creatures, they tended to keep an eye on crimes reported within a certain radius of known supernaturals.
Which, was probably a smart move.
Unfortunately, with my potion business being a little…let’s say…undocumented, a visit from SPA was the last thing that I wanted.
Bat wings and broomsticks, could this week get any worse? Already, we had a paranormal investigator sniffing around, a ghost on the edge of a breakdown, a vampire versus shifter battle brewing, a dead body, and a potential visit from Harvey.
What else could go wrong?
CHAPTER NINE
WITH A FREE AFTERNOON and a full mind, I did the only thing I knew to do that would help me unwind and clear my thoughts: I went to work in my garden. Behind the Beechwood Manor there was an old potting shed that had been renovated into a greenhouse some time ago. When I moved in, I asked Posy if I could use it, and she agreed that if I cleared out the cobwebs, it was all mine. A few afternoons and a little elbow grease later (still working on those magically propelled mops and brooms like in the movies) and I had my own private garden to grow all the specialty herbs and plants needed for my potions.
Murder's a Witch: A Beechwood Harbor Magic Mystery (Beechwood Harbor Magic Mysteries Book 1) Page 6