A Veiled Deception

by Annette Blair

  “Sure. You want to see what it looks like now? Or do you want to wait and see what it’ll look like when I’m done with it?”

  “Madeira, you’re not?”

  I tried to look innocent. “I’m not?”

  “Deborah will have a cow.” Aunt Fiona waved me away. “We never had this conversation,” she said.

  “Fine with me.” I let her screen door bounce off my backside as I went inside to hang the gown.

  When I came out, she handed me a glass of iced tea. “How’s our little Chakra Citrine?”

  “Afraid of ceiling fans and cell phones, as well as people, though she fearlessly battles house slippers and the dust bunnies beneath my bed. She especially likes to perch on the top of Dad’s bathroom door and swat him when he goes in. She also happens to love live mice and baby snakes to the point that she brings them home as gifts.” Dad found a tiny green garden snake in his bed the other night.

  Fiona clapped a hand to her mouth.

  I grinned. “I don’t know how Chakra will feel about Dante when we move into the carriage house.”

  “You changed your tune fast. You want the carriage house then? Rewind—move into? You? And who’s Dante?”

  “Dante Underhill, Mrs. Sweet’s old lover. He’s a ghost and comes with the building. Why can I see him and Eve can’t? I’ve had enough surprises, Aunt Fiona. Why are all these psychic activities happening to me since I came home? Conversing with hottie ghosts, visions of the past, messages from the universe?”

  “Really, you talked with Dante? Can I meet him?”

  “You think you’ll see him?”

  “I know I will.”

  I made the porch swing go faster. “Why me? Why now?”

  “I don’t know. Sometimes these talents develop late.”

  “Okay, so that’s the when. So now the why. Who am I to have such gifts . . . if they are gifts?”

  “They are, sweetie, if you want them to be. As to who you are; you’re your mother’s daughter. She, too, was open to what the universe asked of her.”

  “My uptight mother was a witch?”

  “Your father wouldn’t be happy if I answered that question. But yes, and I can tell you that she wasn’t uptight with the craft. By the way, she used dandelion wine for her rituals, which is why your dad wouldn’t have liked the name for your kitten.”

  I chuckled. “Was Mom Wiccan?”

  Fiona looked toward the heavens, as if trying to decide whether to answer. Eventually, she sighed in resignation. “Your recent experiences tell me that you need to know this, but woe to us both if your father finds out that you know.”

  I crossed my heart.

  Fiona did, too. “The Wiccan tradition comes with a set of rules, and your mother didn’t want to be bogged down by rules. Sound like somebody you know?”

  I raised my hand. “Me.”

  “You’re more like her than you know.” Fiona took my hand. “Kathleen liked the earth-based Celtic tradition. She studied different paths and practiced what felt right to her. Sweetie, your mother was an eclectic witch.”

  “I guess you have to be pretty open-minded to practice witchcraft.”

  “It’s like a calling.”

  “I can’t believe I’m like her. I thought she was uptight and you were the free spirit. Now for the big question. Are you a witch, Aunt Fee?”

  “I started as a solitary like your mother, then in college, we found each other and a couple of other like-minded individuals, and we practiced together.”

  “But why become a witch?” I asked.

  “It’s a belief system, sweetie, a spirituality linked to nature. Have you ever seen the quote ‘You call her mother nature; I call her Goddess’? I don’t know who said it first, but that’s it in a nutshell. I love the words “blessed be” and “bright blessings.” I believe if everybody understood that whatever they put out there came back to them times three, they might think before hurting others. Like your mother, I’m an eclectic. I listen to the universe and to the beat of my own heart.”

  “You and my mother, you practiced this ‘respect for nature’ together, didn’t you?”

  “We did, to your father’s dismay.”

  “Can you do magic?”

  “Within the realms of my belief system, the rules of nature, and magical ethics. To start, as I said, whatever I send into the universe comes back to me times three, therefore, the words ‘and it harm none’ are, in some form, part of any spell. I can’t change the free will of another; if I try, I’m failing to grow psychologically and spiritually.”

  “What can you do?”

  “I can cast a spell so you find a solution to a problem, but no spell will solve your problem. You have to work at that. By the same token, I can do a spell so you find the right job, but if you don’t go job hunting, my spell is useless. I can cast a spell so you obtain your heart’s desire, but be careful what you wish for. Your heart’s desire may have a cost you’re not willing to pay.”

  “Wow, so how does magic work within the rules of nature?”

  Aunt Fiona smiled. “I can’t make a pot of rosebuds bloom before our eyes. I can’t cast a spell so you win the lottery, though there are spells for luck. I can’t turn a person into a toad.”

  “Or vice versa?” I asked.

  We laughed together.

  “How did Dad feel about Mom’s beliefs? Witchcraft doesn’t sound like something an academic would embrace, especially as sober an academic as my father.”

  “Harry tolerated the craft until we had a car accident on our way home from a midsummer celebration.”

  I stopped the swing. “I didn’t know you were with Mom when she had her accident.”

  “Your mother saved my life by pulling me out of the car before it caught fire. We didn’t know she was bleeding internally. We thought I was hurt worse than she was, but we were wrong.”

  “What about you and Dad; why the feud?”

  “I think I remind him of what he’s lost, so he avoids me. At first, he blamed your mother’s death on our beliefs, and then he blamed himself for not driving us, in protest of our beliefs.”

  “Oh, no. Poor Dad.”

  “I know. Now, I think he’s trying to make peace with destiny.”

  “Trying but not necessarily succeeding?”

  Fiona shrugged.

  I sighed and straightened my purse. “I’m not ready to tell Dad about my new gifts,” I said. “I may never be.”

  Aunt Fiona patted my knee. “That’s up to you, dear. Just remember that he’ll love you no matter what, the same way he loved your mother.”

  “Thank you, Aunt Fee. Because this scares me, this new . . . power? Insight? Witchcraft? Insanity?” I shivered. “Is there such a thing as being a natural witch?”

  “I think some of us are born to the nature of the craft, though it takes time to settle into it.”

  “Did you and Mom take me moon dancing because you thought I had a natural affinity for the craft?”

  “You saw the house ghosts like we did. We thought it was possible.”

  “But I can embrace the craft or not. It’s my choice.”

  “You’re in communication with the universe; it hasn’t rushed you yet, has it?”

  “Whew. Good. Because I’m not sure about any of it.”

  “You wouldn’t disappoint anyone if you didn’t embrace it.”

  “I’m glad to know that. Do you think Dante is a natural part of the universe communicating with me?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Suppose I don’t want to communicate.”

  “If you weren’t open to communicate, you wouldn’t have seen Dante.”

  Scrap! Of course I wanted the gift; the visions and the hot, chatty ghost, in the same way that Eve wanted to open those caskets, screaming with the thrill of adventure.

  The witchcraft? I wasn’t so sure. “Why doesn’t Mom appear to me?”

  Fiona smiled. “I’ve often wondered the same thing. She may have gone to the other
side right away. The power of love can do that. Nothing left undone. She’d honored and respected the universe and gave it four gorgeous gifts, you, your sisters and brother.”

  “So once you go to the other side, you can’t come back?”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “Wow, you’re full of information.”

  Aunt Fiona chuckled. “I’m sorry, dear, but some of this you’ll just have to learn for yourself. As you embrace your gifts, answers will come to you.”

  I sighed. “I’m flattered that I’m like you and my mother,” I said. “Scared, but honored. Dolly’s building is like a gift from the universe, too, isn’t it?”

  “You tell me. The universe always has something to say. Listen.”

  I listened, hard, but I didn’t hear a darned thing, beyond birdsong, the wind in the trees, the river licking the shore, and the whisper of butterfly wings.

  Fiona took a folder from the small, white, wrought-iron table beside her rattan porch chair and cleared her throat. “Change of subject. The carriage house, ghost and all, do you want it?”

  “How much are the yearly taxes on it?”

  She shuffled through her papers and showed me an amount.

  I whistled. “I can afford to keep that building for five years without making a profit.”

  “I think the contents might help with that, though there’s no official inventory.” Aunt Fiona took off her glasses. “But as far as your design talents are concerned, what about creating private designs under your own label . . . in addition to selling vintage? You have a magic flair with clothes. A unique style to market.”

  A magic flair with clothes . . . Bling! The last piece of the “what Madeira wants” puzzle fell into place. Vintage and my magic designs. Vintage Magic!

  “Aunt Fiona, I think the universe wants us to celebrate.” I ran down the porch steps to a sunny patch of grass on the side of the house near her star-shaped herb garden. Duh! Her pentacle-shaped herb garden. “Hurry up.”

  She followed me, her smile growing, took my hands, and we twirled and laughed, like schoolgirls at a play-ground.

  My father stopped in his tracks at the sight, with Chakra Citrine pulling against her leash. “Are you two crazy?”

  “Are we?” I asked. “Are you? I thought you didn’t want a dog to walk but now you’re walking a cat.”

  “The point is that I’m not required to walk her . . . unless I want to. What’s going on here? Ah, you’re the image of your mother, right now, Madeira, with the sun shining on that hint of paprika in the dark brown sugar of your hair. Your hazel eyes are so bright, greener than gold right now, and you look . . . happy.”

  “I am happy. This is a celebration.” Fiona and I twirled one last time to show him, and my father chuckled, a rare and cherished sound.

  “What are you celebrating?” he asked as we met him halfway.

  “Dad, I’m accepting Mrs. Sweet’s building . . . for the price of taxes. I’m coming home from New York to stay. Congratulate me. I’m the proud new owner of Vintage Magic, a shop for designer vintage and designer magic originals.”

  The way my father cupped my cheek, I sensed a quote coming on.

  “‘In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold, Alike fantastic, if too new, or old: Be not the first by whom the new are tried, Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.’” He shrugged. “Who am I to argue with Alexander Pope?”

  I threw my arms around him.

  He’d just given me the greatest gift of all . . . his approval.

  Twenty-seven

  Fashion does not reflect a nostalgia for the past but an eternal present that lies beyond the past.—BARBARA VINKEN

  I was among the first to board the noon plane to New Orleans, because Eve had gotten me a first-class ticket. I should have told her I’d fly coach, but I hadn’t thought of it. In future, I’d make a dollar go further, now that I was starting a new business.

  I’d given Sherry a talking-to before I left about taking charge of her wedding and not letting Deborah do it all her way. Sherry perked up at the rebellious possibilities and I felt better leaving her in good spirits.

  I’d dressed in a navy vintage Nicole Farhi pinstripe narrow jacket, with a knife-pleated crepe skirt by Betsey Johnson, the Connecticut-born designer to the stars.

  An inveterate people watcher, I enjoyed the parade of diversity boarding the plane, and I thought again about my carriage house.

  My carriage house . . . be still my racing heart.

  The transfer/closing was scheduled for this coming Monday, but I might die of panic beforehand at the thought of the renovations I would have to do before I could open . . . well, okay, so the panic was also shot with a thick ribbon of wild anticipation.

  Aunt Fiona had succeeded in getting everything rushed through because of the seller’s age. Young Mrs. Sweet approved of her mother-in-law’s generosity, but she didn’t want to get hit with an inheritance tax on a building they were giving away, so the transfer was moving fast. The only thing that bothered me was that everybody expected Dolly to leave us at any moment. That, I would not buy into.

  I looked for my cell phone to turn it off and realized that I left it at home connected to the charger. I really hated when I did that. Sherry said if I didn’t switch purses all the time, it wouldn’t happen so often. She keeps hers in the purse she uses for everything and never forgets her phone.

  I rolled a pillow beneath my nape and closed my eyes, feeling the seat shift with the arrival of my seat mate.

  Plane rides were a dicey business. You never knew who you’d get stuck beside, but at least no five-year-old was kicking the back of my seat every twelve seconds.

  I tried to get a sidelong glimpse of the guy wearing the yummy aftershave, but he was leaning forward, facing away from me, trying to shove his carry-on beneath the seat, his scent making me miss Nick.

  I adjusted my carry-on to give the guy room and we bumped heads.

  “Careful there, ladybug.” He rubbed my sore spot.

  “Nick! No wonder I liked how you smelled. What are you doing here?”

  “Eve didn’t think you should be chasing a murderer by yourself. And neither do I, so I had her get me the seat beside you. You like how I smell?”

  “You know I love Ultraviolet Man, you interfering beast.”

  “I do, you impetuous beauty.”

  “Shush. I have a book to read.”

  “Fine, I have an autopsy report to read.”

  “What? You have it?”

  Already I wanted to smack the Italian studster for his cocky wink.

  “Want to take turns?” he asked. “Me first? Or do you want to read it together?”

  I stifled my exasperation, only because I wanted to get my hands on that report. “Together.”

  “That’s my girl.”

  In a way, I did belong to him, but in another, neither of us belonged to anyone, and sometimes I missed the intimate daily connection with another human being, emotionally and physically. Even spiritually, though I wasn’t sure quite what that meant to me anymore after Fiona’s revelations and the possibilities they entailed.

  “No need to try and charm me,” I said. “I know you too well.”

  He tickled my ear with his breath. “The way I know you.”

  I elbowed him. “Shush.”

  He grunted, took out the report, and held it between us.

  I read for a few silent minutes. Pregnant, I knew. The toxins in Jasmine’s system were common antianxiety drugs. Not enough to kill her, but if she wasn’t used to them, they could have taken the edge off her ability to struggle. Cause of death: strangulation. But the markings on her neck weren’t consistent with the bridal veil as a murder weapon.

  I picked up the picture of Jasmine’s bruised neck and examined it closely. “What would make a mark like this?” I asked Nick. “It reminds me of a fancy dress trim.”

  “Nobody’s figured that out yet.”

  “Any residue?”

  “Yeah
,” Nick said, pointing to the report. “Olive oil.”

  I read it twice. “That’s helpful.”

  “Not yet, it isn’t.”

  I shuddered and gave him the picture. “Gruesome.”

  Nick withheld comment. As an FBI agent, I was sure he’d actually seen gruesome.

  I read ahead and lifted page corners before he was ready, then I sat back in my seat. “We know the rest.”

  “You skimmed, as usual.” Nick pointed to a line in the center of a long paragraph.

  “Pearls?” I asked. “Jasmine had pearls in her mouth? You mean, like the pearls on the floor around her?”

  Pearls . . . like the ones Cort had given Pearl. “Nick, could this be about vengeance?”

  “Every murder could be about vengeance. Why?”

  This was Nick. There were certain people in your life that you trusted to know the real you. Eve and Nick loved me, faults and all. How could I not come clean with Nick, my hero, who’d come on a greased pig chase to keep me safe.

  I bit the bullet and told him about my visions, as corroborated by Fiona, about seeing Pearl Morales in the gown, and why I was going to New Orleans.

  Nick pinched the top of his nose. A total stalling tactic. “Ladybug.”

  “Shut up,” I said, keeping my voice low. “I see that you think I’m a fruitcake. Holy Harrods, I do, too. Do you imagine that this has been easy on me?”

  “I know that you believe you’ve had—”

  “Cut the psychobabble. There’s no point in debating whether I did or not. Just listen. Eve got back to me last night with an updated address for the Morales family, so we won’t have to dig as much as I expected.”

  Acting before thinking had worked in my favor. This time, I could imagine my father adding, and he would have been right.

  Nick took my hand. “Fine, ladybug, let’s say that you had a vision—”

  “Several.”

  “Fine. Let’s also say that what you saw happened at one time or another. There’s no motive for murder. If it had to do with Deborah stopping Pearl from marrying Cort, why would somebody kill Deborah’s houseguest, thirty years later, and not Deborah herself?”

  “I don’t know. Isn’t this like following a lead? We don’t have answers, just clues.”