Watchful Wisteria (Wisteria Witches Mysteries Book 4)

by Angela Pepper

  We hadn’t even paid our admission tickets yet—in full, no cheating—when Tansy suddenly took over. I watched from within myself as the spirit used my body to treat my golfing foursome to a rant about the horrors of artificial greenery and its impact on today’s youth.

  Zoey, Rhys, and young Corvin Moore stared at me with wide eyes.

  Honestly, I could have wrestled back control of my mouth, but I was as amused as anyone. The rant went on for several minutes.

  Spit flew out of my mouth as she, or I, or we concluded, “Why not go all the way? Let’s get to the endgame now, with a perfect low-maintenance world. Let’s replace all the pesky humans with cyborgs and robots. Or better yet, artificial intelligence.”

  I thought she was finished, but I’d barely caught my breath before more of Tansy’s words erupted from my mouth. “Keep on poisoning the environment, humanity! Soon you’ll get the squeaky-clean plastic world devoid of all insects and living creatures that you deserve! I hope you dummies like sand, because it’s going to be sand for breakfast, lunch, and dinner in your desert world. Nothing but red, wind-ravaged deserts and dead seas of poison!”

  My daughter grabbed my arm and pinched the back of my bicep. “Mom, you’re getting carried away over just a bit of Astroturf.” She bounced her eyebrows in a get-it-together suggestion.

  Meanwhile, the poor teenaged employee who’d been standing inside the admissions booth looked like she might burst into tears. The girl in the blue sun visor didn’t make the landscaping decisions. She probably earned minimum wage and had only the lofty career goals of being promoted to Mermaid. The Mermaid got to sit atop the castle, wearing a shimmering fish tail and waving regally, and because she was mute, she didn’t have to talk to anyone.

  My father was casually browsing the rotating wire stand of postcards, doing his best impression of someone who didn’t know me.

  The only person who appeared to be on my side was Corvin Moore, Chet’s little boy, whom Zoey had invited along so we had an even foursome for mini golf.

  “A dead sea of poison,” Corvin echoed, his big eyes wide under his fringe of blue-black hair. “You tell ’em, Zoey’s mom.”

  Zoey’s mom. Right. That was who I was. Not a kooky hermit gardener with magical herbs and an army of left-handed snails.

  I relaxed my face into an approximation of sanity. Tansy retreated to the back corners of my mind.

  The teenager in the sun visor stared at me with a trembling lower lip. “Do you still want tickets?”

  “Yes. That’ll be two adults and two children,” I said sweetly. “Is it still the children’s rate for kids over twelve? My lovely daughter turned sixteen in the spring, and I don’t consider her a child.”

  Zoey groaned.

  Louder, to prove a point, I told the young employee, “I insist on paying the full and fair admission price because, in our family, we have values.” Tansy’s spirit kicked in, and she added, “If you stand for nothing, you’ll fall for anything.”

  Corvin touched my hand and held up a crumpled wad of bills for his own ticket.

  “Save that for a snack,” I told him with a motherly pat on the top of his head. “Today’s round of golf is on me.”

  Corvin crammed the bills back into his pocket.

  The meek employee took my money and fumbled with the cash register for several minutes while her face reddened, and then finally we were on our way.

  Rhys rejoined us as we picked up our golf clubs and balls.

  “How are we doing this?” He crossed his arms and sized us up one at a time. “Boys versus girls? Young versus old?”

  Corvin went to my father’s side and grabbed his elbow. “It’s always us against them,” Corvin said with a serious tone. “Always.”

  I caught my daughter’s eye for some wordless communication. Did Corvin mean shifters versus witches? His father was a wolf shifter, but we still didn’t know what Corvin was, assuming he was a shifter. The boy could see ghosts. That much I knew.

  Rhys chuckled and ruffled his hand through Corvin’s raven-black hair. “You’re not wrong,” he said.

  Did my father mean guys versus gals, or guys versus witches? I hadn’t told him the neighbors were supernatural.

  Zoey must have been wondering the same as well. She put her hand on her hip and asked her grandfather, “What’s that supposed to mean? I could be one of you, if I wanted to.”

  Corvin tilted his head to the side. “Really?”

  Someone behind us cleared her throat. “Excuse me,” she said. “I don’t mean to interrupt—”

  “And yet that’s exactly what you’re doing,” Rhys interrupted right back.

  The stranger made an indignant rhinoceros sound.

  I turned around to find the same woman whom my father had snapped at in fox form. The same woman who’d repaid me for saving her from a bus by tattling on me to Detective Bentley. Margaret Mills. She had five other people with her—family members, by the look of the frizzy hair and rectangular heads on all of them, for a grand total of a half dozen Mills, or Millses. Too many Millses.

  “There are rules,” Margaret Mills said, gesturing toward a fence-mounted sign about mini golf etiquette. “If you’re going to stand around making jibber-jabber, you have to let the next party play through.”

  Rhys made a rubbery, mocking face of concern. “Ma’am, that sign says nothing about jibber-jabber.”

  Margaret Mills’s hand was still waving toward the sign, but it was getting closer to my father’s mouth. He suddenly lunged forward, snapping his teeth at her fingers, just like he’d done the previous week when he’d been draped around my shoulders in fox form.

  Margaret Mills shrieked and stumbled backward into her family. All five of them knocked over like bowling pins.

  The teen employee in the sun visor jumped over the counter and came running over. She was joined by two other uniformed employees who started picking up the fallen Mills family. The most senior employee, who might have been all of seventeen, tried to calm down Margaret, who was bellowing about being bitten.

  Rhys simply smiled, as though this had been planned. He nodded for us to get started at the first hole, which was a simple putt on blue artificial turf with a seahorse theme.

  I kept my head down and went along, eager to get some space between us and the Millses.

  Behind us, I heard Margaret declaring there to be “too much riff-raff on the green” today. The senior employee offered the whole group free vouchers to come back for three more sessions at a later date.

  Rhys said to the kids, “Watch and learn, Zoey and Corvin. Just by putting up a fuss, that woman’s getting a total of eighteen free passes. Six people times three visits!”

  Corvin said, “Only twelve, because she paid for today but she didn’t get to play because you bit her.”

  Rhys ruffled Corvin’s hair again. “Aren’t you a clever little pup?”

  Corvin grinned proudly. The kid didn’t smile much, so the sight of his teeth was unsettling. Perhaps it was that he had all his adult teeth already, with no gaps, and they were perfectly straight.

  Corvin stepped back so Rhys could start off the round. Rhys took careful aim. The hole for that challenge was covered periodically by a six-foot-tall sparkling seahorse’s undulating tail. Rhys sunk the shot on the first stroke. Of course.

  I pointed two fingers at my eyes and then at my father.

  I’m watching you, I mouthed.

  He mouthed back, Why would I cheat at mini golf?

  Because you cheat at everything, I mouthed.

  I made the I’m-watching-you gesture two more times.

  Fun was had at the Atlantis Mini Putt and Water Adventure Park.

  Fun was had by Rhys, Zoey, Corvin, me, and even by Tansy Wick. She grumbled internally about the tacky artificial turf, but like all the other adults on the course that day, she gave in to the pure joy of playing a silly game.

  Unfortunately, both she and I had terrible aim. Zoey wasn’t much better, so we lost.


  “Winner has to buy the ice cream,” I said to my father. “You two boys can gloat all you want, but you’re buying us losers a consolation prize.”

  My father was only too happy to comply.

  At my suggestion, we drove up the coast to the Northern Stargazer Cafe—the same place I’d visited with Chet on Wednesday night. The two kids engaged in childish eating contests and taking turns hanging their spoons from the tips of their noses.

  Other customers complimented Rhys on his “adorable grandchildren.”

  “The dark-haired one’s just a loaner,” he joked with a woman his age. “Poor lad didn’t luck out and get the red hair gene like the rest of us.” This made everyone laugh, even Corvin.

  And then, just when I was enjoying our family outing, Rhys decided to educate the younger ones on how to get free ice cream.

  The tactic involved waiting until someone with a small child ordered a children’s cone. You followed the kid out of sight of the staff, only to return a few minutes later to ask for “a fresh cone of whatever the little tyke was having.” You explained to the employee that the kid dropped it on the dirt, and the mean or cheap parents refused to buy a replacement. Nine times out of ten, the employee working the counter would hand you a replacement ice cream for no charge, gushing over your kindness and wishing you a pleasant day.

  “Golly, gee whiz, Mister,” Rhys said, imitating the employee in this scenario with a dumb-sounding voice. “You tell those folks to come right back for a third one if this goes in the dirt next.”

  “That’s enough,” I said. “That was a great story, but it was just a story. We don’t do those things.”

  “I think it’s good to know about these tricks,” Zoey said. “In case I get a summer job serving ice cream.”

  “More,” Corvin said, staring at my father in awe.

  “More,” Zoey agreed.

  “No more,” I said sternly. “Especially not in front of young, impressionable Corvin.”

  “Boo,” Zoey said.

  “Boo,” my father agreed.

  “Tough turnips,” I said, borrowing one of Tansy’s expressions. “If Corvin passes along any of these tricks to Chet, I’ll be getting a big lecture about my parenting abilities, and we don’t want that, because, as you all know, I’m an excellent mother. Unless anyone disagrees?”

  They all knew well enough to be quiet.

  We returned to the house around three o’clock Sunday afternoon. Together, we started prying the kids out of the small backseat of the 300ZX. Both of them had fallen asleep on the long drive back from the neighboring town of Westwyrd.

  Zoey woke up as soon as I touched her shoulder, but Corvin remained unconscious.

  “He looks so innocent when he’s sleeping,” I said, admiring the way his long dark lashes extended over his pale, round cheeks. “Not creepy at all.”

  Zoey shook her head at me. She’d butted heads with Corvin when they’d first met, but then the two of them had become friends within a few days. She found him unusual, but he didn’t give her the creeps at all. She climbed over him and then helped me with him. With the kid in my arms, I walked him over to his house. Grampa Don came to the door and took over.

  “You wore him out,” Grampa Don said, patting Corvin on the back. “Who won the golf game?”

  “His team.”

  Grampa Don grinned. “That’s our boy.” He stepped back from the doorway. “Care to come in? She’s not here today.”

  “I’d better not,” I said. Chessa was liable to smell me on the furniture or something.

  “Can’t say I blame you.” He glanced around and whispered, “She scares the willies out of me, and I’ve seen plenty of scary things. Have you ever seen a nest of brainweevils?”

  “Are those any relation to bloodweevils?”

  “Much worse.” He tilted his head and frowned. “Oh. Hello, Zara. Are you here to take Corvin to mini golf?” He stepped forward, offering me the sleeping boy.

  “We’ve already been,” I said gently. Chet’s father had a memory condition that caused these time jumps for him.

  “You’re a witch,” he said. “Nothing but trouble, you meddlesome witches.”

  I backed away from the door. “Nice to see you again, Don. Catch you later.”

  He gave me a wild-eyed look. “They’ll never catch me,” he said, and he closed the door between us.

  Finally, I could breathe again.

  I was in my backyard at last, my fingers deep in the dirt. I’d heeded my daughter’s warnings about safe gardening and donned a pair of gardening gloves to help protect me from harmful microbes.

  I let Tansy Wick take over the wheel. Or should I say the reins. Or the remote control? There is no perfect metaphor to describe the surrendering act of letting the deceased use your body for their favorite hobbies.

  I remained somewhat present, though, so I was aware when Zoey came out to let me know a deliveryman was bringing a shipment of soil, seedlings, and mulch in through the gate on the alley side. My daughter was concerned about the cost, but I waved her away. I recalled that Tansy had put in the order by phone the day before, and she’d negotiated an excellent discount.

  The back gate was tricky to get open, but we managed, and the landscapers brought in all the supplies I’d need to make the backyard into a paradise.

  Hours later, the sun had set, and the yard was dim enough that even with Tansy’s expertise, she and I couldn’t distinguish between the weeds that needed pulling and the herbs we’d just planted.

  She gave me back control rather than hunkering down for a dirt nap.

  Inside the house again, I rubbed my back muscles while I showered off the muck. Once again, I was thankful for my witchy regeneration powers. I tossed the clothes into the washing machine and then put on a pair of Zoey’s stretchy yoga pants along with a hip-length fuzzy purple sweater. For a summer night, the evening had gotten chilly.

  Zoey was downstairs, watching a movie. Her grandfather wasn’t with her. The guest bedroom door had been closed, so I’d assumed he’d gone to sleep early—all the better to stay ahead of our slumber party giggles in the bunk beds.

  I started braiding my damp hair and said, “I guess we wore out Pawpaw just as much as we wore out Corvin today.”

  She barely looked up from the movie on the screen. “He had to go do something. Meet with someone, I think.”

  “Did he say when he’d be back?”

  She hit Pause on the movie and checked the time. “Actually, he was supposed to be back by now.” She sounded worried.

  “Who was he meeting with? Was it a woman? Someone named Reynard?”

  She paused thoughtfully. “I got the sense it was a woman. He was on his phone, and I heard him saying ‘she’ a few times, like someone was mad at him and he was trying to blame it on someone else.”

  “Like me?”

  Zoey rolled her eyes. “Mom, he adores you. Why do you have to act like he’s trying to ruin our lives? Ever since he got here, you’ve been stomping around like a grump. And all he’s done is make breakfast, help out around the house, and try to have fun with us. This reunion is going great, as far as I’m concerned.”

  “Great? Zoey, my bedroom has no door. There might not even be a room on the other side of the wall. It could be the black vacuum of space for all we know. What would you say if you were walking down the hallway and the membrane between dimensions got pierced by accident, and you got sucked through a hole in the wall into the cold emptiness of space?”

  “I’d grab onto something before I got sucked through,” she said. “Duh.”

  “That’s when the tentacles from the space monster shoot through and latch onto your legs. Then what?”

  “I dunno.” She shrugged. “I’d scream for help, and then you’d do some witch stuff and save me.”

  “Zoey, what if the tentacled space monster already had me and I was incapacitated? Then what?”

  She shrugged again. “Die screaming, I suppose.”
/>   With grave seriousness, I said, “In space, no one can hear you scream.”

  She pressed Play on the remote control and started watching the movie again.

  I used telekinesis to press the pause button.

  She looked at me with annoyance and said, “I thought you were having fun bunking with me as my roommate.”

  “That part is fun,” I admitted.

  “It’s like when we lived in that funky art studio with the tub in the kitchen. That place was so funky.”

  “Funky is an adjective you use when you’re too broke to afford other apartment adjectives such as adequate or rat-free or not a firetrap.”

  “Funky is fun. Didn’t you have fun today? You did your victory stomp dance after you sunk the trick shot at the flaming mermaids.”

  “That was a very difficult shot, and I didn’t use any magic at all.” Zara doesn’t use her magic at the mini golf course! Zara is a good witch!

  “Pawpaw’s not so bad, if you give him a chance.”

  I crossed my arms and looked at the front door. “You’ll be eating your words when he comes running through that door with a pack of cops and security guards after him.”

  We both stared at the door in silence.

  There was a knock.

  “Very funny,” I said to Zoey. “How’d you do that? Are you kicking the bottom of the coffee table?”

  “Don’t look at me. You’re the one who did it.”

  “Did not.”

  “Did too.”

  There was another knock, and then the doorbell rang.

  “Doorbell!” Zoey jumped up and ran toward the front door.

  I grabbed the back of her sweatshirt and yanked her back. “Let me get this one,” I said. “Find something good and heavy for bludgeoning in case I need backup.”