Beewitched

by Hannah Reed

  I grinned. “Can you do it now?”

  Sally popped her cell phone from its case on her belt, dialed, explained the reason for her call, waited while the call made its way through the proper channels, then handed the phone over to me.

  “Carrie Ann,” I said as I took it, “why don’t you help Sally pick out a jar of honey from the display.” Then to Sally, “It’s on the house.”

  “Why thank you,” Sally said, and the two wandered off, leaving Al and me to talk in private.

  “I only have a minute,” I told Al, “and I need to know one thing. And I don’t have time to explain why I’m asking. Not right now, anyway, but I promise I will as soon as we get you out of there.”

  I heard a rush of air as Al exhaled. “I thought you all abandoned me. I haven’t talked to a single soul since they let me have that one call to Greg. He asked you for help, right?”

  “Yes, that’s why I’m calling.”

  Sally had her jar of honey and was turning back my way. So I took a leap and said, “What was Joan’s son’s name?”

  I could have asked if she had any children and if so, was one a boy, and then if so, what was his name, but I didn’t have time for twenty questions.

  There was a pause on the other end of the line. Sally reached out for the phone. I raised a finger in the air to let her know I needed a second longer.

  Al started to say, “Joan wanted that kept a secret. I don’t know how you found out or why you’re asking, but—”

  “Al?” I interrupted, with a little pleading in my voice, which wasn’t faked at all, and with growing excitement, too, because he’d already started to confirm my sneaky suspicion.

  “Time’s up,” Sally said, ready to take the phone away. “Don’t get me in trouble.”

  “Robert,” Al said.

  “Gotta go.” Sally reached out and took the phone from my hand. I’d lost the opportunity to ask if her son went by a nickname and if it happened to be Buddy.

  But I had confirmed she’d had a son. Joan could very well have been the vengeful mother. She could be Nemesis.

  Had she been hunting for the woman whom she felt was responsible for her son’s death? Had she ingratiated herself with Al and then lay waiting in the weeds for the opportune moment?

  Had the murderer been in our midst the entire time?

  Thirty-nine

  It was all speculation, of course. Circumstantial. Intuition. A hunch. Instinct. I couldn’t go to Hunter and tell him, “I just have a feeling that she is our killer,” because then he would lecture me on gathering evidence versus making up stuff.

  What did I have to support my hypothesis? Let’s see:

  someone with the unlikely name of Nemesis who had befriended the murder victim online and who turned out to be the MIA thirteenth witch

  two unidentified calls from the gas station to the murder victim’s phone

  the discovery of a grieving mother, who had blamed the woman her son had been dating for his death

  a gentle, aging widow who had exhibited a kind and generous heart and just happened to have the same surname as a dead man in the cemetery

  What now?

  I called Greg. “Are you out at the farm?” I asked him.

  “Yes, why? Did you find something?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Why don’t you come over? We’ll talk about what you have so far.”

  “Yes. It might help to get another opinion. Is Joan there?”

  “She went home for the night. Tomorrow she’ll make arrangements to stay out here for a few days.”

  With the comforting news that Joan wouldn’t be around, we disconnected, and I went back inside the store where Trent and Brent were holding down the fort to let them know I was leaving for the night. “I’m driving out to Al’s farm,” I told them, feeling that I needed to tell someone where I’d be.

  I hopped in my truck and took off, wondering why I was so fixated on a sweet little grandmotherly woman like Joan. Did she even have the physical strength to stab someone to death?

  Doubt set in. What about the witches, who were perfect candidates?

  Lucinda gave me the creeps. Suddenly I remembered something she’d said to the coven the night Hunter found the pentacle inside Al’s house. The witches had expressed concern about cops arriving at the campsite. Lucinda had reassured them. How could she have known the search would end with the house? Of course, then I also had to ask myself how Aurora had perceived my distress when Johnny Jay had me trapped at the police station. And hadn’t I added Greg to the list of suspects, and here I was going to be alone with him out at the farm? But recently, I’d been relying on my intuition, and it was telling me that a boy born and bred in Moraine would never harm his own aunt. Nor would he frame his dad for her murder.

  I had to trust my gut.

  When I pulled into the long driveway and parked, I was still playing “what-if?”

  A single light was on inside Al’s house, and after knocking several times without an answering greeting, I tried the door. It swung open.

  I followed the light source through the living room into the kitchen, calling Greg’s name, a little annoyed with him, since he knew I was on my way. Then annoyance turned to concern and then horror.

  Because Greg was on the floor on his back, blood pooling under him.

  Oh! My! God!

  I crouched down and tried to rouse him. He was breathing but didn’t respond. I had to call nine-one-one and get help!

  As I rose to check my pockets for my phone, I felt a presence in the room. Joan Goodaller had been standing off to the side, watching.

  Then my eyes locked on the handgun she was pointing at me.

  “I apologize for not returning your phone call,” she said, “but your cover story was pretty silly. Family history! I thought you were smarter than that.”

  “You did this? You shot Greg? Why? What has he ever done to you?”

  Joan shook her head, seemingly in distress. “The boy would have been perfectly fine if you hadn’t insisted on interfering. I was outside, ready to leave for my home, when I remembered I’d left my house keys inside. That’s when Greg told me you were coming over with important information. And that’s the moment when I knew the gig was finally up.”

  “He’s going to die if we don’t help him.”

  “You’ve been such a busybody and now you’ve involved this innocent boy. Look what you’ve done.”

  What I’ve done?

  “Please toss your phone this way,” she ordered, and all the sweetness had evaporated. “We won’t be making any phone calls.”

  “But I don’t understand,” I said, understanding perfectly.

  “Sure you do. It’s no surprise to you how easy it is to find out anything you want to. Claudene could run, but she couldn’t hide. She killed Buddy, but no one would believe me. I came out here to bide my time, not realizing that she and Al were estranged. Then Greg let something slip. He’d been in contact with Claudene. It didn’t take much prompting to have him arrange for her to visit. It was all working out perfectly. If only you’d stayed out of it. Now toss me the phone.”

  What choice did I have? I tossed it, but instead of taking her eyes away to catch it, which I’d hoped for, she let it fall beside her. I kept her talking.

  “You were Nemesis, too,” I said. “And you made those calls from the gas station, one to cancel as number thirteen, and the other to suggest a meeting place later after the ritual.”

  “Nemesis, yes. How else could I have gained that horrible murdering woman’s trust? And after our wonderful virtual friendship she was more than enthusiastic to finally meet me. I really surprised her!”

  The gun in her hand scared me silly.

  “Wait! Don’t shoot me just yet,” I pleaded, realizing that she could pull the trigger any second. “F
irst tell me, why did you set up Al? One of the witches would be a more obvious choice.”

  “If that leader hadn’t been so alert, you mean. I couldn’t get near their camp after they went on high alert, let alone get one of their prints on the pentacle.”

  “How in the world did you get Al’s fingerprints?”

  Joan gave me a sly grin. “Ever since he sprained his ankle, he’s been self-medicating, doping himself into oblivion. It was easy, actually. He never even budged when I cupped the pentacle in his hand.”

  While we’d been having this friendly little conversation, I’d been thinking about how Eleanor must’ve surprised Greg when she’d shot him up close, and judging by his position, she’d fired into his back. Not nice and grandmotherly at all.

  Unless I wanted to end up in the same mess, I had to make a move.

  At least I was wearing sturdy shoes instead of flip-flops. And I was a fast runner. That is, if I got the chance to run.

  I considered my limited choices. I could continue to stand here like a sitting duck and take a bullet, but that wasn’t my favorite option. I thought about jumping Joan. I had the advantage of youth, but she had the deadly weapon, so I rejected that choice and went with the only other possibility.

  I bolted for the living room, heading for the front door.

  A shot rang out. Then another.

  Had she hit me? Nothing hurt. I was still on my feet, so maybe not.

  Then I was out in the yard, with her closer behind me than I’d anticipated.

  No time to get to my truck. She’d shoot me before I got the door open.

  I ran for the corn maze.

  And disappeared inside.

  Forty

  I hadn’t been inside Al’s corn maze for several years—not that it would’ve helped, since Al changes the design annually. Besides, a maze is a maze, confusing as heck, and as fast as I had been able to make a run for it, that ability was offset because I have absolutely zero directional aptitude.

  Another frightening realization was that my pursuer not only had the huge advantage of holding a gun, which was scary enough, but she’d been the one to actually design this maze. She knew the twists and turns and which paths led to dead ends and which pointed to the way out.

  Hoping to throw her off, I decided not to follow labyrinths or look for corridors leading to exits.

  I’d simply focus on a direction and force my way through the stalks until I arrived outside the maze. Let’s see. That way? Or that way?

  The sound of crackling, treading, something, came from behind me. I cut through a corn wall, only to discover that thrashing and hacking my way through had one serious disadvantage:

  I was creating enough noise to warn Joan of my location.

  A shot rang out, too close. I swear it zinged right past my head, stirring up a few strands of hair.

  That certainly was incentive for me to get moving faster.

  Except it was so dark.

  But that’s okay, I reassured myself. It’s dark for her, too. And she’s older. Her eyesight has to be worse than mine, right? I changed my mind and decided to stay within the maze’s paths, placing my left hand on the left wall. I’d follow every left turn. At some point it would lead me out. Or so I hoped.

  Every minute or two, I stopped and listened. The first few times, I didn’t hear anything unusual. Maybe she’d given up, decided to run for it instead.

  Then I heard something, a disturbance of dried corn husk, faint like a light breeze.

  Eleanor was still hunting me.

  My hand on the left wall led me into a dead end.

  I crouched and listened as hard as I could.

  She was moving, and not very far away.

  My breathing was ragged and labored from fear more than exertion. I cupped a hand over my mouth and nose, squeezed my eyes shut, and forced myself to stop and think.

  What did I know about guns? Hunter had taken me shooting. I had terrible aim. Hunter, though, was a real professional; he could place his shot dead center in the target. Eleanor hadn’t looked confident like that. She’d held the weapon more like I had. Amateurish. And she’d missed when she’d shot at me in the house.

  I opened my eyes.

  Okay, stay calm, because she can’t shoot straight.

  And another thing. Didn’t handguns only carry six bullets? How many had she fired? At least one at Greg, two at me when I ran, another inside the maze. She couldn’t have more than two shots left.

  Okay, she’s almost out of bullets. Plus she’s a very bad shot unless she’s right on top of her target.

  So don’t let her get on top of you!

  Then, out of the darkness, a small flashlight popped on, its glow shining through one of the cornstalk walls. She was headed directly toward my hiding place. I wanted to slink lower and cover my eyes, but then I’d be a motionless target, an easy kill. This would be a dead end in more ways than one.

  The only way out was back toward the woman with the weapon.

  I forced myself to jump up and started zigzagging toward the light, making all kinds of racket.

  Eleanor fired.

  Instinctively I hit the ground.

  Number five.

  I was up again, moving, first left then right.

  The light swept up, blinding me momentarily. I dove again. She didn’t pull the trigger this time, saving her last bullet. Joan had been counting, too.

  She was really close, not five yards away, coming steadily forward, when the light suddenly went out.

  I didn’t waste time trying to run away. Instead, I rushed the spot where she’d last been standing in the glow of the flashlight.

  And connected with her body. We went down. For a moment I was on top, straddling her. Then she bucked up, wrenching away.

  The gun went off, deafeningly loud.

  I waited for the impact of the bullet, for a searing pain, for something.

  Instead, Eleanor slumped back, no fight left in her.

  That’s what I thought at first. That she’d given up.

  But she had gone so limp.

  I fumbled for her flashlight, found it on the ground a few feet away, and turned it on. The beam found her.

  Eleanor must have turned the weapon on herself.

  I stood there for a moment, shocked and panicked. Shocked that someone like the Joan I had come to know and befriend could do the things she had done. Panicked because time must be running out for Greg and I didn’t have any idea how to get out of here and get the help he needed.

  I heard a sob and realized it came from me.

  I had to make the effort.

  What direction had I come from? Where in the maze was I? The middle? Farthest from the house? Where?

  Should I continue along the left wall? Or the right? Or lurch along randomly?

  My mind threatened to go numb.

  Later, I told it. Get moving.

  Then when I was just about to give up on ever getting out, I heard a new sound. The call of the wild. Well, maybe not exactly that. But close enough.

  It was Ben.

  Howling.

  Hunter must be here.

  I started shouting their names and running in the direction of Ben’s call.

  Another howl, then a yip.

  I started to cry.

  Then suddenly I felt Ben brushing against my side, taking a nip at my pant leg as if to say, follow me. I grabbed his harness and held on for dear life.

  I finally stumbled out of the corn maze and into Hunter’s arms. “The twins told me where you were,” he said. “I hadn’t expected to find this scene, though.”

  “Greg,” I gasped.

  “It’s okay, sweet thing,” he said. “An ambulance is on the way. He’s still breathing. Are you okay?”

  Was he joking?
/>   I’d never been so okay in my life.

  Forty-one

  Mom was determined to have an orderly, structured, traditional wedding, which wasn’t a big surprise since that’s totally Mom.

  The bride and groom came down the grassy aisle, which was bordered with ropes of flowering black-eyed Susan vines. She wore an ivory satin lace knee-length sheath with a cropped, three-quarter length jacket, the epitome of refined and elegant.

  At least someone was.

  Because she was framed by her two daughters in our puke . . . I mean puce-colored bridesmaid dresses. Hunter still wore the same amused smirk on his face that he’d had earlier when I appeared in our living room wearing the thing.

  Grams fluttered around wearing a dusty pink mother-of-the-bride dress and taking pictures with her point-and-shoot, getting in the way of the professional photographer whom my sister, the wedding planner, had hired. But he didn’t seem to mind.

  The most surprising thing to me was that the service was attended by exactly the guests whom Mom had put down on her invitation list. No more, no less.

  Right before the minister went into the kissing-the-bride part of the ceremony, I even got to offer up the bride’s honey on a little silver tray with two tiny spoons and fresh rose petals scattered on it. Mom and Tom each sampled a taste, and I said a little bit about their union being sweet as this honey. Then they were kissing, we were clapping, and the music started up.

  Only the music wasn’t coming from the three musicians who had agreed to play certain traditional songs at the beginning and end of the service, starting, of course, with “Here Comes the Bride.”

  Now, at the end of the ceremony, instead of the “Wedding March,” I heard the beginning of “Walk Like a Man” by the Four Seasons. What the heck . . . ? We all stopped to consider the source, since the three musicians were putting away their instruments.

  I was pretty sure Mom didn’t have a thing to do with the disc jockey who had apparently been setting up where none of us noticed, because the stage was hidden under a big white canopy tent that we just assumed was the reception area. Party helpers were now drawing back and tying the canvas walls, exposing the long tables inside that had been filled with all kinds of serving dishes, all colors, all shapes, and more tables than we should need, each decorated with Carrie Ann’s roses floating in crystal bowls and more rose petals scattered everywhere.