A Murder Spells Trouble

by K. J. Emrick

  Addie couldn’t believe it. The thing in the bathroom, the invisible creature that had set her skin tingling and made her stomach churn, wouldn’t have just left. Not without some sort of resistance. It must have been here for something. She had no idea what, but that much evil, in a house this protected, wasn’t just out for a stroll.

  If it was anyone other than Kiera telling her the thing was gone she would have marched through the house herself looking for it. Kiera was the strongest of them. If she couldn’t find it, then it must be truly gone.

  But how could it have gotten in, and where did it go?

  That was a concern for another time. Right now, they had a man Snared in their kitchen and they still had to prove who Esmerelda’s killer was. Willow might be right that they weren’t cops, and it wasn’t their job to hunt down Typic killers, but Addie wasn’t going to let Shadow Lake fall into chaos. This was their home.

  That made it their responsibility.

  Chapter 13

  “I still say I should’ve stayed behind.”

  Willow was sulking in the backseat of the Cherokee as Addie drove the three of them across town to the Norris house. They needed to talk to Misty, and get her side of the story. Addie also wanted to talk to Esmerelda’s mother. She must have some idea exactly why Esmerelda was coming back home. And, who might have killed her.

  If they could find a personal item of Esmerelda’s to secret away from the house too, that would be even better. Casting a Vision to see the last hours of the dead woman’s life would solve the whole mystery, but they needed that one thing to make it happen.

  Surprisingly, Kiera had said they all should go. It was so rare that she agreed to step outside of Stonecrest anymore that Addie wasn’t really sure if she meant it. Not until she was climbing up into the front passenger seat.

  In the entire drive from Stonecrest to the Norris house, Willow hadn’t stopped complaining once. Addie knew she just wanted to stay with her immobilized boyfriend, but she wasn’t stupid. If they’d left Willow back at Stonecrest she would have done everything she could to break Kiera’s spell. Addie wasn’t sure Willow could manage it, but it was better to have her here where they could keep an eye on her.

  Something had been nagging at Addie, though. The boot prints on Luna Moth Trail, around Esmerelda’s body, had been one of the clues pointing to the murderer being a man. If those boot prints belonged to Gary, and if Gary was telling the truth about being there after the murder, then could she have been wrong? Was the killer maybe not a man?

  And if she pulled that particular thread out, how many other things would come unravelling in this mystery?

  Willow shifted closer to the window, breaking up Addie’s train of thought with a loud snort. “I mean, seriously. Why do all three of us need to go?”

  “We will be home in an hour, perhaps two,” Kiera promised her. “So long as things go smoothly, that is. Gary won’t even know you’re gone.”

  “Whatever.” Willow slouched down with her knees braced up against the front seat. “Let’s just go see the Typics and get this over with.”

  Kiera looked back at her, over her shoulder. “Why do you hate them?”

  “Who? The Norris’s?”

  “No, Sister Willow. The Typics. I’ve never asked you about it, but it’s obvious how much disdain and hatred that you hold for those without magic.”

  That stopped Willow short for a long moment while she watched the town of Shadow Lake rolling past them out the window. Just when it seemed that she wouldn’t answer at all, she made a rude noise at the back of her throat. “They’re beneath us, Kiera. We can do so much. Be so much. You and me and Addie. There’s nothing stopping us from doing whatever we want. Nothing, except the Typics. Where would I like to be tonight? With Gary. Why can’t I be with him? Because we have to find a Typic killer. See what I mean?”

  “Uh, Willow?” Addie wasn’t sure if her sister got the irony in what she was saying. “You realize that half your boyfriends have been Typics, right? Like, you know, Gary?”

  “Sure.” Willow smiled at Addie’s reflection in the rearview mirror. “I know that. I’m not saying Typics don’t have their uses. Especially the men.”

  Kiera hummed disapprovingly. Addie turned her eyes back to the road signs. She couldn’t tell if her sister was joking or not, but she had a feeling it was… not.

  The Norris house came into view at the top of a hill. It was a mansion in its own right, even if it didn’t have the dimensions of Stonecrest. Two stories of stonework and filigreed columns, with terraced windows and a gabled roof, was impressive enough. Topiary had been trimmed into tall cylinders and rectangles and even a pyramid shape. Addie knew some people found that to be pleasing to the eye. For her it was abhorrent to see living, growing things compelled to grow into unnatural ways. She could almost feel their stunted life force from all the way inside the Jeep.

  Parking at the end of the long driveway, up close to the house, Addie pocketed her keys and followed her two sisters out of the car. She’d never had any reason to visit the Norris family before. They moved in very different circles because on paper, at least, Addie was a struggling businesswoman and the Norris’s were rich landowners.

  In reality Addie was a witch, and that was a different sort of circle altogether.

  The view from their front lawn was spectacular. The home faced out toward Shadow Lake, and now that it was sunset the gentle waves were crested with gold. She could see the rest of the town—homes, businesses, roads—all nestled along the shoreline as it curved away, and further on she could see the rising hills and stretches of forest.

  Peeking through the trees, miles away, she could just make out the rooftop of the Raithmore Estate. It was like the two homes were staring each other down, as though the rivalry between the families had been ingrained in the very land itself.

  Evening was coming on quickly, and the shadows were growing deep.

  There were other cars in the driveway. A yellow Camaro. A Lincoln Continental. Something fancy and red with only two seats. Addie didn’t care for any of these trumped up luxury cars. She much preferred her durable, reliable Jeep.

  “That car,” Kiera said, pointing out a white BMW at the end of the row. “I’ve seen that car before, around town. It belongs to the Raithmores.”

  “Hmph,” Willow griped. “I’m surprised you’ve seen anything at all around town. You hardly leave the house anymore.”

  Kiera’s eyes narrowed pensively. “I have my reasons, Sister Willow. That doesn’t change the fact that I’ve seen it. Remember, we cast Visions in the tower to watch over our neighbors. Even ones we might not like,” she added purposely, pointing again to the BMW. “That car belongs to the Raithmores. So if Connor and Leo are here, this was exactly the right time for us to be—”

  A man’s sudden cry of surprise and alarm drew their attention upward. From over a second story balcony, they saw someone’s body come flying, thrown out into the open air, arms and legs flailing wildly as he tried to catch himself.

  Only, there was nothing to hold onto. Nothing to save himself with. As he spun around in midflight Addie got a good look at his terrified face.

  It was Leo Raithmore, and he was about to crash to his death on the walkway bricks below.

  Addie quickly raised her hands, preparing to do a spell that would slow his descent, break his fall, anything that she could do to stop the inevitable.

  There just wasn’t time.

  When he was mere feet away from the ground his body morphed. It twisted and lengthened and reshaped itself. Orange and black fur whisked out from his skin in a spotted pattern as his clothes tore away, shredding under the sudden bulge of corded muscles. His jaw lengthened and his nose flattened and his eyes became the slitted green ovals of a feline.

  The leopard struck the ground with an impact that vibrated through the Earth. He landed head first, and the sickening sound of bone cracking and of softer things going squish turned Addie’s stomach.

&
nbsp; Leo Raithmore was dead.

  Leo Raithmore had been a shapeshifter. A werebeast.

  “Well,” Willow said into the silence that followed. “Who says cats always land on their feet?”

  Addie looked at her sharply. “Willow!”

  “What? Hey, at least now we know he isn’t a Typic.”

  “The man’s dead.” Addie was in shock. They’d just witnessed a murder, right in front of their eyes. “What does it matter if he was a Typic or a magic-born? The killer’s inside. Come on, before he kills someone else.”

  “I would advise caution,” Kiera told them, forcing herself to look away from the dead leopard smashed into the walkway not a dozen feet away. Her pale cheeks had taken on a green pallor even as she radiated calm. “The killer overcame a wereleopard and threw them over a balcony. That person must be very strong.”

  Willow traded a glance with Addie. “Connor,” they both said at once.

  “Possibly,” Kiera agreed. “Obviously Leo didn’t kill himself. I don’t see how Misty Norris could have the strength to do this. Also, if Leo is a werebeast then it’s likely his brother Connor is one as well. We will know more once we get inside. Remember to protect anyone else who might be here. That is our priority.”

  “You know what this means?” Willow asked as they quickly followed their older sister to the front door.

  “What?” Addie asked her.

  “It means that Gary isn’t the killer.”

  She said it smugly, with an I-told-you-so gleam in her eye, but Addie had to admit she was right. There was no way that Gary could have committed this second murder, trapped in a Snare spell back in their kitchen. There was also no doubt that the two murders were related.

  Whoever had killed Esmerelda was here, in this house, and was strong enough to kill a werebeast.

  They’d just narrowed their suspect pool down to Connor Raithmore.

  Addie did not like this. For a moment, she found herself being glad that Lucian Knight wasn’t here. He was a dedicated police officer, but this was way over his head. Even though she was still mad at him for what he’d said she wouldn’t want him to step into this and get himself hurt. Or killed. She wanted to protect him.

  It felt different, somehow, than her desire to see the people of Shadow Lake kept safe from harm. It was different. Lucian was different, somehow. Even after their argument, he still intrigued her. It was like they were being drawn together somehow.

  Behind them, she heard a car approaching up the drive.

  Kiera was already opening the front door to the residence, not bothering to knock, but Addie stopped and hung back. She knew whose car that would be. There was no doubt in her mind. She knew, even before she turned to look.

  There he was. As if her thinking about him had made him appear, Lucian Knight was parking his plain car with its rust spots right next to her shiny Cherokee and the other, ultra-expensive vehicles. He stepped out still wearing his hoodie sweater and his jeans, and she thought he looked even more tired than he had this morning when they’d fought at her café.

  Tired, and amazing.

  She came back to herself when Willow told her to hurry up and get in the house. She could hear voices in there now, raised in fear and in anger. She knew her sisters would need her to face Connor. If he was the killer, if he was a werebeast shifter like Leo had been, then the three Kilorian sisters would need to act together to stop him.

  But Lucian was coming her way now, and even though he was still dressed in his casual not-working-today clothes, it was obvious that he was here to work the case. He had this expression on his face that meant he was all business. It was in the set of his jaw, in the way his eyes grew wider and wider as he came closer and caught sight of the spot where Leo had fallen to his death...

  Oh, curse her Irish eyes, he was going to see the wereleopard body!

  Addie cringed, turning slowly, praying fervently that nature had taken its course already, and that in death Leo had reverted back to his human form. Every dead werebeast was buried as a human. That was just a fact. Once they died, their human side took over one last time. The only question was how long it took for their body to give up the ghost, and change.

  She breathed a heavy sigh of relief when she saw that yes, Leo was his human self again, naked and dead and bloody from the impact of the fall. Lucian was kneeling close, not disturbing the scene but inspecting every bit of it, including the ripped clothing that had fallen not that far away. One shoe still hung precariously to a foot. Addie had seen a lot of death, and even so this scene was making her physically sick. She had to admire Lucian’s ability to be that close and not throw up.

  “What happened here?” he asked her, leaving the body where it was and coming over to her. “For that matter, why are you here?”

  He took her hands in his, in a way that she did not mind at all, and searched her face. Addie thought desperately of something to tell him in answer to his question, something that he would believe. Something that didn’t involve the words “oh by the way, I’m a witch.”

  She was saved from having to say anything at all when they heard the scream behind them, inside the house.

  Together, they dashed inside. The entryway was wide and long, with a set of stairs at the back and doors leading off to either side. There was no one around, but with her magical senses Addie could tell that everyone was upstairs. Including her sisters.

  There was a fierce presence up there. Strong and paranormal. She recognized the aura that was Connor Raithmore from seeing him in her café this morning. He was there, and he was angry, and she could sense from here that he was in his shifter form.

  Lucian went around from door to door, up and down the hallway, methodically clearing each one, making sure there was no danger close by. He had a gun in his hand that he must have carried in a shoulder holster under his hoodie. She wondered if he always went around armed on his days off or if this was a special occasion because of the murder.

  She couldn’t let him upstairs. Not with Connor on a rampage. Even with that gun, he wouldn’t be prepared for what was waiting up there. Once he found there was no one down here, he would surely head upstairs. He wouldn’t stop until he found the trouble, and faced it down. Foolish as that would be, she kind of admired him for it.

  When his back was turned, looking into a door that led to a huge dining room, Addie lifted a hand and directed a quick flow of magic up and over his shoulder. It found a target and knocked something off a shelf with a huge crash.

  He immediately tensed, bringing his gun up in front of him. “Addie,” he said to her, “stay here. Wait for me. If you have your cellphone with you call 911. Okay? Stay here.”

  Then he was gone.

  So was Addie, racing down to the end of this open space where the stairs waited. She took them two at a time, feeling ahead of her with her extra senses. The second floor hallway followed the structure of the house, down the entire length of it to a corner that turned left. Down that way was where she heard her sisters chanting.

  Adrenaline surged through her as it always did when the Shadow Lake Coven faced threats that endangered the town. She was in a rush to get to her sisters but she still took just a few bare seconds to lay a spell over the top of the stairs. It was a simple diversion spell, one that would turn away any Typic who tried to come up here. It was similar in nature to the protection spell she had on her café but it was hastily done and wouldn’t last more than a few hours. It should do the job of keeping Lucian or anyone else from coming up here until they had Connor contained.

  When it was done she ran down the hall, turning the corner at a dead sprint.

  The corridor led to a small sunroom, and that was where her sisters stood, shoulder to shoulder, arms outstretched. They were chanting a spell of calming, a spell that worked like a mental sedative. The words stripped away angry thoughts and replaced them with ones of peace. In extreme cases, Addie had even seen this spell put people to sleep.

  Of course, those p
eople weren’t werewolves in a full rage.

  Connor Raithmore had shifted into his other form. He stood there as a tall, furry grey wolf, standing on hind legs that were backward jointed, swishing a tail that could have knocked a grown man unconscious. His body was magnificent. Muscles rippled under stiff fur. Saliva drooled from fangs bared in a long snout. The tip of each finger ended in a hooked claw and his massive arms flexed over and over as he slammed a woman into the floor, again and again. He ignored Kiera and Willow completely, as if their magic wasn’t even reaching him.

  The woman he was attacking was Misty Norris. Connor was killing her.

  Addie stood with her sisters, raising her arms and drawing on her Essence just as they had. “This isn’t working,” she told them insistently. “We need to stop him, not sing him a lullaby.”

  “We were only waiting for you, Sister Addie.” Kiera gave her a stiff smile, and then changed the intent of the spell.

  The air around them went dark, leaving an oily feeling against Addie’s skin. She knew what Kiera was doing and instinctively lent her own Essence to help. This was a spell of a different sort altogether. One that they didn’t have a lot of practice in casting.

  They worked by intuition, bringing their magic to bear on Connor, focusing their power, sending the darkness rushing at him and into him and through him.

  He screamed, the sound of an animal in pain, and then he was thrown back from Misty as if by some immense and unseen hand. He slammed against the far wall, his head whipping back like a ragdoll’s and crashing through the heavy oak paneling. Then he slid down, slowly, to the floor.

  And he changed back into a man.

  Hair retreated into skin. Muscles deflated. Bones cracked and resettled themselves from animal form to human. In short order, Connor Raithmore was revealed to them once again in the form of a man.

  Somewhat less magnificent and impressive than his werewolf form had been, Addie noted.

  He wasn’t dead. Just dazed. Groggily he looked up at the three sisters, staring at them one after the other. His face contorted in rage. His hands curled into fists. Then he growled, and pushed himself up from the floor, and Addie could feel him reaching down for the transforming power deep within. He tried to shift, to pull out his wolf…