The Little Lies (The Great Hexpectations Series Book 1)

by Marie F. Crow

  I nod. “I’ll be careful. Promise.”

  “What’s the second case?”

  “Not sure, yet,” I begin chewing on my lip with my thoughts. “The oldest daughter thinks her mother has somehow brought back the little girl who died not too long ago. The whole place tastes of fresh grief but I didn’t feel the dead there. But it was odd…”

  My words trail off with my thoughts floating upon what I saw last night. Hearing my pause, GiGi is just about coming undone with her own imaginary monsters, or at least the ones she imagines for me. She has become transfixed, not moving until I finish.

  “She, the mom, has gone through a lot of effort to hide something. Okay, picture this,” I say, settling myself on a bar stool across from the kitchen island from which she watches me. “Perfect Pinterest house. Matching. Subdued. Almost boring. I think the colors were Don’t Judge Me grey and Everything Is Fine Here white. I have seen model homes with more life than this home held.”

  “Mmhhmmm,” she answers, waiting to see where my mental ramblings will travel.

  “With all this effort to not stand out, why put heavy fake air fresheners in every outlet all through the house?”

  “How fake?” GiGi asks, as if the caliber or quality of the scent clarifies anything.

  “Whore house fake. My dress still smells like their home fake. Going to take more than just dry shampoo today and not from my oily roots fake.”

  “Ah,” GiGi answers.

  “Ah?” I repeat. “Just ‘ah’?”

  GiGi shrugs. “I can’t account for people’s taste.”

  “You can’t account for people’s taste? Is that really where you’re going to leave it?” I ask her with both of us knowing she’s hiding her thoughts with bland words and clipped sentences. “What aren’t you saying, Old Lady?”

  “Nothing,” she starts but her acid tipped tongue isn’t ready to relinquish the fight, “because I would never have gone against my better judgment and taken on cases dealing with people’s tacky taste or their complete lack of it.”

  “Mmhhmmm,” I mimic, sipping from my cup of steamy salvation as I wait. I know her verbal train has just left the station and we have many miles of track ahead of us.

  “If I had been asked to take a case with a child, which we aren’t supposed to do to begin with, I would know better than to wonder about the scent profile of their house and wonder more about why a family would want to have such a scent profile. Sometimes the migraine isn’t from what is in front of us but what is hidden around us,” GiGi informs me with her abundant sarcasm.

  I almost feel sorry for whatever herb she is sacrificing to her passive aggressive anger. The pestle sounds like nails on an old chalkboard, scratching more than just my nerves with her fit.

  “Hidden like the real reason you’re angry with me, or hidden like what’s in the box, Somerset, hidden?” I ask her, fueled by the bravery of caffeine.

  She wants to yell at me, rail about my life choices in the past few hours, but she won’t. GiGi prefers to let me hang myself and swing in the noose for a bit before stepping in. She once said it was the only way to truly understand consequences. I think it’s more of she enjoys the ‘told you so’ moments. So, she won’t save me from my own descent into trouble, but she’ll judge every minute of it. We stare at each other, neither willing to admit fault or fears out loud, but understand each other none the less.

  “I’ll be careful,” I assure those hazel eyes swimming in the unsaid.

  “I’ll be at the store,” she shares, but it’s what she doesn’t say which hangs in the air, forcing me to retreat from the kitchen faster than my ego would have preferred.

  What she doesn’t say is how she’ll be waiting if I need her. What she doesn’t admit is how worried she is about me. Mostly, what she doesn’t say, what we never say, is ‘I love you’.

  Becky’s grave wasn’t hard to find. Where the Tortes may keep a simple home, down to their very practical cars, Becky’s final resting place is anything but plain. In fact, it pretty much screams ‘child buried here’ with every available option offered to grieving parents. It also screams of Cass’s dirty fingers all over it.

  Even for a recent death, the ground shouldn’t be this disturbed. The sod still holds its individual square shapes, at least where there is sod. The dirt itself is tumbled, not even packed down as it often is after a funeral. Flowers have been tossed to either side of the ornate, marble headstone. With as many funerals as I have attended, this is just a quick wrap-up to ease a grieving family. This is wrong.

  The dirt is still damp in my hand from being removed from the depths of earth’s belly. It still holds the smell of soil and danker things. What it doesn’t hold is the scent of magic. It also doesn’t have a single magical tingle or vibration.

  “Dirt interesting to you?”

  Sighing, I stand hearing the voice of Miranda behind me.

  “I told Bella I would come have a look,” I try to explain.

  “At dirt?” Miranda asks.

  She’s wearing jeans which somehow hug every curve, but don’t hold a hint of being provocative. Which means they aren’t the cheap ones I buy with hopes my butt won’t look as flat as my bank account. Her grey top is the perfect shade of neither being too dark nor too faded, which pulls the black of her little ankle boots perfectly together. Even her high ponytail looks polished, and not a rushed hair style to start the day.

  “At everything.” I tell the woman who is judging my outfit of torn jeans and burgundy top with the same mood as I have judged hers.

  “You still don’t honestly think I have dug up my own child, hauled her body from this place to,” Miranda pauses, trying to pick the right words, “to hide somewhere when I’m lonely?”

  I didn’t. Not exactly, anyway.

  “I can’t imagine you getting your hands that dirty,” is what my brain decides to say. My mouth has the sense to quickly close.

  Miranda pivots to leave but adds a quick parting shot before she does. “If you’re done with the dirt, please be sure to put it back. My daughter’s death may be a joking matter to you, but to me, it’s not. Although the rumors say you have no problem getting your hands dirty.”

  I watch her perfect swish of her heel and the matching sway of her hair when she leaves. I could respond, but honestly, I deserve that one, and dropping the clump of dirt in my hand, I don’t say a thing.

  “Making friends I see?” Cass’s voice creeps up my spine.

  Turning to face another of life’s middle finger moments, I see Miss Henkins has been joined by a few more angry women in various scenes of death. “Likewise,” I tell him knowing full well he won’t understand the joke. Watching the weeping wrists of one of the ladies, I wish I didn’t get it, either.

  Seems I am not the only one still a little shaken by last night. He turns fully around still expecting to see someone. When he doesn’t, he turns back to stare at me and my honey sweet smile.

  “Anyway,” Cass says clearing his throat and tugging on the suit jacket three sizes too small for his robust frame. “I was told you were here. Seems you showing up at these places tends to spook the families.”

  “I wonder why that is?” I ask, tilting my head with feigned innocence before jumping to the next conversation. “Can you tell me about this grave? The marker says it has been over a month, but the ground still looks unsettled. This can’t be good for easily spooked families.”

  “This is a private matter,” Cass almost whispers it, and his demeanor tells me everything I need to know to twist the information from him.

  Leaning over to pretend to wipe the marker, I let my tee shirt hang open a little too wide. Just as I thought, his eyes don’t shy from roaming at the hinted prize. “So sad for the family. It must be painful to see their child’s grave like this. Especially from a man whose only concern is helping the family.”

  “Well, this isn’t my fault!” he exclaims. “Look,” he points to the bas
e of the marker hoping I’ll bend further down to examine his explanation. “See how the dirt is disturbed all the way to the base? If this was my fault, it would be marred by our machines.”

  I lean further over, letting his need to be a creep override his need to keep a ‘private matter’ private. His many lady friends roll their eyes over his antics.

  “And here,” he begins pointing to the well-maintained grass we are standing on, “there would be marks, or at least indentions if we were doing this every single night!”

  Without robbing him of his view, I ask, “This happens every single night?”

  Cass steps closer than I would like. He whispers, “Sometimes several times a day my crew will say it’s disheveled worse than other times. They won’t even touch the spot saying it’s cursed.”

  “Huh?” I remark before rapidly standing. “Well thanks for letting me know.”

  “That’s it?” Cass asks sounding almost disappointed.

  For a moment I have a thought to be a better person than I am but then I remember who I am talking to. “I’m sorry. Did you want to do dinner tonight?”

  It isn’t just Miss Henkins’ eyes which grow wide hearing my question. Cass looks like he’s being choked and is making the sounds to match.

  “Or did you have plans already?”

  “Yes!” Cass quickly answers. “Plans. So many plans. All week in fact.”

  “Oh?” I fake pout hearing his answer, letting the pout fully reach my face and slump my shoulders. “All week?”

  “Yup,” he says already walking backwards. “All week.” He stumbles over a few of the vases, attempting to stand them up without pausing in his escape. “All week.”

  “What about next week?” I call after his retreating form.

  “Next week, too! I think all month. Pretty sure all month.” He tells me this while waving, hoping I’ll take the hint.

  “But you’ll check for me?” I shout across the yard like a lovesick teenager.

  “Absolutely!” He shouts back with a nervous chuckle aware those around us have found reasons to head this way. “Absolutely!” He shouts again, waving and pleading with his face to not ask anything more.

  I don’t. I wave, a little more energetically than I need to though. Miss Henkins waves her goodbye as well. Which is fine. It’s her new friend waving with her wrist wound that made me cringe before I could catch myself. The thin slit became wide gaps as what is left of the tendons twist her hand side to side. The blood which was slowly weeping now travels with a much more eager speed along the flesh of her arm. When it reaches her elbow, it baptizes the little headstone by her and the family standing near her is completely oblivious. They smear her blood as each member of the mourning family touches their lips to the marker, sealing their departure with a goodbye kiss. When they walk past me, nodding with the dead woman’s gift upon their faces, sometimes I wish I couldn’t see the things I see.

  The brass bell over the shop door tinkles its little ‘hello’ as I enter the store. It didn’t need to. GiGi is already leaning on the counter waiting for my entrance. I hate when she does that. I also hate her one arched eyebrow of a greeting.

  “It’s not magic,” I tell her as I walk past her to where she keeps the mini fridge behind the counter.

  “Not magic or magical? A little girl coming back from the grave has to be of one or the other.”

  I stall, still unsure of my answer as the cold soda tickles my mouth with its tiny, carbonated bubbles. I smile to the many ghosts who roam the wooden shelves of books when they wave, having learned long ago, conversation happens on my terms. Well, they all wave but Janice.

  “What’s with her today?” I ask, pointing with the half empty can where the dead teen is swinging the many hanging pendulums for sale. Her normal behavior isn’t one I would call perky with her dark hair and eyes lined with enough black shadow to cause a nationwide shortage, but today her mood is definitely grumpier than normal.

  GiGi is caring enough to glance in the direction I point, as if maybe this time she will be able to see them, before asking, “Her who?”

  “Right,” I remark, still watching Janice in her obvious funk of a mood. “Doesn’t matter.”

  I should have picked my words more carefully. You never let a teen hear you say their mood swings don’t matter. You never, ever, let a dead teen hear it.

  When the whole display is shoved from the shelf, GiGi turns to me with a look of exasperation. “Janice?” She asks.

  I make an expression of sorry before finishing off the can and while watching the teen answer GiGi’s question with a middle finger. “Did something happen today?”

  “Other than my granddaughter embarking on another possible road of self-destruction?”

  “Yes, other than that.”

  GiGi tilts her head thinking over today’s events while I was stumbling along my path of good intentions. Her teal butterfly hairpin holding her grey bun catches the overhead lights. I can’t remember a time she hasn’t had it, and when I’ve asked about it, her answer is always a wink and a mischievous smile.

  “Now that you mention it, there was a gentleman here earlier. Didn’t say much. Just walked through the store, touching random stuff, but didn’t buy anything.”

  Her words from earlier slither with their warning, wrapping their coils around my mind. “The Ripples?”

  GiGi scoffs, waving her hand to wave away my fear and my words. “This man felt different. Definitely wasn’t a random visit. Back to your problem. Not magic but has to be magical?”

  I shake my head over her easy dismissal of the event but travel down this line of logic. “The dirt was nothing more than grave filled energy. I could feel the mourning. I could sense the many people who have come and gone, but nothing of magic.”

  “Anyone stand out?” GiGi has started replacing the display. Even with her back to me I can sense her facial expressions with her thoughts.

  “Nothing, but Mr. Creepy did show his face. Thanks for that, by the way.”

  GiGi shrugs, turning to glance over her shoulder. “At the rate you’re going, cobwebs are most likely in more spots than just the corners of the store.”

  “Ew.”

  “As of late the only company I hear you having is battery operated.”

  “Okay, really. Back to the topic?”

  GiGi shrugs again. “I think what you’re looking for is a source.”

  “Are you still making sex jokes? What is a source?”

  “I’m not, and it’s a token or item used to store very specific types of magic to be used at one location and have the results upon another location.”

  GiGi strolls over to the deep purple bookshelves labeled ‘Occult Reading’. Most of the books there are completely laughable, boasting of easy spells to make everything from your wallet and breasts bigger to making the one who got away beg for you back. GiGi doesn’t reach for those. She pulls a rather plain covered book from one of the top shelves. Thumbing through it, she brings the book to me at the counter. Being this close to her, I can smell her oil made from the herbs she punished earlier.

  “Can smell you’re still worried about the name spoken earlier.” I tease her and her new choice of perfume.

  “Speaking of sources,” she begins, blessing me with a glare which is more menacing than her small frame should allow, “they can be anything from lockets to full standing dressers. The magic is embedded in the object instead of casting a spell, which makes it useable to anyone. Very dangerous and literally any number of complications.”

  “Okay, so you’re telling me you think the most perfect, upper class, Pinterest project home, Miranda somehow just stumbled across one of these things?”

  “No,” GiGi says. “I think someone stumbled across her.”

  “Here, crazy white lady, have a little box of sum’tin sum’tin to bring your dead daughter back. First hit is on the house.” I mock, still unsure of GiGi Jo’s idea.

&n
bsp; “She most likely didn’t pay with cash.” GiGi completely skips over my sarcasm. “Things like this have a higher price tag.”

  “Black Card?” I ask, continuing with my bad jokes.

  “What’s a Black Card?” She asks.

  “It’s a very prestigious credit card.” I try to explain, realizing my jokes are going down in flames.

  “Never heard of it.”

  “Well, you wouldn’t. We’re poor.” Pulling the book closer in hopes of completely escaping this dumpster fire of a conversation, I ask her, “Where would someone like me stumble across someone, to stumble across something like this?”

  “If I tell you, are you going to go there?” GiGi sighs, already knowing fully well I will.

  To avoid having to give her false hope, I just smile as my answer. I don’t use words to be held against me later.

  Her sigh deepens. “There’s a few places, but for something this strong, you would have to go to a place where many gather. This isn’t a one stop shop kind of trinket.”

  “What does that mean?” I ask with more questions waiting behind the one I asked. “Who gathers? Why would witches gather?”

  “This isn’t a witch spell. It’s too strong. You’re looking for something older, stronger. Something I wish you would have the common sense to walk away from right now.”

  I keep smiling, not trusting words to encourage her to share this new information with me, even though I have plenty of words obstructing my throat with their emotions. All this time she’s convinced me we are the only ones like us around here. How would my childhood have been if I knew I wasn’t alone in what I can do, what I can see? But these questions I won’t ask her. Not yet.

  “Go to Grimore’s. Ask for Charlotte. If anyone would know about something this powerful floating around, it would be her.”

  There’s a sadness in GiGi’s eyes. I’ve seen this look before in the eyes of parents knowing they can’t stop their children from exploring the world. It’s the heavy look of knowing about the evils waiting in the darkened corners and also knowing they can’t protect them from being discovered. It’s the look of unsaid warnings, whispered prayers, and the curse of broken hearts.