The Rhinestone Witches Omnibus: Books 1-3

by Addison Creek

“Is that a yes?” he asked. Clearly he hadn’t lost his voice.

  “Yes, that sounds good. We should talk,” I told him.

  Maybe he’d finally explain his wife. If she was involved in any of this pearl nonsense, tomorrow night would be an excellent opportunity for me to get some information about her. I might also find out something about the guy she’d been with at the university.

  “Great. I’ll pick you up here,” Quinn said. “We can eat at a restaurant, then go for a walk, hopefully where we can talk privately,” he added.

  Now it did sound like a date.

  He wasn’t going to leave until I said something.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow night,” I said.

  He nodded and smiled a genuine, warm smile. “Looking forward to it.”

  That night we returned to the unicorn field to try the third packet from Professor Burger, but not before my grandmother had had an entertaining day, with a lot of it spent laughing at me after she watched Lowe and me trail in covered in muck. She only stopped thinking it was funny when she found out that Hannah was involved, but even then she kept making comments about how she wished she’d taken a picture of us.

  Bethel let me take the lead this time. I still wasn’t very good at cauldron work and potions, and she thought there was no time like the present to practice. The unicorns thought what we were doing was novel enough to watch, and the same was true of the cats, who gathered around in their random way.

  At first nothing happened with the cauldron, but just as we were about to give up, Tiger came trotting over. He apparently spoke to the rest of my family, though I couldn’t understand what he said. When he finished Bethel translated. “He thinks the flame is too high. It’s not going to reach a smoke point until you lower it.”

  I lowered the flame, and a few minutes later a bright yellow steam wafted into the air. I glanced into the cauldron. “What is this good for?” I asked my grandmother.

  She looked inside and sniffed. “Grass fertilizer, I expect.”

  We all laughed.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  There are few problems more clearly defined than the ones we were now faced with. A boy had been murdered. His friend was likely hiding in the woods or kidnapped, neither theory seeming to promise any good outcome. It was as if there was only a very small chance that Kyle would return safely to his family.

  Meanwhile, in trying to solve the case we were snooping around chasing everything from owl feathers to stolen pearls. There were killer lizards and giant slugs. You know something is wrong when your biggest problem in a day is something even worse than giant slug. We were snooping around murky yellow swamps and nerdy ladies in labs.

  We were getting nowhere fast.

  At breakfast the next morning we tried to change that. The day was overcast and humid, boding ill for later. Outside I could see the white coats of the unicorns against the colorless sky. Maybe Quinn and I wouldn’t get our walk in after all.

  Lowe and I were discussing whether Henry and Kyle might have any friends who would know what they’d been up to. “I think I remember some of their names,” she said over her bowl of cereal just as Bethel came in from tending to the unicorns.

  “Whose names?” she asked.

  When we looked at her but didn’t answer she said, “Are you talking about Henry’s murder?”

  I couldn’t tell what she made of our snooping.

  “More like that and Kyle’s disappearance,” Lowe corrected her.

  Bethel squinted at her other granddaughter. “Very well, but I don’t want that to mean you shirk your responsibility to the coven,” she said, turning her gaze toward me. Lowe had come with us to the swamp, yes, but she had no responsibilities to the coven.

  “You think in your free time you could have taken up knitting or something else productive. No, you have to go snooping in places where you don’t belong,” Bethel grumbled.

  At least she didn’t try to forbid us from pursuing the mystery. It would have been awkward to have to sneak around defying her.

  In the end Lowe and I decided to go in search of Kyle and Henry’s other friends. This seemed like the next logical course of action. So far in our snooping we had been doing research and experiments, but no interviews with anyone who might have been directly involved. Except for Kelly, in fact, we hadn’t talked to anyone who might be connected to the case at all, and Kelly didn’t know anything about what had happened. New avenues of information were required.

  After saying goodbye to Tiger and Spunk and promising Bethel I wouldn’t shirk my coven duties, we were off. Kelly was going to meet us downtown and go with us to speak with Kyle’s friends, then we intended to stop in and see Jackie at the town hall.

  Downtown Twinkleford was mostly still a mystery to me. I hadn’t lived in town long enough to really understand the twists and turns of the streets, and since downtown was usually packed with townsfolk, it was even harder to navigate than some of the other neighborhoods.

  We were going downtown because Lowe thought that some of Kyle’s friends worked in a bakery there. Our mission required us to walk past the shoe shop Nancy had owned, so we stopped to peer in through the paper-covered widow. A sign in the window read, “Under new (better) ownership and opening soon.”

  “That should be interesting,” said Kelly, who’d met us at the trolley station.

  “We’re getting close,” said Lowe soon after we started moving again. “I can smell it now.”

  I sniffed a sort of sweet tang in the air, but it didn’t smell like any bakery I had ever been near.

  “What sort of baked goods are there?” I asked. At the markets we went to there was always a strange array of pastries for sale. By now I knew enough about Twinkleford to expect the unexpected.

  “I would call it an alternative bakery. You’ll just have to see for yourself,” said Lowe carefully.

  As with many storefronts in the downtown area, this place was small and swamped. When we squeezed through the front door an elderly witch turned around to glare at us. Our offense was unknown, at least to us, but she definitely wasn’t pleased and she thought we needed to know it. In the front of the crowd were a couple of vampires placing an order, and every cramped table was full. Customers waiting to have orders filled were pressed against every wall.

  We had just managed to squeeze the door shut behind us, but like everyone else in the place we were very cramped. Kelly kept scanning the employees to see if she recognized anyone. A swarthy fellow was minding the register, and three pale young men and an old woman were also trying to fit themselves behind the counter. Each was moving at a fast and steady pace to deal with the customer demand.

  “Orio is here, at least,” Kelly whispered.

  “What about Thompson?” Lowe asked.

  “He’s the one on the left,” Kelly explained.

  Shorter and stockier than Orio, Thompson took up more room behind the counter and moved with a lumbering step. One of his arms sported a spreading tattoo. His eyebrows were so thick they touched in the middle.

  The parting of the crowd gave me my first look at the bakery case. I started in surprise when I saw it.

  Twinkleford bakeries definitely weren’t serving plain old chocolate croissants. There was nary a blueberry muffin in view.

  Alternative bakery apparently meant loaves the color of lilacs, topped with frogs, and cookies with studded nails, and cupcakes foaming pink from the middle. Now that I made myself pay attention, I also caught the smell that very subtly permeated the whole place. I kind of thought it smelled like melting roses.

  We waited patiently until we arrived at the front of the line. All the while I was trying to decide if I was going to order something called Spiders Legs or something called Black-eyed Susan Pastry. I wondered: if I ordered it, would I actually have to eat it?

  When Kyle’s friends noticed Kelly, they both tried to pretend they hadn’t. The term “act busy” was employed, and they both ducked their heads and started fiddling with
whatever they could find. Orio and Thompson made it obvious that they weren’t inclined to speak with us, but Kelly shouldered her way through and asked one of them to talk. Thompson shook his head and looked over his shoulder.

  I squinted in the same direction and saw a back door. Just then a girl came through it, and it was someone we recognized from the Young Witches club, the one with long dark hair and sharp eyes. She gave Kelly a big smile and extended her hand. She could tell that Kelly was trying to get something out of Thompson and had been denied.

  “I’m Damien. What can I help you with?” she asked. Her eyes flicked to me. She remembered me too.

  “We were hoping to talk to you about Kyle and Henry,” said Kelly loudly. The bakery was noisy with the hum of conversation, but Thompson must have heard us. His gaze flicked to Damien and her face clouded.

  “Of course. We went to the calling hours yesterday. I’m not sure how else we can help.”

  “I can’t get away just yet,” said Orio crossly. I hadn’t even been aware that he was listening, but the bakery was jammed, so it wasn’t far-fetched to think that this wasn’t a good time for him to talk.

  Damien pointed for us to backtrack and said she’d meet us out back.

  When I glanced in the direction where she was pointing, I thought at first that the door we had come through had disappeared. Then I realized that it had changed colors; now it was blue, before it had been yellow. Right after that I realized that I was wrong altogether. A blue giant, with thick legs, thick arms, and a rotund torso was standing in the back of the line, waiting for a pastry. And he was between us and the door, which might as well have disappeared. I swallowed hard.

  Have you ever tried getting out of a small bakery with a literal giant standing between you and the door? It’s quite difficult. This particular giant seemed oblivious to everything around him, including me. He only noticed me when I finally squeaked out something about needing to leave, and even then he moved slowly and with obvious annoyance.

  Back outside, we went around the back of the shop to a small courtyard, where Thompson and Damien were waiting for us. Just like inside the bakery, there wasn’t much room and we were forced to stand close together. Even out here the smells and sounds followed us. The day was still overcast and blustery, but at least the rain hadn’t started yet, so we wouldn’t get soaked while we talked.

  “We are so sorry that your brother is still missing,” said Damien sympathetically. “He was always so nice to me.”

  “That’s because he had a huge crush on you,” said Kelly with a smile. Damien threw back her head and blushed prettily, while Thompson rolled his eyes.

  Damien was the one leading this charge. She was the talker of the two, while Thompson stood to the side, silent and sullen. He kept scuffing his foot on the pavement as if he thought the whole conversation was a waste of time.

  “I know Kyle hung out with you all from time to time,” said Kelly. “This is his favorite store in the whole town. I was wondering if you had talked to him recently.”

  Without missing a beat, Damien turned to Thompson, who shrugged. “We hung out about once a week. We usually played kickball or something like that. You know, just guy stuff.”

  “I was usually there to play kickball. I don’t see how it’s just guy stuff,” said Damien with a slight smile. “I never really hung out with him otherwise. Just saw him around the bakery. We didn’t hang out, in other words.”

  Again Kelly smiled. “I know that. If you’d hung out, he would’ve been deliriously happy. He wouldn’t have shut up about it.”

  Damien was a couple of years older than Kyle. I figured he must have worshiped her from afar in high school.

  “So nothing happened at kickball except kickball?” I asked.

  “Like what?” Thompson growled.

  Damien elbowed him.

  “Like anything you thought was strange or out of the ordinary,” I said.

  Thompson shrugged and shook his head.

  “Do you have any idea where he and Henry liked to hang out?” I asked.

  “Henry was found unconscious in the woods. Do you know whether they went there often?” Lowe added.

  “Look, I just played kickball with them. That’s about it,” insisted Thompson. “I didn’t know they went to hang out in weird places or did things that got them in trouble. I spend most of my time at the bakery. Which reminds me, I have to get back. Good luck in your search.” Without a backward glance, he turned around and walked back into the store. He had never uncrossed his arms.

  Damien turned and looked at us apologetically. “Don’t mind him,” she said. “He’s like that with everyone. He’s more upset about Henry than he lets on. They had a sort of friendly kickball rivalry. I guess that’s over with now.”

  “We understand. Is there any chance Orio could come out and talk to us?” Kelly asked. “I know he did actually come over from time to time.”

  It was clear that Damien was about to say no, but then she thought better of it. “You know what? I’ll make him come out. This is important.” She too disappeared back inside, leaving the three of us to stand and wait.

  “I feel like we’re close to discovering something. I just don’t know what,” said Lowe.

  “I hope we discover something before anything else goes wrong. Quinn knows we’re up to something. On top of that, Kyle is still missing.” I shook my head.

  It didn’t take long for Orio to appear, but he was alone; Damien didn’t come back with him. He didn’t look as sullen as Thompson, but he was at pains to convey that he was busy. “I only have five minutes. We don’t usually take breaks around here,” he said, sounding gruff.

  “Thank you for talking with us,” I said.

  He shrugged.

  “You were friends with my brother, right?” Kelly asked.

  “Sure. We hung out. There aren’t enough warlocks in town to make it easy to avoid the ones who are here,” he muttered.

  “Of course,” said Kelly. “When was the last time you saw him?”

  Orio glared at the ground as if he knew the answer to the question, but was hesitant to say.

  “I saw Kyle and Henry on the morning of the day they went missing,” he said at last.

  On that cool gray day, his words electrified us as if the sun had just come out.

  “Really?” said Kelly excitedly. “What did they say? How did they seem? Have you spoken with the sheriff?”

  “Definitely not,” Orio’s head snapped up. “Can’t do that. Don’t want to get the guys in trouble. There are rules, you know? We have to be respectful of each other.”

  “Rules for what?” I asked.

  “No snitching,” he said.

  “So you knew they were doing something illegal?” Kelly had gone paler. Orio was confirming her worst fears.

  “I don’t know what they were doing,” Orio hastened to add. “I had no idea. Maybe they were just kidding around. I didn’t have time to ask. Look, this job supports my whole family. The Smiths were nice to give it to me and I don’t want to put it in jeopardy.”

  “You haven’t answered the question about the sheriff,” I told him. I’d have to ask later who the Smiths were.

  “Right. NO, I don’t want to talk to him. I’m sure I wouldn’t be of any help anyway. I don’t know anything,” he said firmly.

  “Just tell us what happened the last time you saw them,” I suggested.

  Kelly had started staring into space, as if she couldn’t quite wrap her head around all of it. To her Orio might as well have said that Kyle was snatching pearls from the mouths of dragons.

  “They came by my house,” he offered, grudgingly. “They’d never done that before. My mom wasn’t happy about them being there. She doesn’t like visitors, you know? Anyway, she told me they’d best stay only for a couple of minutes. I was surprised to see them come in the first place. They’d never come before, and definitely not unannounced. It was also early enough in the day so that I was surprised anyone but
me would be awake. I had an early shift here, which I usually do. I guess they knew when I worked,” he added.

  I nodded encouragingly.

  He sighed. “They were giddy, all happy like. They were talking about career opportunities and how they were businessmen now. They really thought they’d made something of themselves. I asked them what was going on. They said they couldn’t give me the details, but I could come along. They were headed into the woods to make it all official. I could have a role.”

  “They told you they were headed for the woods?” I asked incredulously.

  “Yup. First they said they had to make a stop, but then the woods it was. I said if all of this was aboveboard, what did they need to do it in the woods for? Sounded secretive. I didn’t like it. So I told them I wasn’t going with them. They weren’t bothered. They said all kinds of stuff, like maybe next time,” he finished.

  He glanced over his shoulder. “Look, I can’t stay out here. There’s really nothing else I can tell you. If you’ve already been to their treehouse, that’s all the help I can give you.”

  As he started to turn way, Lowe suddenly lurched forward. My small cousin wrapped one hand around his Orio’s huge arm. She didn’t stop his foreword motion with a physical touch, but instead just managed to surprise him by the contact.

  “Where is that treehouse exactly?” she asked.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Orio reluctantly told us everything we wanted to know, mostly so he could get back inside as quickly as possible. He acted as if we were causing him more problems than we were worth. I thought about offering to pay him for the information, then I realized that the real charitable thing to do would be to offer to stop Kelly from using a curse on him. Once we had the information we needed, we left him to get back to work.

  Tonight was my date with Quinn, so I didn’t want to be out too late, but we absolutely had to check out this treehouse lead. The first thing we did when we left the bakery was to stop at a farmstead and grab sandwiches for lunch. Then it was time to head to the woods.