Beat Around the Broom

by Samantha Silver

  “When I think about it, it does feel like kind of a lot,” I admitted. “But in the moment I just feel motivated. Like I’m responsible for all of it and if I don’t solve the mystery and do everything myself, nobody will. I know how crazy that sounds.”

  “Does Chief Forsetti know how you feel?” Lara asked curiously.

  My face burned pink with embarrassment as I misinterpreted the meaning of her question, but she quickly noticed her error. Wide-eyed and clearly trying not to burst out laughing, she amended her statement hastily. “Oh, I don’t mean like that, I just mean does he know that you feel like you have to do all the work yourself? I mean, he’s the one on the city payroll as a cop. He should be handling the bulk of the work. It’s only fair.”

  I smiled at her warmly, appreciating her worry for me. It was good to know she had my back, though I wanted to laugh at the idea that Xander would ever take advantage of my skills. Especially since I was the one who had basically elbowed my way into the crime-solving process.

  “Actually, he and I are pretty egalitarian with the cases. Xander is really low-key and doesn’t like to take a lot of credit, but when there’s a case like this he goes into overdrive. He even spends the night in his office sometimes when there’s a mystery to solve. He works really hard, I promise,” I told her with a wink.

  Lara nodded, looking a little relieved. “Okay. Good. Just looking out for you, Arti. You’re one tough cookie but even heroes need a break from time to time. That’s why I insisted on ordering takeout for dinner, so you could just come home and chill out instead of working your butt off in the kitchen.”

  “This is pretty good, too. Maybe I should take the night off more often,” I replied, looking down at the spicy noodles on my plate. It was a rare occasion for me to order dinner like this — usually I cooked dinner since I almost always had guests in the Manor. It felt weird and lazy to have skipped that, but I had to admit it was badly needed. Flying all over town on my broom, interviewing lots of people, and running into Xander’s ex was all very tiring. Particularly the last part. I could hardly blink without seeing June Siebog’s obnoxiously glamorous face in the front of my mind. Ugh.

  “Yeah, there’s nothing like noodles to comfort you after a long day,” she agreed. “Although, there’s not a takeout restaurant in the world that could compete with your skills in the kitchen. I only wish I knew how to cook so I could help out more. Too bad everything I touch turns to inedible sludge.”

  I snorted at that very vivid image. “Well, you’re already a stunningly beautiful actress and artist,” I reminded her. “But cooking is, like, my one thing. So I’d better be good at it.”

  Lara laughed. “Oh, come on, you know that’s not true. You have all kinds of skills. One of these days I’m going to finally convince you of your own worth. You’ll see.”

  “Good luck,” I chuckled, picking up a chunk of baby corn.

  We finished up dinner and cleaned up together, Lara using her magic to speed the process along while I rather dejectedly did what I could by hand. Luna and Lucy were busy making a big show of ignoring each other, and by the time the kitchen was all tidied up, I was nearly asleep on my feet. Lara sat in the living room with Lucy to watch some evening television to wind down, so I bid them goodnight and trudged upstairs, with Luna trotting behind me. My muscles were aching and my head pounding, and I knew if I got into bed right now I would just end up tossing and turning, despite how tired I was. So instead, I drew a hot, floral-scented bubble bath and slid into the tub. Luna perched on the bathroom counter, eyeing me with mild disgust and confusion.

  “I just don’t get the appeal of sitting in a gigantic trough of stagnant bubble water,” she pointed out. “First of all, gross. Second of all, boring.”

  “Well, it’s a good thing I didn’t run a bath for you, then,” I quipped with a smile.

  “Very good, indeed!” she replied.

  I sat in the bath just relaxing and trying not to think about anything whatsoever for about an hour or so. Luna was getting impatient and my fingers and toes were like prunes by the time I finally gave in and drained the tub. I got out, stopped myself just before casting a drying spell that might have caused all kinds of mayhem, and just toweled off. As I crawled into bed in my oversized t-shirt and fleece pajama pants, I could vaguely hear the sound of Lara and Lucy coming upstairs. I snuggled down under the sheets, feeling refreshed and cozy, and Luna curled up on the pillow beside me. I was barely able to plug in my phone before dropping off to sleep.

  THUMP.

  I had only been asleep for a few hours when a sudden, loud noise woke me up. I opened one eye, still hazy with fatigue and not quite awake yet. At first, I assumed maybe I had just snored in my sleep and woken myself up, because embarrassingly enough, that had happened before. But then when I heard a creaking sound from downstairs, my stomach turned. There was definitely something moving around down there in my house, and my instincts told me it was not Lara or Lucy.

  I sat up in bed, feeling goosebumps prickle up along my arms and legs as my heart began to race faster and faster. Luna woke up and gave me a petrified look, both of us stunned into silence by the soft but undeniable movements from downstairs.

  “What on earth is that?” Luna whispered, her tail twitching.

  I shook my head. “No idea.”

  “Is someone breaking in?” she asked, green eyes wide and luminous in the dark. My heart skipped a beat and I knew, instinctively, she was right. As quietly as I could, I slipped out of bed, padding softly across the room to open the door. I was half-tempted to call Xander, but I worried that might take too long. If someone was breaking into my house, I needed to deal with it now. Myself.

  “Arti, no!” Luna hissed, not wanting me to put myself in danger. But I ignored her, slowly and quietly turning the bedroom doorknob. I opened the door and stepped out into the hallway, and I nearly jumped out of my skin when I looked up to see a figure standing several feet away at the end of the hall. My heart jumped into my throat and I gasped, clapping a hand over my mouth in terror. But then the figure stepped into the light and I realized it was just Lara, who had evidently gotten up to investigate the scene unfolding downstairs, as well.

  She held a finger to her lips and wiggled her finger, then started making her way down the stairs before I got a chance to stop her. I followed after her, Luna and Lucy trailing behind us, both in full-on prowler mode. Once we made it to the first landing, we paused for a moment to look around. It sounded like the intruder was shuffling around in the kitchen, judging by the metallic clink of pots and pans and the sound of boots on tile floors. Lara and I exchanged firm nods, and she led the way down, impressing me with her courage. I wanted badly to take the lead and keep her safe behind me, but I knew that with my magic not working, I was probably more of a liability than an asset. So we crept down the stairs and started making our way toward the kitchen, my heart beating so hard it made my chest ache.

  Suddenly, the noises in the kitchen stopped. Lara and I froze in place, realizing that the intruder must have heard us coming. My imagination was running wild, picturing all kinds of horrific criminals in the kitchen. Perhaps they had gone to the kitchen to find a butcher’s knife to stab us with. Or maybe they were planning to whack us both in the head with a cast iron pan.

  Lara bent down, then sprang forward, rushing into the kitchen without so much as a glance back at me. Worried for her, I went running in, too. She shouted, “relligoa!” which sent a lasso of electric-blue light hurtling through the shadows to try and tie up the intruder.

  Unfortunately, it seemed to miss, and the intruder shrieked, “Infuscoroa!” I recognized the spell as a defensive charm that sort of blurred the caster’s appearance, to make them look slightly obscured and therefore difficult to locate or get a good look at.

  Except for the flashes of light from Lara’s finger and the intruder’s, it was still pitch-dark in the kitchen, so I reflexively said, “Lumenoa,” only I forgot that my magic wasn’t working
right. So instead of simply turning on the lights, there was an ear-splitting POP as all the lightbulbs in my kitchen shattered. Now it was both dark and filled with broken glass. Fantastic.

  All three of us screamed, and I caught a vague glimpse of the intruder rushing out into the little hallway on the other side of the kitchen, nearly knocking over my vintage record player in their haste to get away.

  “Follow him!” I barked, and we raced after the intruder as fast as we could, gingerly trying not to step on the shards of lightbulb on the kitchen floor. But when Lara let out a yelp of pain, I turned around to help her, seeing that she’d cut her heel.

  “Lara!” I gasped, immediately more concerned about my friend than the intruder.

  “Go! Don’t stop for me,” she insisted, but then we both heard the sound of the glass door to the back deck being slid open and closed again, followed by the pat-pat-pat of boots on the deck before the noises faded out. Clearly, our intruder had escaped out the back.

  “Shoot,” I swore, rushing to get a damp paper towel for Lara’s foot. “The bastard must have shimmied down the balcony or something.”

  “Who on earth was that? Spiderman?” Lara spat, glaring in the direction of the back door as I helped her limp over to the dining table where we’d sat so peacefully just hours earlier. I turned on the dining room chandelier by hand and helped clean her superficial wound while the cats roamed all over the house, sniffing out the trail left by the intruder.

  “Let me at ‘em!” Luna exclaimed. “Just open the back door and I’ll chase after them. I swear, I’ll catch them and make them pay for breaking into my house!”

  “Lu, you can’t go out there. It’s not safe,” I scolded as I locked all the doors.

  “But I could catch up. You know I could. I’m really quick on my feet,” she whined.

  I gave her a withering glare. “No. I said no. And that is final. I am not about to let my familiar go chasing after some creep in the night. You’re too important to me and I will not let you put yourself in danger just to prove how tough you are. Got it?” I said, hands on my hips.

  Luna sighed dramatically. “Ugh. Fine. I’ll just sit here and be useless, then. But how am I supposed to relax knowing there’s some crazy person out there?”

  “I know,” I groaned. “I know. This is insane.”

  “Have you ever had an intruder like this before?” Lara asked curiously. She had moved to the couch, keeping her injured foot propped up on the arm of the couch with a bandage wrapped around her heel.

  I sat on a chair next to the couch and thought hard for a moment before shrugging. “Not really. I mean, the last time someone broke into my house, it turned out to be my own mother.”

  Lara’s eyes widened and she gasped. “Oh my godness. Do you think that was her again?”

  I snorted and shook my head. “Moon, no. Even my mom isn’t crazy enough to rappel down a balcony dressed in all black. She’s intrusive, for sure, but she’s not an intruder.”

  “Why do you think they wanted to get in here so badly? It doesn’t look like they stole anything,” she pointed out, looking around with a scowl. “Maybe they weren’t here to rob you. Maybe they wanted to hurt you.”

  I could see her thought process spiraling into a very dark place. Lara’s home had been invaded months ago, resulting in the death of her personal assistant at the time. She had come a long way as far as healing and moving past what happened to her, but I could tell this event was bringing up some pretty awful memories.

  “Hey, it’s okay. They’re gone now and the doors are all re-locked,” I told her. “Besides, they won’t be dumb enough to come back twice in one night.”

  Lara nodded slowly. “Okay. Well, I’m definitely not going to get any sleep tonight, so I might as well stay up and keep watch. You go on back to bed, Arti.”

  “What? Really? Are you sure?” I asked, taken aback. “I don’t know if it’s a good idea for you to be left alone right now.”

  Lara gave me a warm smile. “I appreciate your concern, truly, but I’ll be fine. Besides, my foot hurts like crazy, so it’ll keep me awake anyway. I’m serious. Go to bed. I’ll be here with my magic at the ready just in case whoever that was tries to break in again.”

  As much as I wanted to decline her offer, my body was begging me to give in and go back to sleep. I yawned, betraying just how tired I really was, and with one more smile at Lara I went back upstairs. Luna came trotting behind me and we fell into bed. We drifted off to sleep right away, but my dreams were filled with monsters and boogeymen.

  Chapter 16

  Despite how exhausted I had been when I fell into bed, I still spent the vast majority of the night tossing and turning. I was nervous, my mind running in every direction. Every tiny noise made me jerk awake, wild-eyed and heart racing. Even just the sounds of the house settling kept me on my toes. It felt like I had spent the entire night in constant fight or flight mode, my body poised to attack, hide, or bolt away at any moment. I kept trying all the old tricks my mother used to teach me back when I was a little kid. I had been a chronic insomniac as a child, often because I was afraid of the dark or simply had too much energy to relax much in the evening. I know, sounds crazy, right? Nowadays I was lucky if I had enough energy to get me out of bed in the morning. But back then, I was constantly sleep-deprived. The recurring nightmares didn’t help the situation, of course.

  It was especially troublesome back when I shared a bedroom with my younger sister, as my inability to sleep would keep her up, too. The only thing worse than a cranky, perpetually sleepy eight year old is a cranky, perpetually sleepy six year old. So my mom would help me do these dumb breathing exercises, similar to meditation, to try and calm my racing thoughts and help me drift off to la la land. That night, I had laid in bed counting slowly to ten and imagining lush green fields, trying to summon some semblance of peace to my bedside, but it was mostly in vain. After having someone break into the Manor, I was on edge, and I was not coming back down from it.

  So when my alarm, which I had set as a substitute for my malfunctioning curtains-charm, went off, I was already wide awake. I had been staring at the clock, watching the razor-thin second hand tick for what felt like hours and hours. Luna had not fared much better. She was curled up against my back, purring but awake. I knew that was probably at least partially my fault; a witch and her familiar had an inextricable connection. If I was having trouble sleeping, if I was in distress, then it was likely my familiar would be going through the same thing.

  I reached out and turned off the alarm clock, groaning. “My moon, last night sucked,” I grumbled as I turned over in bed to pet Luna’s soft little head. She yawned and stretched, her rough pink tongue lolling out for a moment.

  “Tell me about it,” she griped. “I hardly got a wink of sleep.”

  “Yeah. Who would have thought it might be a little difficult to relax after catching someone in the act of breaking and entering?” I pointed out sarcastically.

  “I wonder if Lara and Miss Priss got any rest,” she mused.

  I shook my head as I propped myself up on my elbow. “Probably not. I mean, Lara did say she was going to stay up all night to keep watch.”

  “True. Man, what a night. I still can’t believe we had a genuine intruder last night,” Luna said, shivering uncomfortably. “What is going on in this town? Didn’t it used to be so safe here in Moonlight Cove? Now we’ve got murderers and poisoners and intruders left and right. There goes the neighborhood.”

  “Well, luckily, Xander and I are going to get to the bottom of this. At least, we’re going to figure out the poisoning thing. The other stuff, though,” I trailed off, sighing.

  “Do we have any guests coming in today?” Luna asked, pawing gently at my face.

  “Nope. Thank the moon, we’ve got an open slot today. Good thing, too, because I’m so tired I doubt I would make the most enthusiastic hostess at the moment,” I said.

  “Well, no use languishing around in bed all day,�
� she said, getting to her feet and hopping off the bed. “I’m hungry, and I bet Lara and Lucy are, too.”

  I raised an eyebrow and followed after her, sliding out of bed. “Since when are you so concerned about Lucy’s well-being?” I asked.

  She rolled her eyes. “Just because she and I are fighting doesn’t mean I want bad things to happen to her. I’m taking the high road,” she declared rather proudly.

  I grinned and bent down to scoop her into my arms, kissing her on the nose. “You’re a good soul, Lu. Truly. Even if you try to hide it sometimes,” I cooed.

  “Hey now, don’t press your luck,” she quipped, wriggling out of my arms. “Come on. Get dressed. It’s a brand new day.”

  Following her advice, I managed to drag myself into the bathroom and open my closet. I picked out a dark gray sweater with silvery threads sewn into the pattern, black boot-cut jeans, my usual black boots, a bottle-green scarf made of a light, breathable material, and then scraped my long dark hair back into a ponytail. I leaned close to the mirror and applied some quick mascara and lip gloss, wrinkling my nose at the bags under my eyes. Oh well.

  “You know what I think might be nice?” I mused aloud, looking myself in the mirror thoughtfully. Luna shrugged.

  “One of those gigantic cat trees with the built-in scratching post and a catnip trough?” she suggested hopefully.

  I laughed and scratched her softly behind the ears. “Unfortunately no. Not that. I was thinking more along the lines of running down to the Magic Bean to pick up some coffee and breakfast for Lara. I bet she’d appreciate that after the night we had.”

  Luna nodded. “Sounds good to me. If they have any cat-friendly treats in the display case by chance, could you pick up a couple of them?”

  “Sure thing, Lu,” I told her. I very, very quietly tiptoed downstairs to check on Lara and Lucy before heading out. Just as I suspected, the two of them were conked out on the couch, the Game Show Network still playing softly in the background. I smiled as I grabbed my purse and stepped out into the brisk, slightly drizzly morning air. I took an umbrella with me, since I knew I wouldn’t be able to rely on my magic to keep me dry. I’d have to do things the old-fashioned way for the time being. And it was much easier to hold an umbrella on foot than by broom, so I just started strolling along.