Witch Me Luck

by K. J. Emrick

  Addie squeezed his hand before letting go. “Yes, we are. Just trust me.”

  “I do. I really do, but…”

  They were standing at the entrance to the armory room again, with the empty suits of armor lined up on either side, the battle axes and pikes and other weapons hanging from the walls, the glass display cases containing relics from a time long past. This was where Addie had tried her spell to find the missing weapon. At the time, she thought that spell had failed.

  It wasn’t going to fail this time.

  “Addie, we already decided that Roderick was our killer. That means no one hit him on the head.”

  “Unless,” she suggested, “he hit himself with something.”

  He sort of shrugged at that. “Maybe. That puts us back to not knowing who our killer is.”

  “Then this will prove it.”

  “Or disprove it?”

  “Exactly. I told you not to get ahead of yourself. Now shush, and let the witch do her work.”

  Repeating her motions from before, she waved her hand through the air, fingers crooked just so, calling on her Essence and mouthing the words to the incantation. She had to take a breath, and then another. She was really starting to feel the drain on her resources. Thankfully this was a quick spell to cast, and then the magic spread out across the room, just like it had before. A wave of barely visible energy enveloped the room around them, looking for traces of human blood.

  When the spell struck against the second suit of armor on the right, just like before, she heard the sound that could only mean one thing.

  Plong.

  “There,” she said, smiling as she took another deep breath and let it out again. “Our weapon is right there.”

  “Addie, we already tried this,” Lucian said, discouraged by going through the motions all over again. “We checked that mace-thing in that knight’s hand. There’s nothing on it. That wasn’t the weapon used to club Roderick in the head. I think that proves Roderick is our killer, don’t you?”

  “I know the mace isn’t the weapon,” she said, refusing to let his disappointment catch her, too. “And I know we looked here before. Last time, we weren’t looking in the right place.”

  “We’re looking in exactly the same place, aren’t we? Are you telling me it was the wrong place before but it’s the right place now?”

  “Sort of.”

  “Addie…”

  “Just trust me, and shush,” she said again. “Watch.”

  She took in the utilitarian elegance of the armor. The breastplate was worked with intricate designs that were faded with age. The chainmail was made from hundreds of intricately linked metal rings, all forged and fastened together by hand. In a deadly sort of way, it was beautiful.

  It was also hollow.

  Everything was held in place on a skeleton of articulated metal braces. The breastplate was connected to a back brace by leather straps on the sides, creating a container of sorts. Addie could only imagine how many tourists had been through here and flicked bubble gum wrappers and scraps of paper and worse into the open face of the helmet over the years.

  Of course, she’d seen that before, but it hadn’t clicked for her until after she’d had some time to think about it. Then the idea had come to her that something else might have been put inside. Something far more important than discarded candy wrappers.

  Standing up on her tiptoes, she steadied herself, and then slipped her hand in through the opening at the armor’s throat. She reached in, down as far as she could, and felt around. Her fingertips felt nothing but the chainmail shirt under the armor.

  “You think it’s inside?” Lucian asked, catching on to what she was doing.

  “I know it’s inside. I just don’t have long enough arms.”

  “We could dismantle the suit,” Lucian suggested, looking around at the series of buckles and metal clasps that held the thing together. “If I had a few tools. Or we could…?”

  “Go in through the codpiece?” she said with a wry smile.

  He twisted his hips at the mental image her suggestion created. “Uh, not where I was going with that.”

  “Don’t worry,” she told him. “I’ve got a better idea.”

  She put her hand up to the empty space where a knight’s face would have been and splayed her fingers out wide. She stuck the tip of her tongue out of the side of her mouth and concentrated. This spell was tricky. It had to do with changing the properties of the air around her skin, changing the structure from oxygen and nitrogen to nickel and iron. Just temporarily. Just long enough to create a magnetic attraction between her hand and what she knew had to be waiting for her.

  The chainmail thrummed as the spell spread its magic, pulling against the skeletal mannequin framework, attracted to the magnetic field she was creating. The armor pieces rattled against each other. Addie felt a bead of perspiration trickle down the back of her neck as she held the power there at her hand just a moment longer…

  And then she felt something long and slender slap into her hand. The metal rod had been lying loose inside the armor, where the killer had placed it, and now it practically jumped up into her palm. She held onto it tightly as she let the spell dissipate, listening to the armor and the chainmail resettle itself.

  Her vision blurred for a moment, but then it cleared. She’d been using her magic a lot in the last few hours. Her body was telling her to take it easier. Now that they had found what they needed to solve the mystery, she should be able to do just that.

  Assuming Belladonna wasn’t waiting to pull any of her tricks. Well. If that happened, she would have to deal with it the best she could, witch to witch.

  She pulled the weapon out, about fifteen inches long, until she could show it to Lucian.

  His eyes got very wide, and he let out a soft whistle that echoed around the room.

  “Exactly,” she said. “Now we know who the killer is.”

  “I’ll have Alex round up our remaining suspects,” Lucian said. “I think we should do this in the security office. Roderick is already waiting for us there, after all.”

  “My thoughts exactly. It’s time to put this mystery to rest.”

  As they turned away, Addie sucked at the tip of her right forefinger. It had started stinging a moment ago. She must have pricked it on the armor, she supposed. Hopefully she wouldn’t need a tetanus shot.

  CHAPTER 9

  T he security office had seemed cramped before, with just Roderick in it. Now, there was Addie and Lucian and Alex, and their remaining two suspects. Roderick, and Marcelle.

  This room was a crime scene, but they had gotten everything out of it they could already. Photographs, measurements, and all the rest. Now, it was going to be where they did their final interviews. The other officers who had shown up, finally, had assisted in the final parts of the investigation, and now everything was leading up to this.

  Besides. It only seemed fitting to have everything wrapped up here, right where it began.

  They had rearranged the room a bit, so that the chairs for their suspects were off to one side. Roderick and Marcelle had no choice but to face the room and the stain of blood where Sheila Davenport had died. Addie and Lucian stood in the middle of the room. Alex Candor stood with his back to the door, all five feet and a few inches of him, making sure no one got in or out. They wanted privacy for this.

  “All right,” Lucian said, getting things started. “Both of you are here to see the conclusion of our case. Addie Kilorian and I have discovered who the killer is, and we wanted everyone together when we reveal his identity.”

  Marcelle looked at Roderick. Roderick looked at his shoes. Obviously, neither of them was going to jump up and confess. That was fine with Addie. They didn’t need a confession to solve this murder.

  “Hey, Lucian?” Alex asked. “Not to sound like a broken record but are we sure your girlfriend should be in here?”

  Lucian sent him a look. “Yes, I’m sure. She’s helped the department before, and jus
t like all those other times, I couldn’t have solved this one without her help.”

  “She’s not registered as an official police consultant. There’s protocols.”

  “Addie and her sisters are some of the best consultants we have, official or otherwise. It’s my decision, and she stays.”

  Alex shrugged and leaned his back against the door. “Fine by me. I was just checking.”

  When there were no other objections, Addie said, “This is what we know. Let’s start with the obvious. Sheila Davenport was not a nice person.”

  Marcelle snorted, crossing his arms over his thin chest. “This is not news to me,” he said, his French accent edged with nervousness. “Which is why I sent her packing, as you say, just as soon as I found out the horrible things she had done in her past.”

  Lucian nodded. “Which is also why you might have killed her.”

  “Pardon? Lucian, my friend, you can not believe I did this.”

  “Unfortunately, Marcelle, I could.” Lucian didn’t sound happy to admit it. “There’s a lot of evidence that points to you as the killer. Your past relationship with Sheila is part of it. The things she did is another. She was starting to make trouble for you, harassing you, pestering you to take her back. We all saw the scene here in the museum and how you reacted to seeing her.”

  He sniffed as he pursed his lips. “Yes. Well, that was not one of my finest moments, I admit. C’etait de ma faute. It was just a little slip, is all.”

  “You tried to choke her,” Addie pointed out. “That’s not a little slip. That’s attempted assault. If Sheila wasn’t dead now, there’s a very good chance that Lucian would have arrested you tomorrow morning.”

  “Fine. Écœurant. No, really, that is just wonderful. I have been harassed by this woman, and hounded by this woman, and now that she is dead I am to be accused of her murder? No, I say! Tell me this. How could I have killed Sheila, when I was busy all night with this wonderful ceremony where my good friend was receiving his award, hmm?”

  “I’m afraid that doesn’t give you an alibi,” Lucian said. “You weren’t in the dining hall for most of the night. All you had to do was unlock the security office after Sheila was inside, step in, and surprise Roderick from behind. It’s like you told us before. Nobody knows this museum like you do. You would certainly know how best to get from point A to point B without anyone seeing you.”

  Marcelle made a helpless gesture with his hand. “You have no proof that was me.”

  “We have Roderick’s statement. According to your own security guard, he heard the door lock being undone and figured he didn’t need to turn around to see who it was, because only museum personnel have the combination to his office. You, and him.”

  “Well, oui, that is true, however…”

  “Those number pad locks have nearly endless combinations. Someone had to know exactly how to open it. The list of who could do that is pretty small.”

  “But I swear…”

  “Also,” Lucian said, “Roderick told us that he saw Sheila looking at the person who came in to kill her. From her expression, he could tell that she knew the person. She was afraid of him.”

  “And so you thought of me?”

  “Yes. That’s two strikes against you, Marcelle, because you had the combination, and Sheila definitely knew you.”

  “Yeah,” Roderick spoke for the first time. His voice was a low rumble as he lifted his big head to focus his stare on Marcelle. “That’s right. You know, I never liked you much, Mister Marcelle LeBlanc. You’re a shifty little man, always smiling at the wrong times. Waving your hands around. Stuff like that. Plus, I don’t like your hair.”

  Marcelle put a hand to the top of his head, feeling down the arrow-straight line of the part. “Why? What is wrong with my hair?”

  The two men glared at each other, finding faults that had nothing to do with murder.

  “Actually, Roderick,” Addie said, “none of this gets you off the hook, either.”

  The big man’s narrow eyes blinked rapidly. “What? You can’t possibly…why would you…?” Now it was him making wild gestures with his hands as he pointed to the bandages around his head. “I got hit from behind while I was watching that woman in here! What do you think I did, hit myself?”

  “That is a definite possibility,” Addie said. “After all, you were a wrestler once upon a time. You learn how to take a hit in that profession, don’t you?”

  “Well, sure.”

  “Exactly. You could have killed Sheila, and then whacked your head with something hard enough to give yourself a concussion, and a decent alibi. Then all you had to do was wait until you could hear voices outside the door and stumble out so people could see you.

  “Lady,” he said directly, “I ain’t that smart.”

  “Maybe, maybe not. We’re just walking you through the evidence as we found it.”

  “Hey, guys?” Alex Candor asked from the door. “This is really fascinating, and all, but can we get to the point? I want to arrest the killer so we can go home.”

  “Arrest him!” Marcelle said, pointing to Roderick at the same time that Roderick pointed back and said, “Arrest him!”

  Then they sat there, glaring at each other again.

  Lucian nodded his head. “Well. The point is that we had plenty of reasons to suspect both you, Marcelle, and you, Roderick. In this case there was only one killer, however, and we had to prove it was one of you or the other. We had all these pieces put together, and the two of you were our only real suspects. At the same time,” he added, “we had reasons to believe both of you were innocent.”

  The relief on the men’s faces was almost comical. Addie just smiled, because she knew what was coming next, and she knew the killer was not going to like it one bit.

  “In Marcelle’s case,” Lucian continued, “we noticed that his hands were immaculate and clean, as were his clothes, even though whoever did this had to have gotten some of Sheila’s blood on him.”

  Marcelle started to stand up, believing he was exonerated. “A-ha, you see?”

  Lucian held up a hand to keep him where he was. “But then we found a shirt stained with blood and discarded in the trash, and we realized the killer had brought a change of clothes with him. It was a short shirt. Phi—” He had to stop before he blurted out the name of their angel cohort. “I mean, a friend of ours who found it pointed out how short the shirt was. It was far too small to belong to Roderick. He would have looked like the Incredible Hulk trying to put that shirt on.”

  Marcelle plopped back in his seat.

  Lucian wasn’t done yet. “Add in the pair of gloves I found in the same trash can just a few minutes ago, and that could be why there was no blood on those perfectly manicured fingernails. So really, that’s another reason to believe it was you, Marcelle.”

  Roderick began to laugh, until Lucian turned his police officer sights on him. “In your case, Roderick, I refused to believe that anyone would be foolish enough to bring the victim into their private office, just the two of them, and then commit murder. Even if you did bang your own head to provide an alibi… I just wasn’t buying it.”

  For a moment, Roderick leaned back in his chair, smug and secure in his innocence.

  Until Lucian said, “But then we realized we were looking for an accomplice of Sheila’s, not someone she had stolen money from. She had a partner when she stole from all those men. A partner who was scaring her victims into staying silent. A partner who might just have had an argument with her, right here in this room. An argument that ended in murder. That sounds a lot like it could be you.”

  Roderick scowled again. He wasn’t off the hook.

  “Uh, boss?” Alex interrupted again, shifting from foot to foot at the door. “Where are you going with this?”

  “We started with a murder,” Lucian said, tracing their evidence from the start. “We found out that Sheila used to fleece money from men, after sleeping with them. After taking their money she would leave them br
oke and angry. Then her partner would threaten the victims to keep them quiet.”

  All eyes were on him. Addie loved watching him when he was in his element like this.

  “Now. Fast forward to the evidence we found. We located the change of clothes in the garbage, which told us this murder was premeditated. We knew our killer was in the museum. We just needed one crucial piece of evidence to point us to the murderer.”

  “What?” both suspects asked at once.

  “The weapon used to smack you in the head,” Lucian said with a nod to Roderick. “Once we found that, it cleared you as a suspect completely, big guy. You didn’t knock yourself out. Someone did it to you.”

  “Hmph. Told you so,” Roderick grumped.

  Marcelle’s eyes went wide with panic. “So… me? You are going to arrest me?”

  Lucian waited a moment, and then said, “No. The weapon we found clears you too, old friend. You’ll see why in a minute.”

  The breath Marcelle had been holding in came out all at once in a loud raspberry, like a skinny balloon that was deflating.

  “Wait,” Alex said, bewildered. “We’re here to arrest the killer. If neither of these two did it, then who did?”

  Lucian turned around and looked at him. “You’re asking me who the killer is?’

  “Yeah, I’m asking you who the killer is. You might be the detective, and I’m just a lowly patrol officer, but even I know when there’s a murder somebody had to do it. So who did it?”

  “That would be… you.”

  The look on the short man’s face was one of utter surprise. His jaw dropped slowly open as he returned Lucian’s direct stare. “I couldn’t have heard you right, Detective. You meant to say it was one of these two guys, right?”

  Addie stood side by side with Lucian and faced Alex now, too. “It was you. There’s no doubt about it. You weren’t here tonight to honor Lucian. You came here specifically to kill Sheila Davenport.”

  There were gasps from behind them, Marcelle and Roderick both, but from Alex all they got was a scowl. “That’s ridiculous. How can you say that?”

  “Because it’s true,” Lucian said. “That’s why. You’re a killer, Alex, and you’re going to pay for what you did.”