Crooks and Crystals (A Hocus Pocus Cozy Witch Mystery Series Book 3)

by Constance Barker

  She pondered on each suspect trying to consider who had the greatest motive, opportunity and means. From what she could make of Helen, she seemed like the sort of witch who would cast a spell on anyone who got in her way but would she actually kill someone?

  All things had to be considered; she had watched and helped with enough investigations to know that the killer isn’t always the obvious suspect.

  Celestial bit her bottom lip as she considered the other two suspects: Morgana and Samantha. She had pretty much discounted Morgana; she was either an excellent actor or she was, in fact, innocent.

  Samantha was the typical secretary; the one portrayed in every murder mystery as the naive brunette bimbo who has an affair with her boss and claims she didn’t know he was married. She definitely looked shocked when she found out that Martin was seeing Helen too. It would be wrong to discount her though, just because she wasn’t as confident and sassy as Helen. Celestial’s mother always said those that make the least noise hold onto the most anger.

  She sighed and wondered if anyone should really be bothering to find out who killed such a lousy human being.

  Celestial was still pondering the suspect’s motives when Stella and Bella appeared through the wall each clutching the arm of a male ghost.

  “Hi Celestial, how ya’ll doing?” Stella drawled. “We would like to introduce you to Stan and Dan.” She pushed both men forward presenting them like they were on a quiz show.

  Celestial rolled her eyes. “Stan and Dan?”

  “Yep, they’re twins too and yes, those are their real names,” said Bella smiling up at Dan.

  Celestial cast a glance at Athena and Tamara who had both just landed by the shelf of hair-restorer creams before giving Stan and Dan an easy smile. “It’s very nice to meet you both.”

  Athena turned to her butterfly friend. “Where on earth do they keep coming up with these men? I mean is there a dating app for ghosts?”

  Tamara giggled.

  Bella turned towards Athena and Tamara and flicked her ghostly hair. “At least we can get a date.” She screwed up her nose at them before looking to Celestial. “Should we ask some of our ghostly friends for recommendations for you? I’m sure we could find someone.”

  “Erm, no please don’t trouble yourself. It’s very kind of you but I think I’m good,” said Celestial looking rather frightened.

  “She’s waiting for Nikoli,” said Athena with a buzz of her wings.

  Celestial began a look of horror as the door opened and Nikoli walked in.

  “What is she waiting for me for?” he asked, before smiling at Celestial, his eyes twinkling.

  “Oh erm . . . just . . . updates, you know . . . on the case.”

  Nikoli nodded his head slowly, his eyes still twinkling at her. Celestial cleared her throat and averted her eyes as everyone in the room began to laugh.

  “There’s something I’m missing here isn’t there?” he said narrowing his eyes and searching around the room.

  “No, of course not,” Athena interjected. “We were all just discussing men.”

  Nikoli raised his eyebrows as he gazed at the smirks painted on the faces of all those in the room.

  He shook his head and looked across at Celestial, “No, I’m afraid I don’t have anything new for you.”

  Celestial fiddled with the label on a small bottle and tried her best to sound casual. “Oh that’s a shame. So why are you here?”

  “I was rather hoping you might have something for me,” he said trying to look into her eyes as he watched her cheeks turn from rosy pink to ruby red.

  The room fell silent and all heads swiveled towards Celestial.

  “Not really,” she answered whilst trying to gather herself. “Although I have been thinking about our top three suspects and who had the biggest motive, who had opportunity and who had the means.”

  “Wow,” said Stan, stepping forward, “this is like an episode of Miss Marple. You should put the suspect’s names and motives on a whiteboard so you can see any connections.”

  Stella stared at Stan incredulously. “Miss Marple, are you serious? Your cool dude rating just fell like a hundred points!”

  Bella and Athena giggled at this and Nikoli smiled tightly as he made his way to the door.

  “If you do come up with any conclusions on that whiteboard Celestial, be sure to let me know.”

  Celestial held up her hand. “Will do, as long as you do the same. It doesn’t matter what time it is as I’m not sleeping anyway.”

  “I know who to call for a late night chat then,” he said before winking and walking out of the door.

  Celestial had an incredible urge to follow him out of the shop; if just to get some cool air to her cheeks, which were now burning.

  Chapter 14

  Celestial still had remnants of a blush on her face from her interaction with Nikoli. She was considering getting back at her friends for almost revealing her crush with a little prank or a sneaky spell, but she decided to focus on the case first.

  Nikoli had mentioned that there weren’t any updates from the police station, but she figured she could make some headway on her own if she put her mind to it. With a little research, she figured she could even solve the murder.

  Celestial made her way to a small bookshop that had just opened a few blocks from her own store to do some research. She had heard that The Spell Book had a variety of tomes, scrolls, and books about herbs. With a little luck, Celestial thought that she could find a book with more information on the type of drug that was used to kill Martin.

  The Spell Book was a quaint little store like hers, and the exterior resembled a small cottage. There was a hand-painted wooden sign on the front door indicating that the store was open, but as Celestial slipped inside, there wasn’t a single person in sight.

  “Hello, anyone here?” She called, but when silence came as her answer, she shrugged and decided to poke around anyway. After all, the sign did say the store was open.

  She browsed each of the tightly stocked shelves for reading materials that might give her some insight into Martin’s death. Eventually, after skimming past several unhelpful sources, Celestial stumbled upon a book about natural narcotics.

  “Perfect!” She gasped, thumbing through the pages until she found the one she was looking for. Celestial took advantage of the empty store and read out loud. “Heroin is an addictive, illegal drug that is derived from morphine. Morphine is a natural substance that is extracted from the seeds of the poppy plant.”

  Her brows creased as she read the words on the page, and her eyes widened as she spotted a paragraph that talked about the “China White” version of heroin. “Commonly known as fentanyl, this substance is most often linked to heroin overdoses. It is often more expensive, and can be dissolved with water and injected.”

  She also learned that other forms were also injectable, but “China White” was the most common and most easily found. Although the medical examiner had revealed that Martin wasn’t a habitual shooter of the drug, he had noted that there are other ways to take it. Still, Celestial couldn’t figure out who could have gotten close enough to Martin to inject heroin between his toes.

  Celestial closed the book with a smile, satisfied with herself. Almost certain that this was the strain of drug that killed Martin, she decided she needed to poke around his office to be sure.

  Nikoli’s disappointed face popped up in her mind, and she knew he would not approve of her snooping among the victim's belongings. She quickly shook away the image and shrugged. “He may have told me not to sneak into the victim’s houses but he didn’t say anything about snooping in anyone’s office.”

  With that thought, Celestial whipped up an apparation spell and poofed out of the book store. She landed with a bang inside of Martin’s old workplace expecting to draw attention to herself, but quickly found that the offices were all locked up. George was nowhere in sight, and Celestial figured that he must have been at home mourning the loss of his f
riend.

  After locating an office that had Martin’s name on the door, Celestial hurried to search for a key. The apparation spell took a lot out of her, so she took a moment to recover while she tried to find another way inside. She came across a supply cabinet that looked as if it might hold some spare keys, but found something much more interesting.

  A first aid kit sat on the shelf, and once she opened it, Celestial noticed that a small vial was tucked into one of the pockets. It looked extremely out of place among the band-aids and topical ointments. “Maybe a secret stash of narcotics?” She whispered to herself, but as soon as she started to open the bottle, she heard a set of keys jangling around in the door behind her. Curses!

  Her hand flew to her lips, and she hoped that whoever it was on the other side of the door didn’t hear her talking to herself. Luckily, before she could come face to face with that person, she called on the remaining ounce of magical strength she had left to poof out of the office.

  After struggling more than usual to open the locked door to her old office building, Samantha finally entered with an irritated huff. Taking a deep breath to calm herself down, she scrunched up her nose as she picked up a strange smell about the office.

  As she trudged to her desk, she spoke angrily under her breath and covered her nostrils. “They shouldn’t have stopped cleaning this place. Everything in here smells like sulfur.”

  Although her original intent was to clean the rest of her belongings out of the office, a better idea struck her. Back when she and Martin were on good terms, they would oftentimes participate in risque photo shoots to have a little fun. With all the commotion, those photos were forgotten, but Samantha figured it was the right time to get those back.

  “Wouldn’t want those falling into the wrong hands,” she said with a blush as she reached for the handle to Martin’s office door.

  As if on queue, George came in to interrupt her plans. Samantha cursed to herself. It was as if Martin was trying to prevent snooping from beyond the grave.

  “Can I help you?” George asked, crossing his arms.

  Samantha smiled warmly, but she was sweating heavily. “I was just getting the last of my things.”

  George narrowed his eyebrows. “Getting the last of your things from Martin’s office?” He asked, pointing out that her hands were still wrapped around her late boss’ door.

  Giggling nervously, Samantha shook her head. “Oops, that’s not my office.” She headed for her own desk and packed her stuff quickly under George’s watchful eye.

  Once she finished, George swiped her keys away. “You won’t be needing these anymore. Time to leave.” He gestured towards the door, and she reluctantly took her leave.

  On her way out, she thought that George had bounced back pretty quickly for someone who was supposed to be grieving. She recognized that everyone grieves differently, but George didn’t take much time at all, and seemed like he was in a hurry to get rid of her. Could George have wanted to snoop around too?

  Chapter 15

  After nearly being caught snooping around Martin’s office, Celestial was extremely frustrated. She had been so close to finding out what was in the vial. It seemed as if every time she was about to make a break in the case, something or someone came along to get in her way. What good was apparating if she was always being interrupted?

  In the back room of her store, she lounged on the couch as she thought through everything she had seen in the first aid kit. It hadn’t looked like it was heroin, and there weren’t any needles in the kit, but she couldn’t be too sure.

  She wondered if she should tell Nikoli what she had seen. However, she knew how much he disapproved whenever she came across evidence after snooping. Celestial could see him now with his gorgeous face all twisted in anger, and she decided that it wasn’t worth calling him about.

  Instead, she decided to find out what George had been up to. The talk about the town had been that George was at home mourning, but others were saying that he seemed unbothered by his friend’s passing. Celestial wanted to take on the gossip and find out the truth, so she stopped by George’s house to pay him a visit.

  Before she was able to knock on his door, she heard George yelling on the phone inside. While she debated disturbing him, George stormed out of the garage, got into his car, and drove away, all without even glancing at Celestial. She figured that whoever he was speaking to had made him so angry that he wasn’t thinking straight.

  Still, she wasn’t ready to go home empty handed. She used her magic to follow George’s path and ended up at one of the local pubs. Celestial slipped inside and took a seat a few tables away from George, but she was close enough to hear what he was saying.

  He spoke to the bartender about his troubles. “I can’t believe those model trains were out of stock.” George shook his head before downing a drink. “I already paid for the entire collection, and now the seller said they’re sold out.”

  Celestial wrinkled her nose and tried hard to stifle a laugh. She thought that he would have been yelling about something a little more serious than model trains. Celestial stuck around a little longer to see if he would mention the death of his business partner, but George never did. She would have to dig further when George wasn’t drunk.

  Instead, Celestial figured that this was the perfect time to apparate back to Martin’s old office and finish her investigation. With George tied up at the bar, she knew she wouldn’t have any interruptions for the rest of the night.

  After making sure nobody at the bar had seen her trying to eavesdrop, Celestial hurried into a back alley and quickly apparated back to the office. She went straight back to the cabinet and opened up the first aid kit once again.

  She pulled out the vial she had observed earlier, but as soon as she opened it, she recognized it as a basic healing potion. It was one that was sold at stores all around town, and wasn’t as incriminating as she had hoped. However, as she kept digging in the kit, she found a bottle full of empty pill capsules.

  “Now that’s something worth looking into,” she whispered to herself. Each of the capsules looked as if they had been twisted and opened by hand, and the powder that was supposed to be inside was all gone. Usually, pills such as these would have been ingested with the capsules, so it was immediately suspicious to Celestial.

  Under a tiny flap on the inside of the kit, there was a packet full of fine white powder. It seemed like it could be the missing powder from the pill capsules, but Celestial never liked to assume when it came to an investigation.

  To find more information before drawing any conclusions, she decided to poke around in both Martin’s office and Samantha’s desks. The relationship that Athena spoke about between the two definitely made Samantha a suspect, although Celestial didn’t think she did it. Still, it was worth investigating to see if she could link Samantha to the drugs that Martin died from.

  She started with Samantha’s desk. While she took time to recover from her apparation, she went through every cupboard and dug inside every drawer. They were mostly empty, despite a few things left over such as standard office supplies. Celestial realized that it must have been Samantha who had interrupted her snooping, most likely to clean out her personal belongings.

  Just as she was about to give up, Celestial had an idea. She moved down to the floor and scooted under the desk. Confined in the small space, she lifted her hands and swiped them across the underside of the wooden surface. Taped beneath the desk, was a small packet that Celestial carefully removed to examine.

  Her eyes grew wide when she observed the small bag. It seemed to be very similar to the one she found inside the kit. Could Samantha and Martin have used drugs together? Celestial wasn’t sure, but knew she had to search Martin’s desk as well.

  The energy she had spent apparating early was now fully restored, so she easily poofed into Martin’s office with all of the evidence she had gathered already. His office looked generally undisturbed, and she felt confident that nobody had snoo
ped through it before her.

  In Martin’s old desk, which was much more full than Samantha’s, she was expecting and hoping to find something related to heroin. However, as she went through piles of papers and books, she didn’t have as much luck as she did earlier.

  However, in a small drawer, tucked away very secretively, Celestial pulled out an envelope that was stuffed with pictures. She thought they might be related to the case, but was shocked to see that they were something very different.

  Holding up one of the photos, she blushed as she came face to face with a picture of Samantha in lingerie. She knew from Athena that Samantha and Martin had been in some sort of relationship, but she wasn’t prepared to see how close they truly were.

  After quickly sifting through the photos while cringing, just to be sure that none of them contained evidence of drug use, Celestial stuffed the photos back into the envelope and tossed it into the drawer. It wasn’t what she was looking for, but the other evidence she had found was bound to help the case. Proud of what she found, Celestial summoned Athena to talk over the evidence.

  Chapter 16

  Celestial waited for Athena to arrive and scanned about the office a little more. It wasn’t particularly suspicious on its own but it was clear that there was more going on. And had the police and Nikoli really not found the powder in the first aid kit? It wasn’t well hidden other than being in an out of the way place. Now there were a few more pieces to the puzzle but nothing was really fitting together quite yet.