Wedding Bells And Magic Spells Box Set

by A. R. Winters

  Then came an awkward pause. I wasn’t very good at phone conversations.

  “I’m… calling about Annabelle again. Have you heard from her since I spoke to you yesterday?”

  “No, she’s gone completely off the radar, Jack. I even went by her house to see if she’d been there, but she seems to have disappeared for the time being.”

  There was another pause on the other end of the line. “This doesn’t look good, Aria.”

  I glanced down at my top before realizing he didn’t mean literally and he didn’t mean me.

  “No, I suppose it doesn’t. I’m sorry, Jack, but I don’t know what to tell you. I’m sure she has nothing to do with the… incident, but I guess she doesn’t even want to be associated with it. She must have gone into hiding until the whole thing has blown over.”

  “Blown over? It won’t blow over until we catch the killer.”

  “That’s what I mean,” I said. “I’m sure she’ll come back once you’ve caught the killer.”

  “Right. Yes.” There was a pause while an unspoken if your mom isn’t the killer made itself comfortable. “If you hear anything, please let me know.”

  “I will—I promise.” I wasn’t lying, either. I’d had enough of my mother’s antics and I wouldn’t cover for her anymore.

  Ding!

  “I’ve got to go. There’s someone here. Talk soon, Jack.”

  “Take care.”

  At the door was Sarah in an astoundingly garish purple dress, and clutched in her fist was her scrapbook.

  “Hi, guys!” she greeted us.

  Kiwi replied with a happy squawk.

  “Hi, Sarah,” I said distractedly.

  “What’s up? Who was that on the phone?”

  I wandered across the room and sat down in the armchair where my mother had sat the day before.

  “That was Jack. They’re looking for Mom.”

  “Oh?” Sarah walked over and sat down in the other chair and began to fiddle with her braids.

  “They want to question her again. Jack’s been looking for her a few days now, but she’s been hiding from him.”

  “Well… that doesn’t sound good.”

  Sarah had a frown on her face and I knew what she was thinking.

  “Oh, no, it’s not that. She isn’t on the run because she killed Sandra.”

  “Why’s she hiding then? Just to avoid the hassle?”

  I shook my head. “Actually, the reason she’s hiding is kind of funny. Though now that she’s completely disappeared, I am beginning to worry a little about her.”

  Sarah leaned in, hands on her knees and a handful of braids flowing either side. “Oh?”

  “The night we found Sandra, Mom was at the house before I arrived, right?”

  Sarah hadn’t been there but of course she knew the general details. “Right. She was mad at Sandra because of Donovan and went there to hash it out.”

  “Yep. But actually, she wasn’t just going there to yell at Sandra. She planned to cast a spell on her.”

  Sarah’s face darkened. “Not a death spell, I take it?”

  “Nope. She actually cast a weight gain spell on her. To make her balloon up—literally. I guess she wanted to make her less attractive so Donovan wouldn’t want her. That, and just to punish her.”

  “Oh wow, that’s mean.”

  I shrugged. It was a bit nasty, but it was standard operating procedure for Mom. While I generally don’t use my magic to affect other people’s lives, she most certainly did. ‘What’s the point in being a witch if you don’t use your magic,’ is what she always said.

  “But here’s the thing. It didn’t work. Somehow the spell backfired and landed on Mom!”

  “Ooh!” said Sarah, pushing her palms together and holding them in front of her mouth.

  “Yep. So get this—my mom is now the size of, well, two or three of her regular self.”

  “No way!” She slapped her hands down on top of her thighs.

  “Yes way,” I said awkwardly. “And her hair’s gone frizzy, her skin’s blotchy and greasy, and the only clothes she’s got to wear are ripped elastic pants and a big old winter jacket.”

  Sarah shook her head at the very thought of it all.

  “What’s going to happen to her?”

  “Who knows?” I lifted up one shoulder. “Anyway, last I saw her, she said she had some kind of plan to get the weight back off. But she wouldn’t tell me what it is. She said I wouldn’t approve.” I rolled my eyes as I told her the last part.

  Sarah gave me a wry smile. “You and her do have slightly different moral codes.”

  “Yes, just a bit!” I said with my customary understatement.

  “Does Donovan know?”

  “Nope. I saw him yesterday and he was looking for her too. I don’t think he knows about her little magical mishap. She wouldn’t dare show herself in front of him looking like she does now. No, I don’t think we’re going to see Annabelle Whitmore again until she’s back to her old superficial self.”

  Sarah leaned back in the chair, looking like she was enjoying its comfort. The way a person sits after they’ve done a solid day’s work and has earned their rest.

  “These chairs are really cozy, aren’t they? Sometimes I think we get so caught up in all our work, we don’t take enough time to sit back and relax.”

  “That is certainly true of some people,” I said noncommittally. I didn’t bother to say the rest. Even though she wasn’t the hardest or most reliable worker, she did what she needed to do—usually—and she had amazing rapport with the customers.

  “Anyway,” said Sarah, stretching her arms over her head and yawning. “It might be for the best that your mother is missing. If no one can find her, no one can arrest her. And you certainly don’t need that kind of publicity.”

  I was forced to agree with her. I knew from personal experience that being linked to a murder could be horrible for business. I’d barely recovered from the last unfortunate incident when a bride had turned up dead overnight just a few inches from where we were currently sitting.

  “I suppose you’re right.”

  “And of course, it gives you time to find out who the real killer is,” said Sarah with a cheeky grin.

  “Why is it always on me?” I asked with an exaggerated sigh.

  Sarah lowered her arms, shrugged, then put her hands behind her head and stretched out her legs.

  “I don’t know, Aria. But we all have our talents and yours are weddings and… well…”

  “Finding murderers?” I suggested.

  “Dead people,” she said, closing her eyes.

  “Gee, thanks.”

  There was no response. It seemed Sarah was just about ready for a nap after a strenuous morning of turning up to work and then sitting down to chat.

  With Mom safe from arrest for now—as long as she stayed in hiding, it gave me a chance to follow up on Randi, Molly, Wanda, and everyone else who had a grudge against Sandra.

  I began to stand up but, catching sight of Sarah looking so relaxed, I decided to treat myself to a few more minutes of quiet rest first. I sat back down, stretched out, closed my eyes and yawned.

  Just a few minutes and I’d be good to go again.

  BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP—

  The sound of my alarm clock woke me from my slumber and I blinked in confusion.

  I was in my shop, in one of the armchairs. Next to me, Sarah was also beginning to stir. I watched her stretch out her right arm and slap it down into the air. The hand didn’t hit anything, and her arm continued to sail down until it slapped into the side of the armchair.

  Sarah opened her eyes and gave a few sleepy blinks.

  BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP—

  Scrubbing my hands over my face, I tried to come to my senses but couldn’t shake off the disorientation. When you hear something in the wrong place, it can be quite disturbing. Imagine if you were on a flight and the engines went silent. Or conversely, you were browsing in a shop and suddenly heard
a full jet engine. Or you were sitting in your shop and heard the alarm clock that you knew for a fact was upstairs in your bedroom.

  “Turn it off,” said Sarah with a grouchy tone.

  BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP—

  “Where is it?” I said, peering around. I was half-asleep and fully bewildered. My sleep-addled brain thought that someone must have snuck in, moved my alarm clock, placed it in the shop, and then set it to go off. It didn’t seem particularly likely, but it was the only thing I could come up with in the moment.

  BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP—

  The beeping sound suddenly launched itself across the room, and landed on the arm of the chair I was sitting on. It was, of course, coming from Kiwi.

  “Stop it!” I yelled at him. “When did you learn how to do that!?”

  He didn’t answer me, of course, not in front of Sarah.

  “Wow!” said Sarah, now fully awake. She clapped her hands in front of Kiwi. “What a clever boy! Good boy!”

  If parrots could grin, then that’s what Kiwi would have been doing right then. Luckily, they couldn’t.

  BEEP BEEP—

  “That’s enough!”

  Kiwi jumped into the air and fluttered off across the shop.

  “I guess he got bored.”

  “He’s so clever,” said Sarah. “You should put him on TV.”

  “Oh, he’s been on the TV.”

  “Really?” Sarah’ eyes had lit up. “What was he on?”

  “He was on the TV.” I maintained my poker face. “And he’s been on the sofa, the table, the bookcase, the chairs, the—”

  “Ha, ha,” said Sarah, clearly not amused.

  “Pretty funny, huh?”

  “No,” she answered curtly.

  “I don’t think he’s well-behaved enough for television anyway. He’d cause a scene.”

  “Right, time to get back to work!” said Sarah, jumping to her feet.

  I blinked up at her in surprise. Sometimes I forgot that she knew what work was.

  “Good idea. I was thinking we might start thinking about a holiday display?”

  Sarah tilted her head as she processed what I said. She paused, then shook her head.

  “I mean this work,” she said, holding out her scrapbook in front of me. “For Sandra.”

  Of course. Not real work, pretend work.

  “Wow. Aren’t you done with that thing yet?”

  Sarah’s hobbies didn’t usually last this long or inspire such dedication as this one had. It may have been because of the tragic death of Sandra, or maybe Sarah had even found her true calling. True hobby calling, anyway.

  She shook her head with a whip of braids.

  “Oh no, it’s not done yet. And I’ve got to finish it. You know what my guru used to say, fo—”

  “Your guru?”

  “You know, from when I went to India. Around the time of the Davenport murder?”

  I shook my head. That is not what I remembered at all.

  “I thought you went to Iowa?”

  She gave me a funny look. “Yeah, India, Iowa. It’s a small town. Very spiritual. That’s where I met my guru, Bob. Anyway, he told me: Sarah, you must never ever, ever, under any circumstances whatsoever, quit something before you’re done.”

  “I’ve seen you quit things since then.”

  “Oh,” she said with a dismissive shake of her head, “it’s a guideline rather than strict law.”

  That’s not what it sounded like to me.

  “But,” she continued, “I’ve decided to follow it this time. I’m going to see this scrapbook through to the end.”

  “And then move on to something else?”

  She shook her head adamantly.

  “No, I’ve found my passion. You’ll be calling me Scrapbook Sarah decades from now. I just love it. Now, are you going to just stand there, or are you going to do some work and help me?”

  “What exactly is it that you’re doing?”

  Sarah placed her scrapbook on the counter and opened it up to a page somewhere near the end. I peered over her shoulder to look at it. It was titled “Sandra’s Beautiful Home… and Fudge Shop!” There was nothing else on the page.

  “You see,” she said jabbing a finger at all the empty white space. “I wanted to get a picture or two to put in here, showing where she lived.” She pulled something out of her bag and plopped it on top of the book. It was a Polaroid camera.

  “I didn’t know they still made those.”

  She gave me a withering look. “So are you going to come or not?”

  “I wouldn’t mind another look at the neighborhood. It might inspire some ideas.”

  “Or maybe the killer will be there!” said Sarah with a sudden burst of excitement.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “It’s a law, or a rule, or something. Killers have to go back to where they killed.”

  “I’m not sure they have to. And anyway, the killer could have been back dozens of times already. They’re probably bored of the place.”

  Sarah peered at me, confused. “Why would they go back dozens of times?”

  “I’m not saying they did, I’m… never mind. Come on. Let’s go.”

  Chapter 16

  It was a pleasant if nippy walk through Sandra’s old neighborhood. The trees lining the streets were tall and mature, making it feel like you were walking through a leafy tunnel as you passed under the leafy canopies. The houses were pretty in an old-fashioned way, and I could certainly see why Donovan liked the idea of turning some of them into little galleries and artisanal shops. The nightclub idea still didn’t strike me as being viable though.

  “It’s just around this corner,” I said, indicating the upcoming bend.

  Sarah raised her camera, as if ready to snap something at a moment’s notice. As I didn’t expect the house to lurch off in an attempt to escape at our approach, I found her readiness quite amusing.

  “There it is!” I said as it came into view.

  Sarah quickly took a picture and her device made a loud whirring noise as it processed the film. Judging from our angle, Sarah had managed to get a sliver of the house from between two trees.

  “You’ll get a better one closer up,” I said to her.

  “I know. I just didn’t want to miss the chance!”

  With a few more steps, the whole house came into view and we entered her short and wide-open driveway, still with the sign at the entrance reading “Sandra’s House of Fudge.”

  “Look,” said Sarah, raising her camera in a pointing gesture and then lifting it up to her face and quickly snapping another photograph.

  In front of Sandra’s door were two different things of interest. One living, and one almost certainly not.

  Right by the front door, turned away from us, was a woman. As we watched, she pushed open the door and scurried inside. The door was pushed, but not closed completely, behind her. Next to where she was standing was a small pile of parcels, which appeared to be deliveries left just outside the door.

  “Who was that?” asked Sarah, giving me a nudge with excitement.

  “I don’t know. Maybe she works for some cleaning service or something. They have those, after murders, to clean the crime scene. You should have seen it! There was fudge everywhere.”

  Sarah removed the square photograph that had emerged from her camera and held it up.

  “Just a moment, and we’ll see!”

  The house remained still and there was no visible sign that there was life inside from our position on the street. The woman who’d gone in seemed a little too nicely dressed to be a cleaner, and hadn’t been carrying any supplies either as far as we could tell.

  “Here we are!” said Sarah, waving her photo in front of me.

  The photo showed the woman pushing open the front door. With her back turned to us, we couldn’t tell who it was.

  “It’s evidence, right?” asked Sarah, her voice dripping with excitement.

  “It’s evidence that someon
e’s gone in the house.”

  “But not of murder?”

  “Not quite. Come on. Let’s see who it is.”

  “It could be dangerous!”

  “Maybe, but there’s two of us at least.”

  “If they attack us, I’ll blind them with my flash and then wallop them with the camera!”

  “And I’ll stand back and watch. But let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” I told her. “I’m sure it’s all perfectly innocent.”

  Despite what I told her, I had my doubts. The furtive way the woman had hurried inside the house wasn’t that of someone who was supposed to be there. Was this our murderer?

  “Come on,” said Sarah, yanking at my arm and leading ahead.

  When we got to the front door, I gave it a gentle tap with my hand and it swung inward silently just like last time. I raised a finger to my lips, and Sarah gave me a nod in response.

  In retrospect, sneaking into the house instead of calling or ringing the bell probably wasn’t our wisest moment. Sarah quickly stepped in ahead of me, keen to lead the way. That was fine with me. I’m no coward, but if someone else wants to lead the charge into a dangerous situation, I’m not going to stop them.

  With exaggerated tiptoeing steps, Sarah stalked down the hallway while I followed three steps behind. The kitchen where I’d found Mom and the deceased Sandra was straight ahead toward the back of the house, but there were rustling sounds coming from a room off to the right. If I remembered correctly, that was the living room. I hadn’t entered it last time, but I’d seen into it as I’d passed by.

  Sarah led us right up to the edge of the door frame. She pointed to indicate there was someone in there, and I nodded to show that I too had heard the noises. She held up a finger to her mouth to urge me to remain silent. Then she held up three fingers.

  Two…

  One…

  With an ear-splitting banshee shriek, Sarah jumped in front of the doorway and then charged in. Her violent yell came as a complete shock to me—I thought we were trying to be quiet—and it elicited a scream of surprise from me. I followed her as fast as I could, still screeching through the panic.

  We entered the room like two screaming harpies and our shouts were immediately matched by the scream of the woman who was already in there.