After leafing through, she pulled out a sheet of microfiche with a clipped nod and a tight smile. “Here’s something.”
I took the sheet from her hand and began to make my way over to the microfilm reader, trembling with apprehension and adrenaline. “Thanks a lot.”
“There were no other results for Bagshaw. Were there any other names or keywords you wanted me to search for?” she asked. Though it was annoying to get shushed or scolded by another adult, her dedication to the job was actually pretty admirable.
“No, that should be fine for now,” I said, slipping the sheet of plastic into the machine.
“Put it on top of that filing cabinet when you’re done, I’ll get it back where it belongs,” she said, nodding. Without waiting for a response, she turned around and made her way out of the room.
The front page of a newspaper dated May 9, 1916, appeared on the screen and I scanned it quickly.
Local Woman Survives Encounter with the Rocky Knoll Ripper.
Below the headline was a picture that had me leaning in closer. It was of a woman who looked eerily like Connie. I scanned the article for a name, my breath catching in my throat when I found one.
Constance Elspeth Bagshaw.
“What the hell…”
It seemed impossible to believe it was just a relative of hers, the likeness so complete that it could’ve been taken yesterday.
I stared at the picture for what must’ve been at least a minute before unscrewing my mind enough to even read the article. It detailed an encounter this woman had with a prolific serial killer who had terrorized the Northeast, and how he’d been brought to justice as a result of her escape. I fumbled with shaking hands to pull my phone out of my purse, and snapped a picture of the microfilm reader’s screen before pulling the plastic sheet out.
Unless Connie Bagshaw had a great, great-grandmother who was her doppleganger and shared the same name to boot, my antique-dealing friend had been alive for far longer than a century.
Because, apparently, a haunted murder-boomerang typewriter wasn’t enough to deal with.
I dropped the sheet of microfiche on top of the filing cabinet it’d come out of, feeling more than a little lightheaded. There was no denying it now. Too much evidence had been building to fight it any longer. There were mysterious things at play here, and I had to face facts.
Magic was afoot.
Real life, honest to goodness magic. And now that I knew it, nothing would ever be the same.
I walked down the hall back toward the main room of the library, even more terrified and confused than I had been that morning.
A pained “Ouch”, broke my train of thought and I turned, frowning as I noticed the guy on the ladder.
“Are you alright?” I asked, walking over to him.
“Yeah, no worries,” he said with a wince, giving his left hand a shake. “I was nailing a board up but I got a little distracted,” he said, his piercing blue eyes meeting mine. He had a faint brogue that spoke of Scotland and sent a warm rush through me.
“Can I get you a bandage or something? Trudy keeps a first aid kit in the back.”
“Nah. Occupational hazard. Wasn’t the first time, won’t be the last,” he said, waving me off. “And looks like you’re having a tougher time than me. Everything all right?”
I realized with a start that I probably looked as haunted and scared as I felt.
“I’ve just had a rough day,” I admitted with a tight smile, “but I’ll forget about it all soon. I’m about to go to the bar down the street for a whiskey.” That hadn’t been the plan, but it was a game-time decision. Going home to stew was out of the question. I had to get myself under control before I saw anyone who loved me. If a stranger knew how shook up I was, Eagle Eye Mee-maw would be all over me like white on rice.
“Whiskey, huh? It’s two in the afternoon,” he murmured, letting out a single, deep laugh.
“That should be a clue as to exactly how bad my day has been.”
He shrugged, looking back up at the ceiling. “Seems wrong for you to drink alone, then. If you give me a sec to store my tools, I’ll join you,” he said. “I was almost done here anyway.”
As much as I couldn’t be around my family right now, the thought of being alone was almost just as distasteful, and the library carpenter could prove to be just the distraction I needed right now. “You sure? Like you said, it is two in the afternoon…”
“Apparently, we’re both rebels. Plus, I make my own hours. What’s your name, by the way?”
“You can call me Cricket, how about yours?”
“I’m Patrick,” he said with a wide smile, and I let out a sigh, the pressure in my chest alleviating just a hair.
“Well, Patrick. What say we leave banged up thumbs and worried minds behind and go tie one on?”
Chapter 8
I was well aware that, given the circumstances, dropping into the local dive bar with a man I’d known for all of an hour probably wasn’t the best idea. That didn’t stop me from pushing my doubts away, however, reasoning that at least if I drank myself into a coma, it would be safer to have some company while I did it.
I couldn’t help but steal a glance—or two, or ten—at Patrick as we made our way out of the old library building. He was handsome as hell, there was no denying that, and I couldn’t reasonably be expected not to eat the eye candy when it felt like my world was coming apart at the seams.
None of that stopped me from feeling a pang of self-consciousness as I dug in my purse for my car keys, aware that the car hadn’t been washed in about a hundred years and probably smelled like old gum and hand sanitizer. “I just need to put this stuff in my car quick,” I said, cheeks warming as I gestured to the file folders and notepads in my free hand.
“No problem. Nice ride,” Patrick remarked as I fumbled the keys out of my bag and pulled open the driver’s side door. His tone was teasing but his dark eyes were soft.
“Yeah, Maseratis are so last season. The grunge look is what’s in these days. At least, that’s what the kids are saying.”
Patrick chuckled and a dimple creased his already scarily compelling face. “You know, it’s not a look for everyone,” he said, giving me the once over. “But I think you pull it off.”
“Gee, thanks,” I replied with a snort. I was starting to think agreeing to let this guy accompany me was the best idea I’d had all day. At least, maybe this would distract me from the fact that I had seemingly predicted a man’s death and was now being stalked, Stephen King-style, by a magic typewriter.
I shoved the thought aside as I stowed my stuff and slammed the door shut. “Shall we?”
He fell into step beside me as we headed down the block toward the bar. It wasn’t for another minute that I realized I hadn’t said anything else, my mind feeling like it was being pulled in a million directions at once. Patrick didn’t seem fazed, with an air of surprising tranquility. You’d almost think we had known each other for years. I shot him a glance and his gaze was captivating—almost overwhelmingly so. I had to pry my eyes away, under the guise of checking my watch.
I cleared my throat. “So what kind of work were you doing back at the library?”
“Oh, that? They needed some paneling re-done. The stuff on the wall before was literally falling apart.”
“Well, it looked like you had it under control by the time I got there.”
“Sure,” Patrick replied. “As for the rest of the place, though…” He trailed off.
“Also, literally falling apart,” I ventured. “It seems like they haven’t renovated that place since the seventies.”
Patrick nodded in agreement. “Probably not.”
I felt a heat creeping into my ears. Talking about renovating the library building? Is this what passes for small talk these days?
Okay, fine. I was a little rusty. Patrick didn’t seem bothered, though, projecting an aura of cool composure that would probably withstand a nuclear holocaust. It was admirable, esp
ecially considering I probably looked like a lunatic. Messy hair, no makeup to speak of, caffeine jitters that were coming on full-force.
I pushed aside those concerns, as well. I must’ve looked decent enough for him to join me, and a bad hair day wasn’t going to stop me from getting knee deep in enough whiskey to forget what I’d seen in that newspaper article.
A shiver went through me at the reminder, and I nearly wept with relief as the sign for The Scorpion Lounge came into view. It was only a “lounge” in the loosest sense of the word, a cramped little concrete building across the street from the Burger Bar and the auto repair shop. For all its faults, though, the booze was cheap and people minded their own business there. I was willing to admit to spending an evening or two there after the bakery closed, before heading back to Mee-maw’s basement, staring into a glass of questionable liquor and wondering if I had permanently screwed up my life.
“Nice,” Patrick remarked as we came to a stop outside the establishment’s door. “If we’re gonna be day drinking, this looks like the perfect place to do it.”
“Damn right,” I agreed, shouldering my purse as he swung the door open for me, giving me a decent look at my hindquarters in the dirty window. I wanted to sink into the ground in humiliation. Why on earth had I worn the mom jeans today, of all days? “Just don’t come for me if the rotgut here… well, rots your gut,” I said with a shrill laugh.
The day was getting worse by the second, and a glass full of numb was just yards away.
Patrick touched his hand to his chest. “Promise.”
The air inside the bar smelled like stale beer, and bluegrass music drifted from the jukebox. There were only two other patrons there so early in the day. A bearded man who was elbow-deep in Blue Moon and beer nuts, and a young woman, sitting across from him, who could have been either his daughter or his girlfriend.
“Table or bar?” I asked Patrick, turning to him.
“Bar,” Patrick answered immediately. “If I’m right about the kind of day you’ve had, the closer we are to the source of the booze, the better off we’ll be.”
I followed his lead and sidled up to the counter. Patrick pulled a stool out, gesturing for me to sit down. “How chivalrous,” I remarked, dropping onto the seat with a relieved sigh. This was the closest to normal I had felt since that day in the bakery. “I guess your mama raised you right,” I said with a grin, leaning to rest my elbow on the sticky surface of the bar. I meant it as a compliment, but Patrick’s expression darkened for an instant.
“Sorry…I was just teasing.”
“It’s okay. My mom is gone now and sometimes it just hits me in a weird way.”
Dang it. Not two minutes in and I’d managed to plant my foot firmly in my mouth.
“I’m so sorry,” I said in a rush.
“No, no! It’s fine,” he assured me with a smile. “She was a great lady. No harm, no foul. Let’s order, shall we?”
I lifted a hand to flag down the bartender, a flannel-clad woman who had been wiping down the same glass ever since we walked in the door.
“What can I get you guys?” she asked, her eyes drifting from me to Patrick with a look of piqued curiosity. I couldn’t blame her. He was a full-on hunk.
I glanced at Patrick. “Whiskey? It’s not too late to change your mind.”
“Whatever you’re having,” he replied gamely.
My kind of guy, I thought, before turning back to the bartender. “Something I’ll regret tomorrow morning.”
The bartender favored me with a half-smile and moved to fix us a couple of glasses of mystery liquid.
“So, talk to me,” Patrick said, shooting me a contemplative look. “You know I’m a handyman, but I don’t know anything about you. Come to think of it, I don’t even know your last name.”
Normally, this would be where I would make a joke about serial killers and not giving out personal information to strange men, but for some strange reason, I wasn’t feeling it today. Go figure. “Hallow--” I began before stopping myself, clearing my throat, and trying again. Greg’s name never felt like mine, and felt even less like it now. “Hawthorne.”
“Like Nathaniel Hawthorne. Nice.”
I raised my eyebrows, thinking that good ol’ Hath would probably be proud of the horror story I was now being sucked into. “I wouldn’t have figured you for the kind of guy who’s in to classic literature.”
“Because I work with my hands?” Patrick put on a mock-offended face. “Well, you’d be right,” he added before I could respond. “But I remember learning about him in school and my mind is a veritable steel trap,” he teased, tapping on the side of his noggin with a wide grin.
I snorted and turned to accept the glass of whiskey the bartender held out for me, taking a tentative sniff. It smelled like paint thinner.
Perfect.
“So, what’s yours?” I asked, swigging back a mouthful. It burned going down, almost enough to make me cough. “Your last name, I mean,” I rasped.
Patrick paused to take a sip of his own drink, wincing. “Woof. You could clean a drain with this stuff. It’s Byrne. Patrick Byrne.”
“Like David Byrne,” I observed. “I like it.”
He laughed, and I gave him a smile, but my attention was already being tugged back to the unnatural situation at hand. The typewriter, with its keys like crooked teeth. The quaintness of it had been what drew me in, but now thinking of its old-fashioned face was enough to make my insides riot.
What was I going to do? The idea that I wouldn’t even be able to extract more information from Connie was frustrating enough. What if things got even weirder? What if I woke up tomorrow morning and it was in bed with me, crushing my chest, or typing away on its own in the corner, its keys clacking like gunshots in the night?
No, I told myself, struggling to push the idea out of my mind. Don’t be ridiculous.
But was it ridiculous? Was it, really? Wasn’t all of this totally, completely ridiculous.
I let out a semi-hysterical bubble of laughter and slapped my hand over my mouth.
“Cricket?”
The sound of Patrick’s voice brought me back to reality, and I turned to see him watching me, his brow furrowed. “Sorry, what?”
“I was just asking if you were okay. You seemed a little lost for a minute there.”
I cleared my throat. “I guess you could say that.”
“Same problem from the library?”
I nodded. “Every time I think about it, it feels like it gets worse.”
“Well, I’m not gonna pry,” Patrick replied, “but if you want to talk about it, let me know.” The look on his face was genuine, and I found myself thinking a lot of people probably went to him to discuss their problems.
A lot of female people.
He just had the kind of face you wanted to say things to.
And smother with kisses.
“Thanks,” I managed, taking another drink of whiskey. Maybe it would just burn my taste buds off altogether if I really gunned it down fast.
No doubt sensing my discomfort, Patrick mercifully changed the subject, and for a while we discussed all things trivial. The weather, the new store on Main Street, the flea market, our favorite foods. The drinks kept flowing, and I surprised even myself with how much I drank. Usually, I called it at one, maybe two, but with the typewriter still nagging at my thoughts, I found myself ordering yet another whiskey. At one point, the conversation drifted to the shark attack, but I shut it down before the familiar panic could take hold of me, brushing it off and asking if he wanted to check out the pool table.
“Sure,” he said, “but I’ll warn you now, I’m not exactly a crack-shot.”
“Neither am I,” I replied, “so you’re in good company.”
We made our way over to the grimy pool table in the corner and began making a few shots, but I was paying more attention to Patrick’s features and conversation than the game. He was extraordinarily charismatic, I thought, casting a glance back t
o the bartender, who had been sneaking furtive glances at him since we walked in.
“So how long have you been in Rocky Knoll?” I asked, leaning against my cue.
“About a year now,” Patrick replied. “My sister came over from Scotland with her husband, and I didn’t like the idea of being that far away from my nieces and nephews. What about you? Do you have family here, or…?”
I nodded. “I’m actually living with my grandmother right now, believe it or not. My cousin’s in town, too—I’m helping her out at her bakery. Sort of figuring things out at the moment.”
Yeah. That was an understatement.
“No other family?” Patrick asked, watching me with his big, dark eyes.
I cleared my throat. “Well, I, ah, I’ve got a son and a daughter. An ex-husband, too, as of about a year ago.”
“Oh. That’s too bad. Well, you know what they say, marriage isn’t for the faint of heart.”
I raised my eyebrows, a little taken aback at the brazenness of the statement. “Yeah, I know,” I replied, a little defensively. “I did it for twenty-five years. We worked hard at it, raised two great kids. It was a long time, but sometimes you just have to know when to hold ‘em, and know when to fold ‘em.”
His eyes went wide at my response. “I’m sorry, “ he said with a wince. “That came out wrong. I didn’t mean it like… Look, I know how tough marriage is. No judgment here at all. That’s why I’m not married. The trauma of a divorce…” He shook his head. “It’s not for me, I don’t think.”
“I get that,” I said, nodding. It was obviously a sore spot for him, and I wasn’t about to pry. The drinks had loosened us both up, and there was no better time for past trauma to come to the surface.
There was an awkward pause, neither of us entirely sure what to say. “So,” began Patrick, pursing his lips, “feeling any better yet?”
“Um… yeah, I am, actually.”
It was the truth. Maybe it was the booze, or maybe it was just the charming persona this handyman had, but either way, I was beginning to feel the ball of anxiety in my stomach loosen a little. I opened my mouth, on the verge of telling him something—maybe everything—about my current predicament. The words were almost out before I came to my senses and snapped my mouth shut, kicking myself.
Writing Wrongs: Crow’s Feet Coven, Book One Page 6