He patted his stomach over his knitted woollen jumper. “I believe your cakes aren’t doing my waistline any favours,” he laughed. “But I’m not complaining.” He accepted the bag. “I think Bridget is in my office.”
He led me down the aisle of pews to the alter at the front. There was a doorway to the right where he continued and I followed. It was a hallway of more doors, and at the end was his office.
We walked in to see Bridget preparing a small bed of tissue on the desk. She placed her hand on the tissue. Beside them sat a bottle of nail paint, a soft pastel beige paint, and if I wasn’t here to ask her about Marissa, I might’ve asked where she’d bought it.
“Daddy,” she said with a large smile, her eyes flickering between her father and me.
“Ms. Waterhouse wanted to talk to you,” he said. “Do you have a minute to spare?”
She hummed, glancing around the room, clearly looking for an excuse not to speak with me, at least that much was visible.
“It’s okay if you don’t,” I said.
“That’s okay,” she said. “I was just painting my nails anyway.”
I settled into the comfort of the chair opposite her across the desk as her father left, leaving the door open.
I pushed my lips into a smile. “I just had a couple questions, nothing too heavy,” I said. As she moved her hand, the ring on her finger glimmered in the light. “That’s a nice ring.”
“A gift,” she said. “So, what questions did you have?”
I cleared my throat, nerves settling in my stomach. “You knew Marissa, right?”
She shrugged. “Maybe.”
“You were seeing her, weren’t you?”
She glanced at me from beneath her hooded eyes. “Research.”
“Oh? What are you studying?”
Bridget dipped the nail polish applicator into the pot a couple of times. “Religious studies through the Open University.”
“Nice. Jack’s just gone to university himself,” I said. “It’s good that you’re taking an interest in other religions.”
A groan came from the back of her throat. “It wasn’t a choice, the course said I had to talk to someone of another faith,” she said, almost like the words were acid in her mouth and she couldn’t wait to spit them out.
“Marissa was a great source of information,” I said. “I hope she helped.”
She nodded and shrugged slightly, slicking a coat of paint across a nail. “She’s no help now, she’s dead.”
My jaw clenched. “Is there anything I can do to help?” I asked.
“You have any belladonna?”
“Huh?”
“Kidding,” she laughed, forcing out a single laugh. “Don’t look so serious.”
For a moment I questioned how she would hear something quite like it, but she’d been speaking with Marissa and for all I knew she’d been told about such an ingredient, although it was rarely used for anything good.
“It’s an extremely potent herb,” I said. “For a witch.”
Bridget paused and looked at me, squinting beneath her eyes. She pulled the nail brush away from her finger and dipped it back in the pot. “Do you have any idea who did it?” she asked. “Who killed Marissa?”
That’s what I was trying to solve myself. “I have no idea,” I said. “But when I find out, we’ll get justice.”
“Justice?” she asked with a smirk. “Like with all that hocus pocus?”
I wasn’t sure if I should be offended by the remark. “No, through the police.”
“Hodge doesn’t have a clue,” she said with a roll of her eye. “When someone broke into the church and stole from the donation box, he blamed it on the wind smashing the window and blowing the box out.”
“Surely not.”
She shrugged. “He’s an amateur.”
“Hmm. He’s been here before you were born, I’m sure he’s got more to him.”
Bridget dipped the brush a couple more times, finishing off her hand. “He stopped coming to church as well.”
The crystal on her ring glittered as she turned her hand. “That is a beautiful ring,” I said.
“You said,” she replied. “But thank you.” She lifted her hand and tilting it from either side to look at it in the light.
I hooked my hand beneath her hand and touched her palm. I felt the nerves, a fear, like a child shivering in the corner of a room.
“Don’t touch me!” she scolded, jumping from her seat and snatching her hand away.
Her father rushed into the office seconds later. “What happened?”
I stood, pressing a hand to my chest. “I—I—I was just looking at her ring and touched her hand, I wasn’t aware she was—”
“It’s okay,” Bernard said. “She’ll be fine, she’s just not a fan of touching.”
I didn’t say it, but it was strange. “I’m awfully sorry,” I said. “I should be off, I feel like I may have outstayed my welcome.”
“I’m sorry, Gwen,” he said, brushing his hand against my back as we walked out of the office. “She’s never been one for affection.”
We walked back through the pews.
“I wish I knew,” I said, hooking my handbag up on my shoulder. “Did you know she was meeting with Marissa?”
We pulled to a stop before reaching the end the door back out into the cool early autumn air. He pressed his lips together in a thin smile and looked at me. “Well, she mentioned wanting to learn more about religions, and your—your coven was the closest I believe.” He said the word like it was dirty, and until that point I’d respected him.
“Well, I best be off,” I said.
“See you around, and thank you for the cake,” he said.
I strutted off back down the small strip of shops toward the café. On the way, I was passing the charity shop where Allegra worked. I would’ve gone in earlier but my mind was focused on getting to the church.
“Gwen,” she waved me over as she sat at the cash register.
The shop was empty, quiet with the slightest bit of music playing overhead.
“Just been to see Bridget,” I said. “The poor girl was nervous I was there I think, I’m sure she was surprised I got through the doors without burning up on impact.”
We chuckled.
“You’ll never guess what I was told by Pat from upstairs,” she said.
Pat was the owner of the charity shop. “Go on,” I said.
“Weird Will was in earlier, you know when I was at the café, and apparently, he was complaining about Marissa’s death bringing bad luck to the village, they said they shouldn’t have accepted us in the first place.”
I was expecting a good surprise, not to be left with my jaw hanging. “What did Pat say?”
“Nothing, I mean, what could he say? I’m here most days, I don’t think he wants me to bugger off elsewhere.”
“You can’t really take anything from Weird Will as gospel though, can you?”
Weird Will was a tinfoil hat conspiracy theorist. He stayed indoors most of the time, but he would often say the weirdest of things, hence the name. I don’t think he’d always been odd or had such strong opinions, but it was the world we were living in.
“You think he might have something to do with it?” she asked.
“No, if we questioned everyone who thought like that, we’d have a line of nearly a hundred people.”
Allegra tipped her head. “True.” She clapped her hands and rubbed them together. “Who else have you seen?”
“I went to the docks, Shay was difficult, the police have her log book, so maybe they’ve also taken Marissa’s as well, but Hodge seemed a little unaware when I mentioned it to him that she would have had one.”
“Shay probably wouldn’t have even let you look even if it was there.”
I knew just about as much. “I saw Bridget, obviously, but I’m gonna head back to the café and make sure everything is okay, figured I’d wait an hour and reenergise myself before going out to see Car
oline and Ellyn.”
“Good idea.”
So far I hadn’t needed to use the polished amethyst in my bag, it was there, radiating, the presence was calming. I left the shop and went back toward the café. My thoughts were a squiggling mess, I wasn’t too sure who it could’ve been, if it wasn’t stabbing as the doctor briefly mentioned, there must’ve been something else. I’d watched enough episodes of Special Victims Unit on TV to know there were hundreds of ways someone could die.
CHAPTER 15
The café had calmed somewhat as slow jazz played from the radio. Smiling faces stared back at me as I walked through the front door. I waved at them and made small talk before throwing myself through the doors to the backroom. It was exhausting.
I sighed and dropped my bag on the table with a thud.
“Gwen,” a voice came.
I flicked the switch to see Noelia standing still at the back of the room. “Noelia?”
She sucked through her teeth. “As much as I hate what you did when you called that detective, I appreciate it.”
“I didn’t call him, but I’m glad he came in to question you,” I said, approaching my book of shadows on the pedestal of the table. “But I hope he got some use out of that truth serum.”
She cracked her knuckles into her palms. “I think I got more use out of it with him, than you did.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m not against using my ability,” she said. “And instead of him asking me questions, I asked him some of my own, and I got some very interesting responses.”
A pit opened in my stomach with an audible dropping falling through me. “You did?” I asked.
“He hasn’t the foggiest idea who did it, but he knows she was poisoned.”
“What? How?” My bottom lip trembled. “Your mother wouldn’t want you to abuse your power like this.”
“A little magic goes a long way.”
“And so does a little truth serum.”
She waved a hand at me in the air. “I’m not mad at you,” she said. “You have every right to suspect me. I guess when even the police don’t have any idea, you have to be a little curious.”
“Are you going to tell me what else you found?”
“The poison is most likely organic, they don’t know where it came from, or what it is, but it was organic.” A pained grimace crossed her face briefly.
“Now we know, we can try and find out,” I said. “But I still don’t approve of how you got it.” I didn’t have too much of a leg to stand on, and I knew this, but I wasn’t going to beat the thought like a dead horse.
“I know, but I got it, and I swear, whoever did this to my mother is going to pay.”
I shook my head. “Noelia, no, let the police do their job.”
She scoffed. “You let the police do their job.”
“I am, but I have more senses than the police so I’m doing some investigating of my own,” I said. “Plus, if it turns out this is something not completely human, how will the police deal with that?”
“If it’s something not human, it’ll get away,” she said.
I couldn’t have that, not with the note Tana received and the wording of the newspaper article. Either it was a human who had an axe to grind or something made of pure evil with a penchant for killing witches.
“Just be safe,” I said. “I don’t want more witches getting killed.”
“I can take care of myself, if you hadn’t already guessed, I’m quite powerful.”
It was a wave of energy, like the ebb and flow of a sea wave, pushing and pulling from all areas of her body. I wasn’t sure if it was all completely natural or whether she was keeping something in her possession to keep her strong.
“I’ll have to go, the police are giving me the keys to my mother’s house, I guess it’s mine now,” she said.
Once Noelia left, I took a seat on a small cushion and grabbed my bloodstone geode crystal from the bottom shelf, it was within. Most of the energy had been drained and desperately needed recharging. I depleted the rest of it, letting the hum of energy vibrate through me.
Abi and Ralph were both managing the café perfectly well.
“Are you staying or going back out?” Ralph asked, whipping a towel over his back.
I worked the coffee machine, pouring myself a to-go cup. “I’m heading back out but I should be back before closing, I hope you don’t mind saying.”
“Oh, not at all,” he said. “I’m glad I have something to occupy my afternoon with.”
I nodded, adding cold milk to my drink. “Fantastic, if any of the women arrive, tell them I’m out,” I said. He knew who I was referring to, although I knew he didn’t quite believe in witchcraft, I’d helped him out before, but he was a man committed to his church, and I didn’t blame him. Beliefs were what kept me strong.
“Of course.”
I packed a couple servings of cake onto paper sheets, adding them into a plastic bag. “If Bernard or Bridget arrive, there’s a Victoria sponge in the bakery fridge.” I pulled at the necklace, sending tingles through my hand, it was a powerful jolt, enough so I knew I could stomach handling one of the women if it went south.
If Caroline had been a woman who visited the café often, I might have been able to take a cake she’d enjoy, but she wasn’t, and that might’ve been because she wasn’t particularly fond of the company of witches.
Caroline lived in one of the houses looking out over the sea. The thought of not having a front or back garden wasn’t a happy one. It was one house along a line of several houses. Number 23, a pink door. I knocked, straightening out a smile on my face and blowing my hair out with the back of my hand in wait.
It took her a couple minutes of shouting and heavy thudding before she answered the door. “Who is it?” she asked.
I cleared my throat. “It’s—it’s Gwen, from the café, I was just stopping by because of Marissa.”
Immediately she unlocked the door, sliding chains across the dead bolts before opening. She took a single look at me and sucked in a deep breath. “Oh, hi.” She poked her head outside and glanced left to right.
Caroline wore clothes two sizes too big for her body and had long curly hair that reached her hips. “I can’t believe she’s dead,” she said.
“I know, it’s horrible.” I shivered in the chill air. “You mind if I come in? I brought cake.”
I watched her eyes for a moment, squinting and staring back at me with concern. “You’ve not done anything to it, have you?”
“Don’t be silly, it’s cake. I heard Marissa was helping you.”
She nodded. “Yeah, yeah, come in.”
Caroline’s house was a mess, as soon as she locked the door behind us, a loud barking dog cried out from a closed door. The floor was pitted with strewn children’s clothes and unopened boxes of toys.
“Sorry for the mess,” she said. “I haven’t got around to feeling myself.”
“You have a dog?” I asked.
We walked through to the living room where the TV played in the background and a large Doberman laid on the floor, growling. “I don’t get to walk her as much,” she sighed, pushing her stomach out slightly to reveal the bump. I could barely tell she was pregnant through the clothes she wore. “One of the women from church has been taking her for walks,” she said.
“That’s nice of them,” I said, taking a seat on the sofa and falling into the worn in soft fabric of it. “Oh, this is cozy.” I rested my bags on my lap.
Caroline sat beside me, perched on the edge. “Did she tell you what she was seeing me for?” she asked, chewing on a fingernail.
“No,” I said, rooting around in the plastic bag. “So, I brought a few different types of cake, chocolate, Victoria, and carrot.” Covering all my bases.
“Marissa would always have your cakes when I went over to see her,” she said. “I’m definitely a fan of the carrot cake.”
“Did you see her the other night?” I asked, digging around for the
cake.
Caroline wiped hair away from her face and stretched at the arm of jumper. “Nope,” she sighed. “I’m surprised you haven’t heard, I wasn’t particularly nice to her the last time we met.”
“Oh? She didn’t say.”
“We argued a little, so you see Marissa was helping me and bump.” She rubbed her hand on her stomach. “I’ve been through many miscarriages and I couldn’t go through another, so she was helping, and I was paying a lot of money for it as well.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I’m heading into the third trimester and emotions have been running high.”
“So, how was she helping you?”
“Crystals, antenatal herbs, and then she told me her crystals had been drained and the herbs were dead.” She pressed the arm of her jumper to her face, collecting the tear in the corner of her eye. “I mean, I put my everything into her help, and you know I would prefer the doctor to see me and prescribe vitamins, but Marissa told me she could help.”
“How peculiar,” I said, tapping my chin.
Perhaps that had been what happened to her storage room, with everything depleted and all her resources dead, she’d have to get rid of them, but she would’ve told one of us about it, surely, she would’ve mentioned it to one of us, it wasn’t like Marissa to go on her own about something troubling her. I bit my tongue in thought, a sharp realisation that if she could keep a secret about a man she was having an affair with, there was no saying what we knew she would or wouldn’t do.
“I’m sorry about what happened to her, and hopefully they’ll find out soon,” she said. “She must’ve pissed someone off more than me.”
I had enough to work with, from the way Caroline was, which I safely assumed was a mess, there was slim to no chance of her killing Marissa. Before leaving, I gave her a hug and the beating red pain beneath her skin caught me off guard.
“Oh,” I stopped, my face frozen in shock. “Come by tomorrow and I’ll fix something up for you, maybe something similar to what Marissa was giving you.”
Muffins, Magic, and Murder Page 9