by Leanne Leeds
“I don’t know, that’s all he said. Well, thought.”
We stood in silence in the late morning sun as the words we’d spoken between us hung there. Both Clutterbuck and I kept secrets from one another, but we’d opened up a little and built a bit of trust.
The problem. By doing that?
We also opened a can of worms and spilled them all over the floor.
Eight
Prunella Noble—I assumed—threw open the door moments after Chief Clutterbuck rapped three times in quick succession. The moment she saw the tall man standing on her porch, she froze in shock, then spat, “What are you doing here?” After a moment of silence that didn’t last long enough for Clutterbuck to have taken a breath in preparation to answer, she repeated the question. “What are you doing here? Why are you here? Why have you come?”
The chief tried to smile at her. “Mrs. Noble, Ms. Delphi, and I—”
“Delphi!” Prunella Noble looked like she was choking on her tongue, her eyes bugging out as they worked hard to look at me without looking at me. She took great pains to avoid looking me directly in the eye. “A Delphi! She’s a Delphi? Why would you bring a Delphi to this house? How dare you!”
The chief looked confused at the question and the issue with my last name. “Ma’am, I’m not precisely sure what you mean but—”
“Surely, Mr. Clutterbuck, you know that woman’s in league with the devil.” Tallulah Abernathy, Hoyt Abernathy’s grandmother, stepped around the (presumably) grieving widow. Flinging her arm out, she swept Prunella back. “You can’t bring one of the devil women in here with a grieving widow. She might call up poor Conrad’s ghost, and then where would we be? Or she’ll do what she usually does,” the woman sneered. “Try to have some innocent soul thrown in jail.”
The door hadn’t been opened longer than a minute, and I was already sure we weren’t getting into the house. Tallulah Abernathy placed her ample girth between the two of us and the hallway. Planting her feet apart, she stared us down defiantly—unafraid to look me in the eye.
“Maybe having me on this case wasn’t the smartest decision you’ve made,” I murmured.
“Have all you women just lost your gosh dang minds?” Chief Clutterbuck glowered from beneath the shadowed shelter of the front door overhang. It was a cool spring day, but beads of sweat gathered on his forehead. “You’re all acting like you’re in some James Patterson novel or something—”
“Laurell Hamilton,” I muttered.
“What?” Clutterbuck glared at me.
“I said Laurell K. Hamilton. She writes the Anita Blake series. That’s probably more apt because it’s got supernatural elements. James Patterson writes—”
“Do you really think this is the time?” Clutterbuck’s jaw was so tight I could see his muscles flexing.
“Sorry.” I wasn’t, really. The last thing I needed was for this to turn into a James Patterson novel.
“A man was shot, and you’re all talking about ghosts and trying to pick a fight!” Clutterbuck scrubbed a hand along his jaw with an angry sigh as he looked back at Tallulah Abernathy. “Just what in tarnation is going on in this town?”
“Well, if you’d been attending church, the way you should, you’d know exactly what was going on here, Mr. Clutterbuck,” Tallulah responded with a head snap and a judgmental stare. “You wouldn’t be running around town with the likes of her, I’ll tell you what.” Turning toward Prunella, she shook her head. “I swear, everything would be just fine if it wasn’t for the men in this town.”
“You heard her, copper. We don’t need your help. We’ve got everything under control. Now you get off my porch, and you leave us be,” the widow spat as she tried to slam the door. Clutterbuck’s hand shot out, and his palm hit against it with a loud smack. “Just what is it you think you’re doing!” Prunella barked angrily. “This is my property, and I don’t care who you are. You get off my porch!”
“Has everyone in this place gone mad?” Clutterbuck asked again.
Bond Noble raced into the hallway, his eyes wide. “What’s going on here, Prunella?”
“This stupid man and his harlot won’t leave!” Tallulah told him.
“Harlot!” I barked, insulted. And, to tell you the truth, a little grossed out. Terrance Clutterbuck was the father of my sister, after all. “Now, you wait just a minute!”
“Blood devil harlot!” she hissed while staring at my chin. “You’re a heretic! Blood devil harlot!”
I paused. Did she think I was actually a vampire or was that just an insult because I was dating a vampire?
“Get out! You can’t come in anyway! You weren’t invited!” Prunella screamed.
Chief Clutterbuck’s hand was at least ten inches inside the door frame, so I didn’t think she was talking about him. Maybe she really did think I was a vampire, or they had grown so used to seeing Chris walk in the daylight thanks to Karen’s magic they assumed all vampires could. If they knew he was a vampire. Which I was pretty sure they did, at least at the church.
I reached forward to see if I could slip my arm inside.
A sharp and sudden torrent of air flew from the door and straight toward me. The air smelled electrified, and it slammed me so hard that I felt genuine pain. I stumbled backward, gasping.
“What happened?” Clutterbuck asked, reaching out quickly to study me.
“Warded,” I whispered. “The doorway, or the entire house, is warded.”
“Awarded what?” he asked, confused.
“Not awarded. Just warded. It’s a form of protective magic. Think of it as a magical barrier, like a force field.” Prunella and Bond Noble looked horrified that the wards had manifested themselves in front of the chief. Tallulah Abernathy looked wholly satisfied, as if she both expected me to set them off and that they would shove me back. “I can’t get in. Someone has set barriers against me. Or people like me.”
Clutterbuck looked confounded, as if uncertain whether I was serious. I knew the look. In fact, I knew this look on this man. He’d exhibited it several times throughout the great magical probiotic poisoning of 2020. (Again, long story.) “Wait,” he said hesitantly, his eyes cloudy and tense. “I remember. You’re a…you’re a witch.”
“She’s a harlot! She’s the devil’s handmaiden!” Tallulah shouted at Clutterbuck.
With the chief lost in thought, I stood up straight and attempted to stare each in the eye. All—except Tallulah—turned away, wincing. You would’ve thought I had x-ray vision—though I guess that’s (sort of) what they thought I had. Unfortunately, my telepathy was blocked at the door the same as I was, and I could sense nothing.
“We came here to question you about your husband—”
“She’s got nothing to say to you,” Tallulah told Clutterbuck, and she pushed Prunella back toward Bond. “And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll get free of that harlot over there, turn around, and forget anything about this case.” The old woman’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “This ain’t got nothing to do with you, and it’s for the good of the town. You stay out of our way, now, chief. You hear?”
The door slammed shut.
“This all sounds ridiculous. You know that, right? Utterly insane,” Clutterbuck said after I read him in. What else was I supposed to do? There was no way to explain the crazy relatives of the dearly departed unless I did.
“I understand.” I added nothing else.
If Tallulah hoped Clutterbuck really would just turn around and walk away, the drama on the front porch had precisely the opposite effect. “If I hadn’t seen what I saw back at that house with my own eyes, I never would’ve believed any of this. And you say Angie is a witch, too?”
“She doesn’t know how to do a lot,” I said as we sat outside the Mystic Diner and picked at our food. The air was still chilly, and the two of us were the only folks in the picnic table area. “She didn’t really know she was a witch. But Karen, our mother? She’s a witch. Or partial. Not sure, but we inherited the gene,
I guess? From her. Angie has some really cool powers, actually.”
“Dalida, too,” Pepper said as she walked out the diner’s back door and slid into a chair at our table without waiting for an invitation. “Angie would make a fortune hiring herself out to doctors. She just touches your hand, and whatever pain you’re feeling just goes away. Mental pain, emotional pain, physical pain? Poof, gone.”
Clutterbuck stared at her. “You know about all this psychic witch stuff?”
Pepper’s face fell. “You don’t read my blog?”
Clutterbuck looked as if he’d woken up from a bad dream to find an even worse reality. “How many of these supposed witch bottles are left?”
“You told him about the witch bottles?” Pepper asked, surprised.
“Well, I wasn’t going to tell him about anything. But then he saw me get zapped by wards.”
Pepper frowned. “What you mean, he saw you zapped by wards?”
“Conrad and Prunella Noble’s house?” I said, grabbing a french fry. “Someone warded the door. Probably the whole house, actually. It’s an elemental ward, too. I got knocked in the chest by a gust of wind, and I could smell ozone.”
“Ozone?” Pepper made a face. “Why would you smell ozone?”
“I wasn’t hit by lightning, but there had to be some somewhere.”
“The way you say these things, so matter-of-fact.” Clutterbuck shuddered as if a chill had passed through him.
“It is a matter-of-fact to us,” I explained, grabbing another fry. “Magic, even magical enemies, and wards. It’s all just another day in the life for me, really. I’m kind of used to it.”
“Are you a witch, too?” Angie’s father asked Pepper.
She shook her head, no. “I’ve been bit by a vampire, though.”
Clutterbuck turned white.
“Oh, shoot, I’m sorry,” Pepper said, reaching into my plate and grabbing one of the last remaining fries. “You didn’t tell him about the vampires, did you?”
“I hadn’t got to them yet, no.”
We sat at the table and finished our meal in silence.
Towards the end of the meal, Pepper’s eyes traveled back and forth between Clutterbuck and me. Then me and Clutterbuck again. Her foot tapped. Then her finger. The chief was still lost in thought, and Pepper was desperately trying to respect the silence so he could process all he had been told.
Trying.
Eventually, she failed.
“Prunella and Bond deeded the Noble family distillery to the Holy Grove Church,” she burst out as if she’d been holding her breath for minutes. Digging into her knapsack, she glanced up. “I’m sorry, chief, I know this whole ‘reality differs from what you thought it was’ is a lot to take, but I think this has something to do with Conrad’s death.”
“Why do you think that?” the chief asked her.
“Because it was signed this morning, and if Conrad Noble was alive?”
“It couldn’t have happened unless he agreed,” I guessed.
She nodded and handed me the papers.
“Hey,” Clutterbuck objected. “There is only one law enforcement officer sitting at this table.”
“You’re ‘the man,’ chief,” Pepper told him with a sunny smile. “I’m a reporter. Independent. The fourth estate. I can’t be handing evidence over to the chief of police. My credibility would be shot. My renegade reputation destroyed.” She waved at the papers in my hand. “If Fortuna shows you, well, there’s nothing I can really do about that, is there?”
Clutterbuck stared at her. “You’re a strange woman, Stanford.”
Pepper raised her eyebrow. “You just found out she’s a witch, and you’re calling me strange?”
I continued skimming the papers as Clutterbuck and Pepper bantered back and forth. Suddenly, my eyes fell on a name that made me squint to be sure I read it right. I couldn’t understand what this particular attorney would be doing filing these papers. “I know this lawyer,” I held up the last page. “Gerard Blatworth.”
“Blatworth?” Pepper asked, surprised. “Isn’t that Martin’s lawyer? The one he got you when Chief Clutterbuck was trying to put you in jail for Hugh Maddox’s murder?”
The chief shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “About that, I—”
“Forget it—water under the bridge. But yes, that’s the same guy. I would’ve sworn he worked directly for Martin. Well,” I said, leaning back in the chair and thinking. “He worked for the track. Like, the business.”
“Which means there’s a possibility he worked for Martin’s father.”
I looked at Chief Clutterbuck and nodded. “Or Karen.”
“I think we should go visit Martin. See what he knows about where Blatworth’s loyalties lie.”
“This is unexpected,” Martin said, giving a start of surprise.
“Daddy!” Angie’s smiling, surprised face peeked around the corner. After the verbal greeting, she slipped into her father’s arms and gave him a hug. Clutterbuck’s expression softened swiftly the moment his daughter touched him, and I could see him taking stock of the changes her nearness brought. “How’re you doing, Daddy? Are you being nice to Fortuna?”
“I always said you had a healing touch, Row.” He looked down at his daughter as if he’d never quite seen her before. “Fortuna tells me I was right about that.”
“I already told you about my powers, sort of,” Angie said with a glare in my direction. “What did Fortuna tell you? And why are you calling me Row? You know I hate my birth name.” She blushed with embarrassment.
“You shouldn’t be. Rowena is a Celtic name, ancient. Its origins aren’t entirely certain, but it first appears in Welsh historian Geoffrey of Monmouth’s 12th-century History of Britain’s Kings. Rowena was the daughter of the Saxon chief, Hengist.” I smiled warmly at my younger sister. “Kind of appropriate considering who your dad is.”
“It just sounds so…so country.” She shrugged. “Anyway, what are you guys doing here?”
“We actually have a question for Martin.” I handed him the papers Pepper had given me. “These turned up in the investigation into Conrad Noble’s death. Prunella—Conrad’s wife—and his brother Bond signed over a parcel of land that had been in the Noble family for over a hundred years. They filed the papers just this morning. They were prepared by—”
“Gerard Blatworth,” Martin murmured, his eyes scanning documents.
“Does he still work for you?”
Martin looked up. “No. I let him go over a month ago.”
“Why?” Chief Clutterbuck asked his future son-in-law. (Oh, come on, we all know it will happen.)
“My father and I had a long talk once…Once we realized…” Martin looked back and forth between Angie and her father as if he was unsure of exactly how much to say.
“I know who you are, son,” Clutterbuck told him gruffly. “I knew who you were when you showed up in this town, and I know a lot of what transpired since. I definitely know who your father is. My Row’s been telling me about the things you’ve been doing, taking steps to make the past right. I will not judge you for what you say.”
“It’s not really that, Sir. It’s—”
“He knows Karen’s a witch.” Martin and Angie turned, their stares curious. “We just came from Prunella’s house. It was warded, and I can’t get in. Only a witch can set wards, and they were powerful enough they almost knocked me off my feet.” Angie bit her lower lip, her eyes darting toward her father. “If there are people from your organization there still helping, my guess is they’re helping Karen make some kind of last stand.” I gestured toward Clutterbuck. “We have to trust him. He has Karen, he has the last witch bottle, and he may have evidence that shows where the selenite crystal ball went.”
“Crystal ball?” Martin asked frowning. “What crystal ball?”
“I feel like we keep getting bits and pieces of this,” Clutterbuck interrupted. He stepped forward, ready to take charge. “We’re going to spend all our time getti
ng people up to speed.” He paused and glanced around. “Call Gabe, Ollie, and Jeeves. Dalida, too—your sister should probably be a part of this. Let’s get the whole posse together and go through this once.”
“Um, about Jeeves,” I began.
“He goes by Chris now, Daddy,” Angie told him.
“And he’s um…busy for a few hours,” Martin added, nodding.
“Busy?” Clutterbuck asked with an eyebrow raised. “If what you say is true, what’s more important than this?”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake.” Pepper rolled her eyes and turned to face the chief of police. “Jeeves is a vampire. He’s sleeping somewhere under the ground, away from the sun. He’ll be with us at sundown, so let’s just set the meeting for then, shall we? In the meantime, go back to the station and get all the evidence from the room. Bring it here.”
“I can’t bring it here. How would I explain that?”
“To who? You’re the chief of police. If you leave it there, you’re leaving it in the same building that Karen’s in. The room’s not warded, is it?” Pepper extended her hands. Her question hung in the air. “No, it’s not. But this building is. Bring everything here.”
“The bottle, too?” Clutterbuck asked.
“Especially the bottle,” Pepper told him. “There’s someone in there. Let’s make sure she’s safe.”
Nine
“And now you’re caught up,” I told Chris as we sat in Martin’s large, luxuriously paneled office.
Chris looked as if he understood…but didn’t want to. He leaned back in the chair and gently rubbed his fingers together as if attempting to come up with the missing ingredient in lasagna. “Despite all that, no one has the smallest suspicion as to why Conrad Noble was murdered? Or why?”
“Well, we have suspicions. They’re not even small,” I began hesitantly. I thought I just explained those, but maybe I wasn’t clear. “I mean, it probably has something to do with the land Prunella and Bond just signed over to the Holy Grove Church. And after talking to them this afternoon—or, really, not being able to talk to them—it’s clear the land transfer has something to do with Karen, the witch bottle, and the selenite sphere.”
