by Mara Webb
Ryan guided me to my feet, and we shuffled to the edge of the doorway. I looked up at Amber with alarm and she gave me a big thumbs up, not reassuring in the slightest.
Her face was warping in the most bizarre way. Wind hurtled into the cabin and made her skin move like she was being blasted by a leaf blower. We sat and Ryan scooted us to the edge, my feet dangling outside into the open air.
“Ready?!” he shouted to me.
“No!” I shouted back.
“Too bad!” Ryan shouted back.
Ryan jumped forward and the floor disappeared from underneath me. We tipped forward, fell out of the plane, and started falling through the air.
12
I opened my eyes and tried to take in my surroundings as quickly as I could. My last memory had been on a plane with Ryan, but I couldn’t see him now. I was on a bed, lay on top of the sheets and I felt the sting of artificial light in my eyes. There were no windows in this room.
A chill in the air brought me to full alertness quickly and I sat up and looked around for a clue as to where I was. Had the plane been a dream? A premonition? I had been in a jail cell and now I was out of it, that was all I knew. This wasn’t jail, there had been some natural light in jail.
The pattern of the fabric on the bed was the type that my grandmother had liked, heavy floral with a lace trim. It was almost like a studio apartment in here, there was a small kitchenette, a bathroom with a shower cubicle and on old TV with a cable leading out of the back and tunneling upwards through the ceiling.
I stood up and my legs buckled beneath me as if they had atrophied from lack of use. How long had I been in here? I stood in the center of the room and spun slowly to look for an exit; if there was a way out of here, it wasn’t obvious.
I walked over to the lounge area and turned on the TV, the sound of it was initially loud and I hurried to turn down the volume. It seemed I had switched on in time to see the local news.
“Police are urging Sucré residents to lock their doors tonight as they launch an extensive search for Ms. Nora Wildes, pictured here. Ms. Wildes was being held in connection with two recent incidents but has escaped and is at large. At this time, she is considered to be dangerous.”
I shut the TV off and slumped back into a chair. So, the escape had been real, I had somehow found my way out of one prison and into another. My face was plastered across the local news and there was a manhunt operation going on, likely involving my boyfriend, trying to find me.
Little old me.
When I had been speaking with Quin in the jail cell and he offered me the chance to escape, I hadn’t thought much about the following fallout. Of course, I now looked more guilty of the things they suspected me of, of course they were going to try and find me after they discovered that I was gone. Had I thought no one would notice?
I tried to use my magic to light the wood in the small fireplace, but nothing happened. I tried again, waving my hand more frantically as if trying to swat away a fly.
Nothing.
Where were my powers? Had they been stripped from me? Was this part of the deal when I had escaped from jail? I had abused magic for personal gain, so was this my punishment?
But the goat had suggested it, or was it Quin? Either way, was I really going to blame my lapse in ethical judgment on two talking animals? Maybe I could use an insanity plea when this goes to court as clearly I was losing my mind.
Something was digging into my back and I turned at the waist to look behind me. Half a carrot was sticking out of the cushions and prodding me in the back.
Yep, I’ve lost it. I picked up the vegetable and saw that it had been sloppily chewed, then I realized that the chair I was sitting on was covered in wiry hairs.
Goat hairs in fact. I must be in the basement that Quin said he had kept the escape goat in. Did that mean that I was only a few feet below my house? How could I get back up there?
“Quin!” I shouted, hoping that maybe he could hear me through the concrete barrier between us.
“Yes?” he said. Quin appeared on top of the counter in the kitchenette with a ‘pop’ sound, and started to lick at his paws, his tail wrapped neatly around him.
“What happened? Why am I here?” I asked. “I had a vision that I was…somewhere else.” I didn’t know whether to mention the weird skydiving thing that I had seen, it would only trigger a long irrelevant anecdote.
“Oh yeah, the goat does that. I think that using an escape goat is supposed to be pretty painful, or was it supposed to tickle? I can’t remember, but anyway…you have some random dream as you are transported. It’s part of it, the vision takes your mind off the discomfort and helps you solve the problem.
“You usually can’t just escape a physical place and have that be the end of your problems, the vision shows you a solution.”
It was a neat concept, but I couldn’t possibly figure out how Ryan and I jumping out of a plane that Amber was flying would help anyone. “Ryan is upstairs by the way.”
The sound of his name sent a shot of adrenaline through my blood, he was here, and he was waiting for me. I had dreamt that being wherever he was would mean that I was safe, he was here to protect me from whatever was coming after me, the police and the mystery killer.
“How do I get out of here though?” I said, miming the hand gestures that a flight attendant gives to indicate the emergency exits but then shrugging as there was not a visible door.
“I’ll bring him down to you, it’s kind of my special place down here so only I can control who enters and leaves. The police can raid the house and never find you. Pretty neat huh? They’ve actually tried once already this afternoon, but Ryan shut it down with some legal jargon, they said they’d be back with battering rams or something.
“There are like six cars parked outside watching the place, I haven’t seen Brent though. Have you heard from him?” That hit a nerve. The sound of Ryan’s name had brought comfort and a sense that everything might be okay, but Brent…it brought back the memory of his screaming when I was being escorted into the police car.
If all of this was somehow rectified, would our relationship be salvageable? Did I want to save it?
Since the moment that he mentioned an engagement our whole world had flipped over and we were separated by doubts and murder. If I was honest with myself, hadn’t this always been about Ryan? When I was in trouble, who did I always call? Who could I rely on more than anyone?
With a potential life imprisonment sentence hanging over me if the police ever managed to discover my hiding place, maybe now wasn’t the best time to fantasize about kissing my lawyer.
The goofy grin on my face was still there when Ryan appeared next to the kitchen counter in the sad, little basement. Quin must have transported himself back upstairs because he was no longer down here with me, maybe he could sense that we had some talking to do.
We both walked towards each other, the acceleration of footfall sounded as if we were both beginning to run track, but the room was too small for that. We collided and wrapped our arms around each other before Ryan leaned back so that he could see my face and then he kissed me.
It was just the pressing together of our mouths like an extended peck on the cheek, it felt like time slowed down and I took a deep breath through my nose before pulling back.
“Stupid bat pocket,” I said. He had one hand wrapped gently around the back of my head, cupping it softly. We both smiled at each other broadly before stepping apart.
“Yeah, it wasn’t ideal that you left ID at a murder scene, but that is circumstantial. There is nothing concrete connecting you to a murder weapon. Same with Joanne, other than her being on top of your car a few hours after you complained she was stalking you. Again, not ideal.” An expression of concern flashed across his face then faded as quickly as it had appeared. That didn’t fill me with confidence.
“Mysteriously escaping prison though…” I said.
“Not totally ideal. The important thing to focus on is
that you are innocent.”
I paused. “You don’t know that though, do you? For all you know I could be the one behind all this.”
Ryan just laughed. “Not in a million years. There’s no way. You’re a good person Nora.”
“Not according to the TV. They have my photo on the news, I’ve hit the big time. My mom will be so proud,” I said.
“It’s a cute photo though,” he replied. I felt my heart pound harder for a few beats as I held his gaze. “Look, it’s bad at the minute, like, catastrophic. But people have gotten away with murder with more evidence stacked up against them, so I don’t think we need to panic.”
“I’m not trying to get away with murder though, remember? I didn’t actually kill anybody.”
“Sure.” He gave an exaggerated wink and we both laughed. Well if I was going to rot in prison at least my lawyer had a good sense of humor about it. “We had a plan before this all went South, and I think we can still stick to that for the most part. We visited one house on our list, which sent the police after us and got you arrested. Let’s look at lucky house number two!”
He did his best game-show host voice and the whiteboard that he had been using to make notes suddenly appeared behind him. He pulled a blue marker out of thin air and turned to begin adding notes. “So, what have we learned…?”
“Well Nancy is pushing daisies, so I’d start with that,” I said. Ryan switched to a red marker and drew a cross underneath Nancy’s name to suggest that she was eliminated from the suspects list. “There was something at the house, most likely the killer. There was a shadow creeping up on us and they probably saw our faces, we possibly won’t make it through the night,” I stated matter-of-factly.
“Oh no, we perhaps only have a few hours left, if that,” he replied with a smile and a twinkle in his eye. “There are five names on the list and two have been killed. Someone is narrowing down the suspects for us! How kind of them. Did you ever play wink murder as a kid?”
I shook my head. “No?”
“It’s very simple. One kid is the detective and has to leave the room, then the rest of the kids pick a ‘murderer’ and shout for the detective to come back in. The murderer winks at people to ‘kill’ them when the detective isn’t looking, eventually there are like two or three people left and then it’s obvious. This reminds me of that.”
“Is that early exposure to crime what inspired you to study law?” I smirked.
“Jeez, you try and open up to a gal and she just stomps all over you.” This silly flirting was almost pushing out all the thoughts about dead bodies and police raids. “Right, if we try and go through the list in order then we should look into Cassandra Thomas next.”
“How do you suggest that we get there without the police tracking me? Won’t Brent have shared the names of all these women with his colleagues? There will be a police car guarding everyone of these women now, I don’t see how we can do this.”
“When nothing goes right, go left,” he said. He shouted for Quin to come back and they began working on an idea for getting me back into the main body of the house, it was going to take Quin using up all of his acting skills and he was very excited.
“Oh! This could be the perfect opportunity to showcase my Mexican accent!” he purred happily.
“On second thought, why don’t I just stay here?” I said sarcastically.
“That… might be for the best,” Ryan said.
13
“Why yes, I think I see her now running through my back yard…oh goodness is that a knife? Please, someone needs to help me,” Quin shrieked in his best southern accent. It seemed he was just doing a slightly shrill impression of Sam the escape goat, but nevertheless, it seemed to be doing the trick.
He had called in to the Sucré Police Department through 9-1-1 and claimed that he could see me lurking in the bushes. This was intended to draw some of the heat away from the house long enough that I could get back upstairs to access my attic library.
Quin could only transport us one level up from his secret, hidden basement, so I would have to travel some of the way on foot and it turned out that none of the downstairs drapes or blinds were currently covering the windows.
The police were aware that Ryan was inside, but if he started blocking their view into the house, they might get suspicious. It was probably an overreaction on our part but at least Quin got to speak to someone on the phone which was one of his favorite things to do.
On the phone, no one knew they were talking to a cat. Quin often said that fooling a human with this trick was “One of the greatest highs”, but he had said the same thing about eating lasagna.
Even from the sealed off basement I could hear the sirens whirring into the distance. Quin had given them an address that was on the other side of town to buy us some time. He disappeared upstairs and then returned almost straight away. “Why it seems there is still a ve-hickle parked out there, they seem to be sticking to us like red on candy,” Quin said, continuing his thick southern drawl.
“Hey, you can drop the accent now Daniel Day-Lewis,” Ryan jibed. “One car is better than six. I can work a little magic to fog up the glass on their windscreen long enough to get you up to the attic. I’ll head up, then send Quin back down for you when it’s time.”
Ryan ‘popped’ out of the room and I was left alone in the basement with the whiteboard. I wondered how Ryan was able to use his magic to bring it down here, but I wasn’t able to get the fire started. He had a full license for his magic, until I passed all of the O.W.L. assignments and exams, I would be limited.
I hadn’t felt restricted up until today. I didn’t know how long I would be waiting but I was curious to see if the news would be talking about me non-stop until my capture.
I switched the TV back on and saw that there was a helicopter camera shooting footage live from above someone’s back yard as armed police stormed the property. It made for very dramatic viewing, but I of course knew that they wouldn’t find me there.
The stream of text across the bottom of the screen was providing updates about me such as my age and my typical fast-food order just in case I was heading for a drive-through. Where did they even get that information? Urgh, I could really go for some French fries now.
“Okay we are now getting reports that…okay yes it seems that although this is not the location of Nora Wildes, local fugitive, the police have stumbled upon a stash of stolen electronics in the garage at this home and are bringing in two thieves that have been terrorizing the town for almost eight months. Not exactly what we were hoping for tonight, but ultimately a win for our heroes in blue…”
I wondered if Quin had known this somehow when he gave out the address. Was he just fighting crime by himself now as a side-project? He did sometimes wander out into the back yard and disappear for hours, maybe he had wriggled in through a gap in their door and seen a pile of car radios.
Quin ‘popped’ back onto the kitchen counter.
“Come on y’all, I’m busier than a moth in a mitten and you’re slowing me down.”
“Oh good, the accent is here to stay then,” I said, rolling my eyes as I walked over to him.
“Why you’d be madder than a wet hen if you think I’m stopping now darling!” Quin drawled.
“Let’s just get out of here.”
Just like I had with the escape goat, I placed my hand on Quin’s back and he transported me straight out of the weird little concrete dungeon and back into the kitchen on the ground floor of number thirteen Charm Close. Ryan was standing upright but gestured for me to duck down, I complied.
“Just stay low and follow me. It’s also probably a good idea that we move this completely out of sight in case the humans burst in again,” Ryan said, holding up the Rune textbook I had left out earlier. I had forgotten all about the heavy workload from my O.W.L. tutor, there was too much other stuff to deal with.
“Good read though,” he said. “I mean, it looks interesting. I had a skim of the first page
earlier, never got around to learning runes myself, but I hear it is a highly sought-after skill in the justice department. I think you are being molded for a desk job here,” he laughed.
“That sounds dull, so I’ll pass. Come on, attic,” I said. I was crouched over and running which wasn’t something I did very often in my own home, or anywhere for that matter. It put a strain on my abs and my back at the same time and I wanted more than anything to just stand up straight.
It wasn’t until we were on the stairs that I remembered something important, something that I had somehow completely forgotten about until I was running back towards the attic door, and therefore back along the corridor that connects to my bedroom. Quin had trapped a ghost upstairs.
Joanne wasn’t screaming anymore, which is probably how I had ended up forgetting she was there. Never in a million years would a regular person forget that their bedroom had been temporarily transformed into a ghost holding cell, but I wasn’t regular, and this was turning out to be a strange week.
Standing on the carpet outside my room, I could hear Edith’s voice trying to comfort Joanne and there seemed to be a calm, civilized conversation going on.
“Stay here,” Ryan whispered to me. He walked through the door and into my bedroom to join the two ghosts. Joanne was still under the curse so obviously the sight of me would enrage her and she would stop talking.
I curled up with my legs crossed on the ground and eavesdropped as best as I could.
“Good evening ladies,” he said. Silence followed but I imagine his entrance startled them, the type of startle that would maybe cause someone to gasp or drop what they were holding, but they were ghosts so a lot of what they did was soundless.
“It’s okay,” Edith said, “he is a friend of mine. Ryan this is Joanne, Joanne this is Ryan.”
