Playing With Fire

by Adrienne Woods et al.

  Ben removes a business card from his pocket and hands it to the security guard. “I’m Detective Ben Walker. New Jersey State Police. This is official police business.”

  The security guard gulps. “Okay. I guess.”

  “It’s okay,” Ben assures her.

  As we approach Kiki, she seems to be in her own little world. As I get closer, I see she’s wearing ear buds.

  When Ben gives her a wave, she removes them from her ears. “Detective Walker. What are you doing here?”

  “We’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  She stops peddling and stares at Ben. “About what?”

  “Did you and Lenny Moreno recently get married?”

  Her face breaks into a huge grin. “He flew me to Las Vegas so we could tie the knot. I wish we could have stayed longer but we heard that Lenny’s father passed away, so we flew back to New Jersey.”

  “When was the last time you saw your husband?” He removes a small notepad and pencil from his pocket.

  “I left the house early this morning. I had to take care of some personal business. I’m trying to get moved into Lenny’s place.”

  “Where do you currently reside?”

  “With my mother.”

  “And her name is?”

  Kiki squirms in her bike seat. “Why are you asking me so many questions?”

  “I’m sorry to have to inform you that your husband, Lenny Moreno, is dead.”

  Her eyes widen. “What?”

  “Someone killed your husband.”

  She starts to get woozy. Thankfully Ben’s reflexes are quick. He catches her as she slides off the exercise bike.

  “Do you have someplace she can lie down?” Ben asks the security guard.

  She gestures towards the changing room. “There’s a small lounge area with a couch.”

  I follow as Ben carries Kiki into the lounge area. He carefully places her on the couch.

  After a few moments, her eyes flutter open. “What happened?”

  “You passed out,” I tell her.

  “Is this a dream?” She pinches her own arm. Then waits for several moments. “I guess not.” Tears begin to stream down her cheeks. “Is Lenny really dead?”

  Ben nods. “He is.”

  She breaks into a sobbing mass. If she is the killer, she deserves the Oscar for acting. I don’t think she had any idea that Lenny was dead.

  “Would you like me to call an ambulance?” Ben asks. “Would you like to see a physician?”

  Kiki shakes her head. “No. I just want to go home.”

  “We should take you back to your mother’s place. Lenny’s house is considered a crime scene.”

  Her eyes fill with panic. “I’ll be fine. I have my car here.”

  “You aren’t in any condition to drive,” Ben says.

  “My mother isn’t well.”

  “There are still some questions I need to ask. Perhaps you’d be more comfortable if I took you home so we can continue the interview.”

  All the color drains from her face. Something doesn’t seem right. What is she trying to hide? It seems to have something to do with her mother.

  “We can do the interview at your mother’s house, or I can take you to the police station for questioning.”

  Kiki’s forehead creases. She looks pained. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Is there a reason you don’t want us going to your mother’s house.”

  “I already told you. She isn’t well.”

  Ben and I exchange a glance.

  “Then I have no choice but to take you to the police station.”

  Tears stream down her cheeks. “I just lost my husband. Can we do this another time?”

  “This is a murder investigation.”

  “Fine. I’ll go to the police station.”

  “And I’ll need to see some ID,” Ben adds.

  Her entire body freezes. “I don’t have my driver’s license with me.”

  “You said you drove your car to the gym.”

  Her nose scrunches up like she just smelled something rotten. “I did, didn’t I.”

  Ben places his hand out. “Your ID please.”

  She heaves a sigh. “It’s in my bag. Over there.” She points to her pink gym bag that got dropped several feet from the couch.

  I grab the bag from the floor and hand it to her.

  At the speed of an aging tree sloth, she opens the bag and removes her driver’s license. Then she hands it to Ben.

  “Robin Nicoletti. You’re not Kiki Rogers?”

  “Nope.”

  “According to the date of birth on your driver’s license, you’re forty-five years old.”

  She nods.

  Kiki Rogers, a.k.a Robin Nicoletti, looks like she’s twenty-five. How did she pull that off?

  Nicoletti. That name sounds so familiar but I’m not sure why. “Excuse me for just a moment,” I tell Ben. “I’ll be right back.”

  I dial my grandmother’s number as I hurry out of the gym. She’s lived in northern New Jersey for over seventy years. She knows just about everyone who resides within several counties.

  “Are you okay?” My grandmother’s voice is filled with concern.

  “I’m fine,” I lie. “I have a quick question. Why does the last name Nicoletti sounds so familiar?”

  “The Nicoletti’s lived a few doors down from us when you were little. I went to school with Brenda Nicoletti.”

  “Is she a witch?” I ask.

  “She lived in Raven Circle. What do you think?”

  “Does she have a daughter?”

  “She was a teenager when they moved away. Let me think. It was a while ago. Hmmm… I believe her name was Robin.”

  “One more thing. Do you know of a way for a witch to make herself look younger? Like twenty years younger.”

  “That would make you a ten-year-old.”

  “Not for me. We’re questioning a witness. She looks twenty-five and her driver’s license says she’s forty-five.”

  “A witch can change her appearance using a glamour. But it does have unintended consequences if it’s used too much.”

  “Thanks, Grandma. Love you.”

  “Love you too. Please take care of yourself. You know I still worry about you.”

  I end the call and hurry back inside.

  When I return to the lounge area, Kiki, or should I say, Robin, is now seated on the couch. She’s still bawling, while Ben looks on helpless.

  “Now that we have her address,” I point to the driver’s license that’s still in Ben’s hand. “Maybe we should take her back to her mother’s place. We can try to question her mother, Brenda, too.” I lean in close and whisper in his ear. “Brenda is a witch. My grandmother says she used to live in Raven Circle. Robin is most likely a witch too. My grandmother thinks Robin could be using a spell to make herself appear younger.”

  “You can’t see through the spell?” he whispers back.

  “I haven’t gotten that far in the spell book yet.”

  He rolls his eyes at me. “Seriously?”

  “We may be born into the lineage, but we aren’t born knowing everything about magic. We have to learn the craft and practice it. You weren’t born knowing how to be a witch hunter, were you?”

  “Okay, you have a point.”

  He jots the address down in his notebook then hands the license back to Robin.

  She sniffles. “You’re going to take me back to my mother’s house, aren’t you?”

  “We are.” Ben hands her a tissue.

  “Is it okay for me to call my mother and make sure she knows that we’re coming?”

  “Let’s surprise her,” Ben says.

  The Nicoletti’s house is buried deep in the woods about ten miles from Raven Circle.

  Calling the dirt path to their house a road is giving it way too much credit. We haven’t had rain in a while, so the drive to the Nicoletti estate covers Ben’s car with a layer of dust.

  As Ben an
d I exit the vehicle, we both cough as the settling dust fills our lungs. Robin seems unfazed as she hops out of the car and the dust covers her white workout clothes.

  “Please keep in mind what I told you,” Robin says as she heads towards the front door. “My mother is not well.”

  The Nicoletti’s house is a beautifully restored Victorian painted a lovely pale blue with white trim. I can’t help but feel a twinge of jealously as I approach what could be my dream house.

  Like my grandmother, the Nicoletti’s don’t lock their front door. Robin simply opens the door and walks inside.

  Ben and I follow.

  “Mom… I’m home,” Robin yells. “Mom?”

  There’s no response.

  “She may be on the back porch,” Robin tells us. “She likes to sit out there and watch the sun set.”

  The interior of the house is beautifully decorated with antiques of the Victorian era. If I had unlimited funds, I’d love a home like this one.

  “Nice place,” Ben whispers to me.

  “Very,” I whisper back.

  As I glance around, I notice several photos on the mantel. Something about them looks familiar. When I move closer to get a better look at the pictures, my entire body tenses.

  They’re photos of Sal Moreno and one of his many ex-wives. She and Sal were together when Nick and I started dating. Nick said that she was in her 40s and his dad was in his 60s at the time. It wasn’t too long after that Nick told me that his dad dumped her for someone even younger.

  “Who’s the woman in these photos?” I ask Robin.

  She gulps. Then after a very long pause, she finally says, “My mother.”

  Nick and I look at each other. How is that possible? Her mother is the same age as my grandmother. She would be the same age as Sal, not twenty years younger.

  Was she using a glamour spell too?

  “I think we need to talk to your mother,” Ben tells Robin.

  “I’ll be right back.” Robin exits the living area and heads toward the back of the house.

  “There is some very strange stuff going on with these two women,” Ben says.

  “You’re preaching to the choir.”

  After several moments, Robin returns. “My mother will speak with you now. She gets tired quickly, so I don’t know how long she’ll be able to talk.”

  Ben and I follow Robin through the house and onto an enclosed back porch with a wonderful view of their colorful garden filled with flowers.

  Brenda Nicoletti is seated in a rocking chair in the corner of the room facing the picture windows. She’s staring outside and doesn’t immediately notice us.

  Even though it’s a hot day, she’s wrapped in a heavy quilt.

  Instead of looking twenty years younger, she now looks twenty years older. If you didn’t know she was in her 70s, you’d think she was in her 90s.

  One of the first things a witch learns is the law of karma. For every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction. Did using the glamour spell to make herself look twenty years younger finally take a toll and now she looks twenty years older?

  Ben grabs a chair from a wicker set on the other side of the porch, pulls it next to Brenda, and takes a seat.

  “Ms. Nicoletti?” Ben reaches into his pocket and removes a business card. “I’m Detective Ben Walker. New Jersey State Police. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”

  As she slowly turns to face him, I can’t help but feel a little bit sad for the woman. She looks like a living skeleton. “What can I do to help you, Detective?” Her shaky voice is barely audible.

  “I’m investigating several deaths related to the Moreno family. If you could help me understand how you are your daughter are related to the Moreno family?”

  When she sighs, I wonder if it will be her last breath. She looks completely defeated. As if she’s just sitting in her rocker waiting to die.

  “I knew Sal Moreno in high school. I had the biggest crush on him, but he never noticed me. He was one of the most popular guys in school. I was a shy girl who no one paid attention to. We met again years later when I applied for a job at Moreno Industrial Supplies. I didn’t get the position, but I did catch Sal’s attention. He told me that I was attractive and then asked if I had a daughter. He said he enjoyed the company of younger women. That’s when I decided to use a glamour spell to make myself appear younger. I went back a few days later as a 40-year-old. Not only did I get the job working for Sal, I also started dating him. I thought it was a dream come true, but it quickly turned into a nightmare.”

  She coughs for several moments. It sounds like she’s going to cough up a lung.

  “Do you need something to drink, Mom?” Robin asks.

  Brenda waves her away. When she finally stops coughing, she continues. “Sal and I had a whirlwind romance. I had been through a series of bad marriages. For the first time in my life, I felt like a princess. Sal spoiled me rotten. He even bought me this house. Then almost as quickly as the romance started, I noticed his attention towards me fading. I was no longer a shiny new toy for him to play with.”

  A lone teardrop slides down her face.

  “It didn’t take long for Sal to find someone else. He traded me in for a 30-year-old. I was devasted. Completely shattered. The man broke my heart. And this is what I get for using the glamour spell to make Sal fall in love with me. It takes a lot of energy to make yourself looks twenty years younger for a long period of time. This is the result.”

  Ben turns to Robin, who is now seated at the wicker table sobbing. “I don’t understand why you went to work for Sal. Why did you marry Lenny Moreno after what Sal did to your mother?”

  “I wanted my mother’s ring back.”

  “What ring?” I ask.

  “The Seal of Solomon,” Brenda says. “It’s been in our family for generations. I was so in love with Sal that I gave the ring to him as a wedding present. He knew it was valuable, but I don’t think he ever realized its significance. When we got divorced, he refused to give it back.”

  “I started dating Lenny so I could get the ring back,” Robin admits. “I was only planning on using the glamour spell for a short period of time. But then I feel in love with Lenny and I couldn’t stop. He thought I was a twenty-five-year-old.”

  Like mother, like daughter.

  “Do you know of anyone who might have wanted to harm Lenny?” Ben asks Robin.

  She shakes her head. “I know Moreno Industrial Supplies was a little shady. They did business for the mob. Maybe he got into some business trouble.”

  “Sal died of a heart attack, but someone put him in a freezer. Do you know anything about that?”

  Robin sniffles. Then grabs a tissue from a box on the table and blows her nose. “Lenny was the one who put his dad on ice. When his dad didn’t show up for work for a several days, he got nervous. That wasn’t like Sal. He might have been a womanizer, but he was always at work. Lenny went to the beach house to check on Sal and found him dead. He also found a copy of Sal’s will. Nick was supposed to inherit everything. Lenny wasn’t going to get a cent. Not even Moreno Industrial Supplies. Because Nick died in the fire, and Sal hadn’t changed his will before he died, Maggie would have gotten it everything. Lenny went a little crazy when he figured that out. He thought if he could kill Maggie before anyone found out that Sal was dead, that he’d inherit his dad’s fortune.”

  “So, Lenny was the one who froze Sal. And Lenny sent the goons to kill me?” I ask.

  “That’s correct,” Robin says.

  “Is Lenny the one who started the fire at Bookman College that killed Nick and Lizzie?”

  She shakes her head. “I don’t think so. He seemed shocked when it happened. Honestly, he didn’t even know exactly where Nick worked. When we first started dating and I asked him about Nick, he said that his brother was a stupid librarian. When I asked him where Nick worked, he looked at me like I had three heads and said, do I look like someone who goes to libraries?”

 
; “So, you have no idea who set the Bookman fire? And you have no idea who killed your husband?”

  She shakes her head.

  “But you did know that your husband attempted to kill Maggie several times?”

  She nods.

  “And you did nothing to stop him?”

  Tears stream down her cheeks. “I told him I wouldn’t tell anyone about the contract on Maggie if he married me.”

  As Ben rises from his chair, he asks Robin to stand. “I’m arresting you as an accessory for the attempted murder of Maggie Moreno.” As he places handcuffs on her, he reads her rights.

  Robin turns to face me. “I’m sorry. I know it was wrong. I just wanted Lenny to love me. I wanted to be his wife.”

  Her face slowly turns from that of a young woman to someone in middle age right before our eyes.

  All of the glamour is gone.

  ***

  By the time Ben processes the paperwork on Robin’s arrest and we leave the station, we’re both exhausted.

  “Are you still hungry?” Ben asks as we slide into his car.

  “After everything we’ve been through, you wouldn’t think so. But I am.”

  “I am too.”

  “We’ve still got a mass of Chinese food in your refrigerator. We’ve just got to heat it up.”

  “Let’s do it.”

  Chapter 16

  BEN

  * * *

  “I feel like we’ve come to a dead end.” I clear the empty food containers from the kitchen table and throw them in the trash.

  We devoured it all. There’s not a scrap of food left. Not even a grain of rice.

  “If Lenny was the one who sent goons to kill me, why was someone still shooting at me at his house even after he was dead?”

  “That’s a good question. Maybe the shooter he hired didn’t know he was dead. Or maybe the person who killed him was the one shooting at us.”

  “And we still don’t know who set the Bookman College fire that killed my family, which is how all of this started.”

  “I feel like we’re missing something.” I reach into the fridge and grab a beer. “Would you like another one?”

  “Sure. Why not? I’m not going anywhere but the spare bedroom.”