Thistle’s eyes went wide with amusement as Landon sidled closer to me.
“Sweetie, now might not be the time for you to pick a fight,” he offered. “I mean ... I’m not telling you what to do or anything, but I’m not sure I can take all three of them.”
I shot him a quelling look. “I’ve got this.” My words were bolder than my courage. “Clove is pregnant. There. It’s out of the bag. You know and everybody can calm down and accept it.”
“Accept it?” Marnie’s voice was unnaturally shrill. “What if I don’t want to accept it? Have you considered that?”
Ugh. She was being purposely obnoxious. “It’s not about you,” I shot back. “It’s about Clove. Why can’t you guys just be supportive and give her the encouragement she needs? There’s a reason we were trying to keep it secret.”
“And just how long were you planning to keep it secret?” Mom challenged, her eyes a fascinating mixture of fire and ice. If I didn’t know it was impossible, I would think she was about to combust. “Were you going to hide Clove from us for six months and then magically show up with a baby?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Besides, she’s a lot further along than that. You really only have four and a half months to adjust.”
Marnie’s mouth dropped open. “Four and a half months!” She swiveled on Clove. “How are you that far along?”
“I think the better question is: How did we not notice she was that far along?” Twila countered. She seemed to be taking the news best. That was hardly a surprise. She might’ve been the flighty one — and that was putting it mildly — but her nature allowed her to roll with changes much more seamlessly than my rigid mother and Clove’s dramatic maternal figure. “Why didn’t you tell us, Clove?”
“That’s what I want to know.” Aunt Tillie, cookie in hand, plopped herself on the couch and smiled. She seemed to be enjoying the spectacle. I wanted to shake her. I knew her finding out about the baby would screw us. Still, I figured she would be able to hold out for a few days. “We’re not ogres. Well, Winnie is an ogre, but she’s not your mother. Why not just gather your courage and tell us the truth?”
Clove frowned. “I just ... I was afraid. I knew you guys would yell. I hate it when you yell.”
“What makes you think we’re going to yell?” Marnie shrieked.
“Perhaps because you’re yelling,” Sam shot back. “I wanted to tell everyone from the start, but Clove refused. She’s terrified ... she hasn’t been sleeping. You all should think long and hard about that. She shouldn’t be this afraid.”
He wasn’t wrong. “That’s a very good point,” I said. “Do you want us living in fear? I mean ... that’s ridiculous. We’re not kids anymore; we’re adults. There’s no reason to freak out about this.”
“Oh, really?” Marnie shot me a look that could’ve melted a cauldron. “You don’t think that being married is a necessity when one is pregnant?”
“No,” I answered without hesitation. “I don’t believe that. You were all married when you had us and look how that turned out. None of the marriages lasted, but we’re fine.”
“Are you blaming that on us?”
Well, that was a thorny question. “It takes two people to break up a marriage,” I answered carefully. “You can’t deny that our fathers felt overwhelmed by this family. They shouldn’t have left. That’s on them and they’ll have to live with the repercussions the rest of their days. That doesn’t mean Clove has to be married to be a good mother.”
“Of course not,” Mom interjected. “That’s not what we’re saying. You aren’t little girls any longer. You’re not teenagers with rampaging hormones. Why couldn’t you wait until after the wedding, Clove?”
Still behind Sam, Clove peeked out, sheepish. “It’s not like we did it on purpose. It was an accident. We thought we would have more time before it happened. That doesn’t mean we’re not excited about the baby.”
“Nobody says you can’t be excited,” Marnie shot back. “I just ... I didn’t expect this from you. Thistle, yes. I thought she would be the bad one.”
I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing at Thistle.
“Hey! I’m not the one who’s baby crazy,” Thistle snapped. “Clove was dying to be a mother. I guess she got her wish.”
“I guess she did.” Marnie was prim. “Well, what’s the next step? What do we tell people?”
I felt as if I was mired in conversational quicksand ... fifty years ago. “Why do you have to tell anyone anything? It’s nobody’s business.”
“Besides, Sam and Clove are going to be married in, like, two days,” Thistle pointed out. “After that, will anybody really care?”
“Frankly, I don’t understand why anyone cares now,” Landon noted. “I mean ... are you not going to love this baby because Sam and Clove weren’t married when it was conceived? Try as I might, I can’t imagine that. I think this is going to be the most spoiled baby on the planet.”
“And who doesn’t love babies?” I added.
Thistle and Aunt Tillie raised their hands, earning a dark glare from me. They weren’t helping.
“What?” Thistle made a face. “They’re messy poop machines. It’s not like they’re all that great.”
Marcus shot her a look. “You’re going to be a fabulous mother someday. I can’t wait to see you holding a baby and going gooey all over.”
“We’ve already talked about this,” Thistle warned. “I’ll have one ... maybe two if the first one is really quiet. Once I pop them out, you’re responsible for all the diapers and midnight feedings. I need my beauty sleep.”
She was a bold talker, but nobody, including Marcus, believed her.
“It will be fine,” he reassured her. There’s nothing to worry about.”
“Definitely,” I agreed. “There’s absolutely nothing to worry about ... so stop worrying. This isn’t a big deal. Clove is financially stable. She and Sam have an awesome house. This baby will be loved and there’s a wedding in a few days. Stop your bellyaching.”
For the first time since the baby bomb dropped, my mother and aunts looked almost happy.
“It is kind of neat,” Mom said after a beat. “I mean ... I’m not thrilled about how it happened, but having Annie here so often has made us realize how much we missed having small children under the roof. It might be fun.”
“Yes, and this will be a small child who won’t be able to talk back for years,” Marnie noted. “Those are the best kinds of children.”
I rolled my eyes but maintained my composure. “See. This is a good thing. We’re expanding our family.”
“Yeah.” A genuine smile spread across Marnie’s face. “I hope it’s a girl. Do you know yet?”
Clove shook her head. “We’re waiting until the birth.”
“Why?” Aunt Tillie made a hilarious face. “It’s a girl. You know that. It’s always girls in this family ... and the babies keep the Winchester name.” She said the last part for Sam’s benefit, but the look on his face told me that despite the healthy level of fear he kept in reserve for our tempestuous great-aunt he was having none of it.
“The baby’s last name will be Winchester-Cornell,” he corrected. “We’ve already talked about that.”
“No way!” Aunt Tillie leaned forward. “That’s not how it works in this family.”
“That’s how it works now,” Clove corrected, firm. “It’s not fair for Sam to be cut out.”
“Besides, we had different names when we were kids,” I added. “You changed them only after the divorces.”
“That’s neither here nor there. All babies born to this family are Winchesters.”
“The baby will still be a Winchester,” Thistle offered. “It will be a Cornell, too. There’s no reason to get your panties in a bunch.”
“Okay, mouth, you’ve done it this time.” Aunt Tillie’s face flushed with annoyance. “You’re on top of my list. Congratulations. You managed to supplant Hazel and Margaret. That’s truly miraculous.�
��
“Oh, curse me,” Thistle shot back. “I don’t even care.”
“You should. Besides, I’m not wearing panties. They don’t look right with these leggings, so I’m going commando. That means there are no panties to get into a bunch.”
I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing at the pained look on Landon’s face. Apparently he could’ve gone his entire life without having to envision the picture she was painting.
“Let’s focus on the important things,” Mom suggested. “Clove is pregnant and she’s getting married. I don’t think we have time to worry about trivial stuff when we have that on the agenda.”
She wasn’t wrong. “Yes. Let’s focus on that. I mean ... you guys are all going to be grannies and grand-aunties. That’s got to be exciting.”
The smiles that had been on their faces died.
“I didn’t think about that,” Mom muttered.
“Yeah, I don’t want to be a granny.” Marnie was firm. “I need to come up with something different for the kid to call me. This granny thing won’t cut it.”
Ah, well, one crisis averted.
LANDON WAS SO DETERMINED TO KEEP ME from having nightmares he practically dragged me on top of him to sleep. At first I thought it would be impossible to drift off. I was wrong.
“How did you sleep?”
His eyes were the first thing I saw when I woke. He was staring directly into my face, and he looked worried.
“Fine.” I smiled as I ran my finger over his stubbled chin. “Everything is fine.”
“You look better rested than yesterday, that’s for sure. Still ... if you had a bad dream I want to know about it.”
“Well ... I had a dream about Mom, Twila and Marnie wearing shirts with the word ‘Grandmother’ on them and they were crossed out with those big circle things with the lines through them. Aunt Tillie was trying to strap the baby to her chest and ride around on her scooter. That wasn’t exactly a good dream. It wasn’t a bad one either.”
“I can’t help you there. That’s simple anxiety ... though the big conversation went down better than you led me to believe it would. They weren’t nearly as furious as I expected.”
“There’s no reason for them to be furious. I mean ... Clove and Sam are getting married. Even if they weren’t, this is hardly the end of the world. Most of the time I think of our mothers as progressive. On some things, though, they have an antiquated belief system.”
“Yeah ... although I prefer we’re married before having kids.”
I shifted, mildly uncomfortable with the direct way he addressed our future. “Oh, yeah?”
His smirk was mischievous. “Are you not okay with that?”
“I don’t know. We haven’t really talked about it that much.”
“That’s not true. We have talked about it. You know I believe you’re my future, right?”
It had taken a great deal of time and comfort, but I did know that. I couldn’t see myself with anyone else, and I knew he felt the same. “I know. Still, I was kind of hoping we could wait a bit before we have to worry about that.”
“I wholeheartedly agree. Your powers being what they are, I don’t think it’s safe to add a baby to the mix now.”
I hadn’t even considered that. “A baby would probably be afraid of ghosts.”
He pursed his lips, cocking his head as he thought about the statement. “I don’t know. Were you afraid of the first ghost you saw?”
“I’m not even sure I realized it was a ghost. I mean ... I probably saw ghosts long before I could comprehend what they were. I’m not even entirely sure when I came to the conclusion that I was actually dealing with a ghost.”
“Good point. What are the odds any child we have will see ghosts?”
That was the question. “I don’t know. It’s not a very common — or comfortable — gift. It runs in families. I got it because Aunt Tillie can see them. My mother can’t, but ... it’s possible that one or more of our children could see ghosts.”
“Then we’ll deal with it.” He was matter-of-fact. “It’ll be easier for our child because you’ll understand what’s happening. It had to be difficult for your mother when she couldn’t see what you were seeing.”
“Yeah, and I figured out early that it wasn’t a good thing to tell her. She got frustrated. Plus, well, I didn’t want her to send me away, so I stopped telling her about what I could see for a long time. We’ll have to make sure that doesn’t happen with our kid.”
Landon looked pensive. “Why did you think she would send you away?”
I shrugged. “It just seemed a possibility. My mom and aunts watched a lot of those Lifetime movies and they were always talking about sending crazy people away. I was convinced I was crazy for a long time.”
“I’m sorry.” He pressed a kiss to my forehead. “You shouldn’t have had to go through that. You won’t ever again. Our daughter won’t either.”
“What if we have a son?”
He smirked. “I have pretty much convinced myself that we’re going to be blessed with girls. I’m fine with that, by the way. I don’t care what we have as long as he or she is happy.”
That was exactly what I wanted to hear. “Same here.”
He gave me another kiss. “How about we shower and head up to the inn? I’m hungry and I want to talk to Terry. We need to come up with a plan on how we’re going to greet the day ... and start chasing down leads. So far, we’re doing nothing but chasing leads that circle and die quickly.”
“Are you including me in that ‘we’?”
He shrugged. “Maybe. It depends on what we plan. Let’s play it by ear for now. What I really want to do is eat some bacon, and torture your mother and aunts about being grannies and grand-aunties.”
I smirked. “You’re going to give them a ton of grief about this, aren’t you?”
“Oh, you have no idea.”
Seventeen
Landon and Chief Terry had met with Landon’s boss, who wanted an update on the case. They couldn’t very well take me with them, so I took advantage of the situation and headed to the office. I had some things to do — including okaying the layout for the week’s edition — and I couldn’t shirk my duties no matter how much the birds bothered me. Investigating murder wasn’t my primary job, but the way things had gone the past year and a half I probably should’ve considered heading to the academy for proper training.
Viola was waiting for me. “Where have you been?” She was positively apoplectic.
“Around,” I replied, furrowing my brow. “Why are you so worked up?”
“Why do you think?”
I had no idea. Viola was tempestuous in life. She was even worse in death. For some reason, though, I enjoyed her company. She reminded me of Aunt Tillie in a way, even though they were bitter enemies. She often said idiotic things that made me laugh, and because she was dead she had a lot of time on her hands to spy on others. Occasionally she came up with a good gossipy tidbit, so I tried to appease her as often as possible.
“I don’t know,” I answered. “Why don’t you tell me why you’re upset and we’ll tackle the problem from there??”
She shot me a withering look right out of my mother’s playbook. “Don’t handle me. I can’t stand it when people handle me.”
“I’m not trying to handle you. I’m just trying to figure out why you’re so worked up.”
“Them.” She gestured vaguely at nothing.
I glanced around, confused. “What?”
“You know.” She leaned forward so we were in a conspiratorial huddle. “Them.”
I had no idea if that was supposed to mean something to me. “I need more information.”
“Oh, geez. I can’t believe I have to spell this out for you. Them. Them. Them!” This time she waved her hand toward my office window.
I looked through the glass. There was nothing out of the ordinary happening. In fact, all I could see were festival shenanigans. “The witches?” I asked fin
ally. “Is that who you’re talking about? I thought you were looking forward to them visiting.”
“That’s exactly who I’m talking about.” She bobbed her head. “How could you invite them here? And excited isn’t the right word. I’m hypervigilant because they need to be watched.”
“I didn’t invite them.” It was my mother and aunts who decided to resurrect the gathering. This was on them. “I’m just covering the event.”
“Well, they’re evil.”
“Why?”
“All witches are evil.”
“I think you’re preaching to the wrong choir there,” I argued. “You know I’m a witch?”
Viola’s “Well, duh” look was right out of a slapstick comedy. “You’re not an evil witch, though.”
“You just said all witches are evil.”
“I wasn’t talking about you ... or your mother and aunts, for that matter.”
“What about Clove and Thistle?”
“Clove is a sweet girl. Nobody could ever consider her evil. As for Thistle ... I think the less said the better.”
I smirked. “Probably. What about Aunt Tillie?”
“Is that even a serious question? Of course she’s an evil witch. I mean ... her photo is on Wikipedia next to the evil witch entry. No joke. I put it there.”
“After you died?”
She nodded. “I’m getting better at affecting the physical world. It took me an entire night, but I managed to load her photo.”
Not that I didn’t believe her, but I had to check. I logged onto my computer, briefly shoving Viola’s witch hysteria out of my mind. When I navigated to the page in question, I found she was telling the truth.
“Wow.” Without thinking, I took a screenshot so I could forever remember this moment ... and share it with Clove and Thistle. They would get a kick out of it. “I can’t believe you managed that. I’m impressed.”
“Yes, well, I’m impressive.” She made a big show of sitting in one of the chairs across from me. She was a ghost, so she didn’t need to sit, but she’d held on to many of her mannerisms from life. I found it comforting to know that her mind was still intact ... especially after she died directly in front of me from a gunshot to the head. “You need to get over the witches,” I suggested, shifting the conversation back to the original topic. “There’s nothing you can do about them, so there’s no point in getting worked up about something you can’t change.”
Wicked Witches of the Midwest Mystery Box Set Page 74
