Magick & Mayhem

by Sharon Pape

  I was shaking so hard, I couldn’t move for a few seconds. After I regained some control over my limbs, I walked to the mailbox, grabbed the envelope and went inside. There was a time when my first instinct would have been to dial 911, but I didn’t know whom I could trust at the police department. Instead I called Travis. He answered with a sleep-dazed mumble, but the moment he heard my voice, he came fully awake. “What’s wrong?”

  I raced through the salient points of what happened, determined to sound strong and in control. No damsel in distress here, thank you very much. “Can you get one of your buddies to run the plate for you?” I asked hopefully.

  “I can certainly try.”

  I read off the numbers and letters. “I think it was a black SUV.”

  “That doesn’t matter. With a little luck, we’ll have the owner’s name soon enough.”

  “Fingers crossed.”

  “What was in the envelope?” he asked.

  “I didn’t get around to opening it yet. All I could think about was giving you the license plate.”

  “Open it, please. I want to know what it says before we hang up.”

  I’d dropped it onto the kitchen table when I sat down to make the call. I put the phone on speaker and tore the envelope open. Inside was a single sheet of printer paper. “It’s one line,” I said. “IS INVESTIGATING THIS CASE WORTH YOUR LIFE?”

  Travis didn’t speak for a few moments as if he was carefully weighing his words. “Kailyn, promise me you won’t go after any more potential killers or their henchmen on your own. That little stunt you pulled could have ended very differently if that person had had a gun and felt threatened enough to use it.”

  I promised, without argument, which probably surprised him. Although I’d thought of that possibility, hearing him say it in his solemn reporter’s tone, unsettled me more than I cared to admit. I’d been too caught up in fury and frustration to properly assess the danger. But he was right. I could have been shot. I might now be lying dead right there on the quiet street in front of the house where my family had lived for hundreds of years.

  * * *

  I showered, dressed and fed the cats, all in slow motion, physically and emotionally drained from the adrenalin-charged beginning to my day. I was locking up to go to work when I remembered with a groan that I’d promised Aunt Tilly I would wizard-sit. She had several readings scheduled, and if I canceled at the last moment it would turn her day upside-down. At the very least, it would require an explanation. I didn’t want to tell her about the latest visit and threat from the killer. She was already anxious enough.

  When I arrived at my shop, the aroma of warm apple strudel permeated every corner. The strudel had been such an instant hit that it quickly earned a regular place on Aunt Tilly’s tea menu. As with everything she baked of late, she made extra and stashed it away for me, before Merlin could devour it all. He’d filled out a lot since his arrival in the twenty-first century. His cheeks were no longer slack, but nearly as full and rosy as Tilly’s. His scraggly, white hair had a healthy shine to it and his green eyes a sharper twinkle.

  To keep him busy, I’d decided to have him help with a thorough inventory. I needed to know which items to reorder, which herbs and plants to gather and which cosmetic and grooming products to whip up. I took him into the storeroom, gave him a pen and a mini legal pad and told him to note the name of each item along with the quantity of them on the shelf. I figured it would take him an hour or two. At the same time, I’d inventory the retail space, so I’d be available to customers. Merlin grumbled mildly about doing work that was far beneath his abilities, until I placed ear buds in his ears and strapped my iPod onto his arm. I’d made him a mix of country, rock, and pop with a smattering of show tunes and some classical pieces. I’d customize it once I knew more about his preferences. He seemed enchanted by the variety of music, as well as the fact that it was issuing from such a tiny box. For a man of his advanced years, he’d taken to modern technology with the alacrity of a child. While I was showing him how to use it, Sashkatu meandered in. I couldn’t remember the last time he’d had any interest in checking out the storeroom. I knew I wasn’t the reason he’d left his prized perch. To underscore the point, he headed straight for Merlin. When I left them, Merlin was tallying products and swaying to the music, while Sashki wove in and out of his legs, with a beatific look on his furry face. It looked like an interspecies dance routine.

  * * *

  I had a nice flow of customers throughout the morning and into the middle of the afternoon. They were mostly tourists, who didn’t know about the murder investigation, or didn’t care. They asked a lot of questions regarding my stock and magick spells and kept me engaged, with little time to dwell on darker matters. When Merlin finished the inventory, he was content to sit and listen to the music until Tilly came for him. I suspected I wasn’t getting my iPod back anytime soon.

  With thirty minutes left until closing time, it wasn’t likely I’d have any more customers, so I started my end of business routine. I was counting the register receipts when a middle-aged woman ran in, relieved to find the shop still open. She’d come all the way from Elmira and had taken a wrong turn, driving for an hour in the wrong direction, before realizing her mistake. I invited her to have a seat, so she could catch her breath, but she assured me she was fine. “My niece raves about your wonderful products,” she said, “and I desperately need an eczema cream that works.”

  “We have a few different items that should help,” I told her. “I’ll be happy to go over their properties with you.” I led her to the last aisle of the shop and pointed out the three remedies. She was trying to decide which would best suit her needs, when a younger woman walked in. I invited her to explore the shop and promised I’d be with her shortly. Five minutes later, the woman from Elmira decided to take all three eczema products. I rang her up, handed her the tote with her purchases and wished her a safe trip home with no wrong turns.

  I found the younger woman studying a shelf of ointments, creams, sprays and unguents for insect bites and stings. “Sorry about the wait,” I said. “How can I help you?”

  She turned to face me, and now that I was up close to her, I realized she was the woman who’d looked familiar to me the crazy day of Merlin’s ad campaign. But I still had no idea who she was. “Your shop has some fascinating things,” she said with a brilliant smile. Her hair was long, straight, and platinum blonde. I wondered if she’d been a cheerleader back in high school. She definitely had the look. I knew, because I’d envied that look during my teen years. “I’m not in a hurry,” she said. “I mean, if you have other customers to take care of . . .”

  “There’s no one else,” I assured her. “I’m all yours.”

  “Oh great,” she said, “maybe you can help me with this.” She held out a piece of lined notebook paper she’d had in her hand.

  “Sure.” It was always easier when a customer brought along a list, even a generic list of grooming or health problems they wanted to address. Otherwise we wound up playing a version of twenty questions while I tried to figure out what they needed. I unfolded the paper and glanced at it, then looked up at her. “I don’t understand.”

  “It’s simple, Ms. Wilde.” Her smile was gone, along with the sweet, cheery voice. “I want you to lock the front door and put the CLOSED sign in the window,” she said, pulling a gun out of her purse. “And I don’t have all day.”

  Chapter 35

  “If this is a robbery, you can have whatever is in the register, but it’s not a lot.” I couldn’t recall there ever being a robbery in the tourist part of New Camel. We didn’t sell many high-end items. And a magick shop seemed like the least likely target of all. But the customer is always supposed to be right and this one had a gun, so she could take whatever she wanted.

  “Move it,” she snapped.

  My brain finally made the connection that had eluded me for too long. She looked familiar, because I’d seen a newspaper photograph of her with her
family when they moved to the area. She was Ginny Westfield, the ME’s wife. No wonder robbery didn’t interest her. The stakes were significantly higher. She’d killed Jim, although I didn’t have a clue as to why. And now she was here to wrap up a few loose ends, namely me. The threats had not been empty after all.

  I walked to the door slowly, trying to come up with a plan to defend myself if things went farther south. As I was approaching the counter, the shop phone rang. “Don’t even think about answering it,” she warned me.

  “If it’s someone who knows I’m supposed to be here, they’ll come check on me if I don’t answer.” After one missed call during the workday? Not likely. Unless I came up with some better ideas, I’d be dead by closing time.

  “Let me worry about that,” she said. “Keep walking.”

  I considered trying to flee instead of locking the door. She might not have any qualms about shooting me in the back, but I had to try something. There was no cavalry on its way to rescue me. With my body positioned to block the doorknob from Ginny’s view, I turned it slowly, until it was free of the jamb. I started to fling it open, but she’d already realized what I was up to and was on the move. She body-slammed me into the door, knocking it shut. I was going to have a mess of bruises later. If there was a later. It didn’t escape my attention, though, that she could have shot me, but chose not to. Maybe I was wrong about what she was after. Or maybe she was worried that a gunshot at the open door would prompt some panicked 911 calls.

  She ordered me out of the way and took care of locking the door and turning the sign herself. I considered screaming, but that was guaranteed to bring Tilly running and put her in danger too. “Now what?” I asked.

  “We’ll go into your storeroom.”

  “I don’t have one,” I said, trying to punch a hole in her plan. She was probably thinking the storeroom was far enough back from the street that a gunshot in there might not be heard. Then she could run out the rear door and be long gone before anyone knew what she’d done.

  She narrowed her eyes at me. “Do I look stupid to you? I know everything there is to know about this shop.”

  So she’d come in that first time to reconnoiter. Too bad hindsight wasn’t great at solving murders.

  “The storeroom,” Ginny repeated. I led the way down the short hall with her behind me, the gun most likely pointed at my head. When we turned into the storeroom, the theme song from Game of Thrones filled the air. She jammed the barrel of the gun against the back of my skull. “Where’s that coming from?”

  “It’s the ringtone on my cell,” I said. “It’s on my desk up front.” The explanation seemed to appease her. She ordered me to the back of the storeroom where the rear door is located and unlocked it.

  “That took long enough,” Roger Westfield snapped, shutting the door quickly behind himself. Killing was apparently a family activity. Ginny handed the gun to her husband and gave him a brief rundown on what was what, after which he told her to leave. She seemed happy enough to oblige, letting herself out the way he’d come in. Seconds later, Tilly’s voice rang out loud and clear from the direction of her shop, which meant the connecting door was open.

  “I can’t believe you ate it all.” She sounded like she was scolding Merlin. “It’s a good thing I hid a piece for Kailyn!” Judging by the volume of her voice, she was coming closer. I tried to send her a telepathic message to stay away. It had never worked in the past when we’d tried it, but I was desperate.

  A frown creased Westfield’s forehead. When his wife had cased the place, she must have missed the connecting door between our shops. A nasty little fly in the ointment.

  “Not a word,” he said, “or you’ll get her killed too.”

  I nodded, but my brain kept screaming, Tilly, stay away. Please stay away. A moment later she appeared in the doorway of the storeroom, a plate of strudel in her hand. She looked from me to the ME and back again, no doubt trying to figure out what she’d walked in on. When she noticed the gun, the color drained from her face and her breathing became rapid and shallow. She started swaying on her feet, woozy as a drunk on a trampoline.

  “Aunt Tilly,” I said, “get a hold of yourself. Fainting isn’t going to help anyone.” I knew from having seen Bronwen handle Tilly in crisis mode that firm direction was the only way to reach her. She blinked rapidly and clenched her jaw as she tried to oblige me, but she was having trouble finding her equilibrium. By that time, I’d started second-guessing my words. If she fainted, at least she wouldn’t be afraid. Where were Morgana and Bronwen when we could have used them? The sudden appearance of two talking clouds, complete with lightning bolts, would have provided the kind of distraction I needed to try to take Westfield down.

  “How did you get in here?” he rasped at Tilly, who was teetering on the brink of consciousness.

  “I . . . we . . . I mean—”

  I could see he was losing patience with her. “There’s a connecting door between her shop and mine,” I explained.

  “Get over there next to your niece,” he said, using the gun like a pointer. Tilly managed to wobble over to me, the plate of strudel still in her hand.

  “Tilly,” Merlin called out from her shop, “what would you have me do with the leftover tea?” If the situation had been on a TV sitcom, it would have been silly and entertaining, but this was all too real and could easily end up with all of us dead.

  Westfield glared at us. “Tell him whatever you have to, but keep him from coming in here if you value his life.”

  Tilly looked at me for guidance, so I nodded. “Stay there,” she called back, her voice as wobbly as she was. “I’ll be back in two minutes.” Westfield seemed satisfied with her performance. But he didn’t know Merlin. Telling the sorcerer not to do something was as good as handing him an invitation to try it. It was one of his less endearing charms.

  A moment later, Merlin was standing in the doorway, followed closely by Sashkatu. “What kind of nut farm is this?” Westfield was getting himself worked up. Not a good thing as long as he was holding the gun. “Is anybody else going to show up?”

  “No,” Tilly whimpered. “I locked the front door after my last reading.” Great, I thought. So much for any chance of being rescued. No, I wasn’t giving up that easily. I turned my thoughts to strategy. The ME had to have a breakpoint, the maximum number of people he thought he could control by himself. Or kill. How many bullets were in his gun? Did he have more in his pocket? Maybe not. After all, he’d planned on killing one person today—me.

  “Get in here, old man,” he ordered Merlin.

  “Do you know to whom you’re speaking?” the wizard demanded regally. “What exactly is the meaning of all this?”

  “Get in here and shut up. Does that work better for you?” Westfield was getting angrier and more agitated by the minute. He clearly hadn’t planned on a mass execution, but now he was stuck. How could he let any of us leave the room alive?

  Although he could be arrogant, Merlin was hardly a fool. Without another word, he made his way over to us, Sashkatu as good as Velcroed to his leg.

  If we had any chance of surviving this ordeal, we needed a plan and we needed it fast. What if all of us charged at him? No, the odds were good that he’d get off a couple of shots and they could be fatal. I wasn’t willing to risk it. Maybe our best chance was to try to reach Westfield on a personal level. That was how I’d connected with him that first time in his office. I knew one thing about him for certain. He adored his wife and daughters. “Dr. Westfield,” I said, “have you considered the consequences of what you’re doing? For your children’s sake, put the gun down. There has to be a better solution, no matter what the problem is.”

  “I tried other solutions, but you don’t scare easily. And you were getting too close.”

  “Too close to what?” I asked naively.

  “Drop the dumb act. You’re as clever as they come. You played the staff in my dentist’s office to get information on me.”

  How cou
ld he have found out about that? “I don’t understand.”

  “They called to change the appointment you supposedly made for me. Ring a bell now?” There was nothing I could say that would help my case, so I kept my mouth shut. “And you probably got my license number last night.”

  “I tried, but it was too dark out.”

  “I have no reason to believe you. The real question is whether or not you’ve convinced Duggan to run the plate for you. He isn’t your biggest fan.”

  You don’t say. I was about to bring up the subject of his family again, when Merlin cleared his throat. “My young man, by any civilized code of conduct, threatening to slaughter unarmed people, especially ladies, is a cowardly and despicable act.”

  “Merlin, don’t,” I pleaded, without any real hope of stopping him. “You’re only making matters worse.”

  “Nonsense, this fellow is sorely in need of instruction.”

  “You ought to listen to the ‘lady,’ ” Westfield shot back.

  Merlin ignored both of us. “Although I am not privy to your complaint with Miss Wilde, the honorable way to correct a perceived wrong is to challenge your enemy to a fair duel. Since it would not be seemly for you to issue such a challenge to a lady, I will act as her second and meet you at a time and place of your choosing.” I felt like I was watching two cars about to collide and I had no way to stop them.

  “What’s wrong with this guy?” the ME asked.

  “He suffers from dementia,” Tilly piped up.

  Merlin wheeled around to look her in the face. “I most certainly do not. Why would you say such a thing?”

  “To save your hide,” she rasped under her breath.