by Nova Nelson
He puffed up and rolled his eyes. “Ha! Victim. That’s an interesting way of looking at suicide. I’d say Ted was the only victim, since he had to deal with her body.”
Sheriff Bloom had once argued that Deputy Manchester had a good heart and that’s why she kept him on. But I wasn’t too impressed with the way he was talking about someone who’d been so low she would end it all. “You’re sure it’s a suicide?” I asked. I was unsure why I wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt or why it would seem less unpleasant if it were murder rather than a suicide. Maybe it was just Stu’s scorn. It ate at me.
“Positive,” he said, adding cream and sugar to his coffee. “Silver poisoning. That’s usually how the bitches do it.”
I flinched, still not big on Eastwind’s word for female werewolves. “And you’re sure someone else didn’t poison her?”
He tipped back his coffee cautiously, taking a trial sip and arching a brow at me over the lip of his mug. “Yeah. I’m sure.”
“But how do you know?”
He groaned. “Because I’ve been a cop a long while and I’ve seen it a hundred times. Woman thinks money buys happiness, turns out it doesn’t. She feels like she’s alone in the world, blah, blah, blah … and she ends it.”
I cringed, realizing his harsh assessment of the deceased would’ve applied to me four months ago. Except for the suicide part, of course, but, well, I can’t say the thought had never crossed my mind when I was alone in my condo on a Friday night, surrounded by silence, not a single invite to go out from any one of my “friends.”
“I just think it’s good practice to explore all angles,” I said. “Maybe it was staged to look like a typical suicide so that you would let your guard down and the murderer would get away with it scot-free.”
He paused in his chewing to stare bemusedly at me with tired eyes. Then he swallowed, wiped off a bit of apple from his mustache, and said firmly, “It’s not a murder.”
I could tell it was his final word on the subject, so I conceded and went on with my side work, hoping I could wrap it up and be out of here in time for a nap before dinner.
But as I rolled silverware, I couldn’t get past the inkling that the victim hadn’t killed herself. Was it my reluctance to admit how sad and lonely I’d been before I came to Eastwind? Or was it that new sense that had awoken inside me over the last few months: intuition?
My landlord, Ruby True, had been training me to listen to that soft voice because, while I couldn’t wave a wand around and cast traditional spells like the other witches, I was gifted with Insight. And my intuition about this felt like more than just the typical version everyone experiences, the kind that tells you not to go on another date with someone or that your next-door neighbor might’ve served some hard time.
“Imagine shutting your eyes,” Ruby had told me months ago, “and rubbing your fingertips over a smooth piece of silk. Then you hit a small crease. It’s not much, and if you’re distracted, you might miss it, but that crease is something. You have to learn to investigate the small wrinkles you feel. That’s how you unlock your gift.”
That was it.
I’d felt a small wrinkle as soon as Deputy Manchester had mentioned the suicide in Hightower Gardens. I didn’t know why the crease was there or what it meant, but I was determined to find out.
Chapter Two
Grim followed me down the claustrophobic staircase at Ruby True’s house following our afternoon nap. Since Grim had surrendered to weekly baths, he was allowed inside, and I’d used a small bit of my savings from work to buy him a comfortable dog bed.
As nice as it would be to have a fluffy dog that big snuggle me on the bed, it was out of the question for a number of reasons. Chief among them was Grim would do it over his dead body, which, of course, is a figure of speech, since he’d technically died once already before discovering he was a grim. But also, it was June, and the third floor of Ruby’s townhouse was like a sweat lodge already without adding a heavy hound as a blanket.
Eastwind, as it turned out, had this thing called seasons. I’d learned about the concept when I lived in Texas, but it’d seemed even more unbelievable than werewolves and elves. In Texas, the closest thing we had to seasons was summer and a random cold front. So, while the June heat was unpleasant, it was at least familiar.
When we emerged into the small first floor of Ruby’s townhouse, which consisted of a single large space she referred to as a parlor with a kitchen set-up in one corner, a reading nook in another, and a bathroom just off the main room. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the dozens of objects hanging from the low ceiling, some of which hung so low I had to duck to avoid taking them between the eyes. Some were metal chimes, others were dreamcatchers, many contained feathers, and all of them in concert was entirely unsettling. It was like the old wooden boards on the ceiling were reaching out with dozens of tiny, misshapen fingers to give the home’s inhabitants an unwanted scalp massage. The heebie-jeebies factor of it had lessened somewhat since I first set foot in Ruby’s home months before, but if I’d been given decorative control of the place, I couldn’t see myself sticking with the talisman-chic vibe she had going, even though I knew now that each one served a protective purpose for the old Fifth Wind witch.
Ruby stirred a cast-iron pot of something delicious on the small wood-burning stove in the kitchen, her back to me. Her familiar, Clifford, a hound the size of Grim but with fiery red hair where he hadn’t yet gone gray, was curled up by the blue flames in the fireplace, snoring gently. You might be wondering why a dog would want to sleep by a fireplace in the summer, or why she would have a fire going at all.
But contrary to what blue flames meant in my old world, in Eastwind, they were used to cool the place down. If you ran your hand through them, which I did because I’m the experience-it-to-believe-it type (doesn’t always work out for the best, let me tell you), it feels like sticking your hand into an ice bath. While I don’t understand the physics of how cold fire manages to cool off a room so effectively, during the hot June afternoons, I didn’t care. It could be evil, dark magic, and I’d probably still say, Count me in!
“Might want to clean yourself up,” Ruby said without turning around. “We have a guest coming over for dinner.”
“Oh.” I looked down at myself. I wasn’t exactly disheveled, but I was in no condition to greet a guest. I’d been forced to invest in a few new outfits lately, thanks to the heat. Though I’d dreaded clothes shopping in Eastwind, it turned out to be much better than I’d thought.
Using magic to make the loathed changing room experience tolerable? Sign me up. All I’d had to do was pick the fabrics I loved, and a friendly stylist helped me imagine the exact outfit I wanted. And then there it was.
It was pricey (more like highway robbery), yes, but as a big advocate for simplifying one’s life, I would much rather have five outfits that fit perfectly than fifty that don’t.
Today I was wearing a white boat-neckline tee and charcoal gray cotton capris.
Oh, did you think I would go high-style just because there was magic?
No, I much preferred casual and functional, and now that I worked at a diner rather than Chez Coeur, I could go casual, and no one thought twice about it.
“Who’s coming over?” I asked.
“Tanner Culpepper.”
I nearly choked on my spit. “Tanner? But why?”
Ruby spared a furtive glance over her shoulder. “I thought you’d be excited to see him outside of work.”
“Why would you think that?!” My brain was in full-on panic mode. But why? Why did I want to spring out of the house at the mere mention of a man, who I spent most of my waking hours around, showing up unexpectedly? Maybe it was the suddenness of the announcement. We’d done an admirable job so far of keeping all the sexual tension contained within the walls of Medium Rare. I never saw him outside of work, mostly because all either of us did was work, sleep, then work some more. It felt safe keeping Tanner isolated in th
at facet of my life. Having him over for dinner was a wrecking ball smashing down the carefully erected wall I’d built between work and personal life. I was a fantastic emotional mason. Always had been. When I’d read “Mending Wall” by Robert Frost in high school, I remember seeing the line, “Good fences make good neighbors,” and thinking, They also make good friends. And as I grew up, I decided the same held true for boyfriends.
“You’re not the only one with the gift of Insight around here, Nora. Don’t forget, I’ve been doing this a long time.”
I hurried to the bathroom to stand under the showerhead and freshen up. As the magic sprinkled down on me where water might have been, I managed to pull myself together, and when I stepped out and examined myself in the mirror, I felt much more in control. My clothes were now pressed, my hair uniform in its straightness, and my face was fresh and radiant rather than post-nap greasy.
“You shouldn’t be so anxious,” Grim said. He was flopped next to Clifford by the fire. “I can smell the pheromones wafting from that guy the second he lays eyes on you.”
“Yeah, and that’s half the problem,” I replied.
“The problem is that you have the hots for Tanner and the feeling is mutual?”
“Exactly.”
“I fail to see how that’s a problem for anyone other than me, since I’ll have to witness the disgusting sappiness of it.”
I couldn’t believe I was about to explain this to a dog, but I did anyway. “It’s a problem because I have absolutely no earthly idea how to date a nice guy. I don’t even know what to do with one! I’ll probably just crush his soul or something!”
When Clifford stirred slightly, lifting his head to scent the air, Grim locked eyes with him. “I tell you, Cliff. Witches be crazy.”
A sharp knock at the door made my stomach jump into my chest.
Tanner was here for dinner.
* * *
“Here we are,” said Ruby, pouring tea for both Tanner and me. She set the kettle down and wiped her forehead. “That fire’s hardly doing anything after that hot stew,” she said. “Why don’t you two take your tea out onto the porch swing and get a little breeze while I clean up?”
Dinner had gone smoothly, largely to Ruby’s incredible ability to steer the conversation to comfortable territory. I was amazed by how she’d managed to make the whole affair seem casual, natural, not at all like she was secretly trying to set up Tanner and me.
Although that was obviously her intention.
Spending dinner chatting with Tanner and Ruby was nice. It was easy. I felt relaxed yet invigorated as the three of us took turns telling stories and jumping into each other’s tales with questions and jokes. There was no pretense, no, er, wand measuring contests like there used to be when I’d get together with my high-powered and status-driven friends back home. I didn’t feel worse about myself as the conversation progressed. In fact, I felt less of myself. Not less myself, let’s be clear. Less of myself. Meaning my self-awareness faded away, and I felt present in the moment, able to focus on the things around me. And dare I say it? I felt a part of something, rather than a separate element or an interloper. It was a strange sensation I’d experienced in bursts since I arrived in Eastwind. But I felt it for the entirety of our dinner.
I hadn’t seen Tanner this relaxed in months, either. His high-strung baseline was sexy enough, but Tanner relaxed, his arm slung over the back of his chair as he threw his head back and laughed at Ruby’s stories of young Deputy Manchester and the one time she caught the stylish Echo Chambers stumble drunkenly to his home in nothing but an oversized grease-stained sweatshirt made to fit a literal giant (she clarified that giants didn’t live within the city limits, so I needn’t worry about running into one), that version of Tanner was nothing short of divine.
Maybe it helped his nerves that he’d brought with him Monster, a black and white munchkin cat who was not only the cutest thing I’d ever laid eyes on but also Tanner’s familiar.
Because Monster was so little and Tanner worked in a predominantly werewolf part of town, he almost never brought his familiar around. She remained a house cat most of the time, and the way he told it, she was fine with that. But she and Grim had met once and instantly hit it off because, apparently, Monster’s cute demeanor was mostly unintentional and she had quite the forked tongue and wasn’t afraid to call it like she saw it.
I only knew about that from second-hand knowledge. While Tanner could communicate with her, and other familiars could communicate amongst themselves, I was left out of the loop. But Tanner had mentioned it before, and Grim confirmed it. If I didn’t know better, I would say my familiar had a slight crush on Monster, but I would never bring it up because Grim might murder me in my sleep for suggesting he could have the hots for a feline.
Tanner and I stood from the table, tea in hand, and I considered calling to Grim to go out but decided against it when I saw him huddled in a tight circle by the fire with Monster snuggled up in the middle of him. She was almost impossible to see among the long black fur surrounding her.
A warm breeze swept across Ruby’s covered front porch as we both sat on the wooden swing. I cupped my tea tightly in both hands as the proximity to Tanner stirred nervousness in my chest.
I was being stupid. Tanner and I were in close proximity to each other all the time at work.
But, no, this was different.
Forcing myself to get over it and not ruin the casual atmosphere Ruby had done so well to create inside, I said, “Good tea.”
Which, obviously, was stupid and immediately made it abundantly clear that I was nervous and resorting to the world’s worst small-talk.
His eyes locked onto mine and that goofy half-grin appeared. “Yeah. It is.” He sipped his then added, “I’m glad you invited me over.”
He was glad I invited him over?
Okay, Ruby was playing games, clearly. She’d probably sent an owl and signed it as me. Wouldn’t put it past her.
I forced myself not to look away from his hazel eyes. “I’m glad you came.”
“Taking over Medium Rare has meant neglecting everything that’s not work lately. Monster’s been making passive-aggressive comments about it for a month straight. My social life is pretty much dead in the water at this point.” He frowned, but all I could think about was, Tanner has a social life? I mean, of course he did, but for some reason I’d never considered it. Did he have a girlfriend, too?
“It’s weird,” he continued, “seeing you at work all the time and never seeing you outside of it.” He brightened. “Have you ever been down to Sheehan’s Pub, or …” He let the sentence hang half-finished in the air. He was fishing.
Fine, I’d bite. “No, I’ve never made it down there. Showing up in a new bar by myself isn’t my style.”
“Oh, Sheehan’s is great, though,” he said. “It’s a come-one-come-all kind of place. We should go sometime soon. I’ll show you around.” As he turned his attention out to the street beyond the porch, I tried not to celebrate in any visible way.
Going to Sheehan’s with Tanner was this ridiculous fantasy I’d held close to the vest since I first heard about a pub in Eastwind. And suddenly it might happen.
“Yeah, that could be fun,” I said as coolly as possible.
“Unless you’re more of a Lyre Lounge girl,” he added quickly, and I could tell from the controlled tone that he was hoping I wasn’t.
“No. I used to be that kind of person, but not anymore. Sheehan’s sounds great.”
He sighed, kicked his legs out, and draped an arm over the back of the swing. My breath caught in my chest when I felt it brush against my shoulders. He leaned slightly back from me, inspecting me. Then slowly his palm found my shoulder farthest from him. “I can’t tell you how much I’ve wondered about who you were before you came to Eastwind, Nora.”
“Really?”
He nodded, his gaze no longer searching my face, now locked onto my eyes. “Yeah. You’re so different from all the othe
r witches in Eastwind. Honestly, you’re not like any other woman I’ve ever met. You’re strong, independent, you manage to keep all the customers happy while not taking an ounce of nonsense from anyone. And no matter how hard I try, I can’t get a read on you.”
“Are you telling me I’m mysterious?” I said playfully.
“I guess I am.” He pulled his legs in and sat up straight, moving slightly closer to me on the swing. “I have to say, though, I love a good mystery.”
A freezing jolt ran down my spine right as his grip tightened on my shoulder and he leaned in, but no matter how hard I pretended the cause of it was my long-standing crush on Tanner amounting to something physical—finally!—I knew that wasn’t the culprit.
“Oh, for fang’s sake,” I said when I caught sight of her. She hovered a foot off the ground just to the left of where Tanner sat in the swing.
“Huh?” he said, scooting away from me and quickly removing his arm from around my shoulder.
“No, sorry, it’s not you,” I said hastily, my eyes darting back and forth from his concerned face to her semi-transparent air of entitlement.
“You’re Nora, right?” the ghost said.
“Yeah, just wait one minute, though, would you?” I replied.
Tanner whirled around to see who I was addressing. When he looked back to me, he appeared deflated. “Ghost?” he asked.
I cringed apologetically “Yeah, sorry.”
“The same one from earlier today?”
“No. New one. I don’t recognize her.”
“I’m Heather Lovelace,” she said politely. “How do you do?”
I held up a hand to silence her. “Slow your roll.”
“Who is she?” asked Tanner.
“Heather Lovelace?”
His jaw dropped. “Did you say Lovelace?”
I nodded. “That’s what she said her name was, at least.”
“As in the old Lovelace family out in Hightower Gardens?”
