by Amy Boyles
Crap. Guess I’d better keep some thoughts to myself.
The other one cocked an eye at me. “And we go in pairs.”
“Okay,” I murmured. I turned to Emily. “What do you think of these? They go in pairs.”
Emily’s eyes widened. “They’re beautiful.”
I placed my hand down, hoping the bird would take the hint and jump on. It did. It fluttered up to my finger, and I held it out for Emily.
She smiled brightly as the bird waddled to her finger.
Then it happened.
The glow.
I was pretty sure I was the only person who could see it. Not sure how I knew that, but I did. Emily simply glowed from the inside the same way she had when her light zoomed into her body.
I picked up the other bird, and Emily extended the opposite hand for it.
The aura of light flushed from her again.
I smiled. So did Emily.
“So is that it?” I said.
Emily nodded. “I think so.” She turned back to her aunt. “This is it, Aunt Idie. I’ve got two familiars.”
The birds squawked and jabbered at me. I raised a hand to hush them. “They want you to use them with your magic,” I told her.
Emily closed her eyes. The birds fluttered up and around her head. They created a formation, leaving a trail of magic in their wake. They fluttered back to Emily, landing on her shoulders, but they left a clear magical marker in the store from their flight path.
A heart made of light blazed where they’d flown.
Betty clapped. “Bravo, kid. You just used a familiar for magic. Great job.”
Idie Claire paid for the birds while Emily played with her new familiars. The hairdresser cocked an eye at me. “You know, I just heard about that whole awful business with Ebenezer.”
“Already?” I said, jaw dropping. “It just happened yesterday.”
“Well, ain’t nothing like a murder to get people on the phone tree at night. Anyway, I also heard there wasn’t a will when the lawyer went to read it this morning.”
“There must be more than a phone tree,” I murmured.
“Well, I do hair for just about everybody,” she said. “But from what I hear, old Ebenezer was changing up his will.”
My ears stood to attention at that. “He was?”
She nodded. “You got that right.” Idie Claire leaned forward now. The scent of her hairspray lingered between us. “And you know what else? And goodness knows, I shouldn’t be one to gossip, but what the heck? You can’t go to hell and heaven at the same time, can you?”
I shook my head. “No, and I don’t know what that means.”
She wiggled her eyebrows. “What it means is, from what I understand, Gilda was pretty ticked about the whole will. Ebenezer had originally put her in to inherit everything, but from what I’m gathering around town, he had changed it back to his kids.”
My jaw dropped. “No. Not sweet Gilda.”
“Girl, yes,” Idie Claire said, tapping my hand. “Sweet Gilda got cut out. And now that will’s missing, which means the lawyer’s only got one week to find it. If he doesn’t, everything reverts back to the older will. That’s the law in Magnolia Cove.”
Realization struck me like a hammer between the eyes. “And that last will named Gilda as the one who inherits everything.”
She clicked her tongue. “You got that right.” She leaned so close her hairspray mingled with the scent of her rose perfume. “And wouldn’t you do just about anything for millions? Like commit murder?”
If I were Gilda, I just might.
TWELVE
As soon as Idie Claire and a very happy Emily left, Betty crossed to me. “I wouldn’t believe everything that gossip says. She once told the town I spelled them all to be ornery so they could see what it was like to live a day in my shoes. I told her that in confidence,” she grumbled.
I shook my head. “Who are you, exactly? That makes no sense. Why would you do that?”
Betty crossed her arms. “Who said I did it?”
I scoffed. “You just admitted to it.”
She ignored me and crossed to the puppies. “All right, kid. Time to learn how to clean cages.”
So I spent the rest of the morning cleaning cages and letting the animals out for a few minutes to run around in a bigger space. I was nervous about it at first, but they all went back to their homes happily when it was over.
The pet shop had pretty early hours, closing at five. Betty stayed with me most of the time, but she left early to make supper.
Which, with my luck, was probably bat wing cobbler or something.
Gosh, I hoped not.
I grabbed the cat carrier, locked up shop and headed out for the walk to her house, for the first time realizing my car was stuck out in the middle of the forest. Crap. Deciding I’d deal with that tomorrow, I headed down the street—
And ran smack into Todd the Policeman.
I saluted him. “Hello, Officer.”
He paused, his golden eyes blazing. “Are you making fun of me?”
Oh, sheesh. Couldn’t I grab a break somewhere?
“No, no, sir. Absolutely not. How’re things going with the investigation?” I said, trying to steer him away from thinking I was insulting an officer of the law.
He slowly nodded. “They’re going. You staying out of trouble?”
I grimaced.
“What’s that look?” he said.
I shook my head. “No look. Everything’s great.” I felt a swell of pressure in my knuckles. I cracked them one by one, relieving it.
“Ew,” he said. “That’s a horrible habit.”
I grinned. “Thank you.”
Todd glanced down at the carrier. “Do I know that cat?”
Did he? Crap on a stick, he probably did if he visited his uncle’s shop often. I clutched the carrier. This cat was my ticket out of here. I didn’t need anyone else getting hold of it and scaring the poor creature to death.
“Oh no, this is a vicious stray I found out back behind the shop. Totally feral. Do not get close.”
He raked his fingers through his mop of hair. “Can’t you talk to it? You are the animal whisperer, aren’t you?”
“Oh yeah. Ha-ha. Well, it appears that my powers of animal speak don’t work as well on wild, stray, unhumanized creatures. This one seems to have some trauma also going on with it. I’m trying to figure out how to help. May take some time.” I sidestepped him as he stepped forward. “Anyway, I’ve got to get going. I don’t want to be late for dinner.” I ducked around him, successfully dodging any more questions.
I brushed the back of my arm over my forehead, smearing nerve sweat across my skin. “Listen, cat, the sooner you start talking, the better. I need to get off the hook for this murder and out of this town. Too much weird witchy stuff going on for me. I like my new family, but you know, who wants to get attached? Getting attached leads to all sorts of problems—heartache, heartburn, probably diarrhea, too. Just more complications than I need.”
When I arrived at what I would call home, I guess, dinner was already on the table. Amelia and Cordelia were there, along with Betty and Mattie.
Mattie sat in her own chair. Cool. I guess.
I popped open the cat carrier. The calico slowly sniffed her way out. I filled a bowl with water. “Do we have tuna around here for the cat?”
Cordelia pointed to dinner. “Just give her some turkey and dressing.”
Amelia nodded. “Yeah, she’ll love it. Besides, it’s got turkey in it. That’s pretty close to tuna.”
No, it’s not.
I looked at the thick spread of food. Black-eyed peas, ham, turkey with cornbread dressing. “Wow. Is it a holiday?”
Betty shuffled into the dining room, out from the swinging kitchen door. “No, this is our regular Monday meal. And I brought your cat some turkey, heard about it in the kitchen.”
“Thank you,” I said.
Betty smiled at me. Really smiled, like she was ha
ppy that she could help. My heart ballooned, and at the same time it constricted. A pang of longing pushed to the surface, and I quickly shoved it away.
With the cat settled, I sat down to dinner.
Amelia leaned over. “So we heard that I-Declaire-Your-Business-To-The-Entire-Town came and saw you,” Amelia said.
I blinked at her, not understanding. “What?”
Cordelia poured herself a glass of sweet tea from a pitcher in the middle of the table. “That’s what we call Idie Claire.”
Amelia stabbed a green bean. “She’s the biggest gossip in Magnolia Cove. If there’s even a snippet of gossip in the air, once Idie grabs hold of it, you can guarantee it’ll be all over town by the end of the day. Oh, and it’ll be Bible truth, too. No joke.”
I laughed as I broke open a roll. “Really? I didn’t get that sense at all,” I said, rolling my eyes and dripping sarcasm.
Cordelia and Amelia met my gaze. Cordelia chuckled. “I like you. You get people and aren’t afraid to say it. We need more of that around here. Most of these witches are so serious,” she said, waving a hand in the air. “I mean, they’re witches, so magic is the most important thing to them. Obviously. But some of them are such stick-in-the-muds.”
“Speak for yourself,” Betty grumbled. “I know how to have fun.”
“From what I understand, too much fun,” I said.
Betty shrugged. “I only have the respectable kind.”
Cordelia chimed in. “Anyway, what I mean is—folks around here take themselves way too seriously. They never laugh at themselves.”
“I laugh at myself all the time,” Betty said, scooping up a glob of dressing and plopping it on her plate. “I laugh more than anybody else in this town. I laugh longer and harder than a whole skillet of them. Just try me.”
Amelia blinked at Betty. “Is that before or after you’re trying to spell everyone in town to do what you want?”
I laughed and got choked on a bite. After coughing up half a lung, I found my words. “But seriously, Idie said something interesting about Ebenezer’s will. She pretty much pointed a finger at Gilda, his girlfriend.”
I didn’t know if I should be telling them this. I didn’t know if I should tell Axel this. Probably I should, but I didn’t know where to find him. Course it was a small town. Someone would know where he lived.
“Gilda Goldenheart?” Betty said. “The best baker in all of Magnolia Cove? Why, she’s won the apple pie contest at the Cotton and Cobwebs Festival every year. Won’t share her recipe, either. Stubborn old coot.”
Cordelia tapped a fingernail against her lips. “You think Gilda might’ve had something to do with the murder?”
My stomach tightened with guilt. “I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t want y’all to get involved in this. I’m already in enough trouble as it is. No point dragging anyone else in.”
Amelia reached over the table and grabbed my wrist. Concern bloomed in her eyes. “You are our long lost kin. We should have been in your life ages ago. I am not blaming anyone. All we can do from this point on is move forward. I want to help. Dang it. It’s my obligation as your cousin and blood. So does Cordelia. She wants to help, too.”
Cordelia smiled at me. “That’s true. We do.”
I studied my new cousins—Cordelia with her long, lustrous blonde hair and Amelia with her delicate features—and I realized they did want to help me. They wanted to help me as much as they could.
Amelia raised her eyebrows. “If we really want to find out what’s going on, I say we go to Gilda’s.”
Betty rubbed her hands with glee. “Do you need me to put the town to sleep for one hundred years? Not that I would do that. I’ve never done that before.”
I glanced around the table, a wonderful idea crystallizing in my head. “I really don’t want anyone to get into trouble.”
Amelia shook her head vigorously. “If you’re going down, we’re going down with you. We know you’re innocent.”
Cordelia arched a perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “What Amelia says is true. We’re all in it together.”
A slow smile curled on my face. It was a bad idea. A terrible idea. It would probably get me into more trouble—but hey, I was already a suspect in a murder. How much worse could my life really get?
I ignored the sense of dread quivering in my gut. “Okay, after dinner I say we head to Gilda’s and see what’s going on.”
Lucky for me, Amelia knew just about everyone in Magnolia Cove, or Coven, as I secretly joked to myself. I sensed that Cordelia couldn’t actually be bothered with the nuances of such a thing as people, but as long as one of them knew what was going on, I was glad.
“Does this make me look fat?” Amelia said. She wore slim black leggings and a long-sleeved black tee.
Cordelia shook her head. “You’re already fat. How could it make you look worse?”
Amelia was as thin as a sheet of paper. I had the feeling she knew that, too. You know how we women sometimes like to be told we’re skinny.
Amelia launched a pillow at Cordelia.
“Sourpuss,” Cordelia said. “Of course you don’t look fat. You couldn’t look fat if you bathed in Crisco and deep fried yourself.”
I threw them a smile. “Don’t let Betty hear you say that. She might actually try it.”
They laughed as we slipped from my room. “Hold on,” I said. I padded back in and glanced at Mattie, who was curled up in the window seat. “Can you watch the cat?”
The calico sat on the bed, licking her paw. Her gaze flickered to me when I said that.
Mattie stretched and yawned. “Course I can. Ain’t got nothin’ else to do.”
I grinned. “Thanks. But she can walk through doors. Pretty sure about that. So be careful.”
Mattie stared at me. “That’s interestin’. You might want to ask your grandmother about that. That’s not a trait I’ve ever heard a familiar being able to do.”
I nodded. “Okay, I will.”
Later. Right now I needed to spy on Gilda.
I followed Amelia and Cordelia from the house. We walked down side streets with names like Sleepy Hollow, Bat’s End and Cauldron Court.
“This town is so small,” Cordelia said. “You can get most places easily and quickly on foot. We could drive one of our cars, but we risk being recognized. So it’s probably best we just walk.”
Fine with me. After about ten minutes we came to a home at the corner of two crossing streets. It was a little ways off the road, and looked about the same as all the other cottages in town—white with a picket fence, wooden bars crisscrossing the side, making it look fairy-tale-like.
Amelia rubbed her arms. “This is it,” she whispered. “It’s Gilda’s. What should we do now?”
Cordelia pushed her sister forward. “Well, we don’t need to stand out front so that people can see us and get suspicious. We need to split up. See if we can hear anything. I’ll take the left side; Amelia, you take the right.”
I knew where this was going. “I’ll take the back,” I said.
Yellow lights burned inside the home. I saw a body move in the front, probably the living room. It looked like Gilda was pacing back and forth. Maybe on the phone.
We split up. Gilda’s house was far enough away from the street and from her neighbors that I wasn’t immediately concerned with anyone seeing me. I considered that lucky.
Gilda’s voice drifted toward me as I took up my position. Good. She’d taken up residence in the back. I pressed myself against the siding.
“No will, honey. No idea…stolen. The kids are saying they’re going to sue me for everything I’ve got, honey. Oh honey, I know…I don’t know…Ebenezer was good to me, but the way he talked, the kids were gonna get it all…I know. Well that makes the last will the correct one unless they can find this one. Yes, honey, the last one leaves everything to me. That’s why the kids want to sue me. Oh I know, honey. I know.”
The kids were mad. I couldn’t say I blamed them. When m
y father died, there hadn’t been anything left. He’d had a small amount of money but not enough to retire on. Heck, I was doing my best not to bounce checks—and doing so poorly, I might add.
As Gilda continued her call, I glanced around the backyard.
A wishing well sat in front of a copse of trees.
It wasn’t the plastic kind you could get from a discount store. No sirree, bricks and mortar made up this well. I walked toward it. A rope suspended down from the bar across the top. Hmm. If I had stolen a will and wanted to hide it, that seemed a likely place.
I pulled my phone from my pocket and poked on the flashlight. I shot the beam into the hole. Sure enough, there sat the bucket with a slip of paper rolled up in it.
Lighting flared through my arms. Holy jeez. This might be it.
My heart knocked against my ribs as I grabbed the handle and started turning.
SCRREEEAAAACH.
I stopped. Darn this stupid bucket. The thing was as loud as a shotgun. Or at least, that’s what it sounded like to me.
I inhaled a deep pocket of air and worked the handle again.
My heart jumped into my mouth as the bucket creaked and groaned. I went as slowly as possible, ignoring the beads of sweat that popped on my forehead and slid down into my eyes and slithered along my temple.
The bucket reached the top when a tree branch snapped.
My gaze flickered into the woods. Not wanting to leave the paper, I snatched it from the bucket and took a step forward.
A black blur launched into me, knocking me on my back and the air from my lungs.
The thing flew up toward a tree. It was a shadow, a formless thing blacker than black. It moved from the pines, strutting forward.
Think.
Okay, going back toward the house would put my cousins in danger. I didn’t want to do that, but they had magic. Magic that could help me.
But that shadow loomed and leaped toward me.
Fear. Fear slick as tar, black as ebony, tasting of bile and probably some sour sweet tea, surged through my body. I wanted it gone. Away.
Pressure built up inside my head.
Pressure that had nowhere to go but out.
The creature stopped floating toward me and suddenly streamed backward, away.
