“No, we’ve never been,” Scarlett replied.
“Well, I highly recommend it. He runs them five days a week and your first session is free. Anyway, I knew Linda from there as well, but we weren’t really friends or anything like that.”
“Did you know Thomas at all?”
“Only to say hi to as Linda’s boyfriend.”
“Do you know what their relationship was like?”
Andrea shrugged. “As far as I know, everything between them was fine. I never heard Linda complain about Thomas at all, but then I’m not sure she was the gossipy sort.”
“What about anyone else? Do you know who might have wanted to kill Thomas?”
Andrea looked at us carefully. “Why do you want to know?”
“Oh, you know, what with Mina here having been there, we’re just curious. She’s new to town, and not thrilled about finding out she lives with a murderer, so I’m just trying to show her that most of the people in Fairy Falls are completely normal.”
“Well, welcome to town. I thought you looked unfamiliar,” Andrea said to me. “Honestly, I can’t think of anyone either inside that coffee shop or out of it who would have wanted to kill Thomas. I didn’t know the wizard well at all, though. I doubt I’d be privy to that sort of information, since I don’t know him. Hopefully it was someone from out of town who’s long gone.”
“Yes, hopefully,” Scarlett said. “Alright, thanks.”
“No problem,” Andrea replied. The two of us left, and I couldn’t help but feel a little bit disappointed.
“Well, that didn’t go quite the way I’d hoped,” I admitted when we were back out onto the street, and Scarlett laughed.
“What, did you expect her to just suddenly admit that she’d killed him because we walked up and asked her about it?”
“I guess when you put it that way, it sounds ridiculous,” I said with a sheepish smile. “I think we should check out that fitness center. After all, Linda and Andrea both attended, and the shifter who runs it was one of the people in the coffee shop.”
“Good idea,” Scarlett replied. “I’ll check the schedule online.”
“Does the internet here work like, well, the normal internet?” I asked, and Scarlett nodded.
“Yes, it’s exactly the same, except that in the paranormal world you get more access to certain things. There are websites that exist for paranormals only which can’t be accessed from a human-world connection, and certain apps as well. Magic is awesome, but even we realize that sometimes the human world does things even better than magic can, and the internet is unmatched for reliability and communication.”
“Cool,” I said, nodding approvingly.
“Anyway, looking at the website, there were a couple of classes this morning which we obviously missed, and the next one is at three. So we have a few hours. Why don’t we go and speak with the fairy who was working at the counter? You never know if she saw or heard anything.”
“Good thinking,” I replied. “And she might be the killer, too. After all, who would have had an easier time slipping some poison into a cup of coffee than the person — erm, fairy — who made it?”
“Exactly,” Scarlett said, nodding. “Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 12
C harmed Coffee was closed for the day after the events of that morning, with yellow-and-black police tape cordoning off the whole front of the building that housed the coffee shop. A few curious onlookers idled slowly by, trying to catch a glimpse of…what, exactly? I wasn’t sure. The windows were completely blacked out — I imagined a spell had been cast to stop people from looking in — so it wasn’t like the looky-loos were going to see anything, anyway.
“There’s Mira over there. Is that the fairy who was working?” Scarlett asked as she touched my arm gently, pointing to the fairy in question. She was sitting on a bench in a small park at the end of the street, looking down at the ground. Even her wings seemed to be drooping slightly.
“That’s her,” I confirmed, and the two of us made our way over toward her.
“Hey, Mira,” Scarlett said, sitting next to her. I took a seat next to Scarlett so as not to make the fairy feel like we were crowding her.
“Hi, Scarlett,” Mira replied. “It’s nice to see you. I’m guessing you heard what happened?”
“Yes. It’s just awful. I heard you were working when it happened, too.”
“I was. I couldn’t believe it. I thought he was choking on something, but then he collapsed and Eva came over and told everyone to stay where they were, and that he was dead. Then the next thing I know, Chief Enforcer Tyson comes in and starts interviewing everyone, and she tells me the place can’t be open for the rest of the day as they have to conduct a murder investigation.” Mira hugged herself close. “A murder investigation! Can you believe it? Here, in Fairy Falls. And Thomas was such a sweetheart.”
“What was he like? I didn’t know him,” Scarlett said.
“Well, I mean, I can’t say I knew him well,” Mira replied. “We certainly weren’t friends or anything. But he and Linda came in and had coffee and usually a bit of food at least a few times a week, so I knew him well enough to chat for a few minutes.”
“Do you know if he was having trouble with anyone?”
“Not directly, but you know, I think he was having some problems at work,” Mira said slowly.
“Oh? Why do you say that?” Scarlett asked.
“Well, he was looking a lot more stressed than usual lately,” Mira replied. “I asked him about a week ago if everything was ok, and he told me it was all good, that he was just dealing with some stuff at the hospital.”
“Do you know what kind of stuff?” I asked, but Mira shrugged.
“He wouldn’t say. I’m pretty sure he was keeping it from Linda, too. The day I asked, she came in a moment later, and right when she did he perked up as if nothing was wrong, and acted like everything was just fine. But I’m sure it wasn’t. He was just hiding it from her. I wish I knew what the problem was. I did hear they were having issues with potions being stolen from the hotel pharmacy, but Thomas couldn’t have been involved in that. Only the witches and wizards who make potions are allowed in that wing. It had to be something else, but I haven’t heard any details.”
“Do you have any idea who might have wanted to hurt him?” Scarlett asked, and Mira shook her head firmly.
“No, not a clue. He was a good wizard. He was always friendly, he always asked how I was doing, that sort of thing. Not everyone treats the fairy taking their order like a paranormal with feelings, you know?”
“Boy, do I,” I replied dryly. Even though I’d gotten quite a bit of financial aid to help me through college, I’d worked part-time at a retail store selling children’s clothing when I was in undergrad, and some of the parents there treated me like I was subhuman a lot of the time.
“So no, I can’t imagine why someone might want him dead. That’s so…final.”
Mira sighed, and I decided to take a different approach.
“What about when he came in? Was there anyone in the coffee shop that left soon afterward? Can you tell us everything you can about serving Thomas and Linda this morning? I know it’s hard, but please, it’s important.”
“Sure,” Mira replied. “I want to keep it fresh in my mind, in case Chief Enforcer Tyson comes to interview me once more. Thomas and Linda came in maybe five minutes before you did. They both knew exactly what they wanted, so they didn’t dawdle looking at the baked goods, they just came straight up to the counter. Right around then, Borbordir got up and went to the back of the shop to use the bathroom. Thomas began to place the order, and Linda went and chose the table for them to sit at. Thomas paid and joined her, and I took their two coffees out about a minute later. I placed them down on the table and went back to the counter. Borbordir came back from the bathroom a minute after that. After they sat down, Andrea went up to Linda and had a quick word with her. I didn’t see what happened after that; Mercutio came up to the
counter to order another cup of coffee, and then you came in about a minute later.”
I thought about the layout of the coffee shop. Mercutio would have had to walk past the table where Thomas and Linda had been sitting to get to the counter, which meant he would have had the opportunity to slip some poison into Thomas’s cup of coffee. So would Borbordir, on his way back from the bathroom. Mira did say that he was having problems at work.
“Do you think anyone else could have slipped something into his drink without you noticing while you were helping others?”
“Sure,” Mira replied. “I like to think I’m eagle-eyed, but even I can’t focus on two things at once. And when I’m serving a customer, I’m focused on that customer. I wasn’t watching Thomas like a hawk. Of course, if I had been, maybe I would have seen…” Mira trailed off, and Scarlett put a comforting hand on her arm.
“Hey, none of this is your fault, ok? You couldn’t have known. How many people have you served while working at that shop? Tens of thousands, at least. You can’t have expected this to happen, so you can’t have seen it coming. You wouldn’t have been looking for poison, because why would you? It’s never happened before. It’s not the sort of thing that happens here. It would be like looking for UFOs coming through the door constantly.”
“I know you’re right,” Mira sighed. “But I still can’t help but ask myself what if, you know? It’s just fairy nature.”
“I get it,” I replied. “I’ve thought about the same thing. But there was nothing we could have done. Besides, if the person — er, paranormal — who wanted to kill Thomas was really set on doing it, they would have found another opportunity if this one was squandered.”
“That’s a good point,” Mira sighed. “I just hope they find who did this sooner rather than later. It makes my wings shiver when I think about the fact that I served coffee to whoever did this. I spoke to them! Heck, I’d have known them for years. There was no one in that coffee shop that I haven’t served before.”
She shuddered. “I think I’m going to go home for a while. I thought the fresh air here would do me good, but it’s too close to the coffee shop.”
“Good idea,” Scarlett said as Mira got up. Her wings began fluttering at a quick pace and she hovered about a foot off the ground. “Thanks for coming to chat. It helps to talk things out, I think.”
With that, she turned and flew off.
“Well, there’s a few more leads for us to follow,” Scarlett said. “I wonder what was going on at the hospital. It sounds like a lot, between stolen potions and whatever Thomas was involved with.”
“Me too,” I replied. “Unfortunately, I’m not sure how we’re going to get that information. Do you know anyone who works there?”
Scarlett shook her head. “Not well enough to ask them about it, no. We’ll have to get the information some other way. There’s still a few hours before the fitness class at Mercutio’s gym. Why don’t we head home? That’ll give you a chance to get some of that work you’re itching to do done.”
“Thanks,” I said gratefully. “That would be amazing.”
Scarlett pulled out her phone and opened up an app. I didn’t recognize it, so I asked, “Is that a paranormal-world-only thing?” and my cousin smiled.
“No, of course not. What were you doing in the summer of 2016?”
“Doing my best not to have a mental breakdown as I tried to work and juggle an MBA at the same time.”
“Well, everyone else in the world was playing Pokémon Go that summer, and some of us never stopped.”
“Wait, seriously?” I asked, but the laugh died on my lips as I realized Scarlett was completely serious.
“Sure. It’s a lot of fun, and it gets me out of the house. But there aren’t any pokestops or gyms by our house, so I figured since we’re down here I’d get my daily items. Plus there’s a spawning point right here in the park. Look, there’s an Eevee right here.”
I watched with amusement as Scarlett tapped the screen and a little brown and white mix between a dog, a rabbit, and a fox popped up on the screen. Scarlett used her finger to flick a red and white pokeball at it, and a moment later three stars appeared above it and she pumped her fist.
“Got it.”
I shook my head in disbelief. “I mean, yeah, I did play that game a little bit for like a week, but then I remembered I was a grown woman and that this is a game of catching cartoon animals.”
“Yeah, but awesome cartoon animals,” Scarlett replied. “Besides, I hear in the human world most of the people who play the game are around our age anyway.”
“That’s probably true,” I admitted. “Pokémon came out when I was maybe eight years old or so, if I remember right. My guess is it’s mostly the people who grew up watching the TV show who play the game on their phones now.”
“There’s a TV show?” Scarlett asked, her mouth dropping open, and I grinned.
“Oh, you’re in for a treat. I’m pretty sure most of them are on YouTube if you get that here in the paranormal world.”
“We sure do. Now I know what I’m doing while you get your work done.”
I laughed as the two of us headed down the street, Scarlett showing me every one of the little animated critters she caught on her phone along the way.
CHAPTER 13
When we got home I retreated to my new room, where I was very pleased to find that the closet had been turned into a miniature office nook, with a desk, a chair, and some shelving above. That was more than adequate for my needs, and I grabbed the Macbook Air Grandma Eva had lent me and opened it. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the internet here worked at lightning speed, and that Grandma Eva also had quite a few of the programs I was used to using already installed on the machine.
I logged onto my team’s Slack channel to find that things were going pretty well on the projects we were working on, and that I only had one question to answer from a team member. All in all, I was lucky. I couldn’t have asked for an easier weekend workload. Still, I knew I had to be in the office on Monday — Wednesday at the latest if I claimed my appendix burst — which meant I ideally had just over thirty-six hours to find the killer. I did not want to miss a single second of the workday, not after what had happened on Thursday. I had worked too hard to destroy my career by being stuck in the paranormal world.
I briefly considered trying an escape. After all, I could just go to the portal, say “New York City,” and that would be fine, right? But then I figured I’d have to go back to New Fang, first, and do it from there. And I wouldn’t actually be hard to find when I got back to New York, and Chief Enforcer Tyson probably wouldn’t be thrilled if I jumped the fence back to the human world without permission. I didn’t know if she had jurisdiction over me in New York City, but I figured that would only make things worse.
No, finding the killer was going to be the best way to get out of this mess.
I continued to work away, getting ahead on my tasks, until finally Scarlett knocked on my door.
“Knock, knock,” she said, coming in. “I hope you’re ready for our fitness class.”
“I don’t have anything to wear,” I bemoaned. “I wasn’t exactly expecting this visit to be a long-term thing.”
“Oh, that’s fine, you can borrow some of my clothes.”
I looked at Scarlett’s frame. She was thin, with long arms and legs, whereas I had more of an hourglass figure and T-rex arms.
“As much as I’d love to, there isn’t a chance in the world that I’d fit into any of your clothes.”
Scarlett laughed good-naturedly. “Everything here is magic, remember? Clothes here are designed to conform to your body shape. You just put them on, and magic does the rest.”
“Wow, really?” I asked. “That would have certainly saved me money when I put on the Freshman fifteen back in undergrad.”
“I don’t know what half those words meant, but that’s ok,” Scarlett answered. “Come on. Let’s get ready to rumble!”
I
followed her into her room, and Scarlett tossed me a pair of mermaid-print leggings and a plain black t-shirt. “Are these ok?”
“Yeah,” I replied. “Thanks for lending these to me. I feel like doing a fitness class in jeans would suck. A lot.”
“It certainly would,” Scarlett replied, and my body was filled with a grateful warmth the likes of which I’d rarely felt before. Why was Scarlett being so nice to me? She was just offering up her clothes like it was nothing. Was this what having a normal family was like? I couldn’t help but wonder if Scarlett was going to ask for something later to make up for this, but she didn’t seem to give that impression at all.
I tried on the clothes, and sure enough, even though they were Scarlett’s, the leggings slipped perfectly over my larger hips. The shirt was form-fitting without being overly tight, and I started to think maybe there was something to this idea of magical clothes. It certainly would save a whole lot of dressing room anguish.
“You look great,” Scarlett said, nodding approvingly when I came out into the living room. “Now come on, let’s go.”
“There are no cars in the paranormal world?” I asked Scarlett as we walked down the street, and she shook her head.
“No. There’s never been a need for any. It’s so quaint to see them in human-world movies. They look so clunky and awkward.”
“What do you do when you need to go somewhere that’s too far to walk, then?”
“Well, first of all, that rarely happens. At least, not in Fairy Falls. You can walk from one end of town to the other in about fifteen minutes if you’re dawdling. If you do need to go further away though, or if you need to get somewhere fast, you use a broom.”
“Right,” I said. “That’s one of the things from the human world that’s actually real: broom riding.”
“Exactly. Oh man, I’ll have to show you how to ride. It’s my favorite thing in the world. Are you an adrenaline junkie like me?”
Love at First Spell: A Witch Cozy Mystery (Fairy Falls Mystery Book 1) Page 7
