Anna Denning Mystery Series Box Set: Books 1–3

by Karin Kaufman

  “The only one who can challenge him, get him to back down, is Darlene,” she said. “Jazmin can’t. Though I don’t think he hangs around Jazmin just because she’s easy to manipulate. I think he genuinely likes her, and she likes him.”

  “Jazmin is the wiccan employee?”

  “Right. I’m thinking out loud.” She touched her face involuntarily, then quickly lowered her hand. It was her second hand-to-face schoolgirl move. She told herself to stop fidgeting. This flutter of a feeling in her heart was surprising, jarring. And she didn’t need it, not now. It was Christmas Eve and she had plans. Her and Jackson. And Sean. Just Sean.

  At that instant she knew. She used Sean’s name, used his death. Every time she thought of him it brought her down to earth with a crashing blow, forcing her to face a terrible possibility—that God loved His children but threw His cosmic dice and stood back, letting fate take its course. She had passed sentence on God two years ago, and she fed her doubts of Him daily, taking care they didn’t shrivel and die.

  Gene cleared his throat. “I’d better get going. I’m meeting everyone at the hospital, then we’re going back to my sister’s place for Christmas Eve.”

  Anna glanced through the windshield at the vehicles still in the parking lot. “Where’s your car?”

  “My sister has it. It’s better in snow than her truck.”

  “You walked?”

  “Yeah, I enjoy it. She’s picking me up at Buckhorn’s after I get my mail.”

  “Buckhorn’s is a fifteen-minute walk from here. It’s freezing.”

  “I like to walk.”

  “No, seriously.” Anna threw the Jimmy into gear and eased out of her parking spot before Gene could get a firm grip on the door handle. “They’d find you frozen, still clutching your mail, and I’d never forgive myself. It would taint my Christmases for years to come.”

  Gene let out a boom of a laugh. “I wouldn’t want to be responsible for that.”

  Ten minutes later Anna pulled up to a mailbox store on Deer Ridge Avenue, just outside downtown. She waited as Gene went inside and gathered his mail. She considered how much he had to do if he was moving to Elk Park. For now he didn’t even have a home or his own mailbox.

  “I think the temperature’s dropped just since we left church,” Gene said, hopping back into the Jimmy. As Anna pulled from the curb and drove west for Buckhorn’s, he flipped through his mail.

  “You’re having your mail forwarded?” she asked.

  “Until I can find my own place. Of course, I have to sell my old one first.” He shuffled his mail into a neat stack. “So what are your plans for the rest of Christmas Eve?”

  Anna thought before answering. Should she tell him she planned to do her very own mau-mauing? She didn’t want him to try to discourage her—or worse, make her feel foolish for what she was about to do. But it couldn’t hurt to let one more person know where she was going tonight. Into the aspen and ponderosa behind the stores on Summit. She was going to spy on Darlene’s party. Maybe even walk right up to her store’s back door and knock on it.

  How would she answer if he asked her why? Yes, it was an emotional reaction, she’d say, but she needed to do this. She was sick of waiting for Darlene’s next move and had to make one of her own. She was tired of the fear that woman sprinkled everywhere she went, like poisoned rose petals.

  When they hurt Jackson and destroyed Sean’s mandolin, they touched with heartless hands what she cherished. They were cruel. They preyed on youth—on their longing for a magic that gave all and demanded nothing, that welcomed them as they were, seeming to require nothing.

  “You can tell me if it’s none of my business.”

  “No, sorry, I was just thinking.” The more she thought about trying to explain it, the more foolish it seemed, but she was resolute. “I’m going to pay a visit to Darlene’s anti-Christmas party tonight. She’s holding it at her store.” She gave him what she hoped was a lighthearted smile. “She isn’t expecting me, of course, but that’s the whole idea.”

  Gene frowned. “Are you sure you want to do that? Didn’t this whole thing start with Darlene?”

  “Yup.” Anna maneuvered the Jimmy into a parking space one store down from Buckhorn’s then tuned to Gene. “Tom Muncy told me he thinks Darlene had something to do with Susan’s death.”

  “And this is the woman chanting outside your house at night, breaking into your house?”

  “I don’t know about the break-in. I think she may have sent Rowan or Jason. Or one of them did it on his own, like Jazmin did when she drew the pentacle on my doorstep.”

  “Great. She doesn’t do the dirty work herself, she sends her unhinged employees to do it for her.”

  “Do I sense sarcasm?”

  “Boundless.”

  He was quick. She liked that about him too.

  “Look,” he said, “I have no business telling you what to do or what not to do. It sounds like you want to take the battle to her, and I understand that. Just be careful. If she finds you patrolling outside—”

  “Patrolling?”

  Gene lowered his chin. He was serious. “Lurking, watching. If she sees you, she may overreact. Don’t think she’s going to operate with the same values you have.”

  Anna remembered Monica’s words after the council meeting. Darlene doesn’t believe in evil. “I know this isn’t the best conceived plan.”

  Gene opened his mouth to speak and she held up a hand. “But the idea is to throw Darlene off balance. She’s got to see me as unpredictable, not to be messed with. For once she has to wonder what I might do. So if this looks a little nuts, good. That’s the point. I know she could react badly. I know what she is.”

  Anna shut off the ignition, slid down from the seat, and shut the door behind her. Summit Avenue was awash in light. Every tree, every shrub, every building was wrapped in white Christmas lights, tens of thousands of them, each one mirrored in the sparkling snow.

  “At least take Jackson,” Gene shouted through the window. He stepped to the curb and gave the door a push.

  “Jackson will bark and give me away.”

  “Wait a minute.”

  “He’s fine in the car until I get back.”

  “Then I’ll go with you. I don’t bark.”

  “I appreciate the offer, but Gene, go to the hospital, see your dad. I’m going to patrol for ten minutes then head home myself.”

  “Then I’ll wait.” Gene leaned against the Jimmy and folded his arms against his chest.

  “Your sister.”

  He raised his left arm and pulled back his coat sleeve to check his watch. “I’ve got at least ten minutes before she’s here.” He dropped his arm. “I’ll keep Jackson company. What are you going to do, make me leave? I’ll give you fifteen minutes back there before I come looking for you.”

  She was secretly glad he was staying. She could be bolder, she thought, knowing he was waiting for her. “Have you got a cell phone?”

  “Not on me, why?”

  Anna hit the remote on her car keys, leaned inside the Jimmy, and fished behind the driver’s seat for her purse. “Here’s mine,” she said, handing Gene her phone. “Why don’t you call your sister and tell her she can go on ahead of you, you’ve got a ride to the hospital. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

  “You sure?”

  She shut the door again. “Yes,” she said. “I appreciate your waiting for me, and so does Jackson.” She started to walk from the car but doubled back. “Here.” She pulled her car keys from her jacket pocket and tossed them over the Jimmy’s roof to Gene. “You’d better turn on the heat.”

  21

  Anna slowed her footsteps as she looked through breaks in the trees and shrubs for the blue Dumpster she’d seen earlier in the day. If she’d calculated right, it was three more stores to the west.

  What light the sliver of moon might have given was blotted out by snow clouds. Anna figured she’d be safe if she kept to the woods behind the stores’ parki
ng lots. The snow would muffle her footsteps and her black jacket would be just another dark silhouette among the tree trunks.

  She saw several lights ahead, probably, she thought, from the floodlights at the back of the stores. Maybe one of them from What Ye Will’s single back window. All the other stores on Summit had closed hours ago. She darted through a small clearing and squeezed through a row of bare shrubs before entering the trees again.

  At first she thought the small, bright light ahead was a floodlight, but it moved, entering the trees and tracing an arc across the trunks. Anna froze. The light moved left to right and back again. A flashlight, she thought. Someone was casting a light into the woods, searching. But why?

  She moved closer to What Ye Will, through the sheltering ponderosas and aspens, listening to the soft crunch of snow under her feet, ready to drop to the ground if the light veered her way.

  A dozen steps later Anna knew the light was coming from the store. Someone was in the parking lot, watching the trees. Whoever it was seemed to be expecting her to emerge from the woods. But how? Only Liz and Gene knew where she was. Monica’s words of warning were in her head and she felt her heart move in her chest.

  She spotted the Dumpster ahead and again slowed her pace, glancing around and behind her as she went, fighting to get her breathing under control. She couldn’t allow herself to trip. She didn’t dare make noise by stepping on fallen branches, snapping them. The sound would ricochet in the cold, hushed air and anyone behind the store would hear her.

  The light moved to the right, passing ten feet in front of her. She crouched low to the ground, watching, listening. The thought of Darlene sneaking up on her in that vulnerable position was almost unbearable. She waited a full minute before she rose and moved, hunched forward, toward a spot directly behind the store’s parking lot.

  Was taking Darlene by surprise worth this? Would Darlene even be surprised? Someone was behind the store now, looking into the trees. Someone knew she was coming.

  But how was that possible? How was any of this possible? Darlene knowing when and where to fix her eyes, like an animal spotting its next meal, knowing somehow that Monica was talking to her in her Jimmy after the council meeting. Darlene knew things. She was more than an astute bully, clever and awake to the next opportunity.

  It wasn’t the craft, as Darlene called it, but it was foul just the same. Darlene lived a life of tentacles—bribery, threats, strings pulled. She even had a councilman quaking. And why not? His wife was dead. Not from witchcraft, but from poison. Not from spells, but from yew needles in a cake. But she was dead just the same.

  Anna was directly behind the store when the light went out. She sucked in her breath, her eyes riveted on the parking lot. She tried to make out who was holding the flashlight. Looking to one side then the other, Anna studied the shadows behind her, afraid one would suddenly move, expanding as it leaped, like a pool of black ink, into the shape of a tall, large-boned woman.

  And then she smelled it. Carried on the wind, the odor of cigarettes.

  “Damn.” Anna’s head jerked at the voice. Rowan. It had to be him. “Jackass stupid waste of time.” The voice was louder this time, laced with petulance. It came from the black shape in the middle of the parking lot.

  As Anna watched the shape, an arm rose, the hand floating to a face. The face moved and Anna could see snakelike twirls of hair bob with the movement. Rowan sucked on a cigarette, staring into the night in the direction of the woods. He walked to the back of the store, coming to a stop near a floodlight, and turned back to face the woods.

  “Go ahead, try something,” he shouted at the trees. “Try it, I’m begging you. Do it now, Christ-ee-an. You want to go up against ten witches? Slaughter. I’d love to see it.”

  He took another puff then dropped his cigarette to the road and stamped it out, crushing it as if it was a large, detestable bug. “Epic slaughter.” He opened the back door and disappeared into the store.

  Anna stared after him, stunned by the transformation in his personality. He coursed with hatred. He opened his mouth and it surged upward in his throat. It had to have been there all along, smoldering beneath the clever remarks, the knowing cynicism. This was the real Rowan, then, the real Seth Smolak. Was Jazmin like that too, underneath her smiles and childish fears?

  Anna stepped out of the woods and into the parking lot, her eyes on the store’s back door, convinced it might fly open at any second and let loose a throng of witches. Darlene’s coven was here—and more. Ten witches, Rowan had said. Maybe some were witches from Darlene’s old Denver coven.

  She moved closer. A faint light shone from the window by the door. The office was dark, but a few dim lights were on in the store itself. It was now or never.

  Anna marched to the window and peered inside. The door linking the office to the store was open a foot. She saw nothing at first, then a flourish of brown fabric. Then a black pantsuit—a woman, her back to the open door, her blonde hair a mass of tangled cords running down her back. She heard the muffled rattle of silverware on plates, like wind chimes, and a woman singing. Then a shriek, a voice exploding in rage, and a dark blur flying toward her.

  The back door was flung open with such force that the doorknob struck the side of the building and bounced back, almost hitting Darlene as she stormed into the parking lot and reeled to her left, her eyes shooting daggers. “You,” she breathed.

  Rowan shadowed her, and trailing after him were half a dozen women Anna had never seen. Jazmin exited last, taking small sideways steps at the rear of the group until she’d worked herself into a spot just behind Rowan. Anna crossed her arms, hoping Darlene would see arrogance rather than a move to still her shaking hands.

  “Of course it’s me,” Anna said, “but you knew that, right? Had a chat over tea with one of your mirrors?”

  Rowan snorted.

  “This is a private party,” Darlene said. She tugged at her necklace, anger shooting through her body and bristling with electricity at her fingers. “I want you out of here, now.”

  “We really didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to show up,” Rowan added.

  Darlene’s head whipped around. “Rowan, shut it.”

  Rowan’s mouth dropped open. Anna ignored him and concentrated on Darlene. “You don’t like someone on your property? Don’t like your privacy being invaded? How would you feel about your property being destroyed? That book you’re so fond of, for instance.” Anna took a step forward, surprised at her own boldness. “Do you have a pet, Darlene? One you really love?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Do you have a pet? A dog, for instance.”

  Jazmin poked her head around Rowan. “What happened?” she asked in a tiny voice.

  “Ask Rowan,” Anna said. She turned on him, fastening her eyes on his, waiting. He jammed his hands in his jacket pockets and shrugged. He was the only one wearing a jacket. The others had to be freezing. Maybe they’d end this and go back inside.

  “Rowan?” Jazmin asked.

  “Never mind her, Jaz.”

  “I want to know.”

  “Stay out of this, Jazmin,” Darlene said. “You’re in way over your head, bunny.” She wrapped her arms around herself and warmed one forearm with another. “What are you doing here, Denning? We’re not having your kind of party.”

  “The opposite, from what I’ve heard,” one of the women said. She nudged the woman on her right.

  “Although,” Darlene said, raising a finger, “we do sing the occasional Christmas carol. Let me see if I remember. Oh, yes.” She made a show of clearing the phlegm from her throat then sang in near-monotone, “The wren, the wren, the king of all birds.”

  Jazmin looked at Darlene, her eyes widening. She brushed a clump of orange hair from one eye and turned to Anna, a helpless look on her face.

  “Now you know, Jazmin,” Anna said. “And you can’t pretend you don’t know.”

  “Leave her out of this,” Darlene said.
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  “Out of what, the truth? Hell, no.” Anna took another step forward. She figured it was a gamble. Darlene would either back down or respond in kind.

  “Did you do something to the bird, Darlene?” Jazmin asked. She took a step toward the door as she asked, as if she knew the answer and was prepared to run from it.

  “Come on, Jaz,” Rowan said. “We’re all friends.”

  Jazmin’s lips curled as if she was fighting a wave of nausea. “Not if she did that.”

  “Ask Rowan about my dog Jackson,” Anna said. “A gentle, trusting dog.”

  “Rowan?” Jazmin said.

  Rowan stepped toward Jazmin and took her by the shoulders. “She’s a liar.”

  “A liar about what, Rowan?” Anna said. “I haven’t accused you of anything. All I did was mention my dog. If you didn’t do anything to him, why call me a liar?”

  “The important thing is we stick together.” Rowan continued to talk to Jazmin and she began to pull away from him. “I can’t believe you’re even listening to her. This store, this is our world, where we can be us. This is all that counts.” He let go of her and dropped his hands. “Why are you listening to her? Why?” He shouted the last word and Jazmin clasped a hand over her mouth.

  “I feel sick,” Jazmin said.

  Rowan spun on Anna. “You’re a liar.”

  “Now that we have that idiocy sorted out,” Darlene said. Her voice was calm, flat.

  “Nothing’s sorted out. I haven’t even started.” Anna shivered as she spoke. Lord, help me stop shaking, she prayed silently. She couldn’t appear weak, quivering in the posture of a wounded animal. Such bravado she’d shown Gene. I’ll face these witches, no problem. But she knew she was in the presence of evil. Enthusiastic, festive evil.

  “Go ahead, Denning. I’m all ears,” Darlene said.

  “If you stick your nose in my life or my business again, I’ll go after you with everything I’ve got. I won’t stop until I’ve sued you for every asset you have—here, in Telluride, or anywhere else.” She swung to face Rowan. “And if you dare touch my dog again, no pathetic worm god is going to keep you safe.”