A Charmed Death

by Madelyn Alt

  SunnyStonyMill.com was a fairly recent development sponsored by the Stony Mill Chamber of Commerce. Part virtual marketplace, part community bulletin board, SunnyStonyMill.com had been instituted by the town council to drag Stony Mill residents kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century. A place where store owners could hawk their wares and connect with potential customers, a place where residents of all ages and with interests that ran the gamut could find others of like mind. Part of Evie’s job was to update the store web page with whatever new stock we’d received that week. Maybe she’d been showing Tara her handiwork.

  But why had she behaved so guiltily when I’d walked into the office?

  I’d earned a break, so I connected the laptop to my phone line (not being a technical girl-wonder, the phone cord to the answering machine caused a moment’s confusion, but I prevailed) and clicked Connect, then pointed the cursor at SunnyStonyMill in the history.

  That’s when things went a bit crazy.

  Instead of being taken to the Enchantments page as expected, the screen flashed at me—black, red, black—in quick succession. My eyebrows shot up. Oh, shit. I’d read about the ways viruses and hackers can attack your PC, but I’d never actually encountered one. Was that what this was? A virtual highjacking? What should I do? Disconnect? Shut down?

  It wasn’t that I didn’t know how to use a computer. It was just that my know-how was limited to things like downloading e-mail, using various softwares, and the point-and-click atmosphere of the Web. This was different. This was unfamiliar territory. This was intimidating. Staring at this black screen, I felt totally vulnerable.

  Come on, Maggie. Don’t let some cyber-jerk push you around. It can’t hurt to close the window, can it?

  Well . . .

  Hoping for the best, I slid the mouse arrow up to the X in the corner and tapped the touch pad. Instead of seeing the window close down, however, a message box blipped to life in the center of the screen. Password? it prompted, with a blank space and a button each for Go and Close. I selected Close, figuring it had to be the safest choice. To my relief, the window disappeared without any further ado. It also severed my connection.

  Talk about coitus interruptus.

  I stared at the computer, wondering what just happened. The SunnyStonyMill.com website had never behaved that way before. After a moment’s consideration, I decided to reconnect. This time, when I opened the Internet browser, I typed the URL into the address bar myself.

  The front page of SunnyStonyMill.com popped up, easy as you please, with its usual brand of down-home corn and country charm. Swiftly I ran through the menus until I picked up the Enchantments pages. Felicity had hired out the website creation to Marcus Quinn, her magical partner who, as it turned out, also knew a thing or two about computers. Picturing the lean, lanky, and darkly sexy Marcus in my mind’s eye, I had to admit I would never have believed him to be a closet techno-geek. Funny how appearances can deceive.

  The Enchantments page was only a little over a month old, but the website was already making an impressive impact on our bottom line. Was it a true upward trend? Only time would tell, but both Liss and I had high hopes for its success. Thanks to the big-city tax refugees flooding into our housing and market base, retail property values in Stony Mill had skyrocketed in recent months. The extra sales helped to ensure the continuation of a physical brick-and-mortar presence for Enchantments, which as a side benefit ensured my continued employment. Always a good thing in my book.

  The elegantly feminine site was at odds with its leather jacket-wearing designer, but that was Liss’s influence. Her presence was everywhere, from the lacy background and warm colors to the unexpected details. I selected a few items from the menus. Everything loaded quickly and without incident.

  Nothing strange about that.

  Finally, as an experiment, I reopened the history and clicked on the exact link Evie had used earlier. And there, once again, was the strange strobing screen, black, to red, to black again.

  What. The. Heck?

  Something was going on. I could feel it, that prickly skin, hair-on-end sense of trouble not far ahead.

  Uneasy now, I X-ed the black window and was again presented with the Password? prompt.

  So it wasn’t a fluke. I didn’t think so, but I had to be sure.

  I closed the prompt and watched as once more the Internet connection was severed by some unseen directive.

  Spooky.

  With fingers that trembled from a sudden influx of nervous energy, I removed the modem connection and plugged the phone back in.

  I didn’t know who or what was behind it, but I had a feeling I’d be finding out. Like it or not.

  The phone jangled at my left elbow. Heart pounding, I stared at it and grabbed the receiver.

  “Hello?”

  “Maggie, thank goodness you’re home. Oh my God, did you hear?”

  As I’d been half expecting to hear my mom’s ever-chiding tone, Evie’s breathless voice in my ear confused me. “Hey, Evie. Hear what?”

  “It’s Amanda Roberson. They can’t find her, Maggie. She didn’t show up for her shift at the hotel registration desk tonight, so the manager called her mom. Mrs. Roberson’s been calling all over town all night long, but no one’s seen her.”

  I stopped breathing. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “I wish I was.”

  Evie sniffled, and I could hear in her voice that she was hovering on the edge of tears. And I understood. It wasn’t that she was close to Amanda Roberson. It was the threat to her naïve teenaged view of the world. With my own world teetering in those gray areas between myth and reality, oh, boy, did I understand.

  “Hey, don’t panic,” I soothed. “Is it possible she could have taken off somewhere? Maybe she wanted to be with someone she didn’t want her mom to know about? I mean, it’s possible she’ll turn up tonight after all, right?”

  “I guess so. But Maggie, I have a bad feeling about this. Really bad.”

  Truth be told, so did I. But she didn’t need to hear that just now. “I’m sure she’ll turn up, Evie.”

  “I know. But after what happened to Mrs. Harding last fall . . . well, you know. It’s got me feeling a little twitchy.”

  “I know. Tell you what—it’s late. Let’s just see what happens by morning, ’kay? Keep me posted on what you hear?”

  “’Kay. Oh, and Maggie? Thanks for listening. I know you probably think I’m overreacting, but it’s nice of you to let me talk.”

  “Any time, honey. She’ll turn up, you’ll see.”

  But Amanda didn’t turn up.

  I’d been out of bed since seven, munching on grapes and putting the finishing touches on the bookwork I’d started the night before. By nine-fifteen I was just closing the laptop with a satisfied sigh when my phone rang again.

  “She didn’t show, Maggie. Tiffany Coleson called me this morning. Her mom heard it from Joline Davis’s mom, who’s best friends with Mrs. Roberson. The police have been out all night, driving the county roads looking for her. I guess usually the rule for a missing persons case is twenty-four hours, but they make an exception when the person’s underage.”

  Last night Evie’s voice had been fearful, breathless with worry. This morning what I heard was grim resignation.

  Evie told me she was headed out the door to church with her mom and dad. “Tiffany and I both attend the same church, and we’re going to hold a vigil for her with the youth group. Light some candles, pray. You know? I wish we could do more.”

  My mind was reeling. Somehow it seemed impossible to associate the vibrant, self-assured young woman of yesterday morning with a possible missing persons case. What on earth was happening to this town? “Do they . . . do they know who she was with? What she was doing?”

  “I wish I knew. I don’t know her well enough to even guess.” She paused a moment. “I was wondering . . . Do you think maybe your friend Tom might tell you what’s going on? What they know? If we can help in so
me way . . .”

  I knew the way she meant, but I honestly didn’t see how psychic reaching could help. Besides, Tom and I had never quite arrived at friendship when he turned his back on me, and he definitely wasn’t the type to be comfortable with Evie’s kind of assistance. “Er . . . I don’t think so, Evie.”

  “Please, Maggie? I just feel like we should be doing everything we can to help. Please?”

  I heaved a sigh. “Oh . . . I guess. I’ll try to find out what I can. Okay? But I can’t promise anything.”

  “Bless you. Listen, I’ll talk to you later. My mom and dad are waiting in the car, and my dad’s pointing at his watch and squinching up his face like he’s got indigestion or heartburn or an IRS audit or something. I gotta go.”

  So that’s how I found myself joining the volunteer crew who were out that morning beating the bushes and haunting the back roads for any sign of the missing teen. It was, admittedly, against type for me. Not that I was a girly-girly prima donna, but I would never go so far as to consider myself an outdoorsy kind of girl. Despite the sudden plunging temps that signaled an end to our temporary warm spell, I hadn’t even thought to don a pair of long johns and boots, or anything more protective than my favorite wool coat and a pair of fuzzy mittens. The volunteer in charge was PC enough to refrain from open skepticism and gave me the easier (and warmer) assignment of driving up and down a segment of roads on the southwest end of town to keep an eye out for Amanda’s missing silver Corolla. Of course, Christine’s heater had not worked right in years, so I still found myself having to sit on one hand or the other for warmth while I puttered up and down side street after side street, slowing to a crawl with any flash of silver metallic paint I caught sight of.

  A stranger traveling through Stony Mill that morning might have seen nothing out of the ordinary. Tree-lined streets remained mostly devoid of traffic as church bells rang out over the midmorning mists, calling the faithful to come home to worship. It was only upon deeper reflection that some of the elements of strangeness might register: The police cars that roved restlessly en masse rather than sleeping quietly in their usual berths outside of the downtown station house. The sheer numbers of hunters and out- doorsmen, dressed stem to stern in blaze orange Carhartts as they prowled in packs along roadside ditches, shotguns oddly absent. The search crew that operated from the snack trailer at the high school football field. The churches, parking lots full, chapels empty.

  And the quiet. A threatening quality in the air. A rumbling of trouble.

  Or maybe that was just my stomach.

  With the exception of the restaurants, gas stations, and churches, Stony Mill proper had closed down at noon the day before. Around here, Sunday was a day of rest, a day of family, weekend sports, and of course, worship. Church attendance was a given in this town, a custom few dared to rebel against. I was one of the misguided few, much to my mother’s everlasting dismay. I hadn’t been to Mass in over a year, and my attendance had been spotty for several before that. I just couldn’t bring myself to believe anymore, you know? Maybe I’d grown tired of the hypocrisy of the so-called faithful who trotted out their piety for their friends and neighbors, but forgot what it meant when no one was looking.

  And yet none of the petty stuff mattered this misty morning, as the town pulled together to search for one of its own.

  I’d run through the bulk of my assignment without a sign of the missing teenager or her car. I’d saved the hardest area for last—a run-through of the old backwater Riverside Park. Really, it was little more than a grassy turnaround strip along the edge of the river. Once it had been a popular picnicking spot, but today it boasted nothing more than a couple of rickety picnic tables and a rust-bucket basketball hoop on a crumbling pad. Sure, it was a little on the disreputable side, but it was harmless enough on a winter afternoon.

  Somehow the park was the last place I wanted to be today.

  I hadn’t been down this way in years. Back when I was a bored teenager, in a world slightly less jaded and dangerous, I had on occasion made an appearance at the park with other similarly bored teens looking for a little gab, some crunching rock sounds, and a bit of harmless flirtation. I’d had my first kiss down here (ahh, fond memories) . . . But that was then. Things always seemed to change, didn’t they? Over the years, the teen element at the park had become seedier. Drugs had replaced the occasional beer, the music had turned angry, restless, and the harmless flirtations had . . . well, let’s just say the things that went on down here were better kept behind closed doors. What was left was more than sad. It was depressing.

  This place needed some serious healing energy. There was little I could do for the place today beyond a grimace and a quick prayer. Maybe come spring I could assemble a volunteer cleanup crew to spruce the place up.

  Just a quick look, I told myself as I bumped to a halt in the rutted turnabout and set the parking brake with a ratchety creak. Just enough to discharge my duty to Amanda, Evie, and my own sense of conscience. Amanda was probably safe at home by now anyway, after a night of illicit misbehavior with some studly young bohunk. Around Stony Mill, missing teens rarely stayed missing for long.

  Thank goodness.

  I sat in the car, listening to the engine cool with an occasional high-pitched ping. Waiting. Bending forward over the steering wheel, I peered through the windshield. The morning mists had dissipated, bullied aside by storm clouds that now hunkered over the area like a glowering mother bear. A breath of air twisted a smattering of leaves into a coil that slithered over the broken asphalt and disappeared down the incline into the wooded river’s edge. That was where I’d be heading, too. My mind made up, I reached for the door latch and stepped out.

  For being early afternoon, the light out here looked somehow wrong. Cold. Hard. Brittle, as though at any moment the façade of reality might splinter away, revealing the awful truth beneath. And as I stood there, frozen upon the edge of awareness, I felt it: that shiver at the nape of my neck. It was subtle at first. Closing my eyes, I turned my focus upon it. Breathing. Searching. Testing.

  There was energy at work here. It percolated along on the invisible astral tide, just beyond the structural borders of what most people considered reality.

  I wasn’t most people. Not anymore.

  I stuffed my fists deep into the pockets of my wool coat. With my shoulders hunched up, a ward against lingering forces unseen more than a defense against the cold ribbon of air attempting to worm its way down my collar, I waited for a sense of direction. It didn’t take long. From the corner of my eye I caught a flash of movement down by the leaden strip of river water glimmering sullenly through the barren tree branches. It was probably nothing, but I was duty bound to investigate. Maybe I’d hit the jackpot—maybe it’d turn out to be Amanda. Maybe after this we could all go home, stamp the cold out of our numb feet, and joke good-naturedly about the teenagers in our lives and the trials they put their families through.

  Lured by the hopefulness of a happy ending, I scuffed carefully forward through an ankle-deep pocket of leaves some stray wind had deposited along the weedy strip of grass. Just ahead a footpath meandered through the spindly, waterlogged trees that inhabited the floodplain. The rubbish caught by the exposed tree roots gave clear evidence of the park’s most common use. A tire moldered in the mud to the left of the path, complete with rusting wheel, the old rubber gleaming wetly black. To the right an old lawn mower stood on its side, its once sharp blade as jagged as a gap-toothed grin. Crushed beer cans, cigarette wrappers, drug paraphernalia—the flotsam of an uncaring world—all of it carelessly blemishing the park’s natural beauty. And then there were other items I didn’t want to get too close to. Things discarded by young men with partying on their minds and better things to do than worry about where they left vestiges of their DNA.

  Ick.

  As I rounded the last turn, I saw the cause of the movement, but it wasn’t Amanda. Seated atop a large boulder that rested half in, half out of the water, long, co
ltish legs crossed like some kind of modern-day leprechaun, was Goth Girl. Tara Murphy.

  The ways of the Universe were mysterious indeed. I’d hoped for Amanda, and instead was given her polar opposite. Go figure.

  On second thought, maybe this was my chance to hit her up for the books she’d taken from the store. There was nothing wrong with taking advantage of an unexpected windfall. Could a grouchy teenager be considered a windfall?

  “Hey there,” I said by way of announcing my presence.

  Tara’s lug-soled boots flared out comically as she started at the sudden interruption of her solitude. Her head whipped toward me and for one unsettling moment her eyes blazed pure green fire. Almost before it began, the fury eased into puzzled recognition. “Oh. It’s you.”

  I ignored the slam. It was so typically teen that I couldn’t help flashing back to my own misguided youth. (Sorry, Mom and Dad!) Necessary mental atonements out of the way, I came to a halt beside the waist-high boulder. “Sorry if I scared you.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “Good. Mind if I join you?”

  “Suit yourself.” She closed her eyes and settled herself more comfortably on the rock face. Lotus position, leggings-clad legs crossed, palms up.

  There was a second, smaller boulder to the left of the path. I picked my way across the muddy grass and leaned a hip against it, watching her. Tara ignored my presence as long as she could while I focused all my concentration on her closed eyelids. When she could ignore me no longer, she slitted one green eye open and scowled. “Look, I don’t mean to be rude—”

  Of course she did.

  “—but—”

  There was always a “but.”

  “—you’re messing up my auric field, you know what I mean?”

  I nodded with false sympathy. “You’d prefer that I leave you to whatever it is that you’re doing.”

  “Right. Now would be good.”

  “And what is it that you’re doing?” I asked, glancing toward the simple round stone that lay in her palm. It was about the size of a half-dollar and thick enough to have some heft.