by Ann Charles
Prudence, on the other hand, wasn’t nearly as giving as Wanda or Zelda. I’d need to make sure I kept my distance from Hawke once he arrived. The dead executioner had a mean streak that often left me bruised. A thought occurred to me. Could her grumpiness be spurred by professional jealousy, since I was alive and fighting and she could only coach from the sidelines? Maybe, but I knew better than to ask Prudence about the source of her crankiness. A sweet and kind fairy godmother she was not.
I unbuttoned my coat. For the first time ever, I wished Detective Hawke would hurry up and join me. This was the first time Prudence and I had been alone in the house since I had “met” her. She usually had someone else to use as her karaoke machine.
What would happen if she tried to muscle her way into my head? Did it hurt when she made her victim’s eyes roll back until the whites showed? Cooper and Doc were both big, strong guys, and she’d left them weary and battle-bruised with seemingly little effort. Would I remember what transpired between us when she finished with me? Only Harvey had made it through her exploitation while remaining conscious, and I had no doubt that she’d made sure he was “awake” through it all.
Something shifted in the narrow room. Nothing I could see, smell, hear, or touch, but it was here. Or I should say, SHE was here.
“Hello, Prudence.” In need of her help, I spoke in a humble tone, my head lowered. While my executioner lineage had outlasted hers, it was mutually understood that I was a bumbling amateur by comparison. Had the police and other humans not betrayed her over a century ago, she might have taken care of the “other” problem with which I was now forced to deal.
The Tiffany-style stained glass wall sconces flickered and then went dark again.
My heart thumped hard enough for the seismograph monitors over in Yellowstone to register. Criminy, I wished Doc were here to hide behind. He was so much better at handling this ectoplasmic crap.
I backed against the door, leaning on it for support. “We have only a few minutes before Detective Hawke from the Deadwood police force shows up on your doorstep, so I need you to listen.” With shaking hands, I took off my gloves and stuffed them in my coat pockets. “Detective Hawke believes that I’m a witch who can work spells and hexes, which you and I both know is absolutely ludicrous. The imbecile also believes I murdered Ms. Wolff, the timekeeper I found dead back in October.”
I licked my lips, looking around for something to focus on while I spoke. The inability to make eye contact while chatting made me fidgety. Not that I wanted Prudence to show her unnaturally luminous face or those chilling black holes where her eyes were supposed to be.
“You’re probably wondering why I’ve invited the detective to your house, especially since I know how much you loathe lawmen.” A creaking sound came from somewhere overhead in the old house. “I came to talk to you about the timekeeper’s clocks, but I don’t want you to crawl inside my head and scramble my brain, so I was hoping you could use the detective’s big fat mouth to answer my questions.”
The silence seemed to thicken, broken only by the whistling of the wind through the seams around the door.
“Of course you want to know what’s in this for you, right?” Prudence’s help usually came at a cost. Once, she’d even taken her payment in teeth. “For one thing, this lawman is usually a rude asshole to me. So, if you feel the need to insult my professional incompetence, Detective Hawke is an excellent mouthpiece for—”
The sound of a car door shutting outside interrupted me.
“Shit, he’s here.” I stepped away from the door, twisting my hands together. “Okay, I’ll lure him inside and then you can work your freaky magic. Just, please, don’t take any of his teeth while you’re playing puppeteer. I’m already in plenty of trouble with this jerk, and if he loses a tooth while here with me, he’ll probably arrest me for assaulting a police officer.”
Footsteps thudded outside on the porch, followed by three heavy knocks on the door.
“You can do this,” I whispered, coaching myself. “Remember, no fighting with the doofus. Play nice, even if he insults your hair and your aunt. You need to keep him inside long enough for Prudence to try to get into his thick skull.”
I pulled open the door.
Hawke’s shoulders filled the doorway.
Looking up, I pasted a wide, toothy smile on my face. “Hello, Detect …” My focus landed on his eyes, which were all white.
I screeched, stumbling backward.
Hawke stepped inside the foyer, his legs stiff. Throw in a couple of bolts and he’d make the perfect Frankenstein’s monster. His mouth opened and shut a couple of times before words began to come out. “I will remove the lawman’s teeth if I so desire, Executioner.”
It was Hawke’s voice, but Prudence’s Katharine Hepburn-like accent was there under his low tones.
I tried to unglue my tongue from the back of my throat.
The door slammed behind Hawke, making the sconces rattle. “I cannot fathom how you would allow such a buffoon to intimidate you. He is a mere human, apparently inept at that.”
“He … he’s a cop,” I stammered, backing into the living room as she moved Hawke toward me. I hit the arm of the couch and fell onto the cushions, my boots in the air.
Hawke loomed over me, his lower jaw shifting side to side in jerky motions as if Prudence were practicing her technique. “Unlike the lawman you accompanied to my home prior, this one is all bark.”
She had that right. “How can you tell that already?”
“Subjugating his will required minimal effort.” She moved his left arm up and down, then his right, demonstrating her puppet on a string control.
“Can you tweak his mind a little while you’re in there? Maybe convince him that I had nothing to do with Ms. Wolff’s murder.”
Hawke’s right arm dropped to his side. “We are executioners, not enchantresses. Small wonder he confuses you for a sorceress.”
I doubted my pretending to put hexes on him helped my cause either, but we could save chitchat about my vocational blunders for another day.
“The timekeeper is not the only death for which he blames you,” Prudence said through Hawke’s stiff jaw.
No shit. “Is it easy to read his thoughts?”
“No. His thoughts are filled with nonsense. It is difficult to find anything of quality.”
I wiggled upright, my boot heels sinking into the plush white rug underfoot. “What sort of nonsense?”
Nonsense about work? Women? His mother issues? This was my opportunity to find out more about Hawke’s weaknesses. Potential weapons to use in a future battle. For a second, guilt nagged at me for cheating via a mind-reading ghost. Then I shoved that guilty feeling in a closet, locked the door, and waited for Prudence to give me the goods. War was not pretty.
“He has heady aspirations, including fame and fortune. This lawman is dangerous. He is a snollyguster.”
“A snolly-what?”
“A snollyguster.”
“What’s that?”
“I should not be surprised by your ignorance, considering your lineage.”
I resisted the urge to tell her to kiss my ignorant ass.
“A snollyguster,” she continued, “is an individual guided by personal advantage rather than morals.”
I smirked. The first time I had met him I’d figured that out about Hawke without having to crawl into his head, so she could stuff that in her snooty-patooty.
“Who else does he think I killed?” I asked, scooting to the opposite end of the couch. I wanted to be well out of Hawke’s reach in case Prudence turned into Mr. Hyde again and decided to punish me with a bruised leg like she did with her last puppet.
She was silent for several beats. “Who is Jane?”
“My ex-boss.”
“Why did you kill her?”
“I didn’t.” What on earth made him think I had anything to do with Jane’s death? I thought I was well cleared of that one.
“He deems other
wise.” Hawke’s body shuddered for a few seconds. “He also believes you murdered Lila Beaumont.”
“What? That’s bullshit! She fell on a glass shard.” In this very room, as a matter of fact.
“Must you resort to profanity in my house?”
“Yes, damn it.” I shoved to my feet, pointing at Hawke. “Especially when it comes to this jackass.”
His jaw unhinged, doing the side-to-side trick again for a couple of seconds. I’d have been more wigged out by it if I weren’t so pissed about the accusation about Jane and Lila.
“You did not slay Lila,” Prudence said.
“I know I didn’t.”
“I dispatched her.”
“What makes this bonehead think that I …” Her words caught up with me. “Come again?”
“I drove the glass into her throat.”
“You … But … Lila fell on the shard.”
“Do you not find that somewhat convenient?”
“I hadn’t before now.”
I replayed the scene of Lila’s death in my head, reliving the struggles to escape her slashing arm. Lila had been coming for me with a shard of broken glass when she fell. Then she’d gone still. I’d rolled her over to find the piece of glass jammed into her throat, blood everywhere.
I’d thought it was an accident.
“You stabbed her to protect me?” I asked, blinking back to the present.
“I stabbed her to prevent your blood from being used to summon a demon to our plane. Do you have any idea of the frenzy an executioner’s blood can rouse in demons?”
My blood? A demon frenzy? “Uh, no.”
She moved Hawke’s mouth in that weird way again. “Who is George Mudder?”
“Who?” I was still shaking off the nightmare of what a demon frenzy set off by my blood might look like. “Oh, George. He co-owned the funeral parlor down in Deadwood.”
“Why did you behead the owner of a funeral parlor?”
“What! I didn’t touch George!”
Hawke’s head tipped to the side and back. “You should have informed me that you have interacted with a guardian.”
“What’s a guardian?”
“Did it put on airs?”
“Who’s a guardian?”
“They try to behave so formally now that they have learned to blend in with the humans, but they are still contemptible fiends.”
Did she mean Kyrkozz? He’d hidden behind Wolfgang’s face in my dream before tearing his way out. I still cringed at that memory.
“Oh, dear,” she said, turning those empty white eyes my way again. “What have you done?”
“I don’t know. What have I done?”
“You gave the timekeeper a lock of hair?”
“I did?” I shook off my stupor. “I mean, I did not.”
“The lawman is convinced a lock of your hair was found clutched in the hand of the dead timekeeper.”
This time it was my jaw that opened and closed several times. “My hair?”
“Do you realize what that means?” Hawke’s head fell forward as if Prudence had been holding it up for him all of this time and suddenly let go.
“It couldn’t be my hair.” I crossed to the window overlooking the Open Cut and gripped the curtains. The urge to crash through the glass and run away, escaping the weight of so many false allegations washed over me.
“The timekeeper was tying you to another,” Prudence said from behind me.
I shook my head at the Open Cut. “How could she have gotten my hair?”
“Being tied is extremely precarious.”
“I hadn’t even met Ms. Wolff before the day I found her dead.”
“If death comes the one to whom you are tied, your life will be forfeited as well,” she said.
“That must be the evidence Hawke thinks he has that pins me as a prime suspect in her murder.”
“It was very risky even to try to tie you.”
“Someone must have planted that lock of hair in her hand.”
Hawke made a gurgling sound behind me. “It is no wonder the timekeeper was eliminated.”
“Cooper must have convinced Hawke to wait until the DNA results come back on the hair to bring me in.”
“Timekeepers should not dabble in such dark practices.”
I squeezed the back of my neck. How long did it take for DNA results to come back? On television shows, it was sometimes a matter of hours, but there was no way they could map DNA that fast, could they? Surely that was Hollywood magic.
“Was the timekeeper tying you to another to protect you?” Prudence’s voice cut through my worries. “Or compromise you?”
A thought flittered through my head that knocked the wind out of me. Had Cooper snipped a piece of my hair to send in for comparison? Was that part of his ploy for moving into Aunt Zoe’s? He could have easily gotten out the scissors and sneaked into my room in the middle of the night.
Checking my hair for short strands, I turned around. Hawke’s head still hung low, his shoulders drooping. He reminded me of a robot that had powered down.
“Who was the one to be tied to you?” Prudence asked.
“That’s not important right now.” I strode over to Hawke. “I need to talk to Cooper.”
His head jerked upward, the empty white eyes staring down at me. “You are in grave danger, Executioner.” His mouth moved almost perfectly in tune with the words.
Me? Grave danger? I cackled with mad laughter.
Detective Hawke slapped me across the face.
“Damn it, Prudence!” I stepped back, holding my stinging cheek. “What the hell was that for?”
“You have muddled the situation with the timekeeper.”
“Wait a second. All I did was answer her call and find her dead.”
“Are you certain? Time can be a tricky devil.”
“Yes, I’m sure.” I rubbed my cheek, the skin hot under my palm. “I need to find the other timekeeper.”
“Why? So you can wreak more folly?”
“Because someone is stealing the clocks from Ms. Wolff’s apartment and one of those clocks ended up on my doorstep.”
“You received a clock?”
“Yes.”
Hawke’s head tipped to the side, resting at an awkward angle. “Is it running?”
I had to wonder if he’d have a cramp in his neck when Prudence freed him. “We wound it, but it’s not working. Earlier today I got a phone call from someone who wanted to confirm that I’d received the clock.”
“How can this be?”
“How can what be? The phone call?” I’d wondered that, too. My billboards didn’t have my cell number on them.
“You have been chosen.”
“I have?” Ah, hell. I’d bet Harvey’s favorite testicle that being chosen was not a good thing. “For what?”
“You are in grave danger.”
“You already said that.” And then she’d smacked me, dammit. My cheek still burned.
“It is important that you listen to me carefully.”
“I’m all ears, Prudence.”
“Do not move the hands of the clock.”
Oops! “Why not?”
“You must wait for it to start on its own.”
“What if it doesn’t?”
“That would be most fortunate.”
So the clock starting was bad juju. Great. “And what about the lock of hair? And Detective Hawke’s determination to pin every murder he can on me?”
“Snollyguster.”
“Snollyguster?” We’d already established Hawke was a selfish, egotistical bastard bent on conquering the world for his own good, the rest of us be damned. “What about it?”
“Use it when you need a distraction.”
“Use what?”
Hawke reached up and awkwardly jammed his meaty fingers in his mouth, stretching his lips wide.
I cringed at the wet sounds he was making. “What are you doing, Prudence?”
“I want a tooth.”
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“No!” I grabbed Hawke’s hand, tugging on it, but Prudence was much stronger, and Hawke’s slobber made my grip slip. “You promised you wouldn’t take his teeth.”
“I promised no such thing.”
“No, Prudence!” I wrapped both hands around his forearm and pulled harder, using my weight to draw down his arm.
She let me win the tug-of-war with a huff. “Fine. I will leave his teeth be for now.”
“Thank you.”
“But the next time you come, Executioner, you must bring me a tooth for my collection.”
Grimacing, I wiped Hawke’s slobber off on his corduroy coat. “Or what?”
“Or I will take one of your teeth instead.”
I had little doubt that she meant that, too. I didn’t waste time with good-byes but headed for the door, waiting for the detective out in the cold, ghost-free air.
Prudence released Hawke as soon as he crossed the threshold, which made him stumble on his way out the door. Before I could catch him, he tripped over his own feet and fell down the porch steps, landing in a jumbled heap on the sidewalk below.
I smiled, applauding her exit from the bumbling gumshoe.
When I tried to help Hawke to his feet, he shied away, scuttling across the wet, snow-splotched grass like an Alaskan King crab. He gained his feet, unsteady for several seconds, and then finally got his balance and faculties back north and south of his neck.
“What in the hell did you do to me, Parker?” he snapped, his beady eyes accusing.
“I don’t know what you mean, Detective.” I kept my tone light and friendly, holding my hands wide. A picture of innocence, I was.
He rubbed his eyes. “You put some kind of hex on me in there, didn’t you?”
“Come on, Hawke. How many times do I have to tell you I’m not a witch?”
“How come I can’t remember anything after leaving the car?”
“Maybe you hit your head getting out.”
“I didn’t hit my damned head.”
I held my hand to my mouth, pretending to think while covering my smile. “You know, I’ve heard that this mile-high altitude can cause periodic blackouts due to lower levels of oxygen. Maybe you had a little blackout moment.”
He glared at me. “I’ve never blacked out before.”
