by Amy Boyles
Chloe's lips twisted into a frown. “This town has lots of magic.”
“Now. It didn’t a month ago.”
She shrugged. “Things change. That’s life.” Chloe flattened her hands on the glass top and clicked her fingernails over the surface. “So. Need a crystal? Or do you need a dream catcher to catch all the dreams of guilt I’m sure you have.”
Okay, so she didn’t buy my lie about Dot. I cleared my throat and extended my hand. “Hi. I’m Andie Taylor. We got off on the wrong foot. I’m sorry. I’ll get the cauldron fixed.”
“Chloe Maple.” Her lips twitched into a smile. See? I could turn even the blackest of hearts to my side.
Right.
“I’m guessing this little visit has something to do with my ex-boyfriend.”
I ran a finger over a jade Buddha on a shelf. “Word travels fast.”
She nodded. “I wasn’t at the meeting, but everyone’s talking about how you murdered him.”
“Nice.” I shook my head.
Chloe finally offered me a warm smile. “Don’t worry. I don’t think you did it. What can I do for you?”
“Can you tell me something about your relationship with Cal?”
Chloe stepped out from around the counter and started straightening the knickknacks on display. “To be honest, I came here to get a clean break from him. Cal was a cheater, through and through. He was never faithful, and I was tired of dealing with it—so I moved here.”
A cute young woman with a button nose and wavy caramel-colored hair bounded in from the back. “Hey, Chloe, do we have any more of the witchy chocolate?”
“Yeah, in the closet.” Chloe motioned toward the woman. “Grace, this is Andie Taylor. She’s the hunter I was telling you about.”
Grace stepped up and took my hand. “Nice to meet you.”
Chloe smiled at the young woman. “Grace is my sister. She moved here with me.”
“Welcome,” I said and actually found myself meaning it.
“Well, I’d better get back to work,” Grace said. “Inventory takes time.”
Grace left as quickly as she arrived. Chloe turned back to me. “Anyway, that’s all I know about Cal. I didn’t even know he’d moved here until a few days ago when I saw him at the coffee shop.”
“You mean the one down the street?”
Chloe nodded.
“Did you talk to him?”
She swatted the air and motored her lips together. “Yeah, we talked. Exchanged a few words. You know, a little chitchat. Nothing big.”
Sure. Nothing big. You run into the ex you’ve moved away from, and you don’t spout off at the mouth. Happens all the time.
The sudden urge to pee overcame me. “Mind if I use your bathroom?”
“Sure. We have one for customers, but I haven’t done the morning clean on it yet.” She led me through a doorway framed with hanging beads. The glass tinkled as we crossed to a small, dark-wooded alcove.
A bud vase held a small cluster of white roses that fragranced the bathroom. I did my business and washed my hands with a paper towel. As I threw it into the wastebasket, a red mark caught my attention.
I grabbed a wad of tissue and pushed a clump of paper out of the way. A slender stick with a tiny plus sign was revealed.
A crash came from the store. I finished up and rushed through the beaded door. I found Chloe and Grace in back. A stack of boxes was strewn across the floor.
“What happened?” I said.
Chloe stared at the mess. “I don’t know. We heard a crash, and they were just lying here.”
I pushed the boxes aside and walked to the door. It was cracked open. Interesting. I pushed it the rest of the way and glanced down the alley. A dark shape jumped from a rickety fire escape onto the flat roof of one of the buildings.
“Hey,” I yelled.
But the figure had vanished. I went back inside and found the women cleaning up the mess. “Well, whoever it was, they disappeared.”
“Great. They left us a huge mess,” Grace said.
I helped them pick up the boxes. “Do you know anyone who might think you’ve got something valuable in these?”
Chloe shook her head. “No. They’re just a bunch of boxes.”
“Well, someone thought they were valuable.”
Grace laughed. “They should’ve tried the front. That’s where all the good stuff is. Not back here.”
I stayed a few more minutes and then thanked them for their help and left. I decided to run over to the coffee shop, check out Chloe's story that she’d seen Cal and had a nice, civil conversation.
“Hi, Molly,” I said. “You got any ham quiches left over from the morning rush?”
Molly Malone, co-owner of Brewhouse with her husband, Joe, gave me a wide smile. Molly was pretty in a girl-next-door sort of way. She was nice, too, about as nice as folks got around here.
She checked behind the counter. “I’ve got three quiches left.”
“Great. I’ll take them.”
As she rang me up, I leaned over. “Have you met the woman who opened up the herbal store?”
Molly cocked her head to one side. “You mean the one who dresses up like a witch?”
I snapped my fingers. “That’s her.”
Molly frowned. A crescent-shaped crease formed between her brows. “I have met her. She was in the other day.”
I poked Molly a little more to get the good stuff. “She told me she ran into an old boyfriend, big burly type of guy.”
Molly’s mouth puckered into an o. “Yes, she was in here with him. Couldn’t forget it if I washed my eyes with soap. They got into an argument.” Molly motioned for me to come closer. Which, of course, I did. “I don’t know what they were talking about, but she was so mad she slapped him hard enough that it echoed in the whole store.”
“No,” I exclaimed. “Tell me more.”
Molly nodded. “She sure did. Right in public. I saw the whole thing.”
Sheesh. If it had been me, I would’ve at least tried to work some sort of forgetful spell so that people wouldn’t recognize me as a store owner who goes around slapping random men. Well, not random to Chloe, but random to everyone else. It was not good for business to look like a frantic flake with a temper.
“You’re sure it was her?” I said.
Molly nodded. “One thousand percent. Same woman.”
I crumpled the bag in my fist, thanked Molly and left. As I walked to my car, the picture of a scorned woman was beginning to take shape, but was it the picture of a murderer?
“Hey, you,” someone yelled. “You there, hunter!”
Okay, way to tick me off right off the bat. No one called me that in public. No one. I had reached the 4Runner but turned around, ready to square off with whomever it was.
On the sidewalk stood three elves, including Lana the murder accuser, as I liked to refer to her quietly in my brain. Flanking her sides were two waitresses from the restaurant. You know, the ones I’d spelled to look human.
“Yes?” I said.
Lana strode forward. She was tall and so lithe she was really only a slip of a thing. Pretty sure I could snap her between two fingers if it came right down to it.
“You put magic on us.”
I glanced around the street to see if any humans had heard that. I mean, you don’t walk up to someone and start spewing off stuff about magic—not in a place that didn’t believe in it.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
She brushed the hair back from her ears. They still looked human, not pointy at all. I clicked my tongue and almost patted myself on the back. I’d done a seriously awesome job of making that spell stick, if I did say so myself.
“I know you did this, witch, and I’m going to get you.”
“We all are,” one of them chimed in. Yeah, she looked like I could snap her, too.
“You gonna get my little dog, too?” I said.
Lana frowned in confusion. “What?”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s from The Wizard of Oz. You know, when the witch says she’ll get Dorothy and her little dog, too.”
“Do you have a dog?” she asked, almost too hopefully.
I shook my head. “No. I don’t have a— Listen, that wasn’t the point of what I was saying. You were saying you were going to get me, and I referenced the movie because it was funny. See? I have comic timing, and I like to use it in stressful situations. Of course, this really isn’t a stressful situation. I’ve got a gaggle of elves—”
“Fairies,” she corrected.
“Right. Fairies. Same thing. Anyway, it’s like being ganged up on by a bunch of sticks.”
One of the fairies spit on the ground.
“Not ladylike,” I murmured.
Lana dug her toe into the ground and brought her nose within inches of mine. “Elves and fairies are different,” she said. “
“How?”
She smacked her head. “Elves are woodland creatures; fairies are more flower based.”
“Whatever that means,” I said.
Lana pinched her eyes to wedges. “Like I said, watch your step.”
“You didn’t say that.”
“We’re watching you,” she growled. “We have magic too, you know. You’ve made our list.”
I quirked an eyebrow. “Your list?”
She nodded. “Yeah. You’re on it. Watch your step. That is all.” She turned on her heel, and all three fairies left.
I guessed I was supposed to feel threatened by that. Really, I wasn’t. Not at all. It would take a lot more than a bunch of fairies threatening me with pixie dust or whatever to scare me.
I turned back to the 4Runner and grabbed the handle. A piece of paper floated onto my wrist and slipped to the ground. I didn’t think anything of it until more paper landed on my arm. I glanced up.
Slivers of paper floated from the sky. Not one—a thousand. It was like a snowstorm. Except paper. I wanted to tell the fairies to watch their long, pointy noses because they might end up with a paper cut.
I snatched a piece from the air. It read:
ANDIE TAYLOR IS A WITCH AND SHE’S BEEN HIDING IT FROM THE RESIDENTS OF NORMAL.
Lana turned around. “See? I told you I’d get you. Murderer.”
Tendrils of fear curled around my throat. Holy crap. My life in Normal was officially over.
EIGHT
I grabbed as many of the slips as I could, but since I was competing with thousands of them, a couple hundred didn’t seem like much. And since the slivers outnumbered me a million to one, I felt over my head magically.
Darn pixie dust or whatever. That’d be the last time I made fun of fairies and their magic.
I threw the papers on the floorboard of the 4Runner and sped home. I screeched up the carport and ran into the house, throwing the door open.
Kate and Dot were in the kitchen. Little orbs of light were scattered around the room, zipping this way and that. Gabby sat in her miniature wooden toddler chair, a bottle of blue nail polish in front of her. Her toes had been painted blue. I had to say, they were really quite adorable.
She giggled and laughed at the blips of light.
The air was thick with otherworldly energy. The hairs on my arms rose as if pulled by an electric field.
“What are those?” I said, eyeing them suspiciously.
Kate clapped her hands with glee. “Dot’s teaching me how to make light.”
“Is she?” I said. “Is that what those are?”
Dot nodded. “Little lights we made.”
I fisted a hand to my hip. “And what are the lights made of? Dot, did you tell Kate?”
Dot opened her palm, and one of the orbs landed on it. “Yes. Slivers of energy.”
“Energy from where?” I said, grinding my teeth.
“Oh, Hades, I suppose.”
Kate frowned. “What does that mean?”
I threw my keys on the Formica counter. “It means what you’ve actually done is invited a whole bunch of little ghosts into my house and then turned them into lightning bugs.”
Kate’s nose wrinkled. “Ew.”
“Right. Ew. And now see how easy it is to get rid of them.”
Kate threw Dot a concerned look. “Will it be easy?”
Dot chewed on that a bit, doing a big job of smacking her lips together. “I suppose it shouldn’t be too hard.”
“Andie,” Kate said. “I went to that new little antique shop in town. They have the best finds. I purchased this adorable little pillbox. I think it’s got some sort of precious jewel on the lid. Of course, it might not be so precious anymore since Gabby decided to take the nail polish to it.”
I groaned. “I’m sorry. Is it okay?”
Kate nodded. “It’s fine.”
That was a relief. I didn’t have time for another catastrophe in my life.
“Want to see it?” she said.
I smiled. “Not right this second. Listen.” I wrapped my knuckles on the surface. “Dot, I’ve got a problem.”
Dot’s eyes sparkled at that. Like it was the best news she’d had all day.
“Why are you excited that I have a problem?”
Dot shrugged. “It means I get to work some magic. Either that or I get to watch you use magic.”
“It may be both. I ran into some fairies in town. They were pretty ticked that I’d made their ears look normal, so they fired up some pixie dust—”
“Fairy sand.”
“What?”
“Fairy sand,” Dot said. “Pixies use dust. Fairies use sandy dirt. Of course, no one wants to call it dirt, because that’s very uninteresting and there’s all kinds of bacteria in dirt that can make you sick, especially if a cat’s been using it as their own private litter box. So they call it sand.”
“Well, what the heck ever. They used some turbo sand, and these are floating down from the sky. It looks like a blizzard downtown.”
I shoved the papers in Dot’s and Kate’s faces.
Kate smirked. “You don’t think anyone will believe this, do you?”
I grabbed a handful of my hair. “Of course they’ll believe it! Why wouldn’t they? This is a small town. People have nothing better to do than believe crap that falls from the sky.”
Dot fingered the paper. “I don’t know that I can stop this.”
I flexed my fingers. “You should be able to do something. You’ve been a witch for forever.”
The landline started ringing. I looked at the lemon-colored phone screwed to the wall. I stared at it for a good, long moment.
“Aren’t you going to answer it, dear?” Dot said.
“No. It’s someone calling because they saw those slips of paper. I know it. Listen, I need a spell. Something quick that’ll help stop all of this.”
The phone kept ringing. Dot answered it. “Hello?” She handed me the receiver. “It’s for you.”
I shot her a look that would’ve barbecued her with my eyes if I could have. “Hello?”
“Andie, this is Miss Givens.”
I groaned. Givens was the director of Giving Trunk, where I worked. “Hi, Miss Givens.”
“Andie, I found a piece of paper that claims you’re a witch.”
“Yes. Terrible joke someone’s playing on me. Listen, can we talk about this tomorrow? I’ll be in your office first thing. Promise. Gotta go.”
I hung up the phone and ran to the window. The papers were beginning to fall in my yard. They’d followed me home. My heart raced, and panic filtered through my body.
“Dot, please! You’ve got to do something.”
“We must join the power of the three.”
Dot liked to think that me, Kate and herself were the three. Technically we were since we’d all eaten some sort of weird gummy thing a few weeks back. It helped join us so that we could work our power together.
I took Kate’s hand in mine. “Great. Grab hold.”
We joined hands. Dot closed her eyes and murmured, “Let what is, change to
that which it should be.”
“What does that mean?” Kate murmured.
“No clue,” I whispered.
“Hush,” Dot chided.
A sliver of paper hovered in the center of our circle. I watched as it curled and coiled, looking more like an inchworm than a devious trick. Really. I didn’t deserve being outed in my own town. I might’ve glamoured the fairies’ ears a bit, but it was a glamour. It would eventually go away. It wasn’t like I’d ruined their lives or anything.
Not like they were trying to do to me.
The paper shifted, becoming very small. It popped open. I blinked. The vellum was gone. In its place floated a feather.
Dot blinked open her eyes. “Go look.”
I rushed to the window. Floating down from the sky were hundreds of feathers. All the papers on the ground had changed, too. Thank goodness.
Wow. The Normal Inquisitor was going to have a busy week. I gave Dot a quick hug. “Now. Are you going to get rid of the little light spirits that are still floating in my kitchen?”
A few minutes later all the lights had vanished except for three. The final stragglers hovered around Kate’s head.
“I think they like you,” I said.
She pulled her cloud of curls into a ponytail holder. “I don’t like them. This was cute a few minutes ago, but it’s really not my thing now.”
I clapped her on the shoulder. “Buck up. They might help you get a date. You know, a tall, dark wizard sees you’ve got spirits; he might stop to help you get rid of them.”
“Meanwhile? What am I supposed to do?”
Dot tapped a finger to her nose like St. Nick about to fly up the chimney. The orbs disappeared. I could still feel their energy about, and I was pretty sure Kate could, too.
Kate swatted the air. “I hear something buzzing in my ear.”
“Don’t worry,” Dot said. “They’ll eventually get tired and leave.”
Kate shrugged. “Okay. Well, I’ve got to go and get some work done. Andie, I’ll see you tomorrow?”
Kate, as well as being my best friend and neighbor, also worked at Giving Trunk.
