Ghost Mysteries & Sassy Witches (Cozy Mystery Multi-Novel Anthology)

by Неизвестный

  I barely restrained myself from jumping up and down. “The X-Files are real! It's totally a real thing! Are you a Fox Mulder or a Dana Scully?”

  He didn't even crack a smile. “The X-Files are part of the FBI, and I already told you I'm not FBI. And, more importantly, the X-Files aren't real. It's a TV show, like Wicked Wives.”

  “That's my other favorite show,” I said, gushing.

  “Never seen it,” he said. “Are there aliens?”

  “Yes, but mainly it's about regular housewives who are secretly witches. You don't believe in witchcraft, do you?”

  Slowly, he answered, “I have an open mind.”

  “How open? Are you secretly a warlock?” I grinned and let out a totally-joking laugh.

  “I'm not a warlock,” he said. “I'm something else.”

  “What are you?”

  He stopped walking and cupped one hand around his ear. “Did you hear that?”

  In the stillness, a branch snapped nearby, and then another. It hadn't been a branch on the ground, though. The sound came from the tree branches overhead.

  I looked up at the dark canopy of lush leaves. The pain at the base of my skull returned with a vengeance. Ouch. I pushed the pain down to a level where it wouldn't cloud my senses. How did I do that? I didn't know, and didn't have time to wonder. The canopy shivered as a dark shape flitted from one tree to another. Something was stalking us from above.

  “We're not alone,” Chet said.

  My throat hoarse, I croaked out, “Danger.”

  I crouched down and picked up a staff-sized branch from the side of the path. I turned to face Chet again but found only empty air. He was gone.

  I whirled around, calling out his name. My head throbbed. Had he run down the path? The section we stood on was straight enough that I could see the exit to the grassy park. He wasn't anywhere on the path.

  A dark form descended from the trees. My arms moved with minds of their own, and a pulse of blue shot from my fingertips. The throb in my head was the least of my concerns. I'd just shot lightning. From my hands.

  The darkness let out a horrifying squawk and came at me again.

  I repeated the hand movements and another blast of blue shot from my hands, brighter than before. This time, there was a kickback that knocked me off my feet. Down I went. The darkness expanded, covering me like a cloak.

  I made the gesture a third time, but everything felt wrong. Nothing but tiny sparks came from my fingers. The throbbing in my head became unbearable. I closed my eyes. I was tired. So tired. Did I hear wings? The air around me beat with what felt and sounded like huge wings. The wind swept dirt and grime into my nose and mouth.

  I cracked open my eyelids just as my fingertips sparked once more with a damp hiss. The wind subsided, and all was still within my bubble.

  I opened my eyes all the way. Just beyond a shimmering wall, an enormous monster of a bird shrieked, its cry loud enough to make the pain in my head even worse. The bird's form kept changing shape, but its gold eyes stayed constant within its nebulous form. They were the largest eyes I'd ever seen on anything outside of a museum. The whole bird-beast was enormous. Its wingspan spread so wide I couldn't see both wingtips at once.

  The creature let out another cry, this one a scream. The luminous membrane between us shimmered and evaporated with a pop. Now the air was thick with the smell of forest—pine and sweet decay.

  I raised one arm and willed my magic to work. Come on, blue lightning! My fingertips grew hot, but nothing flashed. The battery for my witchy defenses had gone kaput.

  Another beast, this one gray and furry, launched from the ground beside me and flew through the air like an arrow of fury.

  It was a wolf.

  The wolf's mouth gaped, big white teeth flashing. It attacked the great bird with open jaws. Their cries mingled, becoming one chorus of rage.

  I cautiously crouched down and grabbed the stick I'd dropped seconds earlier. I wanted to break up the tumultuous ball of feathers and fur, but I couldn't get a clear shot with the stick, and I wasn't entirely sure which was my foe.

  Before I could smack anything, the bird beat its mighty wings and headed skyward. It clutched the snarling wolf in its talons. The two flew crookedly into the canopy, still snarling and screaming. Leaves and branches rained down as the beasts fought.

  And then, with one last angry shriek, the bird appeared in a patch of blue sky overhead, alone.

  Something dropped down to the ground beside me. The wolf. It was breathing heavily, standing on shaky legs, but it was alive.

  “Chet,” I said. “You saved my bacon.”

  The wolf whimpered and took two steps toward me.

  “Chet? Is that you, or are you just an enormous wolf with Chet's heroic personality?”

  The wolf nudged my outstretched hand and licked my palm.

  I looked up at the canopy again. Was Chet the bird? Had I gone completely crazy?

  The wolf let out a soft bark.

  I knelt down and looked into its dark eyes, which were as black as the bottom of a well. As we stared at each other, I saw a glimmer of green in its dark eyes.

  “Wolf, bark once for yes and twice for no. Are you Chet?”

  “Woof.” Yes.

  “What was that bird you were fighting?”

  The wolf tilted its head and blinked.

  “Right. That wasn't a bark-answerable question. Chet, do you know what that bird was?”

  “Woof, woof.” No.

  “Are we in danger right now?”

  Chet-Wolf didn't answer.

  “You should change back so we can have this conversation the human way. Can you change back?”

  Chet-Wolf nudged my hand again. I ran my palm over his pelt, stopping when I reached a spot that was wet and sticky with blood. He was hurt.

  A queasiness rose in me. Blood. I could easily recall every scrape, cut, and terrifying moment my daughter had put me through. The first time Zoey hurt herself badly—cutting a tooth through her lip when she fell—I'd nearly fainted. But I'd learned to quell those panicky feelings and jump into medical mode. This was no different. I had to keep my head and become Dr. Mom.

  As I smoothed Chet-Wolf's fur to find the source of the blood, at least my queasiness was of some comfort. It proved I was still conscious and hadn't fainted. As long as I remained conscious, I could help.

  As I pulled at the shredded hide, my hands pulsed with warmth, tingling and powerful. It was clearly magic, but much different from the blue lightning.

  I'd barely located the gash in Chet-Wolf's pelt, and it was already healing, stitching together under the orange glow coming from my hands. He whimpered softly.

  The rest of the world disappeared as I tended him from head to toe, fixing one gash after another. The sharp talons of the flying beast hadn't been just for show. The creature had done its best to shred my hero. My werewolf neighbor.

  A woman's voice startled me out of my reverie. “Is your doggy okay?”

  I turned to find a pleasant-faced woman in a red hat, walking a gray Miniature Schnauzer in an equally red vest. The Schnauzer regarded Chet-Wolf with apprehension, one front paw frozen in mid-air.

  I found my voice deep within my gut and answered, “He got scratched up on some branches, but I think my, uh, doggy's okay.”

  “He's so big,” she said. “Is he part wolf?”

  “It's a European breed,” I answered, which seemed to satisfy her.

  “See you around,” she said breezily, tugging at the leash as she walked away.

  I stood and waved goodbye. The Schnauzer was so transfixed by Chet-Wolf, it let itself be dragged for several yards on stiff legs before getting its paws working.

  Once they'd disappeared from sight, I turned again to tend my hero.

  He was no longer covered in a thick pelt of fur.

  He was standing.

  He was human.

  He was completely naked.

  I let out a surprised shriek.

>   Chet's green eyes showed amusement. “Now you scream?”

  Chapter 15

  I distracted myself from Chet's nakedness by helping him hunt down his clothes in the nearby brush.

  “No peeking,” he said. “I can feel you checking me out.”

  I snorted as I picked up one of his shoes and shook the dirt from it. “You wish,” I teased. “If I had been looking—and I'm not admitting to anything—it was only as a professional healer. If you have any more wounds from that nasty bird, let me know, and I'll fix them for you.”

  “You can look now,” he said. “I've got jeans on.”

  I glanced over and caught an eyeful of his remarkably fit upper body. I took a moment to inspect his body carefully for scratches. Very carefully. Especially the abs.

  “You don't even have any scars,” I said. “How is that possible?”

  “It's magic,” he said. “I don't know how it works. Regular physics don't apply. My weight as a shifted animal is rarely the same as my weight as a human. Where does the mass come from, or where does it go?”

  “Are you asking me?” I handed him the shoe I'd been shaking free of dirt for at least a minute while staring. “How would I know where the mass goes?”

  “You've been a witch for sixteen years, Zara. Your kind always has explanations for the physics of magic.”

  “My kind?” I blinked innocently.

  “Zara, I saw you shoot a fireball from your fingertips.”

  “So? That doesn't prove someone's a witch.”

  “What else could you be?”

  I shrugged. “I'm a freakishly good conductor of static electricity. The air is rather dry at the moment, and I was working in the library all day. We have dehumidifiers to keep the books from getting musty. What you saw must have been static discharging.”

  “Nice try, but I know better. I've had you under surveillance on and off for years. It was a lot easier back when you were Zara the Camgirl, and you had webcams running in your apartment all the time.”

  “Right.” I handed over his shirt and waved for him to cover his nakedness. “Thanks for saving me from the hell-bird and everything, but you're starting to creep me out.” I gave him a squinty-eyed look. “You've had me under surveillance? That doesn't sound good.”

  He continued getting dressed, keeping his eyes down as he dusted debris from his clothes.

  With a gentle tone, he said, “Thank you for healing me, by the way. I would have stitched up on my own after a few hours, but it's almost impossible to shift with an injury.”

  “You haven't answered my question. Why was I under surveillance? And are you implying it was your job to watch me? You didn't tune into my webcams and chat with the other Zara-fans in the chat room on Tuesday nights just because you enjoyed my sparkling wit and my unique take on popular culture?”

  He kept looking down. “I can't say I agreed with all your movie reviews. You gave a lot of thumbs-down reviews on action movies.”

  “Chet, don't make me shoot you with a blue lightning ball.”

  He met my eyes. “You couldn't hit the side of a barn right now, let alone a moving target. And that's assuming you can even muster one up.” He glanced up at the dark canopy and rubbed his arms. “Let's get walking home. We're both depleted. It's a good thing we had all that chocolate, or we'd be staggering like zombies right now.”

  I stepped over a fallen tree and joined him on the path. We continued in the direction we'd been heading when the attack began.

  “Chet, before that nasty bird pooped all over our cornflakes, you were about to tell me who you worked for. After that display, I'm ready to believe anything you tell me. Is it MIB? By which I mean Men In Black?”

  He chuckled. “I'm not authorized to tell you about my employer. Just that we're looking into the Vander Zalm case, and I may need your help getting access to suspects.”

  “Suspects?” I skipped to keep pace with him. I was a speedy walker, but Chet had longer legs and bigger muscles, not to mention the power boost of werewolf DNA.

  He answered, “I'll tell you more once I'm authorized.” We walked for a moment in silence before he said, “I'm surprised you're not more skilled with your magic. Your defense bubble was lopsided and weak. It's almost like you're a total newbie witch.”

  “I'm not a newbie,” I snorted. Even though Chet had just saved my life and he looked like a calendar model in the nude, I didn't trust him completely. If he didn't know my powers were brand-new due to my late-blooming status as a witch, I wasn't going to tell him. The less information other people had about me, the better.

  “Why were you so shaky?” he asked. “Are you out of practice?”

  “Of course I'm out of practice,” I said. “For the last sixteen years, I haven't had to deal with horrible creatures all that much, not unless you count a teenager.”

  “What are your strategies? I'll have a teenager of my own in three years.”

  “Make sure they get enough sleep. That's the first line of defense, coupled with always having a granola bar in your purse for when they get hungry-cranky.”

  “Always?” He lunged for my purse. I reflexively slapped him in the chest with a fizzle of blue light. My flaccid magic didn't even slow him down. A second later, he'd located the granola bars in my purse and was gobbling one down. With a look of puppy-guilt in his eyes, he offered me the second granola bar.

  “Help yourself,” I said. “You need it more than I do.”

  He ate the second granola bar in three seconds flat and then licked the foil wrapper.

  I offered him the box of chocolates he'd bought for Zoey.

  “I'm stable,” he said. “Besides, those are hers.”

  We emerged from the other end of the forest. The bright late afternoon sunshine felt surreal after our ordeal. We continued walking toward home.

  “You can't tell me about your employer,” I said. “Can you tell me your official job title?”

  “Investigator.”

  “Does your boss know you're a werewolf?”

  He let out a low, disapproving growl. “We prefer the term shifter. We can change at will, and while the moon does affect us, we're not slaves to its cycle.”

  “Are the other investigators shifters? Or witches?”

  “I'm not authorized to provide that information.”

  “Is the Vander Zalm case a homicide investigation?”

  “Yes.”

  I gasped. “Really?”

  “Suspected homicide,” he said.

  “Who are the suspects?”

  “I'm not authorized to provide that information.”

  I groaned. “Am I in danger?”

  “We haven't ruled out the possibility it was simply an unfortunate accident. People kill themselves in bizarre, unplanned ways all the time.” After a minute, he added, “But accidents don't usually cause ghosts, and you do have a ghost in your house, don't you?”

  “Maybe,” I answered cagily, and this time it was my turn to say, “I'm not authorized to provide that information.”

  “Touché,” he said.

  “Am I a suspect?”

  He turned and gave me a surprised look. “Of course not.”

  “Is your son Corvin a shifter?”

  He was slow to answer. “Leave Corvin out of this.”

  “Listen, Chet. I may be a little slow on the uptake sometimes, but your son's name literally means raven, and we just got attacked by what appeared to be a mutant radioactive raven on steroids. Don't tell me you're one of those clueless parents who can't believe his sweet little angel could ever do anything bad.”

  His walking pace slowed to regular-human speed. “That wasn't Corvin back there attacking us. Are you always so paranoid?”

  “Are you always so quick to label a sharp woman who asks questions as paranoid?”

  He let out an audible breath. “Sometimes,” he admitted.

  “On that note, don't you think it was a strange coincidence that we were attacked by a magic creature at t
he exact moment you wanted to talk to me about your secret?”

  He shot me a wary look. “You're driving at something.”

  “It was an effective way for you to win my trust by being my big, strong hero.”

  His wariness turned to annoyance. “You think I enjoy getting my hide sliced to ribbons? You think shifters don't feel pain?”

  I shrugged. “The end justifies the means. You endure some pain now, so you can get what you want down the road.”

  He stuffed his hands in his pockets and glanced around. “We shouldn't be discussing this in public.”

  “Plus you're not authorized to tell me anything interesting.”

  He didn't respond.

  “Clam up all you want,” I said. “I have my own resources.”

  We walked the rest of the way home in silence.

  Chapter 16

  “You forgot to tell us about shifters,” I said to Aunt Zinnia. “Wolf shifters, and scary bird shifters, and heaven knows what else. Also, I can levitate things—as long as they're under five pounds. It's pretty cool, and also a complete surprise. As our elder, aren't you supposed to be guiding us through these strange new developments?”

  Aunt Zinnia looked from me to Zoey, and then back to me again. Her eyes twitched, like she was planning to cast a shoo-go-away spell.

  Finally, she said, “Come inside.” She stepped in from her doorway. “Don't just stand there on my porch talking about imaginary creatures like a couple of ding-dongs.”

  I turned to my daughter. “She called us a couple of ding-dongs.”

  Zoey shrugged. “That's how families are. They can call each other the worst things, but there's always love beneath the surface.”

  “If she loved us so much, why didn't she return our phone calls or at least warn us about the wolf shift—” I didn't get to finish because she'd grabbed my arm and tugged me into the house.

  Zinnia shut her door and locked it. “I've been busy,” she said. “My world doesn't revolve around you two. I had a life long before you showed up here in Wisteria.”

  “Busy doing what?” I asked. “Writing reference letters and arranging for other long-lost family members to get job offers here in this town?” I gave her a plastic smile. “That's right. I know all about your glowing letter—the one that convinced Kathy Carmichael to give me the job at the library, despite being the least qualified of the applicants.”