Charmed Bones

by Carolyn Haines

  I recognized the witch, Angelique, and her willingness to do whatever was necessary to keep Barnabas with her. “Stop this, Angelique. No good will come of voodoo dolls and curses.”

  “He will always be mine!” She came toward me, needle ready to stab the doll again.

  Adrenalin shot through me and I drew in breath, ready for battle or at least to tackle her. Something about the curve of her jaw stopped me.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I threw back the covers. My bare feet hit the floor and Sweetie Pie jumped to attention. She looked over at the blonde, yawned, and flopped back down.

  “Jitty!” I knew then it was my haint doing another of her insidious witch impersonations. But why a witch from a soap opera? Angelique had been obsessed by a love she could never have, a love never returned. Her desperation only brought misery to herself and the people she cared about. What did Angelique have to do with my world of Zinnia, Mississippi?

  Angelique’s milky skin took on the soft mocha coloring of my haint.

  I could not believe this. Jitty was determined to torment me to madness. “I know what happened,” I said. “I died in my sleep last night, and I have been sentenced to hell, haven’t I? I’m going to have to spend eternity with a ghost pretending to be a television star pretending to be a witch. It boggles the mind!”

  “I could make a little doll to look just like you,” Jitty said in her sultry Southern accent. “Keep harpin’ on like an old magpie and see if I don’t. It’ll have pins poking out of every inch of it.”

  “Why are you doing this? I’m desperate for sleep. Don’t you want me to be refreshed and ready for some action when Coleman has time for me?”

  “If you worked that moneymaker properly, he’d be beatin’ down the door right this minute.”

  I couldn’t believe it. A roomful of flowers wasn’t enough. Now Jitty was going to give me guidance in the art of lovemaking? This was beyond the pale, even for my bossy, pushy ghost.

  “Get out of here. And get out of that cotton candy nightgown. The only thing it’s good for is mosquito netting. If you think that’s sexy, you are about seventy years behind the times.”

  “Where is that big hunk of man? Why are you up here sleepin’ all by your lonesome?”

  “We don’t have to spend every freaking second with each other. I need some sleep. I can do that by myself. So can he.”

  “I’ll bet Tinkie’s working on her situation. You’re never gonna catch that lawman unless you put some effort into it.”

  Not even two hands would give me enough fingers to count the ways Jitty’s behavior was wrong. She had to get over the idea that a single female wasn’t enough—at life, a job, a household, or whatever she wanted to do. I wouldn’t become one of those codependent women who couldn’t take out the trash without her boyfriend or husband to tell her how or to hold her hand while she did it.

  “I don’t aim to catch Coleman. I aim to enjoy him,” I said. “If it turns into a permanent thing, all the better. You can’t hurry love, Jitty.” I threw the line from one of her favorite songs at her.

  “You better put a spell on that man while you can. Bond him to you with love and laughter and some bone-melting sex.”

  The aqua peignoir disappeared and there was Jitty, wearing my best black jeans and favorite sweatshirt, looking as modern as you please, and holding a microphone. She broke into a rendition of “I Put a Spell on You” that had me transfixed. I even forgot that I was mad at her. Of all my girlfriends, Cece could really belt the blues, but Jitty would give her a run for her money. She was that good.

  “Stop it, Jitty. Just stop it. Leave me alone.”

  The guitars and harmonica ceased, and the room was silent. Jitty sat on the foot of my bed. “You don’t need a spell or a curse to hold that man to you, Sarah Booth. But you do need to let him see your heart.”

  The torment was over. This was Jitty honestly trying to be helpful. And her concern deflated my anger. “I’m not so good at that.” Even Budgie Burton knew my biggest weakness. I couldn’t allow myself to be vulnerable. I simply couldn’t. If someone else saw that, I might be forced to own it. And my carefully constructed fortress might crack and shatter.

  Jitty was suddenly moon-glow pale and wearing that damn peignoir again, and she held a little doll that bore a remarkable resemblance to me. “I’m going to curse you with the gift of allowing your heart to open to love, Sarah Booth.”

  I wanted to hug her. She was trying to help. “Thank you, Jitty.”

  “Be careful. If you never love fully, you can never lose fully.”

  Far in the distance were the strange tones of the theme music to Dark Shadows, a story about a man who could never truly love. “Don’t do this, Jitty.” I was suddenly terrified. Loving another person was the most dangerous thing in the world. I thought of Tinkie—she was so willing to give her whole heart, her whole self to a child. Would I ever be that courageous?

  “You will love. You owe it to yourself.” Angelique stabbed a huge pin into the heart of the doll that resembled me.

  I sat up in bed gasping for air, rising from the dream like a fish gulping the useless oxygen on a riverbank. Cold sweat slid from my hairline down my face. I looked around the room. No Jitty. No Angelique. No open window. No raging sea. It had all been a terrible nightmare. But I had been cautioned. Like all lovers before me, I knew that the only thing worth risking was my own heart. I just didn’t know if I was brave enough to do it.

  * * *

  My reception at Musgrove Manor left something to be desired, from the snub Budgie and I got from the feral cats to the three sisters sitting on the front porch drinking coffee and ignoring us. Tinkie had been a no-show, but she finally called saying she was on a lead involving the Arlington Woods subdivision and the Fontanas. I was glad to keep her away from the witches and the influence they had over her.

  The three sisters sipped coffee and eyed Budgie as if he might be the next human sacrifice. “I know you’re here for something,” Faith said in a slow drawl. “Care to tell us what it is?”

  “We need to explore the third floor,” I told them, after introducing Budgie.

  “Go right ahead,” Charity said, waving a hand absently. “The sheriff has been here and searched the place up and down.”

  “Thanks.” I motioned Budgie inside before they changed their minds. He was so busy ogling them that I had to snatch him by the arm. “They will put a spell on you,” I warned him.

  “They’re gorgeous. I thought witches were old and warty.”

  “Only in fiction,” I said. “The Harringtons are modern witches.”

  “That brunette looks like a model. All of them do. Those miniskirts are hot.” Budgie was loosening the collar of his shirt with a finger.

  “You’ve been working at the prison too long,” I told him as we trudged up the stairs to the third floor. He stopped at the claw marks in the beautiful wood. “What do you make of that?” I asked.

  “I’ve never seen a Delta creature with that wide of a paw. We still have a few little black bears, but that must be eight inches across.”

  “So what is it?” If I could identify the mark at the manor, I’d also know what had been hanging out at Dahlia House.

  “I don’t know.” He snapped a photo with his phone. “But I’ll bet I can find out.”

  Some detective I was. I hadn’t even thought of snapping a photo and contacting some of the university biology departments. We moved into the studio and I gave Budgie a few moments to gawk at the beautiful paintings. “My goodness, Trevor was talented,” he said. “I never appreciated him for what he could do.”

  “Trevor never tried very hard to build a local audience. I think it goes without saying that most local talent is never appreciated at home. He’s supposed to be very popular in Europe, especially Italy. And also in South America.”

  Budgie nodded. “I remember when the school groups used to come out to the manor. We had no clue he was up here painting naked women.”
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  “No, we didn’t.” I maneuvered him into the hallway near Trevor’s bedroom. “Let’s look for those passages.”

  Together we tapped and sounded on the walls and floor, seeking anything that echoed hollowly or indicated it was a false front. We moved along companionably, not really talking, just working. When we came to the fireplace in the little parlor off Trevor’s bedroom, Budgie hit pay dirt.

  “Here it is,” he said. He tapped the wall beside the mantle. “It’s back there. I just don’t know how to access it.”

  “It’s always the mantle in the movies,” I said, pulling down hard. Nothing happened.

  “Or a book in the shelf.” Budgie tried that approach with a collection of leather-bound volumes to the side of the mantle.

  “Or a brick in the fireplace.” I reached into the chimney and pressed and pushed. For my effort I got sooty hands. And nothing else.

  “It has to be here.” Budgie touched the beautiful scrolled column of the fireplace. “This is quite elegant.”

  And it was the lever that shifted the paneled wall toward us just enough to reveal a recessed room. We hadn’t brought flashlights, but there were numerous candles stuck in wine bottles. I grabbed two and lit them with one of the many lighters scattered on all flat surfaces. With Budgie right behind me, I stepped into the darkness.

  19

  The thick dust in the narrow room made me want to sneeze, and the candles gave poor illumination. Still, I trudged forward across the rough-planked floor toward the darkness at the end of what looked to be an ever-narrowing corridor.

  “There has to be stairs or a passage to another part of the house,” Budgie whispered. “Otherwise this is just a hidey room and could easily become a death trap. If someone decided to burn the manor during an attack, any person hiding here would be roasted alive.”

  “Great image, Budgie,” I said. “I don’t remember you being so macabre in history class.”

  “That’s because you hardly ever paid attention in class. You were always reading. I don’t think there was a book in the library you didn’t go through. You loved Beth Henley’s plays most of all, though. You’d sit in the back row with a play tucked into your history book and this faraway look would come over you. I knew you were dreaming big then. I thought for sure you’d get the lead in Crimes of the Heart on Broadway.”

  Even if it was empty flattery, it was kind of Budgie to say it. His words were a salve to the raw wound of my failed Broadway career. I had wanted that part—really wanted it. He was correct. I’d dreamed about Margaret Magrath. I’d crawled inside her skin and prepared for my Broadway debut. I grieved when I wasn’t cast. Older and wiser, I understood that a known actress with a big name was a smarter, better choice than an unknown. But at the time, the rejection had been brutal. The role of Margaret Magrath had been written for me, or so I’d thought. Water under the bridge.

  “Budgie, I did pay attention. At least some. I mean, I remembered about the hidden rooms in the old manor houses.”

  “And I’m shocked,” he said without meaning to be sarcastic. “Hush a minute. Listen. I hear a cat.”

  I kept my lip zipped and focused on the silence. Far away, I heard the cry of what sounded like an adult kitty. Pluto and Sweetie Pie had come with me, but I’d left them in the car. Which meant they could be anywhere. Pluto was like a rat. He could crawl through the smallest openings, balance on the thinnest ledges, and hide in shadows undetected. He and Sweetie Pie were capable of conning the Harrington sisters into opening the car door and letting them out. If Pluto was in this secret passage, I had to get him before I left. That might not be an easy chore.

  “Me-ow!” The call came to me muffled by the thick walls and layers of dust.

  “Pluto!” I had no doubt now it was my kitty. How he’d gotten inside the passage I had no idea. “Pluto! Where are you?”

  “Are you sure it’s your cat?” Budgie asked. “There are dozens hanging around here.”

  “It’s Pluto.” I recognized his distinctive voice. “He’s down this way.”

  There was barely room to edge down the passage, and I worried that if there was no outlet and Budgie got stuck, since he was following me, I’d be trapped in the walls forever. The sisters wouldn’t find us until we started to stink. Damn. I was as macabre as Budgie.

  “Pluto, you’d better come here right now,” I called softly as I crab-walked down the passage. This had sounded like it might be fun to explore the old manor and maybe find leads to evidence of who—or what—might be lurking around Musgrove Manor scaring people to death. I thought of Trevor’s and Esmeralda’s faces and realized that if I did run into something in the passage, I would likely die of terror, too.

  “Keep moving,” Budgie huffed. “I’m getting claustrophobic. It’s like the passage is getting narrower and narrower.”

  Sadly, he wasn’t hallucinating. I’d noticed the walls closing in, too. “There’s a bigger space ahead.” The darkness sucked at the light of my candle and gave nothing back. It was either a room or a black hole to another universe.

  “Sarah Booth, don’t stop.” Budgie nudged me. I’d become paralyzed by my own stupid imagination. The tightness of the passage had to be even more uncomfortable for Budgie because he was taller and stouter.

  I inched forward, holding the candle in front of my sideways progress. People really were smaller back in the day. I’d laughed at the little short beds in tours of antebellum homes. Now I understood that stature was no laughing matter. Tinkie would have been much better at this assignment because she was a petite keg of dynamite. Budgie wasn’t fat, but he was struggling.

  “Just a little more.” My candlelight was absorbed by the total darkness. No wall blocked it, so I could only assume we were nearing an opening. I exhaled, making my rib cage as small as possible, and pushed on. Something scuttled across the floor not ten feet from me.

  “What was that?” Budgie asked.

  My heart pounded so loudly, I didn’t know if I could speak over it. “I don’t know,” I whispered. And the truth was, I didn’t really want to know. Whatever was creeping around in the dark—I didn’t want to lay eyes on it. “Maybe it was Pluto.” I clung to that hope. Maybe it was just my very own black cat. In my dark imagination, though, I saw the claw marks that had marred my front door and window, and the third floor of the manor. Something deadly could be lurking, waiting.

  We couldn’t remain in that horribly cramped corridor. I pushed forward, holding the candle with my right hand. A draft of cold air blew against me, making the candle gutter. Almost as if someone had opened a door up ahead and allowed the outside air to intrude.

  The right side of my body was suddenly freed of the compression of the passage and I wiggled fully into an open space. Budgie squeezed out behind me and inhaled.

  “Man, I thought I would suffocate,” he said. “Wherever we are, I’m not going back through that passage even if you have to get those witches to take out a wall.”

  I had similar sentiments, but I was focused on the sense that someone shared the space with us. I reached to find Budgie’s hand and pressed it. We pushed together, back to back, illuminating the space around us with the candles as best we could.

  The old bricks of the enclosure, which wasn’t large by any means, told me the room had played a role in the history of the house. In the corner was an old trunk and a cheval mirror. Our images, cast back at us in the weak candlelight, showed two very stressed individuals.

  As I advanced into the room, I saw a narrow cot against another wall. This had been someone’s room. Someone who was hiding here? Or someone who had been a prisoner? The latter thought was chilling. All the old stories of crazy relatives held captive in attics because they were a danger to themselves and others and the family was too ashamed to put them in an institution smacked into my brain with the force of a hammer. Had this been the “ward” of such a mentally unstable person? One capable of killing Trevor and Esmeralda? I had to get out of that room and research t
he old Musgrove line. Had there been crazy aunts or uncles that disappeared into the dust of time and the hidden room? And what of the Harringtons? Had they brought someone dangerous out of the Louisiana bayous and into Sunflower County?

  So much had gone wrong since they’d come to town.

  “Do you smell that?” Budgie asked.

  A whiff of something burnt and a bit sulfuric drifted to me. My body reacted before my brain. Lizard impulses for survival aren’t rational, but they are strong. I ducked, pulling Budgie down with me just as both of our candles extinguished in a blast of frigid air and a large knife slammed into the wall, reverberating, where my head had once been.

  Some material brushed against my face.

  “Aaaaaaaaaaarrrrgh!” Budgie hurled himself into the darkness. He landed on the floor with a woof as the air rushed out of his lungs.

  Torn between helping Budgie or trying to pursue the knife thrower, I went to Budgie. I couldn’t see a damn thing in the dark, and chasing after someone who might be armed was too dangerous. I found Budgie and helped him sit up until he caught his breath. He’d been flattened and had the air knocked from his lungs, but he wasn’t hurt.

  “Who was that?” Budgie wheezed.

  “I don’t know.” I felt around on the floor until I found one of the candles. I’d put the lighter in my pocket and soon had illumination. I swallowed dryly. Budgie was sitting in the middle of a pentagram drawn with a series of symbols and signs. He looked around at the floor and jumped to his feet.

  “What the hell is going on here?” he asked.

  The cheval mirror gave us the reflection of two unhappy people staring at what could only be described as a Satanic symbol on the floor. I didn’t have an answer, so I said nothing.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Budgie said. “There has to be a way out. Someone was here and now they aren’t. They didn’t just vaporize.”

  I couldn’t argue with his logic and I also wanted out of that stale, dark room. The sound of a cat calling made me put a hand on Budgie’s arm to hold him still.