Cassie Scot: ParaNormal Detective

by Amsden, Christine

  “At less than ten miles an hour?” I sighed and checked myself. Reason was obviously not going to work with this woman, so I switched to threats. “Do you know who my parents are?”

  “Should I?”

  “Edward and Sheila Scot.”

  There wasn’t an immediate response.

  “Mrs. Hewitt?” I said.

  “Oh hell,” she said. I heard a car door slam and an engine rev up.

  “Mrs. Hewitt?” I repeated.

  “You deserve this,” she said. “I think your parents will agree.”

  Then she drove away.

  As it happened, my parents did not agree. I wish I could have seen the confrontation when my parents found out what had happened, but I was blind. Suffice to say, it was one of those not-so-subtle moments that has given my family a certain degree of notoriety in Eagle Rock.

  When I was able to see again, the first thing I noticed was what everyone else in town was looking at–the large column of fire and smoke curling above Jasmine Hewitt’s home. The flames never actually touched the house, but it was a near thing.

  Later, the die-hard disbelievers swore it had simply been a forest fire, but they never could explain why not a single tree had been scorched.

  * * *

  Once Evan and I were settled into his Prius, I decided I had to ask, “Do you know what happened to Robert’s hair?”

  A corner of his mouth twitched upward. “It was part of my community service project. I intercepted a shipment of shampoo to his shop last week, found it all spiked with love potion, and added an agent to counteract it.”

  “Wait a minute, all the shampoo was spiked? The ones he’s selling in his shop? Will his customers’ hair start turning pink?” I touched mine, anxiously, then remembered I hadn’t gotten my hair washed.

  “Most of it had a weak potion in it, something to make people more susceptible to romantic invitations. That was easy to counteract, but one had a note on it, saying something like ‘for my special man,’ and that one was far more powerful. I had to use more extreme measures.”

  “Oh.” I would have to trust that he had done what he needed to do, but I still had one more question. “Did Belinda often sell love potions to the unsuspecting public like that? Slipping it into shampoo bottles, I mean?”

  “Yes.” Evan’s jaw went rigid, and I could see the topic upset him. “She thought there wasn’t enough love in the world.”

  We drove in silence for a few minutes, and then Evan broached another subject. “What got Madison’s hackles up?”

  My face turned a little pink. “Oh, she’s just terrified of you; you know that.”

  “That’s exactly why I’m curious.”

  I hesitated. Every time I’d brought up love spells with him, the conversation had gone badly.

  “Don’t worry,” Evan said, offering me an encouraging smile, “whatever she said, I won’t hex her.”

  “I know. She’s just one of the people who’s convinced you cast love spells.”

  “Ah,” he said, looking more serious, “and she thinks you’re my next victim?”

  “Yes,” I said. No point in sugar-coating it. “I explained we were just friends, and I’m seeing someone else, but she has this weird idea that you can cast love spells with a kiss.”

  “Does she?” If the accusation upset Evan, he didn’t show it.

  I found myself momentarily staring at his full lips. “So do you have some kind of magic kiss?”

  “Oh, yes.” Evan’s serious expression melted away, and a mischievous grin took its place. “I can drive a woman to orgasm with a single kiss.”

  I snorted. I covered my mouth with my hand, somewhat mortified by the reaction, but his quip had been just the thing to break the dark mood that had been hanging over our heads ever since we found his poor, battered cousin. I needed to laugh, though I almost felt guilty for doing so with the image of her mutilated body still so fresh in my mind.

  “What? You don’t believe me?” Evan asked with wide-eyed innocence. “You should try it sometime.”

  I laughed again, this time pushing the guilt away. “There’s an image. No wonder you never had trouble getting dates, and here I thought they were just in awe of you.”

  “Good thing you never had that problem.”

  “Yeah, good thing.” Although, I noted with some chagrin, I did have another problem. The more time I spent with Evan, the more I did, in fact, want to kiss him. I had pushed thoughts of him out of my mind since high school, branding what I had felt as a silly crush, but I couldn’t deny the spark of attraction still existed. Had Madison seen it? Was that why she warned me off? And did Evan, despite his lighthearted banter, feel the same spark? Did I want him to?

  No, I decided, I didn’t want him to feel that way. I had moved on, and Braden was a great guy. Not to mention one who couldn’t, even accidentally, throw someone fifty feet and put him in a coma. I hated thinking that way, because Evan was far, far more than a long ago accident, but I understood better than anyone how accidents could happen. My mother had reminded me of that, quite painfully, earlier in the day. The scars were still fresh.

  The house came into view then–a modest two-story dwelling that reminded me of Belinda’s in all but the most important aspect: the plant life. There were a few shrubs along the path leading to the house, but that was about it.

  A sign in the front yard read: NO TRESPASSERS. VIOLATERS WILL BE CURSED.

  “That’s friendly,” I muttered. “I hope this ends better than our run-in this morning.”

  “What happened this morning?” Evan asked as he pulled into the short driveway.

  I hadn’t meant to tell him, although it had been a pretty careless slip, so maybe some part of me wanted him to know. I had felt pretty relieved when he suggested visiting Mrs. Hewitt together, since I didn’t want to face her by myself again.

  “I ran into her this morning,” I said, “and asked her if she’d seen Belinda. She tried to curse me, but it’s all right. I had some nettle on hand, so whatever it was, it’s on her now.”

  Evan put the car in park and gave me a look I recognized all too well. It was the same look I had seen on his face the day he had hurt Paul Ellerson. Maybe I shouldn’t have slipped. I shouldn’t have had an ounce of compassion for the old witch, but she had just lost her daughter, and she had already fallen on her own curse.

  “That is not all right,” Evan said.

  “She only ended up hurting herself, and besides, she must have been hurting pretty badly to do it, after what happened a few years ago.”

  “The fireball. I saw it.” Evan clenched his hands into fists, then slowly let go. “Fine, but she’d better not give you so much as a dirty look while I’m here.”

  “Dirty is her natural facial expression,” I said.

  He laughed, and most of his hostility eased away. It was good to know he still had his sense of humor.

  No sooner had we stepped on the path leading to the house, then the front door banged open, and Jasmine Hewitt stepped onto the porch, looking exactly as ugly and unfriendly as she had that morning. If she still suffered from the effects of the backfired curse, I couldn’t see them.

  “What are you doing here?” Mrs. Hewitt aimed a long, bony finger threateningly at me, and I saw that she still wore red fingernail polish. “The sheriff’s already been here, and I won’t talk to you.”

  Evan drew up alongside me, and very deliberately, slid his hand around my waist. Mrs. Hewitt’s eyes widened somewhat, making me think she had not seen him until that moment.

  “We’re trying to figure out what happened to your daughter, Mrs. Hewitt,” I said with as much respect as I could manage, which wasn’t much. “I’d think you’d want to help us.”

  “You don’t care what happened to my girl,” Mrs. Hewitt said. “You want to know what happened to Nancy Hastings.”

  She kept shooting sideways looks at Evan, as though sizing him up. If she thought she could take him, she really had lost her min
d.

  “She is my cousin,” Evan said, stepping slightly in front of me. “Now put those daggers back in your eyes before you hurt yourself. There’s no reason we can’t work together on this. We both want the same things.”

  “You have no idea what I want,” Mrs. Hewitt said.

  “Did the sheriff tell you it was a vampire attack?” I asked.

  “He told me you said so.” She couldn’t have made it plainer that she didn’t believe me. “I wouldn’t trust the word of someone like you.”

  Evan started to say something, but I cut him off. I could handle a few insults; I’d handled worse, and from people I liked a lot more.

  “Actually, Mrs. Hewitt, it was pretty obvious, since she had turned into a vampire.”

  “Liar.” A shadow passed over Mrs. Hewitt’s face and she scowled. “That’s just not possible.”

  “I assure you,” I said, “it is. Even someone like me can see when a person has turned into a vampire.”

  “You’re a disgrace. If you didn’t have your daddy to hide behind–”

  “He wasn’t with me this morning,” I said.

  Her eyes flashed. “You ran like a frightened child, and I notice you couldn’t face me again without backup.”

  The kernel of truth in her statements made me hesitate. I could have armed myself with a few more protections and come alone, but even though she was far from the strongest practitioner in town, I normally dealt with her by using my family name. I had wanted to bring Evan only because she seemed beyond that kind of reasoning ability today.

  Evan had apparently had enough, either because of her latest jab or my hesitation. “Are you upset because Cassie took you on and won, or because you know if you try anything again, you’ll have to answer to me?”

  She clenched her fists into tight balls, but she couldn’t take on Evan, not by a long shot, even if she looked like she wanted to try. “My daughter did not turn.”

  A silence spread between us, thick and palpable. I think everyone was waiting for someone else to break it, and I, for one, was struck by Mrs. Hewitt’s certainty. She had given her daughter the anti-venom potion, probably as a child. Of that, I had no doubt. Now, I needed to find out if the potion had failed, or if Belinda had found a way to counteract it, intentionally becoming a vampire.

  “When did you last see your daughter?” I asked, breaking the silence.

  “Last week. I met both my girls for lunch on Monday. And no, she never mentioned anyone she was seeing. I didn’t ask after her love life. I disapproved, to be honest.”

  “Why did you disapprove?” I asked.

  “Because she sometimes managed to make very powerful people very angry with her.” Mrs. Hewitt wouldn’t look at us, but we had seen the scrapbook, and knew the truth of her words.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Hewitt,” I said. “I think we’ve taken enough of your time.”

  “You can’t trust him,” Mrs. Hewitt called to my retreating back. “Men are all snakes and the ones with power are pythons, especially when it comes to girls like you.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, but before I even had a chance to turn around, the door slammed shut, and Mrs. Hewitt disappeared inside.

  “Come on.” Evan’s hand was at my back, a firm pressure ushering me away. “She’s just a crazy, bitter old lady.”

  I let him guide me back to the car, but I felt uneasy. Her last words may simply have been the parting shot of a crazy old lady lashing out at the world, but coupled with Madison’s observations, and his hand at my back, I couldn’t help but wonder.

  “I have a date tonight,” I said as soon as we climbed back into the car.

  “With Braden?” He started the engine and pulled out of the driveway.

  “Yeah.”

  “Is it serious?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Okay.” Just that simple word. He didn’t sound upset or even resigned. Maybe I had gotten my signals mixed up; I never had been good at flirting, or noticing when men were flirting with me.

  “I still have some shopping to do,” I said, “since my mom burned my purse and all its contents. I need a new cell phone. It would be nice if you had one, too.”

  “Won’t argue with that one, but it won’t happen until I graduate.”

  “So, listen,” I said, deciding to get down to business, “I believed Mrs. Hewitt when she implied she vaccinated her daughter.”

  “Me too.”

  “So what went wrong? Is there a failure rate? Or did she find some way to counteract the potion, so she could intentionally become a vampire?”

  He hesitated just long enough for me to let my own unspoken fear rise to the surface. Belinda Hewitt, while a gifted herbalist, didn’t have a lot in the way of magical talent. She wasn’t dry, like me, but I did wonder if somehow the degree of magical talent was related to protection. Some potions didn’t work at all on me, not many, but some.

  “Sometimes, the potion fails if you only take one dose,” Evan said. “That’s why there’s a booster three years later.”

  “Mrs. Hewitt might not have known that,” I said. “The magical world doesn’t exactly like to share.”

  “No, but in this case, it really is common knowledge. Master Wolf sent out pamphlets to all the magical households a couple of decades ago, giving detailed instructions for making and using the potion.”

  My jaw dropped. “He did?”

  “Remember, I told you he’s of the opinion we’d all be better off if we organized. There’s this guy on the east coast, Alexander DuPris, that’s been working towards magical unification for years, and Master Wolf follows everything he does. They’ve compiled a book of common knowledge–things they think all magic users should know.”

  I thought I’d heard my father mention the movement as well, with great contempt, but I didn’t follow magical politics very closely.

  “I didn’t realize it was a matter of public record. Should I mention it to the sheriff?” I usually had some leeway in what I could tell the sheriff.

  “No,” Evan said, sharply, making me jump. “Sorry.” His voice softened. “Look, a lot of people got pretty upset with Master Wolf when he passed around the information. We can’t protect everyone, and right now we think the vampires don’t know about it. The more people who know, the more likely they’ll find out.”

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “I don’t know. Master Wolf makes a good argument about the dangers of letting a sorcerer become a vampire.”

  I shuddered at the image. “One thing’s for sure, we need to talk to a hunter. Things aren’t adding up, and I can’t put my finger on why. If Jason’s tried to call me back, I won’t know because I don’t have a phone.”

  “Okay, we’ll pick this back up tomorrow. I need to spend some time with my family this evening, anyway. Hopefully, your cousin will have called you by then. If not, we’ll figure something else out.”

  “Sounds good. Meet me at my office at eight?”

  “Master Wolf may need me to do a few things tomorrow morning, but I’ll find you. If you’re not at your office, I’ll stop by the diner to use a phone.”

  “Okay.”

  “Just do me one favor. Don’t let your date go on too late tonight. Sunset’s around eight forty; you need to be behind a threshold by then.”

  13

  I DIDN’T KNOW IF I WAS in love with Braden or not. It had been a concept I’d played with for most of our time together, wondering what it even meant or whether it was simply something you decided to do. We had never used those words with one another, a fact for which I was grateful, because I didn’t want to have to decide in a heated moment whether or not, “I love you,” was something I wanted to say to him.

  We had always been honest with one another, a concept some have had difficulty with, given the fact that we agreed to a non-exclusive relationship. But we had agreed to it; it’s not like he cheated on me. When our lives had taken us down two different paths, we didn’t
make any false promises, but we still agreed to keep one another in mind. It was always fun, while it lasted, then he would go back to school, and I would return to whatever I was doing–first junior college, then my job as a deputy, and finally my attempt at entrepreneurship.

  As for the fact that he saw other people and I didn’t, well, it didn’t bother me all that much. I think part of me enjoyed my quasi-single status. If I had ever wanted to, I could date someone, but if I didn’t, I could always use Braden as an excuse to say no.

  Lately, though, I had begun to wonder what I really wanted, both from Braden and from life. We had never even slept together, because I wouldn’t take that step without a little more commitment. It didn’t look like things would change anytime soon, either, not since he planned to attend law school in Chicago in the fall. In fact, he would be even further away than before, and while he had talked about returning to Eagle Rock when he obtained his law degree, that time still seemed so far off.

  Meanwhile, I didn’t know what I wanted from my own life. Facing the reality of what it was like to be a deputy had been hard. Maybe I would even have enjoyed being a cop in a different city, but my childhood dreams had me serving and protecting my family and friends, not a city full of strangers. Leaving Eagle Rock had never really crossed my mind.

  Braden arrived promptly at five thirty, a tentative smile on his handsome face, carrying a bouquet of red roses. Red roses are a powerful symbol of love, passion, and fertility, but Braden didn’t understand their potential, and I wasn’t going to clue him in. They were beautiful and romantic.

  He wasn’t prone to giving me flowers, though, and I wondered if he had made the effort because Juliana had told him her lies.

  He looked great, like an anchor of normalcy in the middle of a storm. He’d had his blond hair freshly cut, his face freshly shaved, and he smelled of my favorite aftershave. So why didn’t I feel that spark of chemistry I’d grudgingly acknowledged feeling with Evan? It couldn’t be simply because we had been together for three years, and were settling into a more mature relationship, because most of those three years had been spent at a distance. Besides, I had known Evan longer.