3-Book Series Bundle: Wisteria Witches, Wicked Wisteria, Wisteria Wonders - Cozy Witch Mysteries

by Angela Pepper

  If Zoey was going to reject people who were unusual, how long would it take before she abandoned me? I had to hope it was just a phase she was going through.

  "We should give Dorothy Tibbits a chance," I said. "Sure, she smells like incense and camping gear, and she talks to your eyebrows rather than looking you in the eyes, and she's just terrible at selling houses, but she seems nice enough."

  "Super," Zoey said with the exact opposite of enthusiasm. "Dorothy and her Botox face can be your new best friend."

  Lightly, I added, "Or maybe Chet Moore, from next door. He's not horrible."

  She narrowed her eyes at me. "Turbo-flirter."

  I pretended to be hurt by the label of Turbo-flirter. Can I help it if I don't like small talk? What's the point in talking about nothing when you can dig into something good? I love asking people about something random yet specific, such as their bowling experience. You can learn a lot about someone if you throw out a good question or two.

  Zoey said, "I can see the appeal of Mr. Tall Dark and Green Eyes, but isn't he too normal for you? He was wearing chinos. He looked like a catalog model."

  I hadn't actually noticed his clothes. "The man's got a goat on his roof."

  "But not a real goat. It's just a decoration on a weather-vane. Besides, the inside of his house is colossally normal. I can see right in through his windows."

  "Have you been spying on our new neighbors?"

  "They started it," she protested. "There's a little boy with dark hair and big eyes. He was watching me from his window the whole time I was unpacking my bedroom. The way the houses are lined up, he can see right in. I felt like a monkey in the zoo."

  "Do you want to switch rooms with me? I want you to be happy. We moved here as much for you as for me."

  "Mom, stop being such a mom." She turned her head. "Shh."

  Something thumped somewhere inside the house. It sounded a lot bigger than expanding nails or air ducts rubbing against wood. It sounded like trouble.

  Zoey's pale hazel eyes widened. "The ghost," she breathed. "I told you so. We're being haunted."

  "It's probably a friendly ghost," I said with a shrug.

  She shook her head and pulled out her phone. She tapped away, frowning at the screen for a few minutes before announcing, "This website says we can get rid of the ghost."

  "Is it expensive? Can we use that white chalky stuff that keeps out slugs and silverfish?"

  She ignored my questions and kept reading. "We need to go into every room and clap and sing really loud, to scare the ghost away. The key is making more noises." She glanced up at the ceiling. "It's probably the old lady who used to live here. Do you think she died inside the house?"

  "Not until you mentioned it."

  "What if she doesn't know she's dead? What if she climbs into bed with me tonight, and screams because she thinks I'm the ghost?"

  I'd been getting the creeps from the conversation, but imagining a ghost screaming in fright at my daughter made me smirk. "Did you say we should sing?" I shook my head. "That won't work. People adore my singing. That won't drive anyone away. But you could play some of your favorite music."

  My daughter gave me another blank look.

  Something in the house thumped again. Whatever it was that made the first noise, it was getting more insistent.

  Zoey shrieked and threw herself into my arms.

  It thumped again.

  A chill ran up my spine. For the first time in my adulthood, I considered the idea that ghosts were real.

  My anxiety escalated the thought into a whirling panic.

  We were being haunted, and it was all my fault. My bad decisions were catching up with me. I'd been impulsive, taking a job in a new town and buying a house immediately rather than renting and taking things slow. I had been so sure of myself. I'd felt there was a larger entity guiding me toward some great destiny.

  I'd trusted that everything would turn out for the best, but now I had a ghost.

  What next?

  I was as broke as any first-time homeowner, but I'd wisely held some money back from the deposit to cover maintenance surprises. If the old pipes broke, I'd call a plumber. If a tree got diseased, I'd call an arborist. And if ghosts were real, then by the same logic there'd have to be a whole industry of people around to deal with them. I'd simply consult the internet and call in a spiritual medium. Or a priest. Or Beetle Juice.

  There was another thump, followed by a crash. It sounded like dishes breaking.

  "My good china," I said, my hand over my heart. It was a lie. We didn't have any fine china, let alone good stuff.

  "The ghost is in the den now," Zoey said, her voice and body quivering.

  "Uh, which room is the den?"

  "The one with the smaller of the two fireplaces," she said.

  "We have two fireplaces?"

  The crash was followed by rustling noises. Zoey buried her head in my shoulder and whimpered.

  "Maybe a cat or a wild animal climbed in through an open window," I said. "It's not a ghost, because ghosts aren't real."

  "It could be a zombie," she said.

  "Now you're just going through monsters willy nilly. Next you'll say Frankenstein's Monster is in the den."

  "Don't let it eat our brains," she said with a giggle. At least she was laughing through her terror. Having a good sense of humor helps in almost any situation.

  With my daughter clinging to me, I grabbed a broom and walked us both out of the kitchen and toward the den, which was a cozy room I planned to turn into a home library.

  The den was empty. No zombies or stray cats.

  But there was a mess. The welcome gifts we'd been given by the real estate agent had fallen off the fireplace mantle. The leafy fern, which hadn't stood much chance of survival even in the best of circumstances, was now a pile of smashed fronds atop dirt and shattered pottery. Next to the dirty mess lay the shredded remains of a welcome basket and scented bath products.

  Zoey crouched over the mess and sniffed. "Smells like vetiver oil."

  I raised an eyebrow.

  She explained, "Vetiver is a grass from India. The scent is supposed to be grounding."

  "It smells like a hippie dipped in lemonade."

  Zoey gathered the bath products, examining them closely. "None of these are open," she said. "Where's the smell coming from?"

  "Your butt," I said with a laugh. Your butt was one of our favorite answers to dumb questions. Where are my keys? Check your butt. Am I forgetting anything? You forgot your butt. What time are you coming home? Ask your butt.

  In a serious tone, Zoey said, "The ghost smashed our welcome gifts."

  "There's no such thing as ghosts. Look at the slope on this mantle." I patted the wood. "Every time those big mover guys went up and down the stairs, they sent vibrations through the house until this stuff slid off."

  She made a hmm noise, unconvinced but considering.

  Since I had a broom in my hands anyway, I began sweeping the dirt into a pile.

  "But we were both in the kitchen, not on the stairs," she said. "Someone pushed these things off the ledge."

  "Why would someone do that?"

  She blinked at me, her hazel eyes looking exhausted. "These were welcome gifts, and someone literally destroyed them. The message is pretty clear. We are not welcome here. We are unwanted and unwelcome."

  "This isn't about a ghost," I said, still sweeping the dirt toward a corner. "You're projecting your fears about moving here onto some imaginary ghost because you'd rather repress your fear than admit you're scared."

  She finished gathering the bath products and stood to face me. She'd grown recently, and we were nearly eye-to-eye.

  I asked, "What's really bothering you?"

  She stated simply, "Someone doesn't want us here." She turned and went to the den's small window. She pressed her forehead against the glass and said, "Look!" She pointed to our yard.

  I joined her at the window and looked.

  At
the edge of our backyard was a slim figure clad in black. The figure climbed over the fence separating our yard from the neighbor's.

  "It's that stupid boy," Zoey said angrily. "The one who was peeping at me in my room. I think he must have gotten inside the house and smashed our things. The nerve!"

  I growled some non-repeatable words. I was having a hard enough time getting my daughter settled in without having to deal with a saboteur. I growled some more, this time about torture devices.

  Zoey said, "Mom, calm down. Don't get all lightning-bolts-and-brimstone. He's just a bratty kid."

  Too late. The day had been long and full of cardboard boxes and whining-some of it mine-but we'd survived. Our new life awaited. Nobody, and I mean nobody, was going to stand in our way, especially not an ill-behaved child.

  I muttered a few more choice words, turned on my heel, and marched straight out the front door into the twilight of the spring evening. The sweet scent of the wisteria blossoms on the porch hit me like a potion. I fantasized about grabbing the kid and holding him upside down over a bubbling cauldron. The air seemed to crackle with blue sparks around me.

  I marched over to the door of the Moore Residence. My daughter ran along right behind me. My hair was a mess, I was wearing the only other clothes I'd unpacked so far—a weird black dress I used as a night shirt, and I clutched in one hand the straw-bristled broom I'd been using to clean up the mess. As I banged on the door of Chet's house, I couldn't have looked more like a mad witch if I'd tried.

  Chapter 3

  With the broom in one hand, I used the other to bang on the neighbor's door.

  To make it wildly clear I meant business, I yelled, "Open this door right now! I know you're in there!"

  Zoey tugged on my arm. "Mom, it was just smelly soap and a potted plant."

  Through clenched teeth, I replied tersely, "That lovely fern was a symbol. A gesture of welcoming."

  "We should get some food into you," she said sagely. "What's gotten into you today? Are you so hungry it's turned into hangry?"

  With effort, I unclenched my teeth. Something had gotten into me. I felt a bit like something huge and terrifying, with big, scary tentacles, was trying to jump out of me and swallow everything into a gaping chasm of a hellmouth. If that was hangry, then maybe I was.

  She glanced at the door. "We can deal with him another time."

  "Don't be so sure of that. If we don't nip this problem in the bud, one day we'll be the ones smashed to pieces at the hands of that sociopath."

  She smirked. "He's just a little boy."

  My daughter was right, but my pulse was still racing. "Sure, he's just a little boy now. But before they grew up, so were all of history's worst dictators."

  The door creaked open. A man said, "Are you comparing my sweet boy to Hitler and Stalin?"

  "Yes, I am. Your sweet boy snuck into my new house and smashed…" I trailed off and blinked at the man standing in the doorway. I'd been expecting someone handsome with green eyes, and while this guy fit the description, he was also well into his grandfather years.

  "You're not Chet," I said.

  The older man pinched the wrinkle of skin on the bridge of his nose. "What's Chet done now?"

  "Not Chet. It was a little boy." I held my hand four feet above the porch's floor. "About this high. Dressed in black, like a ninja, with dark hair falling over his forehead. He was inside my house less than five minutes ago, smashing things and making both of us feel generally unwelcome."

  The man dropped his hand from his face and gave me a curious look. "Are you two the chumps who bought the old Vander Zalm house?"

  Zoey chose this moment to speak up. "Hey! Who are you calling chumps?"

  "That's us," I said with a forced smile. "But this one is a minor dependent. I'm the one who's on the hook for the mortgage, so that makes me the chump."

  The man said, "Whatever you paid, it was too much."

  And then he slammed the door shut between us.

  Zoey gave me her told-you-so look.

  I gave her my don't-make-things-worse-for-your-mother look.

  I knocked on the door again. This time nobody answered, which was probably for the best, since I was still clutching the broom and thinking about hitting people with it.

  The curtains on the window next to the door twitched, and a pale, round face appeared. The little boy had his eyes crossed and his tongue sticking out.

  Zoey clenched her hands into fists and shook one at him. "You creepy little brat. You don't scare us."

  The boy responded by jamming a finger up one nostril and using his other hand to make a rude gesture.

  I smacked the glass with the broom and made a scary face right back at him. His eyes widened and he ran away from the window.

  Zoey said, "Good job, Mom. Now, let's dial your crazy down and go home to our delicious... chopped salad."

  As we stepped off the porch, I said, "Forget the salad. I'm having fantasies about turning day to eternal night and consuming entire cities. Is that normal, or am I so far beyond hangry that I'm in some new, universe-destroying state of mind?"

  "We wouldn't want to cause an apocalypse," she said wisely. "To be safe, we should order pizza."

  "But we don't know which place in Wisteria has the best pizza. We know nothing about this town, except that they have a ridiculously well stocked zoo for a population of this size."

  We climbed the steps to our own porch, and both stopped for a moment to admire the dangling wisteria blossoms. Zoey stood up on her tiptoes and gave them a sniff.

  She asked, "What's up with the zoo, anyway? I mean, it's not big enough to be world famous, but it does seem awfully large. And parts of it are blurred out on the aerial view maps on the internet. Actually, entire sections of the town are blurred out."

  I put my free hand on my hip and stared into the round face and hazel eyes that were a mirror of mine. "You got me," I said with a smile. "This town is part of a huge conspiracy, and there are top-secret organizations here, running underground research facilities, doing science experiments, and manipulating the space-time continuum."

  "Figures," she said. "But with all that going on, there should be plenty of amazing takeout options." She quirked an eyebrow. "Mad scientists don't have time to cook dinner."

  "You're pretty wise for someone who's only sixteen minus a day. That must be why people are always telling me you have an old soul."

  She wrinkled her nose. "I don't like people talking about the age of my soul."

  My stomach made a very loud growl. "That's ominous," I said.

  She gave the pale purple wisteria strung across the front of the porch one more sniff before turning and opening our front door.

  "Come on," she said. "Let's order pizza before your stomach brings on the End of Days."

  "Don't worry about my stomach," I joked. "It's the sanity-shredding tentacles you have to look out for." I paused at the threshold. "Speaking of losing all grip on reality and succumbing to despair, I don't know which box we packed the TV remote in, so we'll have to unpack all of them."

  "That was a dirty trick," she said.

  "The dirtiest of all, because I unwittingly played it on myself."

  We went inside, where we rejoiced in the miracle of finding an unsecured wireless network somewhere along the street. Our own internet would be hooked up on Monday, but in the meantime, we were in business.

  We each took one side of our comfy sofa and ordered the pizza.

  After a few minutes, I said, "If you're going to the kitchen anyway, I could use a cup of tea."

  She gave me a playful scowl, but she did get up and make us two mugs of tea with honey to keep my stomach grumblings from deafening us before the pizza arrived.

  As I was reaching for my tea, I bumped the spoon, which clattered to the floor.

  Without looking up, Zoey said, "Company's coming for dinner."

  "You think? Are you psychic now?"

  "You dropped a spoon. That's an omen. I was readin
g all about these things on that website about witchcraft. Dropping a spoon means we'll get a visitor." She rubbed her temples and closed her eyes. "A dark, mysterious visitor who brings foreboding."

  "You mean the pizza delivery guy? He'd better not bring any foreboding. I specifically asked for pizza only."

  Her eyes flashed open suddenly, and for an instant they weren't hazel. Both irises were as black as the wing of a raven. "Wicked," she said with a guttural smack. "Wicked."

  "Wicked? Zoey, what are you talking about?"

  She blinked, and her eyes were hazel again. "Huh?"

  I started to explain to her what she'd done but stopped myself. The black eyes had to have been a trick of the light, or a symptom of her exhaustion. It had been a long day for both of us. Even so, I sipped my tea and kept one eye on the front door, uneasily awaiting the unnamed visitor.

  Chapter 4

  The doorbell chimed.

  "Doorbell," I said.

  My daughter raised her eyebrow at me. "And?"

  "We talked about this. Now that we have the pleasure of owning a doorbell and a front door, it's your job to answer it."

  "Okay," she said amiably. She jumped up from the couch, raced to the door, and flung it open. I followed behind her, opening my wallet.

  We found a skinny twenty-something girl holding our pizza. Standing behind her was our new neighbor Chet Moore, gripping a small, dark-haired boy by the collar.

  Zoey leaned to the side to look around the delivery girl, and glared at the big-eyed boy. She spoke with an accusatory hiss. "You dare darken our doorway, pestilence?"

  The boy stuck out his tongue.

  Zoey jerked forward, reaching for his tongue, but he recoiled quickly.

  "Too slow," he taunted. "And I'm not pestilence. That's what you are. I was here first."

  I grabbed Zoey by the shoulder and hauled her back.

  "Kids," I said to Chet. "Every day is like a trip to the zoo with no admission fee."

  Chet nodded and gave the boy, who looked about ten years old, a stern look.