Runes and Roller Skates

by Amanda A. Allen

“You don’t believe that,” Scarlett’s voice was chiding, and he flinched a little bit. “Bridget wasn’t the type to cheat on her boyfriend, was she?”

  Jay started crying again and shook his head. “No…but…”

  “You were jealous,” Scarlett said as she rubbed his back, humming under her breath, calling on the nature around them to soothe him. The flowers were more scented, the breeze was gentle, the trees rustled in a way that would calm anxiety, encourage faith that Bridget wasn’t gone forever.

  “I…she just…she was leaving me. A little bit at a time. She was going to leave me and I’d be here and she’d be gone. Be better. Mr. Day was right. Bridget was too good for me. I loved her, but she was too good for me.”

  Scarlett didn’t say anything, but she glanced at the little shack, thought about the little sister. She glanced back at Jay and asked, “What are you?”

  The kid paused and then said, “My mum’s a banshee, my dad’s a warlock. I’m not any good at any of it.”

  “Did you sense death around Bridget?” It was hard for Scarlett to add, Maeve. But it had to be done. “Or Maeve?”

  Jay paled and then he said again, “I…I’m not good at any of it.”

  Scarlett took his reaction as a yes. He probably only saw it looking back. The skills of banshees were in “knowing” like druids, but they knew about death. Their ability to discern things beyond that was minute. They could, however, use spells and herbs. They could do a lot of things, but they all required learning and practice. Scarlett didn’t need to ask Jay to know that he hadn't put either into his abilities.

  She waited, leaving her hand on his mid-back to steady him, hoping for something else.

  “Is Maeve alive?” Jay asked. The tears stopped and his jaw firmed. “She is, isn’t she? You’d have said. Where is she?”

  Scarlett glanced at Lex who shrugged and she said, “We’re trying to find her.”

  Jay’s mouth trembled, but he didn’t say anything. Their gazes met and his was…evasive. Scarlett could often catch the direction of the thoughts of another with enough focus. Not telepathy so much as reading body language and the tenor of the conversation, but Jay had somehow shut down.

  “Do you know where we can find her?”

  He shrugged. He didn’t answer yes or no. He shut down to the extent that he didn’t provide one bit of information. She knew he was trying to avoid her skills which meant he knew who she was or at least what she was. She took that as he had some ideas, but he didn’t trust her. Not with Maeve. Not even though Lex was a police officer. Why? There must be some reason they were afraid of police.

  Goodness, Scarlett thought. That meant Maeve wasn’t going for help. She was hiding and trying to get away, Scarlett thought and a sense of knowing hit her. Maeve was hiding. She was afraid. She was hungry. She was terrified of being found by everyone. Scarlett felt such a fierce need to scoop her up.

  Scarlett looked at Jay and her capacity to hide her disgust with him faded. His protectiveness was ill-considered. The child could be forgiven for having no idea that there were people who would help her—but Jay…he was protecting her from something that Scarlett couldn’t quite catch, but he should know that her life was in danger. Assuming, of course, that he wasn’t the killer.

  She didn’t think they’d get more from him about where Maeve was. Scarlett glanced up and shook her head at Lex just the smallest bit. A random thought hit Scarlett and she asked,“Bridget didn’t grow up here?”

  Jay shook his head, but he didn’t expand. His face went mulish, and she was sure that he both knew where Bridget was from and whatever Bridget was hiding. Scarlett had the growing certainty that Bridget did have something to hide. Was that what caused her death? Maybe the girls were runaways? Given their age, Scarlett didn’t really think it could be anything else. It wasn’t like they could be art thieves or fraudsters.

  “We need to be able to help Maeve,” Scarlett said with a real plea in her voice.

  “It’s too late for that,” Jay snapped. His gaze avoided hers again and Scarlett fought the desire to slap the back of his head hard and repetitively.

  “It’s not too late for Maeve.”

  Jay paused and his jaw trembled again, but he shook his head before he lied, “I don’t know anything.”

  “Where did Bridget work?”

  “At the dealership, at the diner, as a courier, any odd jobs, lots of odd jobs for those Days. Plus a cleaning job. She worked all the time.” The disgust was back in his voice, “What kind of life is that?”

  It was, Scarlett thought, internally shaking her head, the life of a caregiver. When you had to take care of your little sister, you did what had to be done. And with all those jobs…Bridget still could only afford this place.

  Scarlett stood and pulled Jay up. “Show me around,” she said.

  He took her inside unwillingly. The place was a one bedroom, tiny thing. The bedroom had been given to Maeve and showed the signs of a pre-teen. A poster on the wall, some pictures of a little red-head with her friends. The face of the kids matched the dead body that Scarlett had seen. They were clearly sisters. Scarlett pressed her lips together and then took a long breath in, whooshing it out. Goodness. She closed her eyes and thought. Goodness. Scarlett picked up a picture of two redheads with an older woman.

  “Who’s this?”

  “Their mom,” Jay said with a tone that said to back off.

  She didn’t. “What happened to their mom?”

  “She died around then. I don’t know what from.”

  Scarlett looked down. Maeve didn’t look too much older than Ella now—so this had to be a couple of years old at least.

  “They look like each other.” They all had moss green eyes. Not all druids had eyes like that, but a lot of them. Scarlett’s entire family did except for Harper who was adopted and had haunting cat’s eyes.

  “They were close,” Jay said. “We all were. We had good times.”

  His voice cracked again, and he started crying. He snagged a picture of him, Bridget, and Maeve from the wall and then curled around it, slumping onto the bed and holding it to him. “I should have been better. This wouldn’t have happened if I were around.”

  Or he’d have died too, Scarlett thought. He was starting to clam up again and the glance Scarlett gave Lex told him to take over. He needed to use a bit more pressure than the friendly ear of a druid. Jay had answered some, but she was sure he was holding back more.

  “Is Maeve around?” Lex asked Scarlett but Jay shook his head in answer. The knowing of her druid senses could find anything living around there. Scarlett shook her head and Lex turned to Jay and said, “We need to talk further.”

  Jay’s eyes widened and he looked to Scarlett for help as though she could or would save him. He’d misjudged her if he thought that she wouldn’t do whatever was necessary to find Maeve and find Bridget’s killer. Maeve needed protecting, she needed someone to stand up for her now that she’d lost both her mother and her sister. She needed…help. A lot of it. Scarlett was putting the child first. She wished she could say the same for Jay.

  Chapter 5

  Scarlett paused outside of the bakery, noting the full table of octogenarians who were eating her reserved cheesecake and drinking coffee in the business that she had locked up. She shook her head and went through the now unlocked front door. Having Gram around was rather like having another child who thought she could tell you what to do.

  But then again, there was Henna slicing the cheesecake, and Scarlett’s gratitude to her old boss was almost unbounded. Henna was the previous owner of the bakery, Sweeter Things where Scarlett had worked throughout high school. She and her sister had recently bought the building with 4 shops, 4 apartments, and the bakery. All of which was only possible because Henna had carried the loan—there was no way Scarlett and Harper would have qualified for a bank loan.

  “You old coots have to pay for that,” Scarlett said, hanging her bag on the hook by the back door and walked in
to the seating area with her hands on her hips.

  Gram snorted while the gentlemen carefully avoided Scarlett’s gaze. It wasn’t so much that the guys wouldn’t pay as they didn’t want to get between Scarlett and Gram. Especially since Gram wouldn’t let them pay out of sheer spite.

  “Where are Ella and Luna?” Gram took a deliberately slow bite of the cheesecake, letting it roll around her mouth in an utter challenge to Scarlett who had to hide her grin, but Gram was an epic druid and she caught the flash of Scarlett’s humor.

  “Is your hair pink? That’s a color for 12-year-olds.”

  “When you’re old you can do what you want,” Gram said taking a second bite. “And I had the girl weave the pink into the gray.”

  “It looks weird,” Scarlett said.

  “Liar,” Gram countered. She fluffed her hair and then triumph crossed Gram’s face when Scarlett gave up the battle to grin at all of them.

  She finally answered the serious questions. “Mom has Ella. Harper took Luna for the afternoon. I’ll take her out to the Oaken property later. You look like an elderly hooker in that outfit..”

  “Because you’re getting involved in this case, too? Sticking your big nose in, putting yourself in danger? I look fantastic. You wish you looked as amazing as me.”

  “How did you find out so quickly?” All the teasing was gone from her voice when Scarlett asked. She dropped the picture she had taken of Maeve, Bridget, and their mother in front of Gram without a word to turn and cut another piece of cheesecake. The picture left silence between them as their gazes met. The resistance Gram had for Scarlett involving herself in the case ended as soon as Gram laid her gaze on the picture.

  Gram’s wooden silence said it all; she was not thinking quiet stream thoughts or puffy cloud thoughts. She was seeing those moss-green eyes, that redwood colored hair, the creamy alabaster skin that marked many—though of course not all—druids. Bridget and Maeve—how had they been missed? Mystic Cove druids were a close lot who loved and helped each other. They’d never have let two young girls live like Scarlett had found those girls living.

  “What did you find out?” Gram asked.

  “I think she’s a druid,” Scarlett said.

  Gram nodded instantly before her habitual sarcasm won out and she said, “Yes. Obviously”

  “How did we miss them?” Scarlett took a deep breath, shaking her head as she dropped into a chair one table over from Gram and her cronies. What if the druids had found the girls first? The girls may have needed help. Surely they had. Surely the death of that young druid woman hadn’t been random. Maybe the Circle could have provided a refuge. Certainly, they could and would have. If the Circle had known of the girls, this crime never would have happened and that infuriated Scarlett. Gram as well, she didn’t need to say it for Scarlett to know it was true. But, she could see the fury boiling in the calm face of her grandmother.

  Maybe Bridget wouldn’t be dead, maybe Maeve wouldn’t be…goodness, where was she? The anxiety and worry for that little girl was eating at Scarlett, and she was attempting to bury it in cheesecake. As if cheesecake could somehow fight the facts like milk countered heartburn. Gram pushed her cheesecake around her plate.

  “The place they were living was terrible,” Scarlett said as she watched Gram press her fork slowly into the cheesecake and the custardy part push up through the tines. “The trees there weren’t…it wasn’t normal. They were edgy. I had a hard time connecting to most of them. I’d guess…I think they probably had a weak link with the girls…it wasn’t…it wasn’t trained in anyway. It was like they were hungry for each other on both sides. The trees almost felt relieved when they felt me. Like something had woken inside of them but never been fed. I’ve been thinking on it, and I think we need to quiet them.”

  “If they didn’t know who they were…” Henna said, glancing over to Gram and the two of them considering. “There is quite a difference between druidic trees and the saplings others plant that are left untouched by druids.”

  “They could have spent a lot of time in the yard, a lot of time in nature, and never really realized it wasn’t normal how they were drawn to nature,” Gram added as she finally shoved her plate away. “They could have woken the trees and then been unable to care for them.”

  Scarlett sighed and took a bite of the cheesecake more out of habit than desire. Those kids had struggled so hard; their little shack was spotless. They weren’t average young people. Scarlett would bet that they had good grades, that they ate healthy, that they tried harder than most at most things. Their work hadn’t lessened the overall worn and rundown nature of their home. But it wasn’t for lack of trying.

  Scarlett couldn’t help but imagine Bridget alive. Couldn’t help but remember that flash of her at the dealership when Scarlett had gone out there right after she’d come back to Mystic Cove. Was she imagining a light about the girl? If Scarlett had paid more attention at the time, could she have sensed a druid in the girl? Scarlett couldn’t help but picture Bridget laughing with her sister. Running in the waves. Was she responsible for not being aware?

  How often had Bridget gone down to the beach to play in the sand and waves? Had the two sisters ever gone roller-skating? Scarlett didn’t need to ask to know the answer was no. Even if they’d had the money for the skates, Scarlett was sure that they wouldn’t have gone. Bridget worked too much, too hard, for that to have happened.

  A huge piece of Scarlett wanted to go back in time, scoop them up, and let them be children. She pressed her lips together and looked up to see her Gram’s gaze fixed as well, lips pressed as tightly closed.

  “We can’t fix things for Bridget, but we can give her what she worked for,” Scarlett said. “We can find Maeve and give her a childhood.”

  “It’s too late for that. She’ll be like Harper,” Gram said, “She’ll never be carefree. Not a year from now or 10 years from now.”

  Scarlett didn’t argue, but they could do their best. She took a deep breath, pulled out her phone and called Gus. “What did you find?”

  “She’s been dead for around a day,” he said without even bothering to argue about how it was none of Scarlett’s business. “She was probably killed during the middle of the night. It was gray yesterday. It was a work day. The beach was probably pretty deserted, so no one found her. There was the scent of more blood at the scene. Bridget fought back.”

  “Why?” Scarlett asked though she didn’t expect an answer.

  “There’s the scent of something….I can’t put my finger on it.”

  “Huh,” Scarlett said, closing her eyes and pressed her face into her hands. Goodness, why? Why was this happening to these poor girls? They were just kids. They couldn’t have anything worth stealing. There was no reason for these girls to be targeted by criminals. And since when did Mystic Cove have criminals? It had been stupid to think of Lacey Monroe—Mystic Cove’s last murder victim—as being targeted by an outsider, but anything other than a local seemed crazy in this case.

  “Do you think that…I don’t know. Maybe they were up by the beach? Maybe some out-of-towner pulled over?”

  But no, Scarlett thought, Bridget didn’t seem to play. Why would those girls be up there? It was on the way to the dealership where Bridget worked, but you wouldn’t bring your kid sister to work. It was on the way to Barnstable. There was a bus station on Highway 28 out towards that way. Could they have been leaving Mystic Cove?

  But if they had been, who would want to stop them besides Jay? And surely someone to mooch off of wasn’t a reason to kill? It wasn’t like he’d be able to live off of her and her excess of jobs if she…the door of the bakery clanged and Luna came in happily shouting. She held a bird cage and was chattering to Harper. Scarlett met Harper’s gaze who had the grace to look away.

  “I’ve got to go,” Scarlett said. “Luna’s back. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  Harper flopped onto the chair next to Gram, took Scarlett’s cheesecake, and sighed.

  “W
hat’s this?” Scarlett’s tone was dangerous. That was another pet.

  Luna answered brightly as if she hadn’t noticed her mother’s tone. “She’s Piper. Like the pied piper. The other birds didn’t like her and they were mean to her, and I asked her if she wanted to come home with me. And she said yes and then they let me have her. They even gave me a cage.”

  Scarlett’s lips pressed tight and then she said to Harper, “You aren’t going to be able to spend time with the girls alone if you bring animals home every time.”

  “Have you seen Paw Patrol? Because Rubble might be on the double, but I’m going to LOSE it if he says that one more time, and it’s in every damn episode. Over and over and over again. And why does she have to watch it in the car? Every. Single. Time. At full volume.”

  “I hate you,” Scarlett said, running her hands lightly over Luna’s hair. “You’re horrible.”

  Scarlett turned, taking Harper by the shoulders and shaking her lightly just for a moment. Then Scarlett hugged her sister tightly. “What would we have done without you?”

  Harper pulled away, shoving Scarlett off and saying, “Stop it. What’s wrong with you?”

  Luna was giggling as she watched them and Harper finally glanced around, noting Gram, Henna, and the guys. She noted the serious looks on their faces and the way they were too aware of Luna.

  “What happened? Did someone die?”

  Henna rose and said to Luna, “Let’s get Piper settled, shall we? She’s probably a little nervous, and you’ll need to talk to the kitties about being nice to her. Max, of course, is a gentleman. He’ll be a good example for everyone, but they need you to set the tone of how to treat each other.”

  Henna took Luna’s hand and let Luna’s chatter fill the hallway to the backstairs up to the apartments.

  “Who died?” Harper’s voice had an edge of panic and Scarlett grabbed her sister’s hand to squeeze it.

  “A girl named Bridget. She’s…I don’t know…but her little sister is missing, and I’m feeling like I need to help.”