The Trouble with Magic

by Madelyn Alt

  He drew his hand away then, and his whole demeanor changed. Hardened, somehow. Went on alert. I eased up on the accelerator, knowing we must be close.

  "Two houses up. Slow down. Slow. Slow."

  His eyes scanned back and forth, up and down, searching for movement. I pulled up in front of the house he'd indicated. It was ablaze with light from every window. A shadow flitted behind the window at the door.

  "Stay here. Don't get out. I repeat, do not get out of the vehicle."

  Nervousness had finally found me. "Do you, um, think, maybe, that, um, there could be—I don't know—someone—"

  He paused with his hand on the doorlatch. "Lock the doors. Leave the motor running. Stay alert. Stay low. Anything happens, put your foot to the floor and get the hell out of here."

  Well, that was certainly reassuring.

  Before I had a chance to panic, the front door was flung open and a man came hauling butt down the tasteful brick walk, wearing nothing but a pair of boxers. He wasn't close enough for me to be sure, but from this distance I would swear they were silk.

  It was Ryan Davidson.

  Chapter Fourteen

  "So, let me get this straight. You were in your study, watching TV—alone—and the next thing you know there's a bullet hole in your wall, a spray of glass, and the squeal of tires. And that's all that you remember."

  For once, Ryan Davidson looked anything but confident and self-assured. He sat hunched over the glass dining room table, face pale, hair rumpled from pushing his fingers through it. "Yeah. That's all I remember."

  "Did you see the vehicle?"

  Davidson's lips twisted into a snarl. "Well, it's kind of hard to see out the window when you've thrown yourself to the floor in a desperate attempt not to get killed."

  "And you have no idea who might have a reason to want to hurt you or your property."

  "Look. I'm not a saint. I've had relationships that have gone south, same as any man. That doesn't change anything. So are you going to do your job or do I need to go over your head?"

  I yawned behind my hand. It wasn't that I wasn't interested in what Davidson had to say, but he'd said it three times already, and so far his story hadn't changed. And at three o'clock in the morning, a story had to be pretty damned scintillating to hold my attention.

  Tom must have come to the same conclusion, because we were out the door five minutes later, leaving Davidson to seal the fist-sized hole in his window with a roll of duct tape while we hit the high road with the slug that Tom had dug out of the wall with his pocket knife tucked safely out of the way in a ziplocked evidence bag in the pocket of his leather jacket.

  "Soooo," Tom said as we made our way out to Christine, our elbows bumping companionably against each other.

  I smiled shyly at him. "So."

  "Have any plans for the rest of the evening?"

  I laughed. "In case you didn't notice, I think we're past evening and well into the wee hours of the morning."

  He glanced at his watch and winced. "Ouch. Sorry. Some hot date I turned out to be, huh?"

  Actually, despite my need for sleep, I couldn't stop thinking about things better left unthought, all involving the man in front of me. "What will happen with Davidson's would-be attacker?"

  "I'll file a report. Poke around a little bit. See what comes of it. The lab will analyze the slug. Maybe we'll get lucky and the lab results will identify a weapon that's been used in a crime before by a known perpetrator. But other than that, unless someone from the neighborhood saw the car or the gunman, or unless the perp makes the mistake of bragging about their escapades to the wrong person…" He let his voice trail off and he shrugged.

  "There's little chance of finding the person who shot out his window," I finished.

  "You don't sound surprised."

  I echoed his philosophical shrug with one of my own. "I know how this town works. People watch out for their own."

  "That's pretty much it."

  I let myself into the car and waited for him to follow before broaching the thing that had been bothering me since the moment Ryan Davidson had come tearing hell-bent-for-leather across his yard as if actual demons were nipping at his heels.

  "Has it occurred to you yet that not only is Isabella dead, but now her lover has been shot at as well?"

  "You're thinking the two incidents are related."

  "Don't you?" And then, because he was so good at making his face a blank mask, I added, "Nothing else makes sense. It's too coincidental to be coincidence."

  "It'll be interesting to get the results back from the lab," he allowed, cautious as ever.

  Suddenly anxious, I pressed, "But you won't wait until then to ask questions, will you?"

  "No. I won't wait."

  That made me feel somewhat better. "What do you think of Ryan Davidson's claim that he couldn't think of a single potential assailant?"

  "I think the man doth protest too much."

  So did I. But… say that Davidson's attack was related to Isabella's death. Unless Davidson shot out his own window, which seemed a little too implausible even for me, the shooting seemed to throw Davidson out of the realm of possibility as a suspect. Didn't it? Who would have a reason for wanting both Isabella and her lover out of the way?

  My bet was on the husband. Jeremy Harding had a motive for both incidents, by my reckoning. Rage over a wife's unfaithfulness has driven many a husband over the brink. Jealousy, too. Except…

  Except something didn't quite fit. From what Felicity had said, Ryan Davidson was not the first of Isabella's lovers. I couldn't really see why Jeremy would have lashed out at this late date. And he'd had his own affairs as well. Their marriage seemed to be more one of mutual convenience than of emotional attachment. So why would he kill her?

  Unless it was because of money. From what I understood, Isabella held the reins at Harding Enterprises. That left the execution of her will and…

  I stopped for the stop sign and turned back onto the main drag. "Tom."

  "Hmm?"

  "Has Isabella's will been read yet?"

  "We followed up on that, Maggie."

  "Well, I hope so. That is your job. I'm not trying to be nosy—"

  "Yes, you are."

  "I'm not. It's not like I want to know how much she had in assets. I just want to know who will receive the bulk of her estate."

  He narrowed his eyes at me. "You're not just going to stop, are you."

  I raised my brows at him, waiting.

  He sighed. "Her husband will receive some. Her daughter, more. Various minor bestowments. And lastly, a sizable donation to the hospital toward a certain project she'd adopted. Assuming the will isn't contested, of course."

  She would have had life insurance as well, probably with the same beneficiaries. I thought a moment. The execution of an estate, presumably, could be an extended process. "I can't help but think that all of this points to one person in particular as a prime subject. I read somewhere that when a woman is murdered, most of the time it is by someone she is on intimate terms with."

  Tom grunted. "That's true. Unfortunately, as I might have, mentioned, Jeremy Harding has a convenient and ironclad alibi for the morning in question."

  But I wasn't satisfied. What if he'd paid someone to kill his wife? What if he and Jetta had conspired together to get Isabella out of the way? Maybe things were more serious between the two of them than anyone knew. It deserved some thought, anyway, in my opinion.

  I looked up to find a smirk playing about the corners of Tom's mouth. There was no mistaking it for anything but the wiseass sarcasm it was. I slitted my eyes. "Are you laughing at me?"

  "Maggie. Your enthusiasm and your belief in your friend are admirable, but you have to admit you don't know what you're doing, and you're bound to get yourself into trouble."

  "Is it wrong to explore all options when you're faced with a crime of this magnitude?"

  He reached out gently to touch my hand on the wheel. "No. But you're forgetting
the first rule of psychological crime solving: The most obvious solution is almost always the right one. You're not thinking clearly."

  Fear for Felicity tackled the doubt that his words instilled in me. "Well, at least I'm trying to think things through rather than relying on rumors and prejudice."

  He took his hand away. "You know, you are damned sexy when you're angry."

  "And at least I don't play with the affections of innocent women to get what I want."

  A red light loomed. Riding the crest of my own indignation, I stepped on the brake a little harder than I needed to. Christine's nose took a dive.

  "Whoa there. Is that what you think I'm doing?" he demanded.

  I didn't answer.

  "Honey, if I wanted to play with a woman's affections, you can be damned sure I'd be taking a more direct route."

  The next thing I knew, his hand had curled around the back of my neck and he'd leaned over me, into me, his mouth firm and insistent upon mine.

  Stunned, under siege, I did the only thing I could do. I melted into the seat while he made a feast of my lips, his strong fingers following the curve of my head, his thumb moving restlessly at the corner of my mouth.

  I won't say that I saw stars, but I did see sparkling flashes of light.

  Or maybe that was the headlights of the car behind us, flashing from dim to bright.

  The long squall of a car horn finally permeated the fog of red-hot sexual intrigue that had somehow made me forget how much I was determined to dislike him. I started guiltily, breaking the liplock that had distracted me from my original purpose.

  With a shaky laugh, I gestured toward the green light ahead of us. "Guess we'd better go."

  The rest of the drive back to the store passed uneventfully with Tom watching me out of the corner of his eye while I mentally kicked myself for letting him get under my skin. So what if he was good looking and a really exceptional kisser. He was also bound and determined to put my boss behind bars for no good reason that I could see or understand, and as such could only be viewed as a threat to the status quo of my life.

  I found distraction from my mental dilemma in the vehicle that had been behind us at the stoplight. It had followed us nearly all the way to the store. A little too closely, in my opinion, especially considering that we were the only two cars on the road. Probably the driver had had too much to drink at one of the local bars and was using Christine as a homing beacon to help keep itself on the road. Lucky me. In my current state of mind, the person was taking his life into his own hands. Finally the car swerved wildly off onto Main Street

  , two blocks away, and I headed downhill to River Street

  . With a sigh of relief, I pulled into the alley behind the store, and shifted out of gear.

  "Hey. I'm sorry if I offended you."

  Offended me. Oh, yeah. I'd nearly forgotten. For the last ten minutes, it had been all I could do to keep my hormones in check. "No problem."

  "You never did let me ask my questions."

  I risked a glance at him. "What could you possibly ask that we didn't already cover?"

  "Did Felicity describe what happened out at the Harding estate that morning?"

  There was no reason to keep anything from him. The truth could only help Felicity by demonstrating that his suspicions about her were way off base. "Yes, she did. We had just opened the store when she received a phone call—a rather agitated one, as I remember—from someone whom she said was 'a friend.' I didn't know her well at the time, and she had no reason to explain herself to me. She telephoned Marcus Quinn—"

  "Ah, yes, Quinn…"

  "—who met her at the store, and then they left together. For what I later found out was the Harding place. I think Felicity had been given the idea that the disturbances Isabella had described were supernatural in origin, based on what Isabella said."

  "And what did she tell her?"

  I shrugged. "I wasn't listening in on the call. Felicity mentioned that Isabella said there had been disturbances, and she said she was frightened. Oh, and that the things she'd experienced had worsened over a period of six weeks."

  I could tell he didn't believe it. Skepticism is one of those things that most people don't hide very well. "Uh-huh."

  "Look, you don't have to believe in it," I said, just a touch snappishly. "You asked me a question and I answered it. Besides, doesn't it seem more likely, in light of what happened to her, that perhaps someone had been watching her for a while? Categorizing her every move? Maybe to Isabella, explaining the things she heard as supernatural was preferable to explaining it as a real, physical threat."

  He had the decency to look contrite. "Okay. Sorry. Go on. What happened next?"

  "As they arrived at the Harding place—the gate must have been open for them, I guess—Marcus saw what he thought was movement in the woods. He went off to check that out while Felicity hurried inside to Isabella. Except Isabella didn't answer the door. She said"—I frowned, trying to remember—"she said that Isabella had been working in the kitchen having breakfast. Her laptop had shut itself down, but there were remnants of her breakfast on the table."

  "Tea," Tom said. "She was having tea." He paused a moment, and I could sense him wrestling with a worry. When he spoke again, his voice was pitched soft and low. "Do you want to know why I think Felicity had something to do with her sister's murder, Maggie? Do you?"

  I hesitated. Nodded, frowning.

  "Whoever killed Isabella had wanted to make very sure that she wouldn't be able to struggle. Whoever killed Isabella had known her everyday habits. The teabag she had left in the sink—all of the teabags in the tin—were each laced with a large dose of Rohypnol."

  Rohypnol. The word floated on my consciousness, trying to find a home in my memory.

  "Rohypnol is one of the so-called date-rape drugs. It works to relax a person's inhibitions so much that they lose the ability to think on their own, walk on their own, do much of anything on their own. It also makes them very suggestible and utterly incapable of fighting off an attacker."

  Every little thing in place. No better description of first-degree murder than that.

  "I figure that Isabella had her usual cup of tea, and the attacker was there, waiting and listening. Isabella must have felt the effects of the drug but not understood what was happening to her. Somehow she managed to get upstairs to lie down. That's when the killer made his—or her—play. He—or she—took Isabella to the top of the stairs and"—he brought his arm up suddenly and swung it down with a force that startled me—"whacked her over the head, hard, before letting her body fall down the stairs. Which are marble, by the way. The poor woman had enough fractures to keep the whole staff at the ER busy. Luckily enough, she didn't feel any of them. Half her head was bashed in."

  "I was going to ask you earlier," I said quietly, "whether you thought Isabella could have accidentally fallen down the stairs, but the Rohypnol certainly puts a damper on the notion of accidental death, doesn't it."

  "Yeah. Maggie, you really need to find another job."

  I made a face at him. "Really, what is it with you and Felicity? Just because she calls herself a witch does not mean that she is a threat to society. This is the twenty-first century. No one has hanged or stoned a witch for a long time. For good reason. It just isn't nice. Remember? Live and let live?"

  "The tea was a specialty blend imported from England, Maggie. Date stamped this year. Enchantments is the only store in Indiana that carries it. I checked."

  "That doesn't mean Felicity is the one who laced it with the drug. Anybody with access to the house could do that."

  "Whatever," he said curtly. Then he jerked his head toward the store. "So, what was going on up there tonight?"

  I squirmed, a little uncomfortable with the truth. We've done nothing wrong… "Felicity held a meeting for her ghost hunter group. She'd wanted me to meet her friends."

  "Her coven, you mean?"

  "She doesn't work with a coven," I said automatically. "
She's a solitary—she practices alone."

  "Jesus, Maggie! Don't you hear yourself? You're talking about a working, practicing witch. How can you be so blase about it? Oh, I know it's all very politically correct to accept the New Age-y things like aromatherapy and psychics, but doesn't the Bible speak out against those very kinds of things? For God's sake, the next thing you're going to tell me is that you're into that stuff, too."

  "She's not like that. If you could get to know her, I'm sure you would come to feel the same way I do." My words were calm, designed to direct his animosity away from my employer and friend, but inwardly I was fuming. What if I was into "those things'"! What business of his was it? And whatever happened to religious freedom, anyway? Division of Church and State? How about good, old-fashioned love thy neighbor!

  He stared at me, mental distance giving him an aloofness that belied the heat of the kiss we'd shared earlier. "I thought I knew you, but maybe I was wrong. Maybe I don't know you at all."

  I gave him a stony look of my own, "I guess you don't." And then, because it gave me a huge amount of satisfaction to be able to dismiss him, I reached across him for the door latch and pushed the passenger door open. "Good night, Tom."

  He opened his mouth as though he were about to say something else, then snapped it closed and got out, stalking down the alley toward the front of the building.

  Damned pigheaded male.

  * * * *

  Damned pigheaded male.

  The phrase had become a personal favorite after several hours spent tossing and turning in my bed. Even Graham Thomas had given me a baleful look after being knocked to the floor for the sixth or seventh time. No use explaining to him about damned pigheaded males. G.T. would listen, his little ears perked up sympathetically, but he just didn't get it.

  Being male himself, albeit a stuffed and furry one, he no doubt thought I was being melodramatic.

  As soon as the sun was up, I dragged my sleep-deprived body out of bed and guzzled down a mug of instant coffee. I was still too agitated to relax with the tape of Friday night's Magnum episode, so I whipped through a load of laundry, de-scummed the shower, emptied all the trash cans, and vacuumed the entire floor plan of my less-than-substantial apartment. Ghostly voices? Ha. I was in no mood, and I'll bet my bodily challenged houseguest could tell. By the time I was finished, it was nearly nine o'clock. Not nearly as late as I'd hoped.