A Potion to Die For: A Magic Potion Mystery

by blake, heather

  A handwriting analysis . . . that would answer a lot of questions. I wondered if Dylan had found one in the search of Nelson’s office.

  Ainsley took a sip of her coffee, then said, “Everyone’s speculating that Coach is so dang angry and picking fights all the time now because he’s innocent and feels like he’s getting railroaded. I have to admit, if I were falsely accused, I might be picking fights, too.”

  “He has been getting into a fair share of trouble lately, hasn’t he?”

  “Fighting with everyone under the sun, including Angelea, Bernice, and Nelson, so I hear told.”

  Angelea and Bernice I could understand—it was easy to snap at family. “Why Nelson?”

  “Word is Coach wasn’t happy with how slowly Nelson was working to clear his name. He was getting mighty impatient.”

  “How’d Nelson handle Coach’s outburst?” This could take the case in a whole new direction. . . .

  “Cool as could be. Calmed Coach right down. Like I said, Nelson believed he’d clear Coach’s name for good when that handwriting analysis came in.”

  The scent of blueberry scones wafted through the shop as I tapped my fingers on the tabletop. “Okay, for conversation’s sake, let’s say Coach is innocent.” It was hard for me to even say those words. “If Coach didn’t take the money, then where is it? Twenty thousand dollars doesn’t just vanish.” Maybe Angelea Butts had it; that might be why she wasn’t sleeping so well these days.

  I suddenly had a ridiculous image of her sleeping on a mound of hundred-dollar bills. I smiled. That would explain some things.

  Ainsley shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “But if he wasn’t innocent, and Nelson found out he wasn’t, maybe Coach got scared and killed him to keep him quiet? What?” I said at Ainsley’s dubious look. “It could have happened.”

  “Not likely, darlin’,” Jessamine Yadkin said in her raspy voice as she set a plate of cookies on the table. She’d obviously been eavesdropping—a regular Darling County extracurricular activity.

  I could have kissed her for the cookies. I grabbed one up and took a big bite.

  “No reason for Coach to kill him,” Jessa added. Her brassy-colored hair was piled atop her head and held in place with two pencils. Heavy wrinkles pulled at the corners of her bright blue eyes and bracketed her mouth. All those years of smoking hadn’t been kind to her but didn’t dull the sparkle in her eyes.

  I mumbled heartfelt thanks for the cookie over a mouthful of oatmeal chocolate chip, then said, “What do you mean, no reason?”

  Jessa cocked a plump hip and tightened her bright pink apron strings. She was sixty, if a day, and happily married to her second husband, Odell. She’d owned this place for as long as I could remember and made the best coffee in all of Darling County. “Nelson couldn’t rightly say anything even if Coach had given him a full confession on a silver platter. He’s bound by attorney-client privilege.” She winked. “I learned all about that when my first husband was incarcerated. It’s basically a gag order for Nelson.”

  The cowbell on the front door jangled as a young couple walked in, holding hands. The man wore a T-shirt that said I JUST GOT HITCHED IN HITCHING POST, ALABAMA.

  Jessa said to them, “Y’all have a seat, now. I’ll be right with you.”

  The newlyweds sat at a table in the corner and gazed dreamily at each other. Tourists, probably only in town for a weekend elopement. They were adorable, and I sure hoped theirs wasn’t the divorce Mr. Dunwoody had predicted.

  “So, there wasn’t no motive on Coach’s part to kill Nelson, leastways if the killin’ was because Coach stole that money,” Jessa added before sashaying away to the newlyweds’ table.

  “Jessa is right.” Ainsley broke her cookie in half and watched warm chocolate stretch from one side to the other.

  “Well, someone killed him.” Admittedly, I wouldn’t have been devastated to see Coach behind bars. I had never liked him, and especially not now that he’d accused me of poisoning him. “We have to find that girlfriend.”

  Ainsley nodded.

  Jessa ambled by, and I snagged her apron string. “Have you heard about Nelson having himself a girlfriend?”

  Jessa’s eyes widened. “You don’t say. He did?”

  “So we heard.” I dropped what was left of my cookie on my plate, my appetite suddenly gone.

  “Not one I know of, darlin’,” Jessa said. “The only person I’ve seen him with lately is Johnny Braxton, and whoo-ee, were they going at it right outside this here door. They were shoutin’ at each other something fierce before Johnny stomped off.”

  “You sure it was Nelson and not Coach?” Ainsley asked.

  Jessa smiled. “Coach sure is making a name for himself lately, isn’t he? But no, it wasn’t him. It was Nelson—I saw the whole thing clear as day.”

  “When was this?” I asked.

  Jessa looked upward, as if searching the recesses of her brain. “Two, three days ago.”

  “What were they fighting about?” Ainsley asked.

  “I didn’t hear that much, only Nelson saying he didn’t care anymore. By the time I made it outside to eavesdrop properly, Johnny was already storming away.”

  Didn’t care anymore? About what? “Did you tell this to Dylan?”

  “Didn’t think of it till just now.” She tightened her apron. “I’ll give him a call straight off.” She hurried into the kitchen.

  “You know,” Ainsley said, wetting her thumb to dab up cookie crumbs from her plate, “I’ve been thinking on what you said to Dylan earlier, about the potion bottles and how there are colors for men and women. . . .”

  Ainsley already knew my color-coding system since she worked for me. I picked up my cookie again. I couldn’t bear to leave it uneaten—plus, I didn’t like the way Ainsley was eyeing it. “What about them?”

  Shifting left and right, she wouldn’t look me in the eye. “It’s just that at the white-elephant sale, there’s a new booth that—”

  She was interrupted by Jessa, who had barreled up to the table. “I’ve just realized y’all should talk to Bernice Morris about Nelson’s personal life. If anyone knows about a secret girl, it’d be her. She’d probably also know why Nelson was gettin’ on with Johnny something fierce.”

  Brilliant! Bernice was Nelson Winston’s secretary and had been for years. Of course she’d know all his secrets. “We’ve got to talk to her.”

  Ainsley looked at her watch and stood up. “You’ve got to talk to her. I’ve got to be getting to the market to buy a box of wine. But you’ll call me to let me know how it goes?”

  It was getting late, almost supper time, and for a moment, it felt like finding Nelson’s body had happened days ago, not this morning.

  We settled up with Jessa and walked outside, where the scent of rain hung heavy in the thick air.

  “Storm’s coming,” Ainsley said unnecessarily. She pecked my cheek and hurried off, headed for the market. Calling over her shoulder, she added, “You be careful, Carly. Y’hear?”

  It was the second time today I’d heard that sentiment, and as I set off toward Bernice’s place I decided to take it to heart.

  • • •

  Bernice lived on the other side of town, near the Darling Playhouse Cinema, which was, appropriately, half playhouse and half movie theater. I’d seen many a movie sitting in the worn red velvet seats, on the screen draped with golden fabric.

  As I started across the Ring and headed toward Bernice’s house, I suddenly realized that I couldn’t go knocking on Bernice’s door—unless I wanted it slammed in my face.

  Bernice Morris was Coach Butts’s sister.

  There was no way she was going to talk to me about Nelson’s murder, especially if she’d heard the rumors that I’d tried to poison Coach.

  Gnawing my thumbnail, I was debating what to do when I spotted Emmylou and Dudley Pritcherd on their hands and knees crawling around a blanket near the big gazebo in the picnic park.

  Had she lost
her contact again?

  “Yoo-hoo! Carly!”

  Emmylou’s high-pitched voice sliced through my soul. I hid a cringe and walked over. Dudley sat back on his haunches in the grass, a pinched look to his handsome face.

  “Good afternoon,” I said. “You two doing well?”

  Emmylou gave a brief shake of her head, as if warning me to not talk about Dudley’s bedroom dudliness.

  As if I would.

  “We’ve been better,” she said.

  Dudley added, “Much better. Afternoon, Carly.” He bent back over, bringing his nose down close to the grass and sweeping his hands over the blades.

  “You lose your contact again?” I asked Emmylou.

  “I wish,” she said, tears pooling in her eyes. “It’s my wedding ring this time. It flew off my finger while we were sitting here,” she said, clearly exasperated. “Went thataway.” She pointed vaguely behind Dudley.

  Still on the hunt, he peered into the depths of the thick lawn.

  “I can’t believe it,” she said. “I knew it had come loose, but not that loose. It’s this weight I lost. Sympathy weight.”

  “Sympathy weight?” I asked.

  Dudley’s big blue eyes looked pained as he glanced up. “Emmylou . . .”

  Ignoring him, she said, “Dudley’s lost so much lately that I’ve lost some, too, just worrying about him. Look at him. Just look. Shrinking away. Isn’t he shrinking, Carly?”

  Dudley gave me a pleading, “please don’t look at me” gaze, but the truth was, he had lost a lot of weight, and he hadn’t been a big man to begin with.

  Before I could say anything about his appearance one way or another, Emmylou added, “Do you have a potion for that? Weight gain?”

  Dudley dragged a hand through his curly brown hair, rolled his eyes, and went back to crawling around.

  “Depends on what’s causing the weight to come off,” I said. “A tried-and-true doctor would be needed for something serious.”

  There was a good chance Dudley’s health was why he was having bedroom issues in the first place. Emmylou hadn’t said anything at all about him losing weight when she came in for the potency potion a couple of days ago.

  “I’ll tell you what’s causing that weight to come off,” she said, fluffing the ruffles on her blouse.

  “Emmylou, sweetheart,” Dudley murmured, sitting back on his haunches. “Carly doesn’t need to know.”

  Actually in this case I was kind of curious.

  “Pish-posh,” she said. “It’s just Carly. Maybe she can help. It’s this trial.”

  “Coach Butts’s trial?” I asked.

  Emmylou nodded. “Dudley was due to take the stand next week.”

  Was. Now with Nelson dead, that timeline was likely to change.

  “Emmylou.” Dudley sighed, a scarlet stain spreading across his cheeks. “Really.”

  She paid him no mind. “You know Dudley’s the one who found the accounting discrepancy in the first place, right? He keeps the baseball league’s books.”

  Dudley had discovered the mistake after a check to buy new uniforms for the team had bounced.

  “He was to testify against Coach, and was worried the town wasn’t going to like what he had to say.” She tsked loudly. “Plus that old biddy Bernice Morris can’t stop spouting off, trying to ruin Dudley’s reputation.”

  “Emmy,” Dudley pleaded quietly.

  Bernice? Coach’s sister? Nelson’s secretary? The one who probably wouldn’t talk with me even if I came bearing an oversized check with her name on it? “What is Bernice saying?”

  Emmylou threw her hands in the air. “I can’t believe you haven’t heard! Seems to me she’s been telling everyone who will listen that Dudley made a mistake. That Dudley wasn’t qualified to run the audit. That maybe even Dudley was the one who stole that money and is framing Coach. She even talked Nelson into getting another accountant to perform a second audit on the books, as if that was going to help the cause. It’s outrageous.”

  I glanced at Dudley, who looked like he wanted to dig a hole and throw himself in. By Emmylou’s theatrics, I suspected this wasn’t her first retelling of this story, and wondered who was the bigger spouter—her or Bernice.

  With one look at the gleam in Emmylou’s eyes, I figured I already knew the answer to that.

  Tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, Emmylou said, “She’s a bitter old pill, that Bernice, one who has it out for Dudley. It’s tearing him up, and I’m sure she’s pleased as punch about that.”

  My brain whirred with information. The first thing that jumped out at me was that Bernice wasn’t old. She was maybe fifty at most. The second thing was that Dudley did have easy access to those funds. The third was wondering about the outcome of the second audit. The fourth was that Bernice had never seemed the vindictive type to me. “Why would Bernice have it out for Dudley?”

  “Well, it all goes back to—”

  “Oh, dear God,” Dudley muttered, apparently going straight to the Big Guy for help with the ground opening up and swallowing him whole. “Emmy, stop.”

  She brushed him off with a grand wave of her hand. “It’s all because of Angelea Butts.”

  “Angelea?” I wished I had a folding chair and some popcorn for this show. It was getting interesting.

  “On account of Dudley once dated Angelea, while she was on a split with Coach.” She tittered. “Before he met me, of course. Bernice seems to think Dudley’s still holding a candle for Angelea, and that framing Coach is his diabolical way of getting her husband out of the way. Have you ever heard anything so plumb crazy in all your days?”

  A chair, popcorn, and a big Diet Coke with a bendy straw.

  “Angelea and I are just friends,” Dudley said to me in a desperate whisper.

  I suddenly recalled the rumors that Angelea had been cheating on Coach recently. Was she stepping out with Dudley? He did have a guilty flush about him—but that coloring could also have come from Emmylou’s oversharing.

  Emmylou rolled her eyes and possessively latched onto Dudley’s elbow. “If anything, Angelea is still pining for Dudley. For Bernice to think differently is just plain crazy.”

  Dudley looked like he wanted to shove a spoonful of macaroni salad down Emmylou’s throat to keep her quiet. Clearly he was a proud man who didn’t like airing his dirty laundry to outsiders. He’d probably keel right over if he knew Emmylou had come to see me about his dudliness.

  Thunder rumbled in the distance, and a fat rain drop plopped smack-dab on Emmylou’s forehead.

  Looking upward, she squealed, “Our picnic!” and started gathering up their supplies.

  Dudley muttered something that sounded like, “Divine intervention.”

  “Do you want help looking for the ring?” I asked.

  Dudley said graciously, “Go on home before you get soaked to the bone, Carly. I’ll come back later with a metal detector. It’ll turn up.”

  Emmylou was making quick work of packing her picnic basket. “Let me wrap some of this up for you, Carly.”

  “You don’t have to. . . .”

  “No, no. I insist.” She shoved a tin of corn bread into my hands. “I’ll come by the shop tomorrow to see you,” she said with a saucy wink.

  For the virility potion.

  “What for?” Dudley asked.

  “For you, darlin’,” Emmylou cooed his way. “I’m sure Carly has something for stress.”

  Before I could say I did in fact have a stress potion, Dudley spoke first.

  “Thank you kindly, but I’m fine. I don’t need any potion,” he protested, his cheeks bright pink. “Especially not from . . .”

  He trailed off, his blush turning red.

  “Not from Carly,” he was going to say. I just knew it.

  It was like I’d been hit by a two-by-four. Even my regular customers believed the rumors. Dudley never had trouble taking one of my potions before.

  He glanced at me apologetically before Emmylou patted my arm. “There
, there, Carly. This will all blow over soon enough. How is Coach, by the way?”

  “He’s fine,” I said. “Turned out he had a diabetic reaction. He’ll be back home before nightfall.”

  “Diabetes, really?” Emmylou said. “That’s interesting. That poor man, bless his heart. Bless your heart.” She smiled sympathetically.

  I glanced between the two of them, and it was clear as day that neither believed what I’d said about the diabetes.

  “I need to get going. Thanks for the corn bread,” I said.

  Emmylou gave me a little wave and wrinkled her nose. “See you tomorrow, Carly.”

  Nodding, I walked off. As soon as I rounded the corner, I dumped the corn bread in a trash can.

  Chapter Nine

  I was at a loss about what to do. Bernice Morris surely had some answers to my burning questions, but getting her to divulge them to me was going to take a small miracle.

  A raindrop splashed my cheek, and I swiped it away as I headed down the tree-lined sidewalk toward the river walk at the bottom of the hill. It continued to sprinkle, but the storm held off for now.

  Despite the weather the river walk was crowded, but I managed to find an empty bench. Most of Darling River was calm and flat, but every half mile or so it would suddenly form into rough water with rapids and small drop-offs—nothing too dangerous, but exciting enough for an afternoon of fun. From where I sat, I could see several kayakers bouncing over and dipping under the churning white water, and I hoped the storm would hold off until they were safely on land.

  I needed to figure out a plan to get Bernice to talk with me. I was sitting there staring at the water, mesmerized, really, when I suddenly felt a presence studying me. I glanced up and found Johnny Braxton leaning against the iron safety fence not four feet away.

  The look in his eyes matched the storm clouds above.

  Johnny had always been cordial to me, less so to my mama and daddy. He was a shrewd businessman who was all about money, and it showed in the way he dressed. From his silver-tipped boots to his fussy bolo tie.