Voodoo or Die

by Stephanie Bond

  Zane's frown deepened. "Go on."

  "I thought that... perhaps... that is, I wondered if... Dr. Whiting and Melissa knew something about the voodoo doll."

  "So you followed them here and confronted them?"

  "That's right."

  "And what did they say?"

  "Dr. Whiting said he didn't do it, and Melissa ignored me. Then she—"

  "Was killed?"

  Gloria nodded. "It could have been me, except Dr. Whiting pushed me out of the way."

  Zane pulled his hand down his face, then he leaned in close and lowered his voice. "Look, I'm a little fuzzy here. In case you don't remember, I didn't get a lot of sleep last night."

  Her cheeks flamed. "Neither did I."

  "And yet you seem to have enough energy to be on the scene of two crimes before noon?"

  She decided it was a rhetorical question.

  He glared at her. "We were interrupted this morning. Why did you put five hundred dollars in Steve Chasen's mailbox?"

  "To... have the window fixed," she said, rather pleased that such a plausible answer came out of her mouth.

  Zane crossed his arms. "Who did you hire?"

  "Elton Jamison—at least I was going to," she improvised, crediting her WITSEC training for making her a proficient liar. "He's installing a window at my office, and I thought he could take care of the one at Steve's house, too."

  "That's mighty generous of you, especially since I said I'd have the bank take care of it."

  She forced a smile to her lips but didn't respond.

  "Why all the clandestine behavior?" he pressed. "Instead of stuffing the money into a mailbox at the crack of dawn, why didn't you just give the money to Jamison?"

  "I... had to check on the cat this morning, and I thought it would be easier to take the money to the job."

  Zane touched her shoulder and pointed out the window across the parking lot. "The man is working in front of your office."

  She swallowed hard and nodded, then picked up her mental shovel again. "But I didn't know he'd be here—the supplies to fix my window just arrived."

  His mouth tightened, as if he didn't believe a word she said, then he looked around to make sure no one was listening. "You didn't have to go to such extremes just to avoid me this morning."

  She blinked. "I... I'm sorry." Better to let him believe a safe lie than to reveal the dangerous truth.

  "So why did you deny being at Chasen's house when I asked you this morning?"

  "I... didn't want... you to think... that I had something to do with setting the fire."

  His gaze grew lethal. "Lying doesn't help your cause."

  She angled her head. "If you followed me, then you know I didn't get out of my car."

  He didn't say anything, although she saw concession in his eyes.

  "From there I went straight to the hair salon, and that's where I first heard about the fire over the police scanner."

  He rolled his eyes. "Everybody in this town has a police scanner."

  "I, um, understand that you and I were the headline last night."

  "Apparently so."

  "Just so you know, I told everyone that you came by on official business."

  His smile was dry. "Oh, yes—the voodoo doll. And now you have another one?"

  "Er... so it seems." She chose her words carefully. "Don't you think it's a rather strange coincidence that someone sent me a voodoo doll of myself under a book, then I walk into the bookstore and nearly get squashed by a bookshelf?"

  A muscle worked in his jaw. "The power of suggestion is a strong phenomenon."

  She gasped. "Are you saying that I willed the bookshelf to fall?"

  He sighed, the weariness showing on his rugged face. "I'm saying that according to Dr. Whiting, and now your account as well, this was an accident, plain and simple."

  "What about Steve's poisoning? Was that an accident?"

  "We still don't know."

  "And his house being burned down—was that an accident?"

  He looked over his shoulder, then back. "The fire chief doesn't think so."

  She swallowed hard. "And the body?"

  "We don't know—it could be a vagrant, maybe someone who went in and started the fire to stay warm."

  The sound of a camera's shutter closing cut through the air. They turned around to see Daniel Guess shooting photos of the body as quickly as he could get into position.

  Zane swore under his breath and charged toward the man. "Out!" he bellowed, stepping in front of the camera lens, then removing his own jacket to cover the dead girl's face.

  The reporter snapped a picture in their direction, and Gloria panicked at the thought of the man having her face on film. Then Guess gave Zane a haughty look. "Three bodies on your first week on the job, Chief Riley. That has to be some kind of record. Was there a voodoo doll involved in this one?"

  Anger flared in Zane's eyes before he schooled his face into a cool mask. He grabbed the man's camera and tossed it toward the entrance. It landed with a crash, then slid several feet.

  "Hey, that's a two-thousand-dollar camera!"

  "Sorry," Zane said. "I dropped it. Now get the hell out."

  Guess shook his finger. "You can't do this, Riley. There's something called freedom of press in this country."

  "I'm not keeping you from writing about it, just from printing disrespectful photos."

  The man's face reddened, and he shot a glare in Gloria's direction, but he left, scooping up his camera on the way out.

  The medical examiner arrived. While the man conferred with Dr. Whiting, Zane stepped into the coffee shop to talk to Hazel and a couple of employees.

  Gloria played the scene over and over in her mind, thinking if only she'd been less brash, perhaps Melissa wouldn't have been walking away, perhaps too distracted to react to the falling bookcase. And had the young woman been guilty of the things Gloria had accused her of?

  And if Melissa had been guilty, had her secrets died with her?

  She glanced across the bookstore to see that Jill Johnson had arrived, still wearing her pink lab coat from the salon, her face red and puffy.

  Gloria made her way over and offered her condolences.

  Jill tried to smile through her tears. "I understand you came close to being hurt as well."

  "I might have been if Dr. Whiting hadn't pushed me out of the way."

  Jill wiped her nose with a tissue. "Melissa said Dr. Whiting is a very nice man."

  "Yes, he is." Gloria tried to make her voice sound casual. "Do you know if Melissa and Dr. Whiting had a personal relationship?"

  Jill looked surprised. "No—I mean, I don't think so. They were just friends."

  Gloria nodded, then took a deep breath. "Jill, I received another voodoo doll today."

  "No kidding?" She sniffed. "What did this one look like?"

  "Me," Gloria said bluntly. "With purple hair—my purple hair."

  Jill frowned. "Your real hair?"

  "Yes."

  "How would someone have gotten it?"

  "My question exactly. I wondered if maybe Melissa or you—"

  "I didn't do it," Jill cut in, her eyes rounded.

  "Do you know if Melissa did?"

  "If she did, I didn't know about it."

  "What happens to the hair on the salon floor?"

  "We sweep it up, bag it, put it in the Dumpster out back."

  So anyone who'd seen her go into the salon would have had access to her hair waste.

  Ew.

  "What happened here?" a woman shouted. "Who died?"

  They turned to see Mona Black making her way across the bookstore, surveying the melee. When no one else seemed forthcoming, Gloria stepped forward. "There was an accident. Melissa Phillips and Dr. Whiting and I were talking. A bookshelf fell on Melissa, and she was killed."

  Mona's eyes blazed. "Bookshelves don't just fail."

  Hazel Means came forward, wringing a handkerchief. "I was standing on a stepladder stocking books
, and I lost my balance. I f-fell into the bookshelf and—"

  "Get your things," Mona cut in. "You're fired."

  "But it was an accident," Gloria said.

  Mona stepped closer, looking Gloria up and down, then murmured, "Are you sure about that, Ms. Dalton?"

  Gloria swallowed hard. "What else could it be?"

  "What else indeed?" Mona said, her eyes cold. "A lot of strange things have been happening since you arrived. People are saying you brought bad mojo with you."

  Gloria didn't know how to answer—it was true, after all.

  Mona's demeanor changed, back to all business as she leaned in to whisper, "I'll talk to the family and offer to pay for the funeral to circumvent a lawsuit."

  Gloria stared after the woman as she strode away. Gloria tended to agree with Penny that her former mother-in-law had ice water in her veins. Indeed, the woman's insinuation that she was the cause of recent deadly events left Gloria feeling chilled.

  Zane came over and asked Jill if she could provide contact information for Melissa Phillips's next of kin. The tearful woman nodded, saying she had the information at the salon, and left to get it.

  Gloria and Zane were left alone with a flurry of activity around them, staring at each other. Her heart drummed in her chest as she remembered spending the night in his arms. She wanted to tell him how much she had enjoyed their time together, would never forget it, but the time and place seemed inappropriate. There were too many unexplained occurrences in town that had everyone, including her, spooked. Zane, too, looked torn, his eyes guarded, as if trying to figure out whether to trust her, as if there were things he wanted to say but couldn't.

  His radio beeped, effectively breaking the moment. He answered, "Riley."

  "Chief, Jimmy Scaggs is here again," a voice blasted.

  Zane's frown deepened as he lowered his mouth to the receiver. "Can't someone there handle it?"

  "He says he'll only talk to you, Chief, says he thinks he remembers where he saw that dead man in the woods and wants to take you there."

  Zane heaved a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Give me a few minutes." He returned the radio to his belt and muttered, "The whole town is nuts."

  Gloria knew he counted her in the mix, and she was torn between being offended at being called a nut and feeling flattered to be considered a local.

  He turned to scan the scene, seemingly satisfied to see the medical examiner was removing the shrouded body on a gurney. When it rolled by her, Gloria shuddered, overcome with the sensation that it might have been her in that body bag.

  "I'm sorry you had to witness this," Zane said, his hand on her arm.

  "It's just so bizarre," she murmured. "Did you know Melissa Phillips used to be involved with Steve Chasen?"

  "No." He looked at her and frowned. "Do you know something you're not telling me?"

  She wanted to laugh hysterically—he had no idea. "When I was at the hair salon this morning, Melissa came in late and seemed upset. When she was doing my hair, I asked her about Steve, and she had some pretty negative things to say. When I came back from the fire, she was really distressed and left abruptly."

  His eyebrows rose. "Are you saying that she might have set the fire out of revenge?"

  "No. I'm just saying she was acting suspicious."

  "Like everyone else in this town," he said pointedly.

  Touché.

  "Where is this new voodoo doll?" he asked, sounding weary.

  "I left it in my office."

  "Let's go get it." He stopped to speak with an officer who was still on the scene, and to the medical examiner, then he retrieved his coat and shepherded her out the door. She had a hard time keeping up with his long stride as they crossed the parking lot, but she had the feeling that he was trying to keep some distance between the two of them.

  Misery wallowed in her stomach. Whatever had been building between them last night had been razed by all the screwball happenings. Her heart went out to Zane; he'd accepted the job to help eradicate Mojo of its reputation for black magic murders, and here he was thrust directly in the middle of a voodoo investigation.

  It was the story of their life, she decided: bad mojo and bad timing.

  When Gloria and Zane reached her office, Elton was using a soft cloth to polish the new plate-glass window. Despite the unpainted trim, the missing siding, and the gravity of the situation they had just left, the sight of the sun reflecting off the window made Gloria smile. It was a small sign that things could be repaired, replaced, restored.

  It sounded strange, but to her that window represented all the hope that she had felt the first day she'd seen it, her name lettered across it, as if to say "I'm here, Mojo."

  What a difference a week could make.

  "It looks great, Elton," she said as they walked up.

  He stopped to scratch his armpit. "Want me to call the guy who does the fancy gold lettering?"

  She hesitated. "Why don't you hold off for now... but thanks, Elton."

  They walked into her office, and Zane closed the door behind them, eyeing her apprehensively.

  "It's in here," she said, her nerves already splintering at being in the close quarters with the imposing man. Every movement of his reminded her of some movement he'd made the night before, sending awareness pulsing through her body. Light sparkled in her peripheral vision, and a bout of vertigo suddenly struck her. She gripped the back of one of her guest chairs to ground herself—she hadn't taken her Meclazine and she needed rest. She couldn't afford to be on her back with a Meniere's attack now.

  Zane glanced all around, then walked to her desk, where she'd left the gift box, book, and voodoo doll. He snapped on gloves and carefully scrutinized the items. "No one saw who left it?"

  "No," she said, glad to feel the vertigo passing. "Elton brought it in when he arrived. I asked him, but he didn't see anyone in the area."

  "So his fingerprints are on the box?"

  She nodded. "And Diane Davidson's... and mine."

  He picked up the primitive doll and grimaced. "Whoever put these dolls together is one disturbed person."

  "I asked Jill about the hair from the salon floor—she said they bag it and put it in the Dumpster behind the shop."

  "What about the fabric on the doll?"

  "From a jacket of mine that went missing a couple of days ago—from my car, I think."

  "When it was parked here?"

  "I don't know—maybe. But I've parked all over town."

  He worked his mouth back and forth. "Do you think Melissa Phillips was our doll maker?"

  "I don't know, but it's possible." Then a buried memory surfaced, and she gasped. "Wait—I remember from Deke Black's murder case that he and Melissa had had an affair."

  Zane's eyebrows went up. "So you're saying she could have created that initial voodoo doll as well?"

  She lifted her hands. "I don't know, but it fits."

  He nodded and bagged the box, the book, and the doll, then covered his mouth to hide a yawn. He looked sheepish. "Excuse me."

  But the yawn was catching, and she, too, succumbed to one and gave a little laugh. The reason for their lack of sleep hung in the air between them.

  "I... had fun last night," she said finally.

  "Me, too," he said, then averted his gaze.

  "But?" she prompted.

  He looked up. "But what?"

  She crossed her arms. "I sense a 'but' coming on."

  He pursed his mouth and nodded. "But right now I need to focus on my job. Daniel Guess is a pain in my ass, but he's right—three bodies in less than a week is serious. I have a hunch they're all connected, and I have to figure out how before someone else gets hurt." He gave her a pointed look. "I can't afford to be distracted by you, Gloria, considering you've been on the scene of every crime."

  His statement hit her like a slap. She looked away and bit her lip, then looked back. "I haven't killed anyone, Zane."

  As he walked toward her, his hands full o
f bagged evidence, his eyes were dark with fatigue, worry, and wariness. "Maybe not, but you're not being straight with me, either. You're hiding something."

  She opened her mouth to refute him, but the lie stuck in her throat.

  "The truth is, I'm not sure who I slept with last night," he said, then turned and strode out the door.

  Gloria sat frozen. She'd changed her name and her looks so many times, and had told so many lies over the past several years, she wasn't sure she knew who she was either.

  The sound of his footsteps walking away echoed the emptiness in her heart.

  Chapter 24

  When she heard the office door close behind Zane, Gloria's eyes filled with recycled tears. Over the years she'd cried so many tears for him and the life snatched from her that she felt as if she'd absorbed them all back into her skin and was steeped in salty regret. When a drop of moisture escaped and rolled down her cheek, she wondered how many times she'd cried that particular tear. A hundred times? A thousand?

  When the sound of the door opening again reached her, she hurriedly dabbed at her eyes, assuming it was Diane returning from lunch.

  "Gloria?" a woman's voice called. "Are you okay?"

  Marie, not Diane, appeared in the doorway. Her face was even paler than usual, and she looked distraught. "I just heard what happened at the bookstore—are you all right?"

  Gloria nodded. "Just shaken up."

  "And you received another voodoo doll?"

  Gloria angled her head. "How did you know about that?"

  "Jill told me, said it had your hair and everything. Creep-o-rama, but I think your hair looks cool."

  "Thanks." Gloria sank into one of the chairs and gestured for Marie to sit, too. "I'm wondering if Melissa made those voodoo dolls."

  "I guess it's possible, but I've never known her to be into voodoo."

  "What was she into?"

  Marie sighed and dropped into a chair. "Steve Chasen."

  "So I'm guessing he ended their relationship?"

  "Yes. She'd have done anything for him."

  "After he broke it off, was she angry enough to poison him?"

  Marie pursed her mouth, then nodded. "Maybe. She got pregnant by him but miscarried about a month ago."

  Sadness vibrated through Gloria. "Oh, no."