Flea Market Magic (Southern Relics Cozy Mysteries Book 1)

by Falls, Bella

  * * *

  Crystal got up from her chair and fetched the pitcher of her famous Southern sangria to pour us all refills. In all the years she’d made it for us, the only ingredients I knew were in it for sure were red Muscadine wine and at least one kind of moonshine. The rest, she said, was sworn to secrecy lest she be cursed. I suspected it was more likely she put in whatever she had available that would get us all a little tipsy as fast as possible.

  My cousin Dani and my friend Cate held out their empty mason jars to be filled. Empty plates once full of tasty fried chicken, homemade coleslaw, and biscuits with honey butter rested on the coffee table in front of us. We all relaxed into the comfy chairs on my back porch, looking out at the last of the setting sun over the water of Bogue Sound. A small skiff skipped over the water, making ripples as it made its way back to its mooring for the evening.

  Crystal set the pitcher down and plopped into her chair. “Okay, girl. Whatever went down today must have been harder than you’re letting on.”

  I took a sip of my Southern sangria. “Why would you say that?”

  “Because you’ve been distracted all night. And I lost count of all your sighs about an hour ago,” Cate chimed in. “You didn’t even rip one joke on the odd shape of the squash I brought over. And that was an easy target.” She picked up the yellow vegetable and waved it in front of my face.

  “I figured you’d used your elemental earth magic to specifically grow the squash like that. Do you need confirmation from me what it looks like?” I complained, pushing the obscenely large veggie away.

  Dani pulled the basket of biscuits towards her and buttered another one. “Whatever’s bothering her is also bugging my dad. He came into the cafe all flustered and grumpy. It took two slices of Mom’s pecan pie to calm him down.”

  “That must mean that whatever they found or purchased today is big.” Crystal waved the fingers of the hand not holding her glass of sangria in front of her. “Probably in some woo-woo magic sense big.”

  My cousin nodded in agreement. “We all know what you do for a living. So, can’t you just tell us?”

  The three of them called out together in a whiny chorus of pleading to get me to talk. I did my best to ignore them, but gave in once Cate picked up her squash and used it to poke my arm.

  I gave them a shortened version of the day’s events, leaving out the bit about stopping off at Jackson and Marilyn’s place. They didn’t need to be burdened by the bigger details since they got the gist of the powerful magical item that needed to be dealt with to keep it out of mortal hands. I kept to myself the growing concern about it being in magical hands as well.

  “Sounds to me like maybe you need to do something more than mope about on your back porch.” Crystal pulled out her phone and selected some music. “Get off that cute little tushy of yours. Let’s see some moves.”

  The more sangria we drank, the sloppier our dance moves became, but it didn’t matter. Laughter and exerting a little physical effort did wash away a little of the day’s stress. By the time Crystal’s husband came to pick up my three friends, I felt infinitely better.

  Once I cleaned up most of our mess and left the dirty dishes in my sink, I texted Luke to tell him I was alone and ready for him to come over. I settled down in the big comfy chair in my tiny living room to wait for him, closing my eyes for just a second.

  A hard tap on my knee and a shake of my shoulder wasn’t the greeting I expected. “What’s going on?”

  “Honey, wake up,” Luke insisted. “I need you to come with me.”

  I rubbed my eyes. “How long was I asleep? What time is it?”

  “It’s late, sometime after four in the morning. But the time’s not important. You need to come with me. Now.” My boyfriend helped me to my feet.

  It took my sleepy brain an extra second to catch onto the lack of flirt in his tone. “I don’t understand,” I countered, following him out the door.

  “You will.” He picked me up in his arms. “Hold onto me around my neck and close your eyes tight,” he instructed.

  Using his vampire speed, Luke carried me to the storage barn. When we arrived, he placed my feet on the ground, and I did my best not to show how dizzy the quick transportation made me.

  The door was swung wide open, and an odd light emanated from the interior. The muffled voices of my father and uncle made my heart drop into my stomach. Whatever waited inside, I considered whether or not I was ready to see it.

  Luke took me by the hand and squeezed it once to get my attention. “You’re strong enough. And your family needs you.”

  Allowing him to be my guide and pull me forward, I stepped across the threshold and witnessed what concerned my father and uncle.

  Most of the stuff we’d acquired earlier today had been completely trashed. Boxes of other objects that we stored on shelves were turned on their sides with their contents strewn about.

  Amongst the various items in the middle of the immediate area, a lifeless body lay crumpled on the ground.

  Chapter Six

  N othing could prepare me for the scene in front of me. I couldn’t take my eyes off of the unknown person who wouldn’t breathe again no matter how hard I watched for the chest to rise and fall. Based on the size of the body and the clothes, I had no doubt it was a man.

  Wanting to get a better look, I took careful steps forward until my foot crunched on something hard that broke underneath my weight. “What did I just step on?”

  Dad pointed to the empty light socket above us. “Whoever was in here knocked out the bulb above us. It’s why we’re having to spellcast light.”

  “Who is he?” I asked, letting go of Luke’s hand. The second my father’s conjured glowing orb lit up the face, I recognized it. “That’s Croy. Myrna Miller’s grandson.” Caught between shock and sadness, I stood in disbelief staring at the empty hollow eyes still open and unmoving.

  Uncle Jo joined me at my side close enough I could smell the alcohol wafting off of him. “You sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure. Don’t you recognize him from when he tried to stop us from taking the crystal ball?” With the gravity of the current situation, he didn’t need me to point out that maybe whatever he’d been drinking clouded his memory.

  The right foot of the body moved, and I shrieked and melted into Luke’s side for protection from the possible resurrection of Croy as a zombie. Buddy’s head came into view as he pulled on the shoelace with his kitty fangs, making the dead man’s foot twitch.

  “Bad cat,” I admonished before swooping over and picking him up. “You scared me,” I told him while cuddling his warm fur into my face. Buddy’s purrs helped bolster me to continue to stand over a corpse.

  My uncle cursed under his breath. “I only got a quick look at the boy today, but now that I see him up close, he does look familiar.” He glanced at my father and me. “We’ve got a big problem on our hands.”

  “Is that what this is? I wouldn’t have guessed that a dead mortal found on the grounds of a witch family’s property is a problem,” my father snapped.

  I placed a hand on his arm. “Dad, that doesn’t help.” Keeping a little distance between me and the body, I observed the area around it. “I don’t see any blood.”

  Luke hunkered down next to me and took in a few deep whiffs. “Because it’s pooled under his head. My guess is there’s an injury on the back of it.”

  In a low voice, I expressed my concern for my vampire boyfriend. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” he reassured me, standing up and offering his hand to help me rise.

  “Then I guess the bigger questions are how did he die and why?” I asked, my aversion giving way to my curiosity. “Also, how did he get in here?”

  My father shot a cold glare at his brother. “That’s a question I’d like the answer to.”

  “And you think I had something to do with it?” Uncle Jo bellowed. “If you’re thinking that I forgot to spell the place or flip the magical lock on the d
oor, then you and I need to step outside right now.”

  “Maybe then I wouldn’t smell the alcohol from your night out tonight,” Dad shouted back. “If you can’t recall meeting this departed young man, then maybe you can’t be sure you locked this place down.”

  The two of them erupted into an argument that on the surface dealt with the current situation but possessed undercurrents of old beefs. Because of the fighting, Buddy struggled against my hold and leapt down, disappearing into the darkness. When the two men who should know better lost control of their conjured light balls, plunging the entire room into darkness, they finally stopped yelling at each other.

  I waited until at least one of them gathered enough control to illuminate us again with a light ball. “You two aren’t helping matters. How he got in here is something we’ll have to figure out later. But I think we really need to discuss what’s going to happen next. Dead body on our property beats any quarrels you two have with each other.”

  Both of them looked down at the corpse with sheepish shame. My dad spoke first. “You’re right.”

  “Yeah, sorry,” Uncle Jo followed.

  Done with the scolding, I tried to make sense of the situation. “Based on our interaction with Croy, I’m guessing I know what he was searching for.”

  My uncle, Dad, and I all said at the same time, “The crystal ball.”

  I turned in the direction of the family house. “It’s not still up there with Granny Jo, is it?” Even though there wasn’t a truly living soul in the house, it didn’t mean I wanted anyone invading our space.

  “No, I took it out to the vault last night before I headed to the Watering Hole. I’m surprised you and your friends didn’t sense me go by on my way out to our island. I could hear y’all cackling on your back porch,” Uncle Jo answered.

  “Good.” A small sliver of relief fought against my stress until I looked down at Myrna’s grandson again. “Did anyone call the police?”

  “Not yet, but we’re running out of time. We’re going to have to do something soon or it’s going to look like we were involved in his demise.” My father tipped his head at Luke. “Any chance you could help us out here?”

  Careful not to move around too much, I shuffled to stand in between them, facing my dad. “No. Luke is not going to get involved like that. You know how he’s chosen to live his life.”

  “Rue, it’s fine,” my boyfriend tried to reassure me.

  I fixed my father in my unhappy gaze. “It is certainly not fine that my own dad wants you to break your blood fast in order to try and cut corners to solve the mystery.”

  For the second time of the night, Dad sighed with chagrin. “Yeah, I wasn’t considering that. Sorry, Luke. And even if you could figure out how he died by tasting his blood, what could we do with the information? It’s not like we could give it to our local police or the county sheriffs.”

  “But I’ll do it if it will help all of you,” my vampire boyfriend offered. “I don’t require regular blood consumption to exist anymore, and I think I’m strong enough to withstand a small taste.”

  Sometimes I forgot how Luke’s vampire status. Despite being the handsomest man in the South in his late twenties, the multitude of experiences he lived over all the centuries could fill hundreds of books. Maybe even thousands since he never shared his exact age.

  “You said that the pool of blood is under his head. That would mean you’d either have to move him or bite him, and neither of those options work,” I protested.

  “What your eyes cannot detect, my senses can. There is a tiny amount there on a sliver of a cut above his left eyebrow. I wouldn’t need much.” Luke waited for our group’s decision, placing a steadying hand on my back.

  “I vote no,” I stated in a clear voice.

  Dad’s eyes flicked to his brother’s and he shrugged his shoulders. “I think I’d rather know than not. But I understand my daughter’s desire for Luke not to get involved. Jo?”

  My uncle scoffed. “Oh, I have to make the decision? Thanks.” He wiped a hand down his face. “If you can access what you need without disturbing the body, then I think it’s in our best interest to know as much as we can.”

  Without any hesitation, Luke crouched down again. “I’ll do what I can.” In a blur of motions I found hard to see with my non-vampire senses, he reached out and gathered a small amount of coagulated blood on the tip of his finger. He paused before tasting it. “I must warn you that the blood may tell me everything back to the moment of his conception or nothing at all. How much it reveals is different for each individual.”

  I kneeled down next to him. “Then don’t do it. If it’s not going to help, don’t risk it.”

  Luke leaned forward and placed a chaste kiss on my cheek. “For you and your family, I will do anything.” Before I could argue more, he put the tip of his finger into his mouth and closed his eyes.

  Just because an old vampire didn’t necessarily need blood didn’t mean he was immune to the effects of it. Luke had never gone into many details of his bloodlust days and I’d never pushed him. But from the little he’d shared, only I understood how much his decision to help might put him at risk.

  Luke opened his mouth with a sigh like someone who’d just finished eating a satisfying meal. The tips of his fangs protruded enough to be seen, and I swallowed hard at the clear evidence of the blood’s effect on him.

  Keeping his eyes closed in concentration, he spoke with conviction, “You will need to call in the authorities soon. Based on the status of the blood, I’d estimate his time of death to be almost an hour give or take a few minutes.” He licked the tip of his finger again. “This boy has not led a very clean life in more recent times. He was definitely after the crystal ball because he’d been using it to make money. Lottery tickets. Gambling. Using his own grandmother in his schemes.”

  “No wonder he got mad at us for taking it today.” I smacked my own forehead. “And I had to go taunting him.”

  The noise disturbed my boyfriend, and his eyes flew open. “Don’t regret your actions. If he had found you when he came on your property, I don’t think he would have thought twice before hurting you.”

  “Can you tell how he died?” Uncle Jo pressed.

  Luke stood up, pulling me with him and holding me close. “Yes, but it’s not going to be helpful. He felt pain right here.” My boyfriend placed a hand over the back of his head. “And then all went dark. He did not see who did it.”

  “And we aren’t any closer to knowing anything the police couldn’t figure out on their own. Holy hexes, this is a mess and a half.” I buried my face in Luke’s chest and willed my frustrated tears not to burst out of my eyes.

  “We actually do know some things that are going to be important to navigate,” my father interjected. “One, we know what Croy was after, and since the crystal ball was out in the open, I figure that fact will get out sooner or later. And since it’s an object we don’t want confiscated by the police, that’ll become a problem we’ll have to deal with.

  “Two,” my uncle jumped in, “He found his way into a magically warded area. No mere mortal should be able to do that. We’ll need to figure out how he accomplished that, whether he did it on his own or had any help.”

  Luke held up three fingers for the next point. “There is a slight gap in what I could see in the last few hours. It could be the measures he took to numb himself to the world. If they test his blood, they’ll find he was not sober when he passed. It might also be the stubbornness of his blood not letting me see everything. Or…”

  “It could mean that someone with magic was involved and covered his or her tracks,” I finished.

  “I can’t say for sure either way,” Luke apologized.

  With more questions forming than answers being discovered, we all stood in silence. The longer the quiet hush of contemplative irritation lasted, the more I wanted to solve the crime.

  “It’s time.” Uncle Jo pulled out his spell phone. “I’m putting in a call t
o Barney Whittle.”

  My father nodded. “Good. Let him alert the few magical wardens we’ve got in both the local department and at the sheriff’s office to the situation. And then he can make a formal report and get things rolling.”

  “You know, technically our land is it’s own town and we don’t have any wardens, police or deputy sheriffs,” I reminded everyone.

  “Yeah, that won’t stand up. You know we’ve dealt with the Cedar Point police before. They kind of absorb us into their township and we can’t use them when it’s convenient for us and deny them when it’s not.” Dad pointed at the open door. “We should go outside to meet whoever gets sent here. No need to stand watch over the body.”

  With careful steps not to disturb the scene further, we waited outside the storage barn, whispering to each other as if someone might overhear us. While most policing forces in the world contained some trained witch wardens on their teams, in our neck of the woods, there existed far fewer than in more urban areas. If the county sheriff’s department got involved, we had less of a chance to hide the real truth of who we were and what we were hiding every day while living amongst regular humans.

  It took another thirty minutes before the first flashing blue and red lights pierced the dark of the night. The noise of the engine got closer until the police car’s headlights blinded us as it rolled to a stop on a clump of grass.

  A man a few years older than my father and wearing a dark uniform got out of the driver’s seat and greeted my father with a handshake. “I convinced my boss to let me come on my own since I didn’t share the complete specifics. Jo says y’all have a dead body on your property?”

  Dad pointed into the storage barn. “In there. Been about an hour and a half since he lost his life.”

  Barney whistled. “I don’t think I want to even know how you know that. Listen, we’ve got limited time.”

  “We know. We’ll get you up to speed and then you can decide how to handle things,” Uncle Jo explained. “Frankly, we’d prefer to keep this within your department rather than bringing in any county deputies.”