As she walked, she gave Nikoli a call, just to update him on her plans. He didn’t answer, so she left a message. She wanted to make sure he could find her in case anything went wrong.
Chapter 25
Celestial shook the nerves from her system and stepped towards the front door of Joseph Bennett’s current hotel room, only to step back as it began to open in front of her. On the other side, a tired Joseph Bennett stood, almost beginning to exit. He could hardly hold back a scoff from deep in his throat at the sight of Celestial.
“Seriously?” He grimaced, still standing halfway in the doorway, “Can I not even leave my own house in peace?”
Celestial, though taken off guard by his presence, stood firm. “I just want answers Mr. Bennett. I’d think that you’d want some too.”
Joseph sighed. “Of course I do!” His voice raised slightly, “But I think that those answers and questions for that matter would come from the police.”
Joseph stood up straight in the doorway, still acting as a blockade to his residence against Celestial. “You are not a police officer, Miss Meadows, that much I can tell. You cannot question me like this, I know my rights.”
Of course he knew his rights, he was a lawyer, even throughout this whole case. Celestial racked her brain for a moment, she needed answers, and she needed to be smart about getting them. After that attempt on her life, she couldn’t afford to make any more enemies, especially without so much as a single witness around. If Joseph really was a murderer, then this was the perfect opportunity to get rid of a thorn in his side.
“Look, Mr. Bennett, I’m not trying to rile you up, I promise.” Celestial attempted to keep a straight face. “But if you really want answers, and you really have nothing to hide, then what difference could a few questions make?”
Joseph winced, only for a moment, but slow enough that Celestial still caught it. Mentally she cheered, especially as Joseph's strict form relaxed enough to allow her passage into the house.
“Fine,” he grumbled motioning for Celestial to walk inside. “But I reserve the right to end this little faux interrogation at any time.”
Celestial moved and made her way into the open space of the hotel room. Joseph followed behind and made his way past her to stand near the couch. He looked every bit as uncomfortable as the last time Celestial had accompanied Nikoli in talking with him. “Well?” Celestial offered, a warm tone to her voice attempting to calm Joseph enough to respond to questioning.
“Reverend Younger, he…” Joseph started to say, “He was involved with a married woman.”
Celestial’s eyes lit up. He’s talking about Mariah, isn’t he? She nodded her head in an encouraging way.
“The affair had been dissolved, and Reverend Younger-- James was devastated. He really took the breakup hard.” Joseph continued, “We’d been close since I was younger, so I considered him a friend. Of course when he began to call me, I would listen and console him as he needed.”
“Eventually, we decided that he needed to get away from it all. To clear his head and occupy his thoughts with something else. So we planned a somewhat impromptu trip to Las Vegas.” Joseph seemed to tense up again like he was watching and waiting for Celestial’s response to the tale as he spun it.
“I promise you, Miss Meadows, we’d been gone an entire week, even to the day that this murder took place. We didn’t even get back until the afternoon of that very same day.” Joseph continued, a tinge of stress clinging onto his voice. He moved from his standing spot, seemingly looking around the small room, searching for something in particular. He spoke up, louder to broadcast himself even as he roamed around the room. “We… we’d gone to so many bars, hotels...strip clubs. Anything that I felt could take his mind off of his love life. I know that I have the receipts somewhere…”
“Receipts…” Celestial echoed, trying to guess what type of game Joseph was playing at.
For a moment longer, Joseph searched the room, before finally finding what he needed, “Here they are.” Joseph brought the items in hand over to where Celestial stood, urging her to take what he was giving out. Celestial looked down and recognized the format of receipts, several of them. She looked back to Joseph, who added, “Look, here they are. Receipts for all of the places we went during the week.”
Celestial could hardly hide the questioning look in her eye, but Joseph added with a slight groan, “I know how it looks, okay?”
“How does it look? Carrying several receipts from the different places you went as a way to prove your innocence?” Celestial knew she was supposed to be toning down the sass to protect herself, but this seemed far too neatly put together to have been fake or some way to throw guilty accusations onto someone else.
Joseph continued on in a more serious, flat tone. “I was going to hold on to those receipts, maybe use them as tax write-offs next year.”
Celestial sighed, she knew these may have been convenient pieces of evidence, but they'd be solid proof if they held up. “If you felt these could exonerate you, why not hand them over to the proper authorities? Sheriff Brewer could have helped you.”
Joseph avoided her gaze but immediately relented. “I mean, can you imagine if I went to the authorities with receipts that the Reverend and I had gone to Las Vegas and had gone to all these strip clubs? How much of a congregation you think he’d have left by the time word got out that we were drowning our sorrows at bars before getting lapdances? His whole thing is railing against sin and I show up with these receipts from Sin City and his career is over.”
“Besides,” Joseph added, “you seem close enough to the sheriff yourself, I know you can get those receipts to him.” Celestial felt her cheeks warming up at the accusation, but found herself without the words to question exactly what Joseph was implying. Still the incredulous look on her face persisted.
Joseph sighed, holding his hands up, almost flippantly. “Hey, I was only counseling the Reverend. I tend to meet my clients where they are.”
Chapter 26
Since she knew that good detective work required double-checking, and since she wouldn’t put it past a man like Joseph Bennett to fake documents like these, Celestial went to the extra effort of touching base with each of the hotels listed on the receipts Bennett had given her. She even faxed over copies of the receipts to make sure everything--the times, dates, and amount spent--was accurate and in order, reasoning that any discrepancy might give her the excuse to dismiss Bennett’s--and the Reverend’s--alibi entirely.
However, the hotels all confirmed that the receipts were, in fact, aboveboard. Some of the concierges on the phone even seemed to remember Joseph and the Reverend distinctly, and gave eyewitness verification.
“What kind of creep keeps his receipts from his drunken Vegas bacchanal to write off on his taxes?” she griped, setting the phone down heavily on the counter.
Athena hovered uneasily nearby. She and Tamara had been looking on with concern throughout this entire verification process. “So what does it mean that the receipts all checked out?”
“What does it mean?” Celestial swept up the receipts into an untidy stack and set them aside. “It means that both of our main suspects, Joseph Bennett and Reverend Younger, are in the clear. It means they didn’t do it.” She spotted her notebook on the counter, the one in which she’d taken the time earlier to write out all the evidence. Slowly, she opened it to the list of suspects, remembering how tempted she’d been just to strike out Sofia’s name and get it done with. Now, though, she took up a pen and struck through Joseph’s name, then the Reverend’s. Sofia’s was the only name left.
“I don’t believe it,” Celestial said. “It can’t be Sofia.”
“Are you sure, Celestial?” Tamara asked. “I mean, I don’t want it to be Sofia any more than you do. But don’t you think it’s possible that you’re a little blinded in this case?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean,” said Tamara patiently, “that you love to take care of people.
That if someone comes to you in distress and trouble--particularly a fellow witch--you can get kind of single-minded about helping them out. That instinct of yours is the reason so many people love you, and it’s helped nearly all of your friends out countless times, whenever they were in a bind. But maybe, just maybe, this time that single-mindedness caused you to miss something about Sofia--something that could help explain what really happened in this case.”
Celestial tried to set aside her pride and knee-jerk defensiveness and really consider what Tamara was saying. Celestial appreciated that Tamara wasn’t outright accusing Sofia of the murder, but Celestial didn’t feel comfortable with the suggestion that there might have been something she’d missed, something suspicious that might implicate Sofia in any way.
“This just doesn’t seem right,” said Celestial finally. “There’s got to be something we’re missing. I’m going to go to Sofia’s house, to see if I can talk all of this through with her.”
“I think that’s a good idea,” said Tamara. “But just remember… you’d better be careful. Keep an eye out.”
Celestial didn’t like it, but she knew Tamara was only trying to look out for her. Athena, who had been on edge ever since that morning’s close call, was still floating around uneasily, as if too agitated to land. Celestial thought, too, of the fear in Nikoli’s voice when they’d talked on the phone that morning. I still don’t believe Sofia had anything to do with this, Celestial thought, but it won’t hurt just to maintain a little vigilance.
Reluctantly, she nodded.
* * *
Celestial didn’t want to startle Sofia, so she didn’t apparate straight to the house, but rather to the entrance of the winding, overgrown driveway that led up to it. That way, Sofia would be able to see her coming and might have time to prepare herself for what could turn out to be a difficult conversation.
Or more likely, you’re just stalling, Celestial told herself. But she batted the unpleasant thought away.
It looked to Celestial like someone must have driven down this path recently: there were fresh divots in the lane that showed the clear impression of tire marks in the dirt, and some of the new-growth vines twining out toward the center of the path appeared to have been freshly snapped away. Probably this was just a result of Sofia herself driving into town--she could hardly apparate when she’d evidently gone into town laden with honey that she’d been unable to sell--but for some reason it made Celestial nervous, and she picked up her pace.
As she grew closer to the house, she could hear the buzzing of the bees out back. Maybe it was her imagination, but they sounded to her like they were distressed about something.
“Sofia,” Celestial said, knocking at the front door urgently and casting a nervous look at the front porch rocking chair, which had somehow toppled onto its side. But Sofia’s vehicle, still loaded up with the crates she used to transport her honey into town, was parked right out front. “Sofia, it’s me, Celestial!” She knocked again, harder and more rapidly, but still there was no answer.
She was a second away from apparating to the other side of the door when it occurred to her to try the handle.
It was unlocked.
Celestial let herself into a front room that looked like a bomb had gone off inside it. There had clearly been some kind of event here, something like a whirlwind that had tossed everything--books, furniture, potted plants--awry. At a trot now, Celestial ran through the front room and checked first the kitchen, then the restroom, the mudroom, the bedroom, cellar, every room in the house. Each one looked like it had been through some kind of tempest.
And none of them showed any signs of Sofia. She was gone.
Chapter 27
“Okay, okay, Celestial, just calm down,” Nikoli said over the phone, sounding far from calm himself. “Breathe, and try again. Now tell me what happened.”
“She’s gone, Nikoli, she’s not anywhere. And she might have just been out, like, apparated elsewhere, except that her place is a wreck, and the bees are all agitated like something happened, and–”
“Okay,” said Nikoli. “I’m headed out there. Shouldn’t be more than ten minutes.” Already, Celestial could hear that he was slamming his car door shut, buckling up his seatbelt.
“Hurry, please,” Celestial whispered. “I just know it’s the killer. I know he’s got her.”
“You can’t know that,” Nikoli said, his attempt at sounding reasonable somewhat undercut by the fact that he had just started up his siren. The sound got Celestial’s heart racing even faster. “There are several other reasons I can think of that she might have left, and in a hurry, too.”
“It didn’t look like a hurry, Nikoli,” she said pleadingly. “It looked like a struggle.”
“Okay, I hear you, and I’m going to take a look around when I get there,” he assured her. “I’m breaking every traffic law known to man to get to you, rest assured. So you just stay put, will you? And keep an eye out--whoever is responsible might still be around, you know.”
With that, he hung up, leaving Celestial alone with that frightening thought. She also took note of his language: whoever is responsible. She knew that Nikoli was keeping his options open, and still considered Sofia to be a viable suspect. There are several other reasons I can think of that she might have left, he’d said. Well, she knew what that meant: he thought Sofia might have been skipping town, either out of fear of being falsely arrested for murder, or else….
Or else out of fear of being rightfully arrested for murder.
But Celestial knew that couldn’t be the case. Even if she could somehow be made to believe Sofia might be a murderer, she could never, ever believe that Sofia would leave her bees.
If she just stood there fretting about what had happened to Sofia, though, then even when Nikoli got there they would be wasting time. What Celestial needed was to spend this time thinking everything through yet again. What she needed was to figure out, once and for all, who the killer was. If she did that, then she and Nikoli might have a shot at chasing the killer down, not only clearing Sofia’s name but also--Celestial feared--saving her life.
She could only pray they weren’t already too late.
Come on, Celestial, she urged herself. That kind of thinking isn’t helping anyone. She waved her hands as if to clear the air. Think back, think back. For so long, she’d considered all the clues in the context of three questions: Had Joseph Bennett done it? Had the Reverend? Or had it been the two of them working together? Well, now that their alibis had checked out, she suddenly had a handful of clues that she had to reconfigure.
She forced herself to breathe deeply, wishing desperately that she could have a cup of her special blend of calming tea right about now.
Okay, so it wasn’t the three most obvious suspects. However, there were so many people who had access to Jayne Buchanan’s house. And, considering these women were part of a group that had persecuted anyone involved in the supernatural, there were probably dozens of high-powered townsfolk who might have wanted them dead, who wouldn’t have needed conventional access to the house if they’d wanted to rig it to explode.
Even setting aside the supernatural denizens of town, these women had been wildly unpleasant. Meddlesome, judgmental, infuriatingly superior. Just following up on Jolene Bennett’s reputation alone, Celestial had gotten the strong impression that there wasn’t much of anyone this woman liked.
It was hardly helpful to know that anyone in town might have been the killer, and that any one of the four women, or any combination of them, might have been the intended target. The net was simply too wide to narrow down.
Think it through in order, Celestial told herself. You’re missing something.
The letters. Mariah Knight’s affair with the Reverend, which she’d cut off, breaking his heart. Jolene Bennett’s relationship with her mysterious B. At the restaurants around town, Celestial had heard that Jolene often went around with different men, though evidently never one more than the others. No
one the hosts at the restaurants had specifically named, or noticed with any particular regularity.
But there was something about the secrecy, the use of the initial in place of a full name, that snagged on Celestial’s memory. The Reverend, even with all his sense of duty and the scandal that would have broken out if his affair with Mariah Knight had become common knowledge, had signed his real name to his letters. That meant there was some clear, pressing, and practical reason B had not been able to sign his own name to the letters he wrote to Jolene. That, if their relationship had really gone on so long as to sustain this volume of letters, might explain why they hadn’t been seen out and about in town together.
Suddenly, with a flash of memory and surge of intuition, Celestial realized that she knew exactly who the killer was. There was no time to wait for Nikoli to reach her; she grappled for her phone and pressed the button to call him back.
“Nearly there,” he said by way of greeting, sounding tense.
“Don’t bother,” she said. “I know where they took her.” Speaking rapidly she told Nikoli where to meet her.
“There? Why there?” Nikoli asked.
“No time to explain,” Celestial said. “Sofia is in danger. I’ll meet you there.”
“Please tell me you aren’t going to go rushing in without backup,” Nikoli positively growled.
“I won’t have to,” she said, already preparing to apparate, “so long as you hurry!”
Graves and Goons (A Hocus Pocus Cozy Witch Mystery Series Book 4) Page 9
