Graves and Golf Carts

by Annabel Chase

  “I’m glad you listened to me about painting it.”

  “Yeah, but you should have warned me it was against HOA regulations,” I said. “I don’t need to do anything that pisses off Madam President.”

  Jules looked at me sideways. “You breathe, don’t you?”

  I watched as Daisy made a right turn toward the Gods Complex. “Maybe Mitzi got injured on gym equipment,” I said. The idea seemed plausible.

  “No,” Jules said. “The cat’s not going inside the complex, she’s going around it.”

  I pressed the pedal to the metal to keep the cat in sight.

  “She’s headed toward the golf course,” Jules said.

  I pictured Mitzi with her foot stuck in the ninth hole. Although it wasn’t a well, it was close enough. Once the cat started across the green, I parked the golf cart and we followed the rest of the way on foot. I was surprised that Mitzi would even attempt golf. She seemed like a witch who was very aware of her limitations.

  “That cat is faster than she looks,” Jules remarked.

  “You go ahead,” I said, panting heavily now. “Save yourself.”

  Jules flicked a glance over her shoulder at me. “You’re a pathetic specimen, Eloise Worthington. I’m not even using vampire speed right now.”

  “No, but you’re using hot girl speed. I don’t have that one either.” The extra layer around my middle prevented me from too much physical exertion. Of course, it was probably the lack of physical exertion that created the layer of belly fat in the first place. Catch-22.

  We cleared a hill and I glimpsed Mitzi in the distance. She seemed to be alone next to a pond.

  “What’s she doing?” I asked.

  “She’s probably afraid of water. Maybe her ball landed in the pond and she needs help getting it.”

  I balked. “If my tanning opportunity got interrupted to fetch a golf ball out of a pond, there’s going to be hell to pay.” I could see why Mitzi was in a quandary though. If Daisy was anything like Mischief, the cat wouldn’t have wanted to go in and fetch the ball either.

  In the distance, a piece of metal caught the sunlight. “I don’t think it’s a ball in the water. I think it’s her club.”

  Jules marched forward, pumping her arms as she went. “Who loses a club in the water?”

  We exchanged knowing glances. Now that sounded more like Mitzi.

  As we drew closer, I realized that the witch was crying. Given her sorry state, I decided not to comment on her outfit. As the marshal in Divine Place, I would have loved to arrest her for crimes against fashion, but there seemed to be something more important happening right now.

  “Mitzi, what’s going on?” I asked.

  The witch crouched down to scoop Daisy into her arms. “Good job, Daisy.” She resumed a standing position and focused on us. “Thank you so much for coming. I need your help.”

  I motioned to the golf club sticking out of the water. “Yes, we can see that. How did you manage such a feat?”

  “It’s not what you think.” She wiped the tears from her cheeks. “That’s not my club.”

  “Well, that’s even worse,” Jules said. “How did you manage to lose someone else’s club in the pond?”

  Mitzi sniffed. “You don’t understand. The owner of the club still has it.”

  I frowned. “Unless the owner of the club is an alligator, that makes no sense.”

  Mitzi waved her hand back and forth and uttered an incantation that I didn’t understand. The water parted to reveal a hooked nose with a wart. I gasped at the grisly sight.

  “It’s Helen-Mary,” Mitzi said.

  I glared at her. “I knew that.” I finally remembered a name and she had to jump in and ruin it. It was hard to forget Helen-Mary. She’d been one of the first villagers I’d seen when I arrived in Divine Place. She had the look of a classic witch and I’d been convinced at the time that she was in costume.

  Jules moved closer to the edge of the pond, gazing at the witch with the golf club protruding from her chest. “Whoever did this shoved it right through her heart.”

  “That’s brutal,” I said. “Do you think it was an angry boyfriend? Why go for the heart?”

  Mitzi blinked away clinging teardrops. “It’s one of the ways to obliterate a witch. Iron through the heart.”

  “Like a nine-iron or any golf club?” I asked.

  “It doesn’t have to be golf related,” Jules said. “It just has to be iron and the head of that club qualified.”

  “Were you golfing together?” I asked.

  “No, I tried golf once and it didn’t end well for the other villagers, so I decided it wasn’t the game for me.” The witch gazed at Helen-Mary’s body. “She was scheduled to drop off a batch of potions at True Brew over an hour ago. She said she’d be there as soon as she finished her golf game, but she didn’t turn up. I had an impatient customer waiting for one of her potions, so I came here to see if I could pick up the potion instead.”

  “How do we get her out without disturbing the evidence so that we can do an autopsy?” I asked. We had to move quickly if we wanted to examine the body for clues because obliterated bodies tended to dissipate within forty-eight hours.

  “I can probably manage it with a spell,” Mitzi said. “I just didn’t want to do anything until you got here. I thought you might want to preserve the crime scene.”

  “Good thinking,” I said. I tried to remember all the crime shows I’d watched over the years. “Does anyone have yellow tape on them?” That seemed to be a requirement.

  “Gee, let me just check,” Jules said. She pretended to pat down her leather catsuit. “Nope. Fresh out of yellow tape.”

  I waved. “Go on then, Mitzi. Work your magic.”

  Jules licked her red lips. “Do you need to do blood magic? Maybe I can help.”

  I squinted at the vampire. “She’s lifting a body out of the pond, not putting it there.”

  Jules shrugged. “I’m just being helpful.”

  “No blood magic required,” Mitzi said. The witch pushed back her shoulders and cleared her throat. She fixed her attention on Helen-Mary and raised her arms in front of her. “Obladee. Obladah.”

  “If you’re about to say that life goes on, I’m thinking you have the wrong spell for this particular situation,” I said.

  Mitzi closed her eyes, ready to try again. “On top of spaghetti, all covered with cheese.”

  I positioned myself between Mitzi and the body. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  Mitzi rooted through her pockets. “You know what? I think I have my pocket spell book on me.” She reached into a deep pocket of her polka dot dress and produced a tiny book. The cover was a faded brown with no discernible markings. She opened the book and skimmed the first few pages until she settled on a spell. “Here we go. This one’s designed to lift heavy luggage off a conveyor belt, but I think it will do the trick.”

  “Man, you could do that? Witches are so lucky. You don’t know how many times I had to flirt with someone just to get a suitcase off the belt.”

  Mitzi read aloud from the book and I watched in awe as the body began to rise out of the water. Helen-Mary hovered in the air a few inches above the surface of the pond, dripping wet. There was no sign of blood. Out of nowhere, a squirrel darted around the perimeter of the pond and broke Mitzi’s concentration. The body splashed back into the water.

  “So much for preserving evidence,” Jules remarked wryly.

  “I’m so sorry,” Mitzi said. “I got distracted.”

  “Squirrels have a way of doing that,” I said.

  Mitzi regained her composure and the body rose again. She made a pulling motion with her arms and the body slid toward us. I backed up a couple of feet so that the body could be brought to rest on the ground in front of us.

  “I guess we need to take her to Brigit’s office,” Jules said.

  “You mean the lab,” Mitzi corrected her. The goddess of healing had generously agreed to let us use an empty r
oom at the back of her office as our forensics lab. My own office was far too small to store anything, let alone a body.

  Sadness marred Mitzi’s usually pleasant features. “Poor Helen-Mary. I can’t imagine who would do this to her.”

  “I guess that’s my job,” I said, somewhat disappointed. So much for a frivolous afternoon of primping for my date.

  “It seems obvious to me what happened,” Jules said.

  “You mean aside from someone shoving a golf club into her chest?” I asked.

  “Well, last time I checked, nobody golfs alone,” Jules said. “I mean, I would never be caught undead golfing because it’s a lame activity, but for the losers who do it, they do it in groups.”

  The judgmental vampire was right. Helen-Mary had to have been golfing with someone. “Okay,” I said. “You take the body to the lab and I’ll talk to whoever’s running the clubhouse.” I wasn’t a golfer, so I had no idea what the lingo was for any of this. It was difficult enough learning all of the supernatural terms in Divine Place.

  I grumbled all the way to the clubhouse. Every time I was finally able to relax and enjoy the afterlife, something happened that required my attention. I was starting to truly understand suffering.

  The clubhouse was empty except for the leprechaun behind the counter. The little green guy had to be standing on a step stool; there was no way he could see over the top of the counter without help.

  “Hey, I have a question for you.”

  “No, those shoes aren’t appropriate footwear for the golf course,” he said.

  I glanced down at my sandals. “That’s not my question. Was Helen-Mary golfing by herself?”

  He snorted. “No, of course she wasn’t golfing by herself. Who does that?”

  I tapped my fingernails on the counter. “Okay then, Marvin the Martian. Who was she with?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m the marshal and Helen-Mary has been obliterated on the golf course. We just found her body in the pond.”

  The green drained from the leprechaun’s face. “Agatha. She was with Agatha.”

  “You say that as though I should know who that is.”

  “Agatha is another witch in the same coven,” he said. “They work together.”

  “You mean they make potions together?”

  The leprechaun started to replace golf balls in the buckets, his hands shaking, and I desperately wanted to peer over the counter and see if he was on some kind of platform.

  “I guess so,” he said. “I’m not really in the loop on witchy business.”

  “Did you see Agatha leave?”

  “No,” he said. “But that’s not unusual. Sometimes only one player comes in to return the equipment.”

  “There was only one golf club at the scene,” I said. And that was the one found lodged in the witch’s chest.

  The leprechaun’s tiny nostrils flared in annoyance. “And you didn’t bring it in?”

  “Can’t. It’s evidence now.”

  He froze. “Evidence?”

  “Seems to be the murder weapon.”

  He released a breath. “In that case, you can keep it. Consider it a gift.” He scratched the nape of his neck. “Now that you mention it, I think Agatha brought her own club. Some supernaturals prefer to bring their own because they’re made of other substances.”

  “What do you mean? They’re not iron or steel?”

  “The ones with sensitivity to iron tend to wear gloves or use wooden or rubber clubs.” He hesitated. “Not the vampires. They don’t like the wooden ones either.”

  “What about you?”

  He held out his tiny green hands. “Leprechauns are impervious to iron. I can touch anything here without a problem. It’s one of the reasons why I got the job. The boss isn’t worried about me harming myself. The last thing he wants is the HOA getting on his case about labor violations.”

  Leave it to Hera to ignite that level of anxiety. “Thanks for your help.”

  The leprechaun glanced around anxiously. “You’re not going to report this to my boss, are you?”

  I placed my hand flat on the counter. “I hate to break it to you, pal, but I’m pretty sure he’s going to find out one way or another given that someone was obliterated on his property. Look on the bright side, it’s not like he can blame you for what happened.”

  The leprechaun grimaced, clearly unhappy with my answer. “If you happen to talk to him, could you mention that there’s nothing I could’ve done to change the situation? I really need this job.”

  I’d been in his shoes many times before—desperate to keep a job—although my feet were probably five times the size. “I can’t make any promises but I’ll do my best.”

  He smiled and handed me a dull gray coin. “A token of my appreciation.”

  I glanced down at the small round object about the size of quarter. It was heavier than I would’ve expected for a coin. “I thought leprechauns operated on the gold standard.”

  “I ran out a few decades ago. I’ve been hoarding these iron coins ever since because not too many supernaturals here can handle them.”

  “Not enough of them to allow you to quit your job, I guess.”

  His expression soured. “There’s never enough. That’s the problem.”

  “Purgatory, amirite?” Not one to turn up my nose at free money, I slipped the coin into my pocket.

  Chapter Three

  I hovered in the doorway of Hera’s stylish office while Randolph ran through a list of village issues. As much as I dreaded playing the role of harbinger of doom, I didn’t see a way around it. Someone had to tell the president of the HOA about Helen-Mary and, as the marshal, it seemed that someone had to be me.

  “Also, Madam President, the Zone 2 pool filter is clogged again.” The elf rolled his eyes at me. “Werewolves again.”

  “Send someone to handle it now,” Hera said. Her frosted brown waves were pulled into a tight chignon and delicate pearl earrings adorned her lobes. She wore a pale pink blouse that could only be described as the epitome of feminine flounce. “There’s a synchronized swimming competition there in two hours and I do not want to listen to whining sirens.”

  “You’d call the fire department for a clogged filter?” I asked.

  Hera gave me a withering look. “No, I mean actual sirens. They have a team in the competition.”

  Randolph rubbed his hands together. “Ooh, that’s right. I was planning to watch them. They usually win, but the mermaids have an excellent team this year.”

  “Wouldn’t they always have an excellent team?” I asked.

  He pulled a face. “You’d be surprised. Some of those mermaids don’t have a rhythmic bone in their body. They move like water robots.” He mimicked their jerky movements.

  Hera cleared her throat to draw his attention back to the matters at hand. “Anything else, Randolph?”

  The elf got the not-so-subtle hint. “Right. Yes. Someone stole the Aphrodite statue from the fountain in Zone 1.”

  Hera blew an exasperated breath. “Again? Why can’t they leave that one alone?”

  “You know why, Madam President,” the elf said cryptically.

  Hera tapped the end of her quill on the desk and I noticed that it was a peacock feather. She must pluck the ones in her yard. Instead of farm-to-table, it was farm-to-desk.

  “Assemble a team to find it, but don’t put it back at the fountain. Bring it to one of the dwarfs,” the goddess said.

  Randolph’s mouth formed a sly grin. “This is why you’re in charge, Madam President.”

  My curiosity was piqued. “What will the dwarf do?”

  “A little redesign,” Randolph said. “The dwarfs are handy with a chisel.”

  “They’ll do what? A breast reduction?” I asked.

  “No, the dwarfs can stop them from…” Randolph hesitated. “Let’s just say that the breasts are a functional part of the fountain and some villagers think it’s fun to take the statue and fill it with the beve
rage of their choice.”

  My eyes rounded. “Oh. Poor Aphrodite.”

  “Thankfully she’s not in Divine Place,” Hera said. “I can imagine the fuss that would induce.” She shook her head. “Such a drama queen, that one. A relief to be rid of her and her constant need for admiration.” Her gaze flicked to the elf. “Will that be all?”

  Randolph gave a quick nod. “Yes, Madam President. Would you like me to stay for this?” He jerked his head toward me.

  “Unlike Aphrodite’s statue, I’m not a this,” I objected.

  Hera folded her hands primly on the desk. “I can handle Marshal Worthington, thank you.”

  The elf darted from the room, on a mission to save the Zone 2 pool from unwanted hair and Aphrodite’s breasts from unwanted lactation. It was as though Divine Place was dealing with the effects of pregnancy hormones.

  “What is it, Marshal Worthington?” Hera’s scrutiny always felt like the equivalent of a supernatural MRI. I instinctively hugged myself to prevent her from seeing my internal weak spots.

  “Um, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there’s been an incident.”

  Only the slightest movement of her eyes registered her surprise. “Not another obliteration?”

  “I’m afraid so,” I said. “Helen-Mary was found on the Gods Complex golf course with a golf club wedged in her heart.”

  Hera was quiet for a moment as she digested the news. “Helen-Mary was a highly respected witch. This won’t sit well with the community, especially her coven.”

  “No, I guess not.”

  Her focus on me became laser sharp. “Any leads?”

  “I’m just getting started. She had a golfing buddy who disappeared before the end of their game. I’ll start with her.”

  “Not Agatha,” Hera said.

  “That’s her. Do you know her?”

  “Yes, Agatha and I play bridge together on Friday nights.” Hera massaged her smooth forehead. “This is most unfortunate.”

  “Do you know anything about their relationship?”

  The goddess seemed to look past me. “Agatha simply isn’t capable of hurting Helen-Mary. They were friends and business partners.”