A Charming Wish (20 page)

Hiss, hiss.
Mr. Prince Charming batted the air.

“
Adeline has her!” I threw
Madame Torres in the bag and thrust my hands to the side. I didn’t
care if the Mary’s knew I was gone or not. I had to save Faith from
a scorned Adeline.

Chapter Twenty-Four

I stood on the side of the Piggly
Wiggly. I made sure I didn’t teletransport inside in case someone
saw me. The cupcake car was gone, but Adeline’s was there. I hoped
I wasn’t too late.

The Piggly Wiggly was busy. Customers
were in every aisle. I headed over to produce. Maybe George was
there and I could use him for backup.

There he was, stacking the Gala apples
in a perfect pyramid.

“
Hi, George,” I spoke
quietly. “I’m not sure if you remember me. . .”

“
Yea,” He smiled. I could
see how Faith and Adeline fell in love with his playboy looks. He
was handsome and his smile was to die for. Not like Oscar, but
pretty close. “You’re June from that little shop.”

“
Yes.” I looked around to
make sure there weren’t any customers present. “I’m looking for
Adeline.”

“
I haven’t seen her.” He
cut the lid of the last box of apples and started to stack those.
“She said she wasn’t feeling good and for me to take care of the
all the deliveries.”

“
Did you call her about an
hour or so ago telling her there was a delivery problem?” I
questioned. I had to see if he knew what was going on.

Out of the corner of my eye, the
hitman was coming through the front sliding doors.

“
Okay, there is no time
for this.” I grabbed George by the arm and shielded myself from the
hitman seeing me. He was obviously there because Adeline had called
him about a tied-up Faith Mortimer.

What was he going to do? Off her here?
Or take her tied-up and off her somewhere else?

“
What are you doing?”
George jerked away. “Maybe you need to take a few of your own herbs
from that wacky shop that Adeline believes in so much.”

Whacky shop?
Okay, I’d let that one slide until after we saved
Faith and Adeline was in the loony bin or jail where she deserved
to be.

“
Maybe so, but I think
Adeline knows about your affair with Faith from the Wicked Good
Bakery in Whispering Falls.” I rushed the words out of my mouth as
his face dropped.

“
You know about that?”
There was an ‘oh crap’ cheater look on his face. There was panic in
his voice. “Adeline knows?”

“
Not only does she know,
but I believe she has Faith tied up and about to have her hitman
kill her and possibly you.” My legs felt wobbly as I told him about
Adeline’s crazy rant. “I think she is responsible for the death of
Kenny. . .” I knew he didn’t know who Kenny was. “He was a supplier
of mine for my
wacky
shop
. You see, Adeline would do anything
to keep you from never leaving her.”

“
You mean Kenny who is yea
tall and Indian?” He held his hand over his head.

“
Yea! You know him?” I
turned George a little to the left as the hitman walked down
another aisle. He was looking around and I could only assume he was
looking for Adeline.

“
He’s the one who sold us
the Ding Dongs.” He talked fast. “As a matter of fact, Adeline was
so mad when he told her they were discontinuing the line. She went
crazy on him, right here in the store.”

I gasped, panting in
terror. She
did
kill Kenny. She
did
break into Wicked Good. She
did
plan to frame me for all the
crimes, but it wasn’t too late to save Faith.

If she did kill Faith, everyone would
think that I did it. After all, Faith and I did have words and I
skipped out of the forest like the Mary’s told me not
to.

“
Kenny is dead,” I
whispered and turned him again when I saw the hitman go down a
different aisle. “ And I’m afraid Adeline is going to kill
Faith.”

“
What?” George spat,
shaking his head. “You are crazy.”

“
Just help me find Adeline
in the store.” I pointed out to the parking lot. “Her car is here.
Go look if you don’t believe me, and she has a hitman. I came
face-to-face with him at her house this afternoon after I followed
her from Kenny’s funeral.”

“
She went to Kenny’s
funeral?” George was getting more and more confused the faster I
talked.

“
George!” I grabbed him,
losing sight of the hitman. “I will explain all of this after we
find Faith and Adeline. It’s urgent.”

“
Fine.” He grabbed my arm
and tugged me along to the back of the store where Adeline’s office
was.

“
Ouch,” I shrugged. “That
hurt.”

“
Well, you need to be
pinched back into reality.” He opened the office door and shoved me
in.

“
George, stop!” I
screamed, not realizing he threw me into the midst of Adeline and
Faith. Only Faith wasn’t the only one tied up. So was
Adeline.

Instantly my intuition took a blow to
my gut.

My mouth dropped. I gasped, “George?
You are the killer?”

Chapter Twenty-Five

“
But, but.” I stammered,
looking dumbfounded between Faith, Adeline, and George, who had the
box cutter held out in his hand.

“
But, but, but.” He
mimicked me as he waved the knife in the air. “But nothing, you
wack job. Did you really think you could use your mumbo jumbo to
cure a love gone sour?”

I glanced over at Faith. She looked
more scared than a ten-year-old kid seeing their first horror
movie. Adeline glared at George. Her mouth was stuffed with panty
hose that I was sure, or hoped George got out of the hygiene
aisle.

The open and empty box of June’s Gems
from Wicked Good was on the desk.

“
It seems like you enjoyed
my namesake.” I pointed toward the box.

“
Shut up! If it weren’t
for Kenny coming in here and telling us that they weren’t going to
manufacture Ding Dongs, we wouldn’t be in this mess.” George pulled
a spool of string from his back pocket. It looked like the string
used to put asparagus stalks together. “But I knew there was an
alternative, the June’s Gems Adeline got from your stupid
shop.”

It was hard for me to concentrate on
his words when he was dissing my shop and my spiritual gift. He
eased closer with the thread taut between his outstretched
hands.

“
Wait.” I put my hand up.
“How did you know Kenny was going to be in Whispering
Falls?”

“
I knew he had your
territory and I waited.” His eyes narrowed as an evil grin crossed
his lips. “He had to show up somewhere, sometime. So I confronted
him about the Ding Dongs. I didn’t spend all this time with
little-miss-priss to be the veggie boy all my life. Ding Dongs were
the money line of this place. It was because of him we were losing
profits.”

“
Oh, Adeline. I’m so
sorry.” I put my hand on my gut. If only I would’ve listened to my
intuition a little more, rather than thinking she was some crazy
lovesick girl that would do anything to keep her man. I recalled
seeing the symbol of money when she was at the shop, but completely
dismissed it.

“
But there was no apparent
signs of struggle with Kenny.” I remember Petunia mentioning
something about a blow to Kenny’s head was what killed
him.

“
There wasn’t a struggle.”
George’s eyes conveyed the fury within him. “When he turned his
back on me, I shoved him as hard as I could, it was just like in
the movies.”

George acted out the way Kenny flung
forward with his arms above his head. He even had the look of death
on his face, just like I pictured Kenny had.

“
It was great. He didn’t
see me coming, just like I didn’t see how his little idea of
stopping the snacks was going to affect my life.” He snapped back
into reality and pulled the string tight. “Now it’s time to do
something with you three!”

“
What did Faith have to do
with this?” I stalled for more time. I couldn’t even wrap my head
around the situation, and didn’t know what to do.

“
Sweet, sweet, innocent
Faith.” He licked his lips as if she was as tasty as a June’s Gem.
“She was going to be the substitute for Kenny. Since I was already
in that crappy little town of yours, I decided to go in there and
steal the recipe.”

Faith looked down as he talked about
her. A tear dripped off her chin and into her lap.

“
Isn’t that right, baby?”
George’s lips thinned as he hit her foot with his to get her to
look at him, but she continued to look down. “Anyway, there wasn’t
a recipe in the whole damn shop, so I took every last June’s Gem
that was there.”

George walked closer, putting the
string closer and closer to my neck.

Damn!
If I had long hair, he’d have to cut through that, instead of
a direct shot with nothing in the way.

“
What about Adeline?” I
continued to ask questions as I tried to listen to my
intuition.

“
After I got the recipe
for June’s Gems, I was going to marry Adeline,” he sighed, “only to
lose her in a tragic accident on our honeymoon. But now I have
this! I don’t need her or you!”

He pulled papers that were folded in
half out of his back pocket.

“
Adeline was kind enough
to think I wouldn’t kill her if she went ahead and signed ownership
of the Piggly Wiggly to me.” His eyes clawed at me like talons.
“But she was so wrong. All three of you are going to
die.”

Faith let out a little squeak, but
Adeline had passed out. Her head hung to the side.

“
What the hell?” George
went over and pushed her arm with his foot. She fell over. “Shit. I
didn’t have to kill her. She did it herself.” He cackled like the
devil.

He was wrong. The potion had taken
effect and she was out like a light. At least she wasn’t going to
have to watch our fate unfold.

“
Now it’s time to take
care of you.” George reached out. I thrust my hands and went
straight into aisle five, landing on the hitman.

“
You!” The shaggy man
shoved me off. “You have been snooping around a little too
much.”

Instantly, my gut told me he knew the
whole situation and feared he was working for George, not Adeline
like I had originally thought.

“
I…” I jumped to my feet
with my bag still flung over my shoulder. Why on earth did I not
teletransport to another place? I ran out of aisle five and across
the produce section.

“
You better stop right now
if you know what is good for you!” The hitman’s feet were
thunderous behind me.

I stopped shy of the sliding front
doors as George stood with his arms across his chest.

“
Don’t worry everyone.”
George swung the knife my way. “We have a shoplifter here. I’ll
just take her back to the office.”

“
Stop! Police! Drop the
knife or I will shoot and it will hurt you worse than a little
cut!” Oscar had his gun outstretched with one hand and a plastic
salad container in the other.

George did exactly what he
said.

“
Kick it to me.” Oscar
ordered him. When George kicked it, Oscar put the salad down but
kept the gun pointed at George. “June, pick up the
knife.”

I did what I was told, completely
forgetting about the hitman. I handed the knife to
Oscar.

“
Put your hands up in the
air and then place them behind your head.” Oscar’s voice echoed
throughout the store. There was dead silence as George did what he
was told.

Even at a time like this, Oscar was
hot. Instantly my stomach felt better.

Faith? Adeline?

“
Oscar, he has Faith and
Adeline tied up in the office.” I watched as Oscar put George in
cuffs and then called for backup. “There is a hitman that works for
him. He could be back there.”

“
June!” Faith screamed as
she pushed past the hitman who was carrying Adeline. “You saved
us!”

She threw her hands around my neck,
and then around Oscars.

“
Thank you so much, Oscar!
You are a life saver!” She squeezed Oscar.

“
I’m sorry, do I know
you?” Oscar dazed at her.

“
Oscar Park, are you
okay?” Faith put her hand up to Oscar’s forehead.

I stepped in-between them. Faith
didn’t know Oscar had denounced his spiritual gift and now was not
the time to tell her.

“
He is in his element.
Shh,” I whispered trying to get her to hush.

“
Oh.” Her eyes lifted. She
leaned over with her hand next to her mouth. “This is
exciting.”

It
was
exciting to see Oscar in his
element. And it was great to see Locust Grove’s backup haul George
off to the jail. I was pleased to hear the hitman was really a
private investigator Adeline had hired to tail George.