Hoodoo Woman (Roxie Mathis Book 3) (16 page)

“Several kinds.”

A parade of waitresses brought all the food, it taking several minutes to get everyone the correct plate. I let my attention drift as conversation flowed around me. The talk was about anything but what we were here for. Maybe they were saving it for dessert. Harriet Collins never relaxed, watching the proceedings as carefully and unobtrusively as I did.

Plates cleared away, coffee brought to fight the post-meal lethargy, and conversation finally winding down, Alan nodded at one of the men seated closest to the room’s entrance. The man stood and set about pulling the accordion doors closed. Good. I was bored and ready to get down to business.

Silence fell. Alan looked over the group, making sure he had everyone’s attention. “Roxanne, I believe you know why we asked you here today.”

“I’d like you to spell it out, just so we’re clear,” I said. “If you don’t mind.”

The mayor exchanged a look with Ray as he exhaled a pained sigh. “It seems we have ourselves a little problem here in Blythe.”

“The first step to dealing with a problem is admitting it exists. Calling it by name.” I meant no challenge to Alan and I tried to make that clear in my tone, but I had no use for polite euphemisms.

“Britney Parker.” Alan maintained eye contact, earning my respect. “Her ghost. She’s haunting this town, and we need you to, to…”

“Do whatever it is you do.” Snide Helmet Hair took over when the mayor faltered. “Make this stop.”

I regarded her for a moment before dismissing her, meeting the mayor’s eyes again. “There’s only one way to do that.”

A savvy man, Alan Carver could tell he wasn’t going to like my answer but he asked anyway, earning more respect from me. With a pained look on his face he said, “What’s that?”

“Solve her murder.”

Funnily enough, everybody started talking at once.

Mayor Carver banged on the table, yelling for quiet. Once the crowd settled he addressed me. “That’s a hefty accusation there, hon. Real serious.” He wiped his brow with a paper napkin. “Real darn serious. Marty Holt declared her death an accidental drowning.”

“And then bought himself a new houseboat not too long afterward,” I said.

Helmet Hair snapped, “That hardly means anything.”

“What’s your name again?”

She raised her chin imperiously. “Marjorie Hickfield. I’m on the town council and my husband plays golf on a regular basis with Dr. Holt.”

“Bully for your husband.” I took my phone out and texted Ray.
You going to tell or do I keep you out of it?

With his phone chirping as soon as I put mine down it wasn’t exactly subtle but I didn’t care. He could either tell or not. He read the message and cleared his throat.

Marjorie Hickfield wasn’t through dripping her contempt all over the table. “Alan, I must protest this nonsense. This woman is at best a charlatan, a con artist who takes advantage of vulnerable people. At worst.” She stopped.

Then I remembered her. Oh yes, I remembered her quite well all of a sudden. Her last name had been something else back then, possibly Johnson or Jones or something similar. She must have been on a newer husband. When my friend Jody was terrified to death by Haschall’s ghost and every law enforcement in the county except for Ray was trying to hound me and my friends into a confession that could be used to send all or some of us to prison for murder, Marjorie Whatever wrote regular letters to the editor about us. She called us evil, devil worshippers, the product of heavy metal and video games and godlessness and everything else she could think of. My personal favorite was her diatribe against witches in popular culture, especially the part about how Samantha from
Bewitched
turned an entire generation of women into feminist Pagans, helping to destroy the nuclear family and I couldn’t remember exactly. Encourage dogs and cats to live together, maybe.

“What am I at worst? Do tell.”

Seething with disgust and poorly disguised fear, she spat, “Unnatural.”

“There are more things in heaven and earth, Marj, than are dreamt of in your little brain. Everything about what I do, what I am, is from Nature.”

It was hard to tell what incensed her more, my contemptuous attitude or calling her Marj. She sputtered with rage and for a moment I thought, hoped, she was might lose her temper completely and start cussing.

Ray spoke up. “Britney told me she was murdered.” All eyes turned to him, except for Marjorie who was still busy staring daggers at me. I ignored her as Ray continued. “That’s why I asked Roxie to come back. I had no proof and the hauntings were getting worse. I figured if Roxie could help me solve Britney’s murder, it would allow her spirit to rest.”

Harriet bowed her head for a moment. Alan put a hand to his chest. He said, “What do you mean, she told you?”

Ray told his story succinctly, appearing to want it over with. The things he’d revealed to me about how it affected him emotionally, he left out. I couldn’t blame him. When he was done one of the men said, “That still doesn’t prove anything. How do you argue with a coroner’s report?”

Another said, “A ghost can’t make a statement to the police. Or be called to the witness stand.”

I’d been trying to decide how much of our investigation to reveal. “Britney doesn’t know who killed her. But she was pregnant at the time of her death.”

A collective gasp circled the room. Marjorie said, “You can’t know that. You’re making it up to sensationalize this sordid business even more than it already is.”

Alan said, “How do you know these things? If you don’t mind my asking.”

“I held a séance to try to communicate with Britney. She confirmed the pregnancy and she told me she doesn’t know who killed her. I can also tell you she was planning to leave town.”

“A séance? You held a séance?” Alan drained his tea glass.

Marjorie said, “This is completely--”

“That’s enough,” Alan said, quiet but forceful. “Okay. Okay.” He worked to collect himself. “What do you need to do your job?”

“Now wait just a minute,” said one of the men. “We haven’t agreed to anything here.”

“And even if we do, how are we supposed to explain this if it gets out,” said the police chief. “
When
it gets out, because you know it will.”

“Keeping it out of the paper isn’t working anymore,” Alan said, impatient. “It’s all over those damn social network things. Everywhere you go people are talking about it. This town is being menaced by a ghost. Like it or not, whether you want to believe it or not, after what I saw last night I don’t doubt it. I don’t doubt it one little bit. We can either cross our fingers and hope this ghost goes away, or we can get help from someone who knows how to deal with things like this.”

Hell if Alan Carver didn’t make me want to vote for him right then and there. He had a commanding presence under the good old boy bluster, but I didn’t think it was just a politician’s trick. He was the real deal. Not concerned with anyone else in the room, I spoke to him as if we were alone. “I need the freedom to work, whatever it involves. I need Ray to help me investigate. In fact, feel free to put him in charge of that end of things and leave the spooky stuff to me. I need you to lean on Martin Holt so we can find out why he lied on his report and what his real findings were, if he even bothered to do an actual autopsy. And I need you to run interference with the Parkers because they will get in this at some point.”

Alan grimaced. “I tried to talk to Terry this morning but he, well, let’s just say, they’ve closed ranks. That’s gonna get ugly.”

“I know, and it’s gonna get ugly in my direction. I’ll need you to back me when it comes to them.”

“I may be the mayor but there’s only so much I can do when it comes to them. I don’t need to tell you how powerful they are, even nowadays.”

Ray said, “There’s something else Roxie’s gonna need.”

“What’s that?”

“To get paid.”

Marjorie exploded in righteous indignation. “If you think we’re going to spend one single dime of taxpayer money on this trollop, you’re as crazy as she is.”

“Hey,” I shouted. “I prefer harlot, thank you very much.”

For a split second Harriet’s facade of perfection wobbled as she almost grinned.

“This is dangerous work,” Ray said. “Y’all have a discretionary fund. Pay the woman.” He took a note card out of his shirt pocket and passed it to the mayor. “These are her rates. As you can see I took the liberty of estimating what she’s owed for work already done, like the séance and dispelling the ghost last night.”

Alan widened his eyes at whatever was on the card. “That’s quite a liberty you’ve taken there, Deputy.”

“Like I said, it’s dangerous work. She’ll need to be paid for what she’s already done, plus a retainer to secure her for the rest of the job.”

“Secure her?” Marjorie sneered. “What do you mean, secure her?” She turned to Alan. “We are not spending any of the discretionary fund on this nonsense.”

Ray said, “Roxie has a thriving business in Nashville. If we want her to stay and deal with Britney Parker’s ghost, she’s going to need at least a partial payment up front to make it worth her while. As for that fund, you all need to be thinking about what’s ahead. What are you gonna do if it gets out it’s dangerous to come to Blythe?”

Alan slapped the table and shook the note card at Marjorie. “That’s what I’m talking about! That very thing right there.” He turned his attention to me. “You’re from here, Roxanne. You know how important the Catfish Cavalcade is to the local economy. Especially in these times. All the jobs the county’s lost in recent years, we need all the tourist dollars we can get. And there’s a real chance Britney could target the Cavalcade.”

“It is a big deal,” I said.

“Ray says the ghost has been haunting places that meant something to her,” Alan said. “Britney was Catfish Queen her senior year. Years before that she was Little Miss Hushpuppy. When she wasn’t on the court she was volunteering in some capacity or other. She was always involved, even after she was out of school. We can’t afford to have the festival disrupted, people staying away because it’s not safe. What Christmas is to retailers, the Cavalcade is to this county, this town. It’s got to be a success.”

Little Miss Hushpuppy. God, I could just imagine Daniel’s reaction to that. Nadine never thought I was pretty enough for pageants, something I pretended to be grateful for but was secretly embarrassed by. Instead she doted on my cousins who entered as much crap like that as they could and never won. I said, “If she had that strong a connection it is likely the Cavalcade would be a target. Look, Alan, I’m happy to negotiate rates with you. But Ray’s right, I do have a business in Nashville this is keeping me from and this kind of work isn’t always the safest thing. But I want to help and I feel like we can work something out.”

Alan tucked the card into the inside pocket of his jacket. “I’m glad to hear that. Thank you, darlin’. I’m proud to have you home. All of Blythe is proud to have you home.” His tone said,
God damn you better be
. He was as tired of Marjorie as I was. He promised to have a cashier’s check delivered by the end of the day, for services already rendered and a retainer.

The town of Blythe had a witch on retainer. Not only that, that witch was me. In other news, up was down, left was right, the sky green and the grass blue. If the week got any weirder I might have to trade in my Howlin’ Wolf t-shirts and faded jeans for twin-sets and capri pants. Being hired by the mayor had the whiff of - dare I say it -
respectability
.

Daniel was going to have such a good laugh over this.

The meeting broke up, all the various important people returning to their important jobs. I lingered over a bowl of banana pudding as big as my head while Ray conferred with the sheriff on the other side of the room. I couldn’t hear them and didn’t worry about it. Instead I thought of what to do with the fee Mayor Alan and I had agreed on. In a conspiratorial whisper he’d assured me of a bonus if I dealt with Britney’s ghost before opening day of the Cavalcade.

Despite all the shock and protests, I had to wonder how many of them were scared of Parker family, and about the nature of Britney’s death. The Parkers were powerful people no one wanted to run afoul of, but this ghost business going public in such an undeniable manner really was a threat to the Cavalcade. When I was growing up, the town and the county were full of small manufacturing businesses that employed a few hundred here and a few hundred there. So much of that was gone now, either out of business completely or the jobs gone to Mexico or China. A festival like the Cavalcade, along with the fishing and hunting on Kentucky Lake and its environs, could make the difference between a decent year and a disaster for this community. That made it worth the risk of angering Andrew Parker.

Still, though, I guess it was good for the mayor and his cohorts to have someone like me as the fall guy in case things went bad.

The woman who’d greeted me earlier entered the dining room, looking at Ray and the sheriff as if debating whether or not to speak to me. I waved her over, curious about who she was. She smiled and quickly joined me.

“Hey, Roxanne, how are you? It’s good to see you after all this time.” Tall and willowy, she had light brown hair with blond highlights and clear green eyes in a softly pretty face.

“I’m good, thank you. You look so familiar but I’m sorry, I can’t connect your face to a name.”

She bit her lip. “I’ll give you a hint. Fourth period study hall. We were always the first ones done with our homework and we’d trade romance novels when the teacher couldn’t see what we were reading.”

“Oh my god! Gracie Matthews.” We’d sat next to each other courtesy of the alphabet but it was our mutual love of illicit romance novels that sealed our casual friendship. “You look amazing.” Then I wanted to bite my tongue, hoping I hadn’t hurt her feelings. The last time I saw Gracie she was more than twice her current size.

“Thanks. Yeah, I look different, I know. I worked hard to look so different.” She laughed took the seat next to me.

“Viking and Highlanders. That’s what you liked.”

“And you liked Regencies, even though you never did want to read Jane Austen.”

“Why bother? There was no sex.”

We had a good laugh and spent several minutes reminiscing. There was a shadow to her eyes and I didn’t miss the way she glanced over at the men in uniform every once in a while. It felt good, and genuine, to talk to someone who remembered me fondly but I knew there was more to it. When the conversation came to a natural lull I said, “Was there something you wanted to talk to me about?”

Gracie scooted her chair closer and lowered her voice. “Can I tell you something? In confidence?”

“Of course. What’s it about?”

“I heard you were here about Britney Parker.”

“Have you seen her?”

“No, but I might know something about her.” She seemed reluctant to go forward but at the same time whatever she knew was something she wanted to share. If for no other reason, so she wouldn’t be the only person to know it.

“Whatever it is, you can tell me. I’m not a cop. I don’t have to file any reports or tell any names.”

She bit her thumb, her face tight with concentration as she worked herself up to the decision to talk. “My sister is a social worker. Not here, she moved to Jackson. There’s a place there for kids who have been abused. Sexual abuse. They get therapy, one on one and in groups. And there are volunteers who work with the kids. Do art projects with them, get them into sports or just, I don’t know, whatever they can get the kids interested in. Some of the volunteers are survivors of abuse themselves. My sister said it was good to have people like that work with the kids, so they can see someone who got through it. Grew up in, well, if not one piece then close to it. Britney volunteered there.”

“Had she been abused?”

“My sister said she never admitted to it but she exhibited a lot of the same behaviors as an adult survivor of childhood sexual abuse. Look, I heard the rumors that Britney was really murdered. I don’t know what happened to her as a child but I know she was turning her life around. My sister said she did good work with those kids. I didn’t know whether to go to the cops or not. They said pretty much right away it was an accident. The family says it was an accident. I don’t know if my sister could lose her job. She wasn’t talking about a patient, but still. But if Britney was murdered, I don’t know. I thought maybe it was something someone should know. So when I saw you…” She shrugged.

“This wouldn’t be the first anonymous tip I’ve gotten about Britney.”

“I appreciate that. The anonymous part.” She opened her purse, took out a business card, and handed it to me. “Here’s my phone number if you want to get together for drinks. I looked at your website last night and ordered some candles. I’d love to hear about your business.”

“Thank you.” I was genuinely touched. Gracie’s friendly, welcoming attitude was even better than the mayor paying me to be the town ghostbuster. I glanced at the front of the card. “Loan department vice president. Sounds like a good gig.”

She grinned. “It’s not very exciting but it pays nice and I get to wear pretty clothes to work. Lame, I know, but we can’t all fight ghosts and demons.”

I laughed. “What?”

“I found the Blood Shots website that talks about you.” She shook her head, eyes wide with admiration. “You have done some wild stuff, girl. I always thought you were brave, but Lordy.”

What had Daniel been writing about me? It had been a while since I’d read his blog. Sounded like I needed to catch up. “I don’t know about brave. More like stupid and crazy.”

Gracie frowned. “That’s Nadine talking. Don’t sell yourself short. Look, I gotta go. My lunch hour was up ten minutes ago. You give me a call, okay? We’ll go out for Cajun food. I’ll buy you a Hurricane and you can tell me if the rumors about you and Ray Travis are true.” She flashed a wicked grin as she hopped up and left, waving goodbye.

The sheriff followed her out. Ray took the seat she’d emptied. I sat there looking at her card, not sure how to feel. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d gone out for drinks with a girlfriend. In Nashville I had a lot of acquaintances, contacts, people I was on friendly terms with. But real friends? I had Daniel. I didn’t count Shelby as she was not someone I confided in. Had I ever really confided in Blake much?

Ray broke into my thoughts. “You wanna go with me to hassle Martin Holt?”

“Sounds like fun.” I tucked Gracie’s card into my messenger bag and debated how to tell Ray what she’d said while keeping it anonymous.

“What’d Grace want?”

“You know her?” He nodded. I said, “We went to high school together. Just a little reminiscing.”

“Reminiscing? That why she looked so cagey for a few minutes there? You two had your heads together whispering.”

Two busboys entered the room and began clearing dishes, talking loudly until they noticed Ray and his uniform. We stood to leave. “I’ll tell you in the car.”

As soon as we were in the patrol car I said, “If I just say something came from an anonymous tip, is that enough? It might not even have anything to do with Britney’s murder.”

“Anonymous is fine with me.”

I told him. He took his hat off, propping it against the steering wheel, and wiped his face with his hands. “How much more disturbing is this going to get?”

“The sister could be wrong but if she’s a social worker used to dealing with kids like that, she’d know the signs.”

Ray tapped the wheel, then replaced his hat. “Let’s go to the hospital, talk to Holt. I’m ready to get the truth outta somebody if I have to beat it out of ‘em.”

The coroner wasn’t at the hospital. He’d never shown up and wasn’t answering his phone at home. Everyone had been too busy to do more than leave messages. Our next stop was his house in town, a big brick affair in a tony subdivision that hadn’t existed when I’d lived in Blythe. No one answered the door and Ray didn’t have probable cause to enter so we decided to drive to the marina and check the houseboat.

I said, “With so many jobs gone who lives in these houses?”

“Doctors. Lawyers. Retirees from up north. We get a lot of snowbirds now. Some of them live like this, some live in trailers that look like they could fall in at any time.”

“I hate living in a trailer. Feels so insubstantial. The whole place shakes if I sneeze too hard.” I leaned against the glass as the car took a sharp turn. “I miss my house.”

The minutes ticked by as we left town and headed for the lake. When Ray finally spoke again it took me a moment to realize what he was saying. “Real estate’s cheaper here.” He cleared his throat. “I mean, you know. All the retirees. That’s why they come down here. Cheaper cost of living. You can buy a house cheaper here than up north. Even Nashville.”

I didn’t respond. His meaning gradually sunk in. I thought about what Daniel had said two nights before, that Ray was still in love with me. I hoped it wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true.

What if it was true? What should I do about it, if anything?

“Look,” he said. “I’m sorry about the other night. When we argued.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not. I went over the line and it was wrong. You’re in a relationship now and I need to respect that. Instead I’ve tried to push you away, I’ve tried to be friends. I’ve flirted with you, I’ve picked fights. I don’t know whether I’m coming or going with you. I never did.”

“Ray, we don’t need to talk about this.” Especially when I wanted nothing more than to crawl in his lap and cry over breaking up with Blake. I didn’t have time to shed tears over Blake and I had nothing to offer Ray. I had work to do.

“I know you don’t want to but maybe I need to. I messed things up between us years ago and I’ve been paying for it ever since. I know I need to let it go. I need to let you go.” His voice got real quiet, so quiet I wasn’t sure I’d heard correctly. “If I can’t have you back I need to let you go.”

Let go. Yes. That’s exactly what he needed to do. Let the past go, like water rushing down a hill, carving a path through soft ground, leading to somewhere new. I clenched my hands around the straps of my bag, keeping my eyes on the blur of road. Looking at him would do me no good at that moment. The past reached out, a caress of memory. My heart filled with love and longing and a need so great it took my breath. Beneath that was an ease, a sense of comfort buried so deep it almost didn’t feel real. Along with it was a sense of something else, something I couldn’t even name.

Tears stung my eyes. I shut them, tight, willing this to stop, whatever it was. Silence filled the space between us. Finally I was able to think straight. At least part of what I’d felt had come from Ray. His emotions were so close to the surface, roiling under the placid exterior of his calm demeanor, that I was picking up on them in the tight confines of the patrol car. Not quite a spell, maybe, because it lacked deliberate intention, but it was a form of magic nonetheless. It shocked me, but not as much as the private admission that not all of what I’d felt came from him.

Some of it was from me.

I was grateful to see the sign for the marina. Ray turned in, parking in the row immediately in front of the walkway leading to the closest slips. I followed him to the coroner’s houseboat, not paying attention as well as I should have. We were almost to the boat before I felt the thick greasy stain of dark magic.

“Something’s not right,” I said.

Ray put his hand on his holster. “You got something to give me probable cause?”

“Consider it an anonymous tip.” I cast my senses in a wide net, finding the hot spot of a death curse in the middle of the boat. “Someone’s trying to kill the coroner.”