Laure Donavan 2 - Ghouls Night Out (29 page)

“
How long will it take her
to get here? What will she do?” I continued pacing between the
bookshelves.

“
You’re going to make a
hole in the floor,” Mae said.

I ignored her comment and continued my
trek.

“
I’m not sure how long
it’ll take her, Larue. But trust that she knows what she's doing.
She'll probably be here right after lunchtime. Try not to worry
until then. I don't think Becky will do any more harm before the
leader gets here.”

“
That's the thing. She has
Callahan now, too. Who knows what she’ll do next.”

“
Oh, dear.”

“
Yes, exactly. And another
thing, did you ever think that maybe Karyn's illness has anything
to do with Becky?”

“
Just stay put. I'll come
over as soon as I can. You shouldn’t be alone. Sounds as if she's
ramping up her plan, and we don't know what that plan
involves.”

“
Thanks for everything,
Dixie. I'll be here waiting.”

My gang of ghosts stood beside me when
I hung up the phone.

“
Do you want us to go spy
on them? See what they’re talking about?”

Anthony stepped closer. “Does a bear
sh—.”

“
Okay. Okay.” I waved off
Anthony’s words. “I know the rest of that saying. I knew I could
count on you guys.”

Chapter Forty-Two

“
So you’ll just poof in on
Becky. Listen in, and poof right back. Easy as pie,” I
said.

“
Says the woman who isn’t a
ghost,” Mae quipped.

“
Quick guys, here comes a
customer. I don't want them to see me talking to y'all.”

They nodded and poof…they were
gone.

“
Let me know if you need
anything,” I greeted the middle-aged woman who’d just entered the
store.

Instead of tending to my customer, my
thoughts wandered to what was happening next door. I didn’t want to
help the woman with a book—I wanted to watch the goings-on at Full
Cup and across the street. Bad bookstore owner but, under the
current conditions, I couldn’t help myself. Maybe the customer
wouldn't take long. I’d recommend a couple books and she could
scram. Under normal circumstances, I loved chatting with customers,
but not now. Although now that I thought of it, how often did I
ever experience normal circumstances?

“
Can I help you find
something?” My words were rushed, as I eyed the front door, longing
to be near it and watching the action. What would Seth and Mae hear
or see? I wouldn't put it past Mae to really let Becky have it if
she saw her. What exactly it was, I didn’t know.

“
Oh, dear. I’m in the mood
for a really good read.”

This lady had no idea what she
wanted.

“
I'm just browsing, I
guess.” She shrugged.

Ugh. I almost wanted to tell her we
were closing soon and that she'd have to make it snappy. But I
needed the business, so I didn't. Leaving her alone to browse, I
moved back to the counter and tried to busy myself while I waited.
Paperwork needed to be finished, but my heart wasn’t in
it.

I perused through a catalog. The woman
had planted herself in front of the toasty fireplace with a book.
Did she think this was her living room, for heaven's sake? She
leafed through the pages and I guess she felt my eyes on her,
because she glanced up and caught me staring at her. I gave a
half-hearted smile.

“
Is it okay if I sit here?”
she asked.

“
Oh, of course, by all
means,” I said through a gritted smile. Okay, I needed to behave.
Nobody likes a rude business owner. It wasn’t her fault I was in a
paranormal pickle.

She continued reading and picked up a
cookie from the table beside her. I always had cookies and coffee
available for customers to make them feel at home. It was my fault
she was acting as if she was in her own living room. I needed to
reconsider my hospitality offerings.

After about twenty minutes, Mae and
Seth returned. Smiles spread across their faces from ear to ear, so
I knew they'd been naughty little ghouls. When I finally thought I
couldn’t handle it any longer, the woman set the book down and made
her way toward the door.

“
Thanks,” I called after
her.

“
You're welcome,” she said
flatly, as she walked out the door.

She didn't even buy anything. After
all that, she left empty-handed. And she didn't even thank me for
the cookies.

As soon as the bell tinkled and the
door shut, I blurted out. “So what happened?”

They laughed. “We really freaked Becky
out. Mindy was there, and they were making plans to take a vacation
to Las Vegas.”

Damn it. I wanted to go to Las Vegas.
Mindy and I had discussed it.

“
So what else?”

Becky was telling Mindy that she
thought Callahan liked her. She said that he deserved better than
the likes of you. We didn't do anything until Mindy left because we
didn't want her to realize ghosts were around. She would have
ratted you out and told Becky you sent us.”

“
Well, I did, but that was
good thinking. But I’m not sure Mindy would have realized. She’s
not herself right now.”

“
After Mindy left, Becky
got in her car and pulled out this big old book. It had the word
‘Spells’ written across the front. She was at the love spells
section.” Seth propped his elbow on the counter.

“
Could she be working a
love spell? What am I saying? Obviously she is. Why else would she
be looking at love spells?”

“
She had another book, too,
darlin’. A dark leather one. It looked older than me. And that’s
pretty darn old. The pages were yellowed and the binding was
wrinkled. She flipped to the section on illness or, more
specifically, bringing illness to enemies.”

“
What! I knew she was
behind the illness with Karyn.”

“
This is a very ugly thing,
Larue. I think she is very evil Why she’s doing this, I have no
idea,” Seth said

“
I don’t know why either,
but I suspect it has something to do with the fact that Karyn
wanted me as the coven leader. I can't wait to tell Dixie what you
guys saw. This explains a lot. But now we need to fix
it.”

“
Is it fixable?” Seth
asked.

“
I don't know,” I said with
a worried frown.

Seth returned my expression. “I don’t
want Callahan to go through that again. I wish I had more energy to
stop her. I wish I were still alive.”

“
Isn't there something you
can do right now to prevent what these people are doing?” Mae
asked.

“
Not without the coven
leader. I'm not a witch, in spite of what Karyn thinks. I don't
possess their powers. She may want me to be the leader, but I’m
still clueless. I’m just a paranormal investigator who happens to
talk to a few ghosts. Okay, a lot of ghosts, but whatever. My point
is that without the power, my spells are useless, as evidenced from
the last time I tried to perform a spell without Karyn’s help. It
went horribly wrong, don’t you think?”

“
That’s not what Karyn told
you before. Don’t think we weren’t paying attention. We’re dead,
not deaf. She said you have natural talent,” Anthony
said.

I bit my lower lip and considered his
words, but didn’t answer.

“
At least you tried, and I
know Callahan is grateful for that. My grandson is a lot like me,
he can be stubborn and not levelheaded at times. He should have
asked you about the situation before he just assumed.”

“
Well, in his defense, he
did ask the first time. I tried to smooth away the things going on,
but I guess I didn't do a good job of convincing him. I should have
told him the truth, no matter the circumstances and
outcome.”

“
You may be surprised at
his willingness to understand. After all, he agreed to go with you
on one of your paranormal ghost things. That’s what you call it,
right?”

I grinned. “Yeah, that’s close
enough.”

“
You need to give him more
credit.” He patted my hand, but I didn’t feel his touch like I felt
Anthony’s.

“
You're right. I do, and I
will tell him. The truth. All of it. As soon as the situation with
Becky and Cooper is over. If it’s ever over. I have this ominous
feeling that things are going to get really bad. I fear for Karyn.
I don't know what Becky and Cooper will do next.”

“
Will she murder Karyn?”
Mae’s big eyes grew wider.

“
I can't stand the thought
that we're not able to stop her from doing that.”

“
You know you have our
support, anything we can do to help,” Seth said.

The offer was sweet, but they couldn't
help much, other than spy for me. Which was a huge help, mind you.
Look what they'd found out about Karyn. At least now, I had
answers. I knew what was going on. Although, I'd suspected it,
they’d confirmed it for me.

“
Thanks for everything,
guys. You all have been wonderful friends. I haven’t helped y’all
enough. Mae, you were going to tell me why you're hanging around,
but with my problems, I never listened. I know why Seth is still in
this dimension, he wants to help his grandson, but what about you?
And I want the real answer.”

“
Well, I wanted to help
Anthony. He really was in bad shape. But I was never able to do
what you did for him. Now, I just want to see what happens with
you, and I kind of like talking to Seth here.” She wiggled her
eyebrows.

“
So you guys are leaving
when this is over?” I asked.

“
It’s our time.” Seth
smiled.

“
I’ll miss you.”

Chapter Forty-Three

An anxious three hours
passed. The flood of customers helped me pass the time. I’d
advertised a coupon in the paper. It had worked just when I needed
it most. Having the distraction helped until the regional coven
leader could show up. Between customers, I'd peered out the window
looking for any sign of the coven leader, Mindy, Callahan, Cooper,
or Becky. One time, I noticed Cooper at the window of his
innocent-looking boutique, staring in my general direction. Tiny
shivers climbed up my back. Such a deceiving little shop with
its
fashionable mannequins posed in the
window and chic sign above the door. A store that looked so
innocent really housed something incredibly mean.

Had I seen evil in his eyes? Why had
such darkness descended on Magnolia? I couldn’t help but think I
was somehow responsible. Had all my ghost hunting unleashed an evil
presence that had attracted malevolence to the town? Becky had
blamed a demon. Maybe somehow she was right. I prayed that wasn't
the case.

A blue sedan came to a screeching halt
in front of the store. The wheels had barely stopped spinning when
a woman jumped out. I noticed her black heels first. I followed
them up her long legs to her long dark hair and elegant face. She
wore a long flowing dress, something I wasn't sure if I could pull
off with my height.

She yanked Book Nook’s door open and
hurried over to the counter.

“
Larue?” she
asked.

“
Yes,” I
mumbled.

“
I'm Martha Avery. I'm here
about the problem.”

Dixie entered before I could answer,
but I knew what Martha meant when she said problem.

“
I'm glad you're here.” I
wiped my brow with the back of my hand.

“
What's the status?” Dixie
asked.

“
Nothing has changed, as
far as I know. I noticed Cooper watching not long ago. I don’t know
what he’s up to. But Becky has been suspiciously quiet.”

“
That can only mean she’s
working on her next step.” Martha spoke fast.

She had no accent to speak of, not
that I noticed, anyway. I wondered if she was originally from this
region.

“
What’s our next step?” I
asked.

“
Can you close your shop?”
she asked. “We need to perform emergency magic.”

Emergency magic? This had gotten so
weird. How had I ended up in this situation? And I thought talking
to ghosts was crazy. “Will it work? It's not even dark yet,” I
said.

“
By the time we’re
prepared, it’ll be dark. We need to start now because we don’t have
time to waste.”

With only a few hours before closing
time anyway, I agreed without hesitation. Mae and Seth stood in the
corner and listened to the action while Anthony paced behind me
like a shadow. I closed down the register and grabbed my
purse.

“
You can ride with us,”
Martha said. “It'll save time.”

Oh no, that meant I'd be in the
backseat with Mae and Seth. As long as there was room, they'd come
along for the ride. But where would Anthony sit? No way was he
sitting on my lap. The ghosts were too nosy to stay away. I
couldn’t say that I blamed them, though. Especially Seth. After
all, his grandson was involved.

I hopped in the backseat of the
Cadillac. I sat on the left side; Seth sat in the middle with Mae
on the right. The women had no idea that ghosts were in their
presence. And I wasn't about to tell them. Imagine their faces if
they saw Mae West in the backseat.