Authors: Raven Snow
"Briefly." He laughed— a real laugh. "Your protector wasn't letting anyone stay for long. He even kicked your grandmother out!"
My eyes widened at that. Short of shooting her in the face, I couldn't think of anything that Wyatt could say or do that would discourage Gran from something she wanted. I had to put those thoughts aside, though, because my life and the lives of others were at stake.
There wasn't a performance going on as it was too early for most civilized gatherings. Fortunately, the door to the office structure was unlocked, and Oliver and I slipped inside without issue. Not daring to turn on the lights because they might show from the outside, we snuck along in silence.
"Ow!"
I swatted my best friend on the back of the head at his cry—which had been loud enough to wake the dead.
"Stepped on my foot," he hissed.
"I was poisoned yesterday! Believe me when I tell you that you will live."
"You're gonna pull that card for the rest our lives, aren't ya?" He grimaced at me, but kept walking.
Melanie's personal office was at the very back of the building. The peeled walls were the same shade of hideous red that they'd been when my late accountant had called it his office. A large, dark desk sat in the dead center of the room, made of a cheap, unknown material that was definitely not wood.
I pulled open all the drawers, shifting through the crap without any delicacy. On the other side of the room, Oliver followed my lead with the filing cabinets.
"I don't know about this, sweetie," he said. "Melanie Gross would do a lot of things for publicity, but kill someone? Her magic shop can't need customers that bad."
"This is her first year running the festival, right?"
"Right," he said slowly.
"And she fought tooth and nail for the position— one she'd never cared about before— right? I have a theory about that."
"Of course you do." He slammed the filing cabinet shut. "No evil spells or green goo here."
"I think her shop needs the publicity so bad, she's willing to waste months of planning and setting up for this farce of a magic contest."
Oliver mulled it over as he came to help me go through the monstrous desk. "Well... I guess I haven't seen much of anyone in her shop lately. But your grandma's shop hasn't been raking in customers, either."
"Difference is," I said, "Gran can afford to keep it open for the next two thousand years with no profit coming in. I figure she was a successful gold digger back in the day."
"Or maybe an assassin." The smile faded from Oliver's face. "Speaking of suspects and your grandma.... I mean, she does hate the empty-headed witches that enter and the whole contest. Plus, it's not like she's the most stable of old witches."
And Oliver didn't even know how old she really was. Neither did I, for that matter. A couple of weeks ago, a crazy, killer witch had told me that Gran had looked the same since she was a little girl— and the woman had been over eighty. I hadn't been able to confront Gran about it, but the issue was there, never leaving the front of my mind.
"No," I said firmly. "She's crazy, but she wouldn't kill anyone."
Probably.
He shrugged. "If you say so. But Melanie? Really? Where’s the evidence?”
I threw up my hands in frustration. “Where’s the evidence of anything? We don’t have the poison anymore, and Gran hasn’t gotten back to me on what it is.”
“Which she wouldn’t, if she’d made it.”
“Not helpful. All we have is the fact that the Funky Wheel and the contest are related to the killer in some way.”
“That points to you, not Melanie,” he pointed out.
I had the distinct urge to throttle him. “I wouldn’t put it past her to frame me— we hate each other.”
“Obviously,” he said. “We know something else, though.”
“What?” I was on his case like a bee on a flower. “What do you know?”
Shrugging, he said, “The girl I’m seeing that works at the station said they found a shade of lipstick on the victim that didn’t match her collection. Almost purple.”
“Maybe she borrowed it from a friend.”
“It was on her neck. And, more importantly, it wasn’t her color.” At my continued confused expression, he rolled his eyes. “You are so clueless. It means the shade of the lipstick wouldn’t have looked good on her.”
“Of course. I knew that.”
“Says the woman who wears a neon green wig.”
A bump from down the hall made us jump out of our skin. We peered out and around the door, watching as a dark figure pushed his way into Belinda's dressing room. A glance at Oliver showed him shaking his head vigorously at me. I nodded in disagreement, and we went on for a moment, bobbing our heads in different directions at each other.
Finally, I pushed him out of the way and tiptoed down the hall, stopping outside the dressing room door. The man had turned on the light and was staring at the pink room in horror. Despite his slight figure, the guy had a beautiful, almost flawless face.
"Can I help you?" I asked.
Now it was his turn to jump, whirling around to look at me with wide eyes. "Oh, sorry— I didn't mean to...."
I stuck out my hand. "Harper Beck."
Taking it, he said, "John Manos. Belinda's boyfriend. Or ex-boyfriend, I guess."
I inclined my head politely but decided to go without the niceties. "I heard you two were having problems before her death. I'm so sorry."
He snorted. "‘Problems’ is putting it lightly. We were all but broken up. She didn't like my job— I'm an actor."
"That must have been hard," I said, fishing for his reaction. If he was still mad about it, I could have been talking to Belinda's killer. But then, he had no motive to poison me. Most people waited to meet me before trying to kill me.
"Not really," he said. "I knew it was never going to work out."
I shared a glance with Oliver, who was standing at the door. "Why is that, Mr. Manos?"
"I hate pink."
I had Oliver drop me off at the Funky Wheel after we finished talking to Belinda's ex-boyfriend. While I was glad I could scratch his name off my suspect list— he was a really nice guy— it put me back at square one. And square one was titled “Melanie Gross.”
Was she capable of making the poison? Absolutely. Did she have time to put it in mine and Belinda's water? You bet. But could she actually kill people to further her own agenda? Even if one of those people was me? Undecided.
I really needed evidence, not just conjecture. So I piled into my little, burnt orange bug and chugged over to Melanie's house. The lights were off, and the door was locked with no car in the driveway. Unless she was getting around by broom these days, the witch wasn’t home.
I whispered an incantation I'd thought I'd long forgotten, my fingers brushing against the lock. The door flew open like someone had kicked it.
Frowning at myself, I entered the dark house. It seemed that my little fire trick the other day had had a bigger effect on me than I’d realized. I'd now used magic more in one week than I had since coming to Waresville seven years ago. It seemed the practice was like a slippery slope— and it was a descent I was going to stop right here and now.
As it was still ungodly early, the rundown block Melanie lived on was deserted, with no one to see me slipping through her front door. Upon entering, I was instantly surprised by the lack of furnishings in the house. The living room consisted of a couch and an uneven end table, both sagging a bit under the pressure of tons of clothes and knick-knacks. The kitchen was just as bereft, with tiles missing from the floors, and the stove cleanly removed from the wall. It seemed like she was doing all her cooking in a shabby microwave that sat on the rotting kitchen table.
Next to the microwave and covered in pasta sauce and an unidentifiable yellow substance, was a pile of bills. There seemed to be more envelopes on that table than I had received in my entire lifetime. Each one was stamped with large red words that said "overdue" or "late notice.”
Shuffling through them— which I knew was a federal offense— I whistled to myself. "I had no idea it was this bad."
I abandoned my felony for the upper level, which revealed a bedroom with only a mattress and a disgustingly brown bathroom. Despite myself, a feeling of pity and empathy overwhelmed me. The Funky Wheel insured that I never went hungry, but before coming to Waresville, I'd lived in places like this, never quite sure you'd have enough for next week's groceries.
But the last thing I wanted to do was understand Melanie Gross, especially if she was a murderer, so I kept going with my search. The second bedroom had been stripped of all furniture and turned into a kind of magic room. There was an awful purple cauldron— one that looked like it wouldn't keep water from leaking, let alone a dangerous mixture. Texts littered the floor, and I picked one up cautiously.
The book was open to a page about turning substances to gold. Checking a couple more, I found this rags to riches to be a common theme among her research. Then, the subjects took a darker turn towards black magic, death, and poisons.
"Not looking good for you, Gross," I muttered, thumbing through the pages of an old book that I recognized from my grandmother's store.
"Things are not looking good for you either, Miss Beck."
Flinching, I whipped around with my arms up to defend myself. Leaning against the chipped doorway way was Officer Koser, a smug look on his plump face as he picked at his teeth and eyed me with unconcealed glee.
"Breaking and entering is against the law," he said.
"Oh, stuff it." I held up my hands. "Just cuff me, already."
They put me in the same interrogation room as before while I waited to be processed and charged. The room was colder than I remembered and, without the fire of catching a murderer burning in my gut, fatigue dragged me down. Letting my head finally fall against the metal table, my eyes closed of their own accord.
The door opened with a bang that was sure to put a hole in the wall it slammed into. Detective Wyatt Bennett strode through, steam pouring from his ears, and his icy eyes lit up with fury.
Picking up my head seemed unmanageable just then, so I just watched him from a strange angle.
"Breaking and entering, tampering with personal mail— anything else I should add to the list?"
"Well," I said, "I did try to keep Belinda's cell phone from you, so, withholding evidence?"
"Perfect." He looked ready to spit.
Grabbing me by the back of the shirt, he hauled me to my feet and marched me out of the police station. The whirl of movement made my head ache like I'd stuffed it full of needles, but I tried to keep my chin up as we paraded in front of his fellow police officers.
He opened his passenger seat door and pushed me in, leaning down to fasten my seatbelt, even though I protested. I'd been poisoned, but I was not an invalid! Still, having him close made everything—including my impeding demise— a little more bearable.
"Careful." The words were slightly slurred. "Wouldn't want your cop buddies to think you're all cozy with me."
He gave me a hard glance, still leaning over, so his face was only inches from mine. Wyatt's cool fingers slipped behind my neck, tilting it for better access. Though his hands were gentle, his mouth on mine was anything but, stealing my breath and making me forget we were in public with about twenty people watching.
"Now, shut up and take a nap," he said, slamming the car door and headed over for the driver's side.
I was wide awake now, though, and I savored the mint taste of Wyatt on my lips as he drove us out of the parking lot and towards home. He glanced over in my direction and paid special attention to my tongue tracing my lips.
Shaking his head, he seemed to force his attention back to the empty road. "I don't give a damn what anyone in that station thinks about me dating you, Harper— hell, I'll yell it from the rooftops if you want."
"I think that'd be a little embarrassing for everyone involved." My smile slipped away. "Then why... at your house the other day—"
"I was trying," he said dryly, "to hide our involvement, so I could stay on the case. Department policy frowns on investigating a murder that your girlfriend's the prime suspect for."
"Oh."
He let out a long-suffering sigh. "I'd have left it to my colleagues, but I knew you'd stick your nose where it didn't belong. I wanted to be there— as a safety net— when you did."
I didn’t know quite what to say. My cheeks heated with embarrassment. While I was fully aware of my own faults and insecurities, I’d never jumped to a conclusion like this and been so wrong. Usually, logic ruled my actions, even if my smart mouth didn’t reflect that.
Wanting to apologize, but also desiring to drop the whole matter, I changed the subject. “I think she did it, Wyatt.”
“Who, Melanie?” My boyfriend left the car, leaving Detective Bennett in his place. “Not likely.”
“She needs the money— and you can’t deny the murders are cultivating interest in the Waresville witch scene. That translates into big money for the tourist traps.”
“By that logic, everyone with a magic shop in this town is a suspect— including your grandmother.”
“I wish everyone would step off Gran.”
Shrugging, he said, “Besides, people don’t murder for money.”
Now, he was just pulling my leg. “The
main
reason people kill is for money. That’s common knowledge.”
“Money is a justification, a bonus, in premeditated murders. People kill for more personal reasons than money— hate, jealousy, whatever.”
We pulled into his driveway, and he was opening my door before I had even really registered we had stopped. My movements were choppy and awkward, and I knew I was about to crash. While I'd been physically tired earlier, my mind had been alert. Now, I just watched through half-closed eyes as events unfolded around me, almost as if I were a spectator.
Pulling me up the stairs, Wyatt tucked me back into his bed, which was starting to feel just as familiar to me as my own. That thought startled me enough that my eyes flew wide open. Shaking my head, I shrank away from the idea of becoming attached to Wyatt. It'd already been demonstrated that he had the power to hurt me— more power than I liked to give anyone. If this kept up, he'd take my heart for his own, and I'd be completely vulnerable.
My thoughts fragmented as he pressed his lips softly to my forehead, turning off the light, and leaving me in peaceful silence. Well, almost silence. Below me, I could hear the sounds of Cooper and Wyatt bustling around the kitchen, talking. The words were indistinguishable, but the hum lulled me further into relaxation. A moment later, I was asleep.
Just like last time, when I awoke, Wyatt was gone. He was developing a nasty habit of leaving me alone in his house— in his bed— while he went to hunt for murderers. If that was what he was doing. I realized with a start that, after our little scene yesterday, he might not be allowed to work on Belinda's case. He might have even been in trouble with his boss.
Guilt overwhelmed me, and I flopped back into bed. Leave it to me to ruin a man's standing and possibly his career just because I was insecure. Worst of all, until Wyatt had seemingly rejected me in front of his friends, I hadn't considered myself an insecure person. I rolled around in a green Afro, for crying out loud.
But when I'd thought he was ashamed of me, all those old feelings of being the only kid in the class with old, patched clothes and dirty hair came back. I was suddenly ten again, with the other mothers at the PTA conference whispering about my lack of pedigree. It was an old hurt, something I thought I'd come to grips with.
But maybe I'll never stop being that hurt, insecure little girl.
Borrowing one of Wyatt's dress shirts to go over my disco shorts, I left the smelly, tie-dye shirt in the laundry basket. It smelled like Melanie's decrepit house— so did the shorts, for that matter, but they weren't so easily replaced.
I went through Wyatt's medicine cabinet in the small attached bathroom without guilt. I wasn't going to be a polite guest if he wasn't going to be a polite host. There was an inordinate amount of aspirin and Tylenol in there— one would think he got ear-splitting headaches on a daily basis. Then, I wondered if I was the reason for some of those headaches and grinned.
My search was cut short a moment later, when I found the aftershave. It smelled like Wyatt: a little minty and very fresh. I splashed it on generously, trying to get rid of all the stink of the last few fruitful days. It occurred to me that I hadn't showered in a while.
Cooper was waiting for me in the kitchen again, chocolate dripping from his stubborn mouth. This time, since it was almost late morning, he was wearing jeans and a dinosaur t-shirt. He didn't say anything about my appearance, just took it all in with an expression that was eerily like his father's.
"Dad said you'd take me to school today," he said finally. “He also said that he talked to that lady whose house you broke into, and she’s not gonna throw you in jail.”
I decided not to comment on the second part, as it was a whole other can of worms that I didn’t want to discus with Cooper.
"Your father drove me here," I said sweetly. "Does he think I'm going to take you by broom?"
Crossing the room, Cooper stretched up and got the box of cereal from the lowest shelf. He poured me a bowl with a liberal amount of milk, while I watched with a single eyebrow raised.
"A man wearing a pink cape dropped off your car right after I woke up."
Oliver. I decided not to tell him that he was to be forever known as the man with the pink cape. He'd get too much enjoyment out of it.
"Uh—" I looked down at my disheveled appearance again. It was like stepping into the past again, only this time, I was my mother, proud and scruffy, walking past the other mothers with her head held high. Her pride hadn't stopped the teasing, though.
"I'll call someone to take you— probably the cape guy," I said firmly. "I'm a mess."
"So?" He said it like only a ten-year-old can, and I smiled.
A couple of minutes later, we were in my hideous car, and I was picking at my clothes like I was headed to meet the queen in my underwear. Though I'd never gone to the elementary school, it wasn't hard to find in a small town. Basically every road led to one of the three schools— I liked those odds.
Cooper watched my nervous movements. "Dad says people fidget when they're nervous."
"Your dad has a big mouth."
He picked at the plastic on his metal lunch box and looked out the window. Apparently, Wyatt had left the responsibility of feeding his son up to me, as well. We were definitely going to have words when I saw him next. Cooking wasn't my specialty, but I'd managed to scrounge up some carrots, ranch, and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Altogether, I was feeling frighteningly domestic.
I asked Cooper where his dad usually dropped him off, and he gave me such a look that I almost flinched.
"Dad always walks me to my classroom. He says a lot can happen from the sidewalk to the building."
"Of course, he does," I sighed, parking in a spot that specifically told me not to. I'd take the ticket if I didn't have to parade myself in front of these people longer than I had to.
Cooper held my hand as we walked through the crowd, like he was afraid I was going to bolt— which was a distinct possibility. I found it a little odd, though. Weren't ten-year-old boys supposed to be all independent? Didn't I have cooties in his eyes? I decided not to dwell on it because Cooper seemed happy enough, and you couldn't fill a thimble with what I knew about children.
Really though, Cooper seemed ecstatic. He pulled me along from classroom to classroom, showing me artwork, where they played during recess, his math homework, and everything else under the sun. I couldn't help but match his grin, his excitement infectious.
When he showed me one of his own drawings on the wall, I was dumbstruck. "You drew this?"
Unlike the stick figures that surrounded it, the picture was pretty damn realistic. The first person in the drawing, I recognized instantly as Wyatt. Laughing, I told Cooper that he got the scowl spot on.
"That's me," he said, pointing to the short one in between Wyatt and the woman in the picture. She was wearing roller skates and had bright green hair— the focal point for the drawing. We were all standing outside of their house, looking as happy as any family I'd ever seen.
I swallowed audibly. "It's really nice, Cooper."
He pulled me along to his classroom without another word, introducing me to his teacher, not realizing I'd already met her. She'd taken her class on a field trip to the Funky Wheel a couple weeks ago. In fact, that was when I'd first met Cooper.
I hadn't known he was Wyatt's son then, and we'd argued about whether his dad actually knew everything. You can guess what side I was on. Since he'd seemed uninterested in all the other children, I let him follow me around for the rest of the day, helping me with the filthy bathrooms and making pizza for the other kids.
He'd reminded me of myself— a little awkward, a little bit of an outcast. I'd liked him immediately, and the feeling had only gotten stronger since getting to know him better. That just made all of this harder.
"Are you picking me up after school?" he asked as I went to leave. The teacher was starting the lesson, but he paid her no attention, his blue eyes focused on me.
"Not sure," I said, ruffling his hair, "but I'm guessing your know-it-all dad will."
Then, I said, more to myself, "I think I'll go ask him."
The ride to the police station was an uncomfortable one because I was as steamed as a vegetable, and no one was around for me to take my frustrations out on. I contented myself for the duration by swearing at the annoying radio personalities who broke up my jam session.
Wyatt was sitting at his desk, his head over a meticulously organized file. I could only assume that he had put that file together himself— no one else would be that thorough. He smiled when he saw me, but that smile quickly faded into a wariness.
Still, he rose to greet me like a gentleman. "Harper—"
"Let's get lunch."
His lips thinned. "It's nine o'clock in the morning."
"Breakfast, then," I said, grabbing his hand and towing him towards his car. "You drive; I'll yell."
He didn't argue, taking me to Charlotte's— his mother's restaurant and where we'd gone on our first date. I'd just wanted to pump information out of him, no matter how weak at the knees the man had made me feel, but it'd been the beginning of the end.
Now, there was more than just heat between us. He'd taken care of me when I was hurt, trusted me with his son. When I thought of him, I didn't just want to go straight to bed— though that was certainly part of it— I wanted to spend every waking moment with him.