Free Novella, Chapter 6
It’s time for Chapter 6 of my free Halloween novella. If you haven’t read the first 5, they’re here:
Chapter 1
This novella is part of the Superior Bay Cozy Witch Mystery series, and I’ll be posting chapters here every week or faster until it’s all here for you. Enjoy!
Chapter 6
“No. No way. It’s too dangerous.” I crossed my arms to emphasize the words.
Aunt Dru gave me the look. The one she’d used on me since I was three, when my parents disappeared, and she became my guardian. It involved tight lips, slightly raised eyebrows, and a clenched jaw. The look sent dread up and down my spine.
Involuntarily, I backed up half a step, as though she may hit me with the broom she held. She’d never done that, but the look indicated she might. Still, I shook my head. “I’ll follow Darwin and see what I can dig up. I don’t want you going on a date with him, trying to get intel. He may figure out what you’re doing, then you’d be in serious doo-doo.”
“Willow Morgan!” Her tone mimicked my first-grade teacher, when she caught Joel Stoddard breaking crayons on purpose. “I’m a witch, too, in case you’ve forgotten, not some doddering old lady with no way to defend herself. I know he could be dangerous.”
“I still don’t like it.”
“Too bad. I didn’t give the decision to you to make.” She lifted her chin, eyes glinting a challenge at me.
A challenge I wasn’t going to take. After all, she was still my aunt. I respected her like no one else. “Fine. But I’m going to be close by.”
She heaved a sigh like someone had told her she had to put up with eating her least favorite vegetable, lima beans, at every meal every day for two months. “I suppose I can’t stop you.” She grabbed her purse and opened the door. “You can drop me off a couple blocks from the Landing.”
“I wanna eat at the Landing,” I whined.
“Then get your own date to take you.” She winked over her shoulder to take the sting out of the words.
“Maybe I will,” I muttered. “As soon as we prove Darwin Swanson killed Edward Thorne.”
I parked a few blocks from the Landing Bar and Grill and let Aunt Dru walk in alone. I went around a couple blocks in the other direction and took up a seat on a bench across the street, positioning myself behind a lamppost, so Darwin wouldn’t see me.
Aunt Dru wasn’t there yet, but I spotted Darwin, wearing plaid pants and a burgundy sweater, perusing the menu at a round table by the restaurant’s front window.
I wondered what my aunt saw in this guy. She’d never struck me as someone who’d fall for a man in plaid pants before. But maybe my opinion was skewed by his rough way of speaking to me the night before.
Or by the fact I was almost positive he’d killed Dr. Thorne.
Aunt Dru sauntered into view a moment later and accepted a peck on the cheek from Darwin. He pulled out her chair, then re-seated himself.
I tried using my witchy super-hearing to listen in, but the building’s thick walls blocked it. I didn’t see much point in using a spell to amplify my abilities, since Aunt Dru would report everything to me afterward anyway. My purpose was to make sure Darwin didn’t lose his cool and attack her. If he did, between my aunt and me, he’d be vampire toast.
Of course, the run-in I’d had with another vampire kept me a tad nervous. That guy had been strong, magically. Super strong. I hadn’t been able to do anything against him.
I’d learned a lot more about my power since then, though. I was learning from Aunt Dru, finally, after I couldn’t be bothered to spend time on studying magic for most of my life.
Until a couple of murders had jump-started my motivation.
And now we were working on a third investigation. Superior Bay was a small place—three murders in less than a year was unheard of. But that was neither here nor there. A third murder had occurred, right on my property, and I intended to solve it as fast as possible, so I didn’t lose even more business.
That made me wonder how Thorne’s death would affect my vet clinic. Who was going to take over Red River Veterinary now that he was dead? I had to assume it would be Dr. Sanderson. He was the junior partner in that business, after all. I supposed Sadie Thorne could retain a portion. Though it wasn’t settled law in Michigan yet, most people agreed a veterinary clinic’s majority owner needed to be a licensed vet.
It took Aunt Dru and Darwin a long time to eat. Like, a ridiculously long time. I jerked awake when my chin hit my chest, and I toppled sideways, banging my elbow painfully on the bench. I bit back a curse and realized the couple was leaving the restaurant.
They turned toward each other on the sidewalk, and I bumped up my magical hearing while trying to make myself as small as possible.
“Thanks for lunch,” Aunt Dru said.
“You’re very welcome, Druida. By the way, I hope your niece isn’t planning to continue the line of questioning she started with me after the party last night. I have better things to do than entertain such nonsense.”
She crossed her arms. “Willow has her own mind, and I don’t control her. She’s trying to be helpful. I’m sure she’ll be looking elsewhere now that you’ve answered her questions so truthfully. But, I did wonder, did you see what happened to Dr. Thorne, since you were talking to him right before he was killed? It seems so strange that no one would have seen anything, as crowded as the tent was.”
Darwin scratched the back of his neck, jostling a leather cord. It probably held the amulet he kept his stored energy in, from streams and trees, according to Aunt Dru. “When we finished talking, Thorne headed back toward his wife. Stopped to talk to a guy who looked like an exercise nut with crazy hair. I turned away to look for you. I heard the screams a moment later and whirled around to find Thorne crumpled.” He lifted one shoulder and dropped it. “There were lots of people standing around. I don’t know which one did the deed.”
Okay, so Thorne was the person Darwin had left Aunt Dru to talk to, but he’d told me he’d gone to his car immediately afterward, not stood around looking for Aunt Dru. But that wasn’t the part of what he said that bothered me the most. It was the part about the exercise nut.
My aunt frowned. “Such an awful thing to happen.”
He nodded. “I have to run, but let’s make plans for Friday night. I’ll take you wherever you want.”
She nodded, but I could tell she wasn’t thinking about their next date. He kissed her cheek and took off down the sidewalk.
After he’d rounded a corner, I jumped up and hurried across the street.
“Did you hear that?” she asked.
I had heard, of course, and the squeezing feeling in my chest hadn’t let up since he’d described Dr. Thorne talking to Jeremy. “Did he say anything else, inside the restaurant, that we can use?”
“He said he was talking to Edward about their club that night. It’s a weird thing—they pool their money to make more powerful investments together. Stock market, development property, that sort of thing. They get bigger returns than doing it alone.” She glanced in the direction the vampire had gone. “He seemed vague about it if you ask me.”
I started after Darwin.
“Where are you going?”
“I don’t trust him, and I want to know what he’s up to.”
Aunt Dru hurried to catch up. I braced for her to try to talk me out of it, but she remained silent and simply walked next to me. We rounded the corner and caught a glimpse of Darwin turning again, a couple blocks ahead of us. I increased the pace, jogging up to the corner before slowing to peep around it. Darwin entered a squat building.
When we got there, I gaped at the front door. My aunt, panting, caught up with me. “What is it?”
I pointed to the symbol carved into the wooden door. It was a stylized cross exactly like the one on the coin next to Dr. Thorne’s body.
***
See all my cozies right here.