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“First of all, I want you to promise not to freak out.”
Orville was looking straight into my eyes when he said it too. Of the two of us sisters, I was by far the less emotional. That kind of had me worried. Rightly so.
I arched an eyebrow at him but said nothing. What was there to say?
He took a deep breath. “Set in Paper no longer exists.”
I looked over at Sapphire. “Of course, it exists. We were there just a few hours ago.”
“Then it did.” He paused, his eyes still on me. “There was a gas leak in the back of their store and the whole thing went up like a bonfire on speed.” Another deep breath. “The building is pretty much gone. As far as I know, they’re still working on containing the damage now.”
And his first instinct upon hearing the news had been to rush over here and tell me. That made me think only one thing. He had considered the fact that the fire might have to do with our wedding.
I wanted more information on the gas leak, but first things first. Sapphire beat me to the next obvious question.
“Was anyone hurt?”
Orville hesitated. “Hurt, yes, but for what it was, it wasn’t all that bad. The shop closed at three and everyone left. Then the owner remembered that he hadn’t checked the gas stove in the break room before he left. Something he always did. It worried him enough to go back. When he flipped on the overhead lights, the whole place went up. Blew him back about ten feet, but he’ll live.”
“So, the leak was from a gas stove? Surely he would have smelled that before he left.” Or at least before he flipped that light switch.
He nodded slowly. “One would think so, yes. But he swears he never smelled a thing. He said he has a cold. Least of his worries right now.”
Thinking back, the man had sounded a little nasally. That could mess with one’s sense of smell. But still...
“And they’re sure it was a gas leak?” Sapphire asked.
Good question. We both stared at Orville.
He swallowed again. “Right now, that’s the going theory, yes. But it might be a day or two before that can be confirmed. The fire marshal will have to have time to do his investigation.”
“So, it could have been a careless mistake, or it could have been arson. Right?”
Orville looked at me. “I know what you’re thinking. First Reverend Castle, and now this. Well, stop thinking that! This isn’t about our wedding. Who in their right mind would go to this much trouble just to stop two people from getting married? And we don’t even know that this was anything more than a very coincidental and careless mistake.”
True. But it sure didn’t feel that way to me. Not to mention the fact that Orville had come straight here to tell me. That said something too.
I thought it was time to have another heart to heart discussion with Orville. But I didn’t really want a witness for it.
Sapphire must have read my mind because she stood and looked down at me. “I need to be getting home to Archie. Don’t let this stress you out. Invitations aren’t a deal-breaker, you know. If all else fails, we’ll print the darn things out ourselves. Amie is pretty creative with that sort of thing. I’m sure she can pull something spectacular together for us. Let me handle that part of things, okay?”
I nodded. Like I was going to complain about handing off another item on the list. That reminded me about the dress in her trunk, though. Orville and I saw her into her car, and I retrieved the wedding dress before she left.
“Please tell me it isn’t bad luck for me to see the wedding dress before the wedding. I don’t think we could take any more bad karma right now.”
“I agree one hundred percent.” I paused. “I think that only applies if the dress is actually on me. But even if that isn’t the case, I still think we’re safe here. This dress isn’t going to look like this by our wedding.”
He arched an eyebrow at me but didn’t say anything.
“Have you arranged your tuxedo yet? Or are you going with just a suit? I’d be fine with that, you know.”
Orville chuckled. “You might. But Sapphire wouldn’t. Archie called me today from the airport. He’s arranged a time for the two of us to go in and get fitted for tuxes. He insists the expense is on him.” He fidgeted. “I’m not sure how I feel about that. I’m hoping I can change his mind. Especially as I don’t think he’s talking rented tuxedos here.”
Neither did I. Renting wouldn’t be the Mineheart way.
We went back inside, and I picked up the bouquet. I needed to get those daisies into water before they started to wilt. Orville followed me into the kitchen.
While I reached into the cupboard for a vase and filled it with water, Orville took the plastic wrapping off the flowers.
“Why is there a cake in the trashcan?”
“The Frankencake was too ugly to eat. That’s what Sapphire said, anyway.”
“I see. I’m guessing that was a failed experiment on a wedding cake?”
“It was.” I plopped the flowers into the water and turned to face him, my arms crossed defensively. “I’m starting to feel like maybe this wedding wasn’t meant to be, Orville.”
He crossed the few steps between us and put his big, strong arms around me. Then he bent down and kissed the top of my head. Normally, I didn’t like it when he did that. Today? Today, it felt comforting.
“I had a bad feeling you’d be feeling that way. That’s why I came over as soon as I heard about that print shop. All I could think of was... what if?”
“You know omens are real, don’t you?”
He squeezed me a little tighter to his chest. “I don’t think of these as omens, Opal. Omens are things nature gives us, aren’t they? What we have now is a man who was murdered by an actual human being and a building that was destroyed by what might turn out to be carelessness. Even if it turns out to be arson, we’re still talking about a human being. Not nature. And not the Goddess. Do you really think She is against the two of us? After all she went through to get us together?”
Well, when he put it that way. He must have felt me relax a bit because he finally let me go and stepped back to give me a proper kiss.
“And just for the record, Opal Ravenswind, I intend to marry you on June fifth under the light of the full moon. Omens be danged. Understand?”
I nodded. I believed him.
I also believed he would do everything in his power to make sure that all this mystery was cleared away and dealt with long before our I dos.
Of course, he had his way of doing that, and I had mine.
***
THE NEXT MORNING WAS Sunday. My one and only true sleep in day of the week. Well, not this week.
Orville’s wishes or no, I was determined to get involved at this point. It was just too important not to.
Now, don’t take that as I sign that I don’t trust my man had the smarts and ability to do this on his own. I do. Totally. But we were working on a mighty close deadline, and a little help from me might just make the difference.
As long as I stayed away from the station and his official investigation, I should be fine. After all, a woman has a right to visit some of her neighbors, doesn’t she? As far as I knew a little neighborly conversation wasn’t against the law.
Even if, deep down in my heart, I knew it was against Orville’s wishes. I’d just have to deal with that later. He would too.
First things first. Get the killer behind bars where they belonged. All the better if said killer had absolutely nothing to do with either of us or our upcoming wedding. But we wouldn’t be able to rest assured of that until we caught them. At least I wouldn’t.
Kimberly had supplied a list of all the younger girls in the congregation that she could recall. I’d be going online this afternoon to see if the church had some kind of member roster to make sure I didn’t miss anyone. But for now, this was a good place to start.
Unfortunately, Kimberly wasn’t so free with the information on who I should start with. I got that. Most of these girls were her friends. As much as the woman wanted to help me, she didn’t want to hurt her friends, either.
To her mind, I’m kind of thinking the killer did the world a favor in taking out Reverend Castle. That wasn’t a healthy way to look at things. That didn’t mean it couldn’t also be true. A man like that had no right being a shepherd of God.
But there was something I had to do even before my visiting rounds. I had some spell work to do.
What with everything going on, there was a whole lot of negative energy built up in this house. I needed it gone. As soon as possible too. Negative energy never helped anything, but it sure as heck could make things seem worse than what they actually were.
I hoped that was the case here. Get some positivity back in the house and see how that affected my feelings. Hopefully, it would be for the better. Give me a clearer head to work this thing through.
No spell bag for this one, either. Spell bags were great for last-minute spell casting, don’t get me wrong. But for something this bloody important, I wanted fresh ingredients. Luckily, everything I needed was right in my back yard.
My witch’s garden was one of the finest in the world. I’d stake good money on that. A sure bet, in my mind.
Gathering the ingredients was the part that took the longest. After that, it was just a matter of putting a match to them and walking around the house putting a little magic behind the smoke. And yes, there was a little chanting involved too. I kept it down, though. Just because I wasn’t taking advantage of sleep-in day didn’t mean the same was true of the others.
The farmhouse wasn’t a small one. By the time I’d cleared the energy of the downstairs, I was officially wiped out of magical power. The upstairs would just have to wait for tomorrow. I hardly ever went up there, anyway. And, as selfish as it may sound, right now I was thinking mainly of myself.
I needed a clear head, dang it all.
Flopping onto my sofa, I glanced at the clock. Not quite time yet for the church service to let out. I was fairly certain that the church would still have services today. They needed them now more than ever, things being what they were. I just hoped the traveling reverend was a better man than the last one that had taken that pulpit.
That was another reason I wanted to make my rounds today. It was Sunday. A lot of the girls I wanted to talk with either were still in school or held down jobs. I was going on the theory that Reverend Castle was more a hound dog than a pervert. That meant I was going to concentrate mostly on the girls over eighteen.
Part of that was because I really didn’t want to think about it being different. If the man hadn’t at least respected the age of majority, then I was afraid I’d have to agree more with Kimberly’s whole take on his murder. Good riddance.
Plus, of course, I didn’t like to think about a young teenage girl being a killer. Although, now that I thought about it, maybe that might lead to the killing being in self-defense? I could totally get behind that theory one hundred percent.
And if it was a younger girl involved, the killer could also be a father or mother that found out. Or an older boyfriend. Gah! My conversation with Kimberly had opened the door from no suspects to an abundance of them. Glancing at the short list of names in front of me, I truly had no idea where to start.
At least I’d had the forbearance to get Kimberly to give me their ages, as well as their names. That was something. Taking a deep breath, I decided to start with the oldest.
Cassidy Mallard. According to Kimberly, she was around her age, twenty-two. Yes, poor Kimberly had started having kids far earlier than she should have. Not that all of that had been her fault.
This girl was a young mother too. Only in her case, the father of her child had married her. At least that’s what the word on the street was, anyway. As far as I knew, no paternity tests had ever been done. And I’d met the young family. Baby Samantha really didn’t look all that much like her dad. And Cassidy had a bit of a reputation for not saying no to a man.
I pulled up a picture of the reverend to have his face clear in my mind. There was a reason I was starting with Cassidy.
Knowing what I knew now, I kind of wanted a closer look at baby Samantha.