Chapter Six

Today wasn’t the first time I’d thought about Susan’s demise. Back in eighth grade, I went so far as to plan out her funeral, including the music, flowers, guest list, and type of casket and headstone. I even drew out the layout for the memorial service, seating my parents, brother, and me front and center.

My mistake was writing it all down in my notebook, including the drawing, which my mom found while cleaning out my backpack during Christmas break. I could still picture Mom’s pale face and teary eyes when she asked what the memorial layout was. She knew the answer because I’d stupidly written “Susan’s Death Celebration” at the top of some of the pages, but she insisted I spell it out for her.

Lesson learned that day: When secretly plotting to eliminate a family member, don’t use titles on the funeral schematics.

Those drawings had prompted my mother to contact a counselor for Susan and me. Six months of weekly meetings later, my dad put a stop to it all. A short time after that, I overheard him talking about us to Mom in the garage, eavesdropping through the dog door when they thought they were alone. He could see the writing on the wall. No amount of therapy would ever fix our broken relationship. We might share blood, but we were too different, and both too headstrong. The best they could hope for was a truce until Susan and I were old enough to go our separate ways. The sound of my mother sobbing as he comforted her made my heart hurt, so much so that I vowed that day not to lower myself to Susan’s level ever again.

Unfortunately, that vow didn’t last.

“You have all of the kids’ gifts, right?” Natalie’s voice snapped me back to the present.

“Yep. They’re tucked away behind the back seat.”

I stared at the white world outside Doc’s kitchen window. The snow wasn’t letting up even a little, and now gusts of wind were adding swirls of icy flurries. Poor Doc and Cornelius were outside putting the chains on my tires, prepping it for the forty-plus mile trip over the river, through the woods, and down the mountain to my parents’ place. My fingers were crossed that tire chains would be enough.

Natalie leaned back against the counter next to me. “You killed everything that could spark a fire at your aunt’s place, including the Christmas lights, right?”

“Hey, they don’t call me an Executioner for nothing,” I joked. “I killed everything in Aunt Zoe’s fortress but her attraction to Reid Martin,” I added, grinning at my own wittiness about my aunt’s hot-to-trot old flame, who also happened to be Deadwood’s fire captain. “That hunka-hunka burnin’ love is hot-wired to spark Aunt Zoe into flames.”

Natalie’s grin matched mine. “Reid doesn’t just ignite sparks in Zoe, he lights her up from head to toe like a five-alarm fire.”

A snort of laughter came from the pantry where Harvey was loading crackers and snacks into a tote bag. “Good thing Martin packs his hose wherever he goes so he can put out the fire in yer aunt’s pants.”

“Oh, sheesh, Harvey,” Natalie said. “That was so corny it popped before you finished.”

I groaned in agreement.

“What’s Reid doing for Christmas, anyway?” she asked me. “Doesn’t he have a son somewhere?”

I shrugged. “He’s not spending it at my parents’ with Aunt Zoe, that’s what.” Not after the way my dad bellowed and pawed the ground when Reid showed up at Aunt Zoe’s door a few weeks ago, hoping for a spot next to her at the family dinner table. My dad’s threat to rearrange Reid’s handsome mug for breaking his baby sister’s heart wasn’t merely a blast of hot air and Aunt Zoe knew it. Dad had been the one she’d leaned on years back when Reid shied away from marrying her. Now the heartbreaker had returned, toting a pack of matches along with a fireman’s helmet full of charm, but my dad was ready with his own version of a fire extinguisher—two fists and a hefty rubber boot.

“I thought yer aunt was softenin’ up to Cap’n Smokey.”

“Oh, she is,” I said. “But I think she’s got tender spots on the inside that are still frozen solid. Unfortunately, until she tells my dad she’s changed her mind about letting Reid light a fire under her heart again, he’s going to shoot first when it comes to protecting her.”

“Bad luck for Reid,” Natalie said. “I’ve seen your dad work a gun. He’s a crack shot. But back to your closing up your aunt’s place, what about Duke, Bogart, and Elvis?”

“I made sure they have food and drink to last until …” I frowned in Harvey’s direction. “Crud. We have to stop by Aunt Zoe’s before we head up Strawberry.”

“Why’s that?” Harvey asked without looking up.

“I have to get Elvis.”

Natalie’s eyes narrowed. “What do you mean, ‘get’ her? Where are you going to take her?”

“With us.”

“Horse feathers, Sparky. Cartin’ a chicken to Christmas is nuttier than squirrel turds.” Harvey stuffed a bag of dried prunes in the tote. “Just fill up the birdy’s bowl with plenty of feed and that chicken will be so fat she gets in her own way by the time we get home.”

“Sure, Elvis will be fine,” I told him. “But Addy will be a mess once she sees you.”

The front door closed, followed by the sound of boots stomping on the doormat. The guys must have the SUV ready to crunch through the snow and ice.

“Vi, you can’t be serious about taking that dumb chicken all of the way to your mom’s. I know Addy has her leash-trained, but she’s not actually a dog.”

Cornelius walked into the kitchen, his jacket and black hair glistening with melting snow. “Did you know chickens can produce over thirty different sounds?” he asked Natalie, stealing a cookie from the bag Harvey had filled with the chewy version of chocolate and peanut butter heaven. “They have their own chicken language.”

“Thirty, huh?” Natalie guffawed. “That’s twenty-nine more sounds than my last boyfriend made during sex.”

I laughed. Picturing Natalie’s last boyfriend, I didn’t doubt her for a second. I turned to Cornelius. “Did you guys get the chains on okay?” I took a cookie from the bag, too, before sealing it and handing it off to Harvey.

Cornelius nodded. “The Tall Medium did most of the work. Southern living hasn’t allowed me much experience with snowy weather apparatus.”

“Whaddya mean, Addy will be a mess when she sees me?” Harvey set the cookies on top of the bag and closed the pantry door. “Makes no sense.”

“The only reason we were able to get her down to my parents without that damned chicken was because I told her you would be up here checking on Elvis every day. She trusts you way more than me when it comes to that bird.”

Cornelius rubbed his hands together. “Chicken origins have been traced back to theropods.”

“What are theropods?” Natalie asked.

“Dinosaurs from the late Triassic period,” Doc answered, joining us. Like Cornelius, he was covered with melting snow. “You ready?” he asked me.

“That’s over 200 million years ago,” Cornelius clarified for Natalie.

“Yeah,” I told Doc. To Harvey, I explained, “When you show up with me at my parents’ place, Addy will realize that her chicken is on her own for several days and freak out. The whole time we’re there, she’ll worry incessantly about Elvis being stuck in her cage.”

He harrumphed. “So, set Elvis free and let her run around the basement to her heart’s content.”

“No way! She knows how to open the basement door.”

“You’re kidding?” Natalie gaped. “Next you’ll tell me she learned the dance moves to ‘Jail House Rock.’ “

“I knew of a chicken named Cluck Berry that could put jigsaw puzzles together,” Cornelius told us. “Although the fifty-piece variety was its limit. Anything bigger and it would eat the extra pieces.”

I frowned at him for a moment, and then shook my head at Natalie. “I’m not kidding. Given free rein, that damned bird will molt on my comforter and hide eggs all over the house like a feathered Easter bunny.”

“What are you suggesting?” Doc asked, his arms crossed as he leaned against the wall. “We take Elvis with us?”

“What if she gets a wild hair and flaps and flutters all over inside your rig?” Natalie threw out. “We don’t want her distracting Doc while he’s trying to drive through that mess outside.”

She had a good point.

“We could stuff ‘er in yer tumbleweed wagon,” Harvey said.

“My what?”

“Yer puss-n-boots box.”

I looked to Doc for help. “Translate, please.”

“I think Harvey means Bogart’s cat carrier.”

Ohhh. “That’s actually a good idea.”

“I’m full of ‘em,” the old buzzard said with a shit-eating grin.

“You’re full of something, all right,” I said, snapping one of his suspenders.

“We need to hit the road,” Doc said, grabbing the bag of food at Harvey’s feet. “The snow’s getting deep fast.”

A few minutes later, we filed out the front door. I waited as Doc locked it behind us, leaving his porch light on but the rest of the place dark.

“What about Cooper?” I asked him, feeling bad at the thought of the grumpy detective coming home to a dark house on Christmas Eve.

I really needed to get over this newfound concern for the law dog. More often than not Cooper snapped his teeth at me when I tried to pet him. For some reason, though, I had a feeling that deep inside his barbed wire–wrapped heart hid a lonely flea-sized seed of love waiting to grow.

Then again, I had a history of misjudging men. Case in point, the two shitheads who had easily jumped from my bed into my sister’s behind my back.

Doc put his arm around my shoulders as we descended the porch steps. “Last I heard, Coop was staying at his mom’s tonight.”

“Good.” I handed him my keys. “Thanks for driving.”

He scowled at the road. “It’s going to be ugly going up Strawberry, but the chains should help.”

I looked at my SUV. “Is that a trident strapped on my roof?”

“Yep. That was Cornelius’s idea.”

We all piled into my Honda. Doc and Harvey took the front seats. I scooted into the back seat, playing monkey in the middle between Natalie and Cornelius. Doc backed out of his driveway. We traveled the few blocks to Aunt Zoe’s with no problems thanks to a neighbor who had a plow blade on the front of his old Jeep and a love for shoving snow around. In storms like this bugger, the big plows couldn’t afford to waste time scraping through the neighborhoods when they had to keep the main roads clear for emergency vehicles.

Natalie ran inside Aunt Zoe’s house with me to get Addy’s chicken. We returned five minutes later covered with feathers and sporting several peck marks. Elvis squawked from the cat carrier as I stuffed the caged beast in the back and slammed the hatch.

“Damned bird!” I grumbled and raced around to the car door Natalie held open for me.

“Everything go okay in there?” Doc asked, his eyes creased with laughter as he watched me settle in via the rearview mirror.

“Stupid Tyrannosaurus-chicken!” I snarled. “I should have left her there in the dark. That would teach the puny dinosaur a lesson.”

“Chickens can actually see better than humans,” Cornelius told me as I buckled up. “They have two additional types of cones in their eyes that allow them to distinguish both violet and ultraviolet light.”

Harvey snorted. “Doc has a cone that can pick out Violet in the dark, too, don’t ya?”

I pinched the old buzzard’s arm. “Keep it up and I’ll dump you in the snow at the top of Strawberry.”

Harvey’s snort morphed into a chortle. “I got ‘er all hot and bothered fer ya,” he told Doc. “Ya owe me one.”

I glared at Cornelius. “What’s with you and all of this chicken trivia? Did you major in chickens in college or something?”

He plucked a feather from my hair, letting it fall at our feet. “My grandmother had chickens in Louisiana when I was young. Gallus gallus domesticus are fascinating to observe during play, particularly when they joust.”

Natalie leaned forward to look at him around me. “Chickens joust?” At his nod, she added, “Like Knights of the Round Table sort of jousting? Or—”

“Stop!” I held up my hands. “There will be no more talk of chickens until we get to Rapid, understand?”

Elvis let out a loud squawk from the back.

I turned in the seat and grabbed the thick emergency blanket Doc had packed, tossing it over the cat carrier. “Go to sleep, Foghorn.”

“Foghorn Leghorn was a rooster,” Cornelius started.

I held my fist in front of his face. “Don’t make me pop you in the nose, Ghost Whisperer.”

He stared at my fist, his cornflower blue eyes crossed. “You’re bleeding, Violet.”

Was I? I scowled at the wounds on the back of my hand. “That Chicken-saurus Rex has a mean pecker.”

Harvey hooted. Before he could spit out whatever bawdy line that was hovering on the tip of his tongue, I leaned forward and tugged on his ear. “Zip it, ol’ timer. Now give me one of those tissues in the glove box, please.”

“Are you okay?” Doc asked, glancing in the mirror.

“Yeah.” I took the tissue Harvey held out to me. “Elvis resisted arrest is all. The cat carrier must have reminded her of a previous cage she was stuffed into before Addy sprung her from the chicken farm.”

I looked over Natalie’s hands, but she seemed to be better at dodging Elvis’s pecks than I was.

Something barked several times in succession in the front seat.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Coop’s barkin’ at me.” Harvey pulled out his cell phone that was still sounding repeated “woofs” at him, ending any further chicken chatter. “What’s shakin’, Coop?” he answered the call.

I glanced at Natalie. She turned away and stared out the window, her jaw taut.

“Yep, we’re skedaddlin’ right now,” Harvey told his nephew, then paused to listen. “No, I don’t mean the royal ‘we.’ I mean me, Doc, Sparky, Corny, and Nat.” Another pause. “I decided they needed my help, that’s why.” More silence from Harvey’s end. “No, this has nothin’ to do with yer mother’s cookin’, although her Christmas ham is always more like pork jerky. Makes my jaw ache to eat it.” Harvey snorted at something Cooper said in reply to that, and then he frowned at Doc.

He held his phone away from his ear a moment later. “Coop says to tell ya that he just heard over the scanner there’s a plow headin’ up Strawberry. If ya can stick close to it, the driver is supposed to clear the road all of the way to the Rimrock Highway junction where there’s a plow workin’ that section down into Rapid.”

“Got it,” Doc said, his focus on the snow-covered road.

The sky was beginning to darken in the east. At the low speed we were forced to go, we’d be lucky to make it to the junction while it was still light out. Once the darkness took over for the night, it was going to be hell to see. Swirling snow in the headlights would force us to a crawl to be safe.

Harvey returned to the phone call. “Well, I’ll give ‘er a try, Coop, but ya know cell phones get sketchy out thatta way. With this snow, I reckon the signal will be scarce as gone.” He nodded at whatever his nephew said. “Yeah. Keep an ear to the scanner. If anything happens, we’ll flag down a plow.”

A grunt or two later, Harvey hung up. “Coop says we’re all two pickles short of a picnic fer tryin’ to drive to Rapid in this mess, but he wishes us a Merry Christmas anyway.”

Natalie sighed loud enough for my ears only. It sounded torn and heart-achy. I squeezed her leg, earning a shoulder bump and small smile in return.

We rolled past the hospital, one of the few places that would remain open for business besides the Deadwood police station. Everyone else could close up and head home to be with their families, taking the time to enjoy the buildup for the big day, watch holiday specials, and wrap those last-minute gifts. Images of my kids’ smiling faces filtered through my thoughts, giving me a bright spot to focus on instead of Susan’s sharp claws and menacing grin.

“Psychology,” Cornelius said out of the blue.

“What about it?” I asked.

“That’s what I majored in when I was in college.”

“You have a degree in psychology?”

“No. I just majored in it.” When I continued staring at him, he added, “I quit after my third year at the university.”

“Why?” Natalie asked.

I wondered if it had anything to do with having enough family money that he didn’t need to be concerned about a college degree or a career in the psychology field.

“My grandmother was growing weak with age. She told me that if I wanted to study under her and learn about being a soothsayer, I was running out of time. I decided that real-life experiences were far more important in my desired profession of paranormal studies and quit college, moving into her spare room.”

“Did she teach ya about voodoo as well as bein’ a seer?” Harvey asked.

“Voodoo and more. She was a patient and well-versed teacher. Christmas often reminds me of her.”

“Why’s that?” I asked. “Because you spent the holidays with her?”

“Because of mistletoe.”

“What about it?”

“She kept bunches of it strung around her house year around.”

“Why?”

“While mistletoe is a hemi-parasitical plant that can eventually kill its host tree, it has long been considered a good-luck plant. Hanging it throughout your house protects you from werewolves, as well as saving your children from being swapped with faerie changelings.”

“And here I thought it was only good for kissing,” Natalie joked.

Changelings, huh? I grimaced. Too bad the parents of the changeling ghost I agreed to help Cornelius trap didn’t hang some mistletoe throughout their house.

He leaned back to look around me at Natalie. “Here’s a bit of good news for ovulating females: The fresh juice from mistletoe berries increases fertility.”

I cringed. Talk of babies often made my uterus run and hide under the nearest bed. Birthing and raising two kids on my own had sort of scarred me mentally as well as physically.

“You’re scaring Violet’s ovaries, Cornelius,” Natalie said, grinning at my expression.

I glanced up and caught Doc glancing my way in the mirror. I made a cross with my fingers, warding him off. He chuckled and focused back on the road.

“Mistletoe also brings good luck,” Cornelius told us.

“So did your grandmother have it hanging all over for good luck, or was it for protection from werewolves and changelings?” Natalie asked.

“In the voodoo religion,” Cornelius explained, “mistletoe has other purposes such as keeping evil at bay and making love charms and sachet powders.” Again, he leaned back and peered at Natalie. “Mixed with the right herbs, mistletoe is said to make a true-love powder.”

“Really?” Harvey butted in, spinning partway around in his seat. “Do ya have the recipe fer this love potion?”

“Love powder,” Cornelius clarified. “Yes, the recipe is somewhere in my grandmother’s notes.”

“Like you need that,” I told the old goat. “You already have a harem of women at the senior center waiting for you to ask them to do some mattress dancing.”

He snickered and turned back to the front. “Nothin’ wrong with sprinklin’ a little nookie guarantee into their prune juice, is there, stallion?” He nudged Doc with his elbow.

Doc shook his head, keeping his eyes on the road. He slowed to make the left turn onto US Highway 385.

“Here we go,” I said under my breath.

Everyone quieted for a moment as we approached the bottom of Strawberry Hill. I waited until we were partway up to lean forward and touch Doc’s shoulder. “How’s it handling the snow?”

“Surefooted so far. Coop was right, though. The plow just went through, I can tell. But there are patches of ice that are only going to get worse.”

I hunched my shoulders, feeling our escape window close. I crossed my fingers and toes, my gut knotting tighter with every mile we put between us and our warm, safe beds.

Doc leaned forward, both hands on the wheel as he rounded a corner with a steep dropoff on the passenger side into the ravine below. Even in the summer on dry pavement, some of the curves on Strawberry Hill had taken lives.

Natalie tugged my arm, pointing out her window. “Looks like the lanes coming down Strawberry haven’t been cleared yet.”

She was right. The other side of the road had several more inches of snow on it. I couldn’t even see any tracks.

“In the past, when the snow comes down this hard and fast,” Harvey explained, “the plows are stretched thin tryin’ to keep up. The blade that we’re followin’ might be the one that’s supposed to scrape back down into Deadwood.”

Several minutes later, we all let out a breath of relief when Doc eased around the last precarious bend, ending our climb to flatter ground on top. While our journey through this shitstorm was far from over, the first hurdle was behind us.

I looked over my shoulder out the back window at the first dip of Strawberry Hill’s steep, twisty slope into Deadwood. There was no turning back now. Going down that hill would be like a wild sled ride straight to Hell.