Lila sat at the counter where I had left her. Her knitting set aside, she was reading a steamy romance novel.
My shoulders were tense, and the beginnings of a headache pulled at the top of my neck. I needed to go upstairs, turn on some music and sink into a warm tub, maybe open that bottle of red wine I’d stashed days before, but there was still a while until the shop closed for the day. Plus I had the damned hedge maze committee meeting to go to, unless I could think of a last-minute excuse to give to Neville.
I handed Lila the feather duster. “You can work at least for a minute,” I said.
Lila took the duster without setting down her book but didn’t otherwise move. “Was it bad news with Hemlock?”
I snatched the duster back from her and started wiping it frantically over the top of the counter and the collection of bookmarks, little puzzles, and other odds and ends I kept up there for impulse purchases.
“They’re running tests, so no one knows anything yet.”
“I’m sure he’ll be okay. And he’s in good hands now.”
“Is he? What do you know about Conri O’Farrell?”
“The vet? Nothing, really. I overheard Camille Arden talking about how she was going to ask him out, so I guess he’s not married or anything. He moved here about the same time you did. Everyone was happy to have a vet in town. I guess that means he’s doing a killer business.”
I gave a grim chuckle. “Interesting choice of words,” I said.
“What do you mean?” Lila asked, picking up her knitting once more.
I told her about the man’s foul temper and the amulet he had moved so quickly to hide.
“You think he’s a witch? Warlock?”
Suggesting someone was a warlock was a big deal. While witches were natural magicians and came in on all sides of the good and evil spectrum, warlocks operated on borrowed power, usually from demonic forces, and could be guaranteed to deal in the darkest of dark magic. Being a warlock was not an accusation you threw around idly.
“At the very least he has ties to magic. I need to know what that charm is used for, and if it’s connected to any black arts, before I add him to the suspect list.”
“Suspects? You sound like you’re investigating this yourself,” Lila said.
I looked to my feet. I didn’t want to get involved in dark magic, crimes, and murder. But knowing what I knew, and knowing no one else was going to give a damn about it, how could I not?
But hadn’t I moved to Blackthorn to get away from this kind of danger? I wasn’t about to open the door and let that world back into my life. And now that Rowan Jackfort was sniffing around, it was best kept locked up as tightly as possible.
“You’re right,” I said. “All this business about suspects and murder. We need to stop talking about it. It’s risky and stupid.”
Now it was Lila’s turn to look down at her shoes.
“What is it?” I asked.
“While you were out, I made a few calls,” she said quietly. “Just fishing around for some information.”
“Lila, this is dangerous stuff to even talk about.”
“I know, but I had to find out if anyone else knew Kenny didn’t have a heart attack or a stroke or whatever. I had to see if anyone else might even know about a spell like that.”
“And?” I said, desperately interested despite every bit of good sense in my body warning me to get far, far away from this and go back to my quiet little shop, reading books, and screwing up little spells.
“Phil and Molly Yarrow have been in Alaska for the last four months, doing some research on bees or something. So I guess that puts them in the clear.”
It did. A death curse could be delivered at a distance, and there were a few days of waiting until it was ready to strike, but four months from Alaska was too long and too far.
“So, I guess you have been working after all,” I said. “Just not exactly what I pay you to do.”
“This detective game is pretty fun, don’t you think?” Lila said.
“For one, we’re not detectives. And for two and three, I’m not sure we can call it a game. I don’t know about fun either,” I said. “Did you talk to anyone else?”
“Adela was her usual ‘I don’t want to get involved in this’ self.”
“Suspiciously?”
Lila shook her head. “It’s just the Naarin way. She calls it ‘active noninterference in human affairs.’”
I raised my eyebrows, having no idea what that could mean and making a note to do some research into these Naarin demons. “Anyone else?”
“That’s all I found out,” she said. “Except now this vet is suspect.”
Stupid as it was, we were involved in this now—there was no denying it. I might not have wanted to invite black magic back into my world, but it had pushed its way in all on its own as soon as that body had turned up, shattering the sanctuary of my new life, and now Lila’s sleuthing had broken it apart all the more. If I was going to put my life back together, I had to get the darkness out first, and the only way to do that was to find whoever was responsible. And then what? I would figure that part out as I went along.
“By the way, I also called Samir on the shop phone,” Lila said. “I hope you don’t mind. I just felt like talking to him, and my phone was out of charge. Don’t worry, I didn’t mention the murder.”
Lila often talked about her older brother, a hotshot lawyer from Loreton. They seemed to be quite close and she clearly idolized him.
“Is Samir a fairy too?” I asked.
“He’s got the blood, obviously. From our maternal grandmother. But he says he’s never had any powers. I personally think he’s just not trying hard enough. I swear he still thinks all fairies have wings and little daisy crowns, and we all sit around sipping flower nectar out of acorn cups.” She sniggered as she spoke, but I did sense frustration in the girl underneath the admiration she held for her brother.
“What about you?” Lila continued. “Do any of your family share the gifts?”
I wiped the duster slowly across the top of a stack of books I’d already cleaned. “I don’t really have a family,” I said. “But speaking of nectar, there’s a bottle of merlot in the back if it’s not too early for you. I don’t have any acorn cups, though. I assume that’s okay?”
We clinked our tumblers together in a melancholy toast and drank. As I sipped on the full-bodied red, the tension slipped from my shoulders. I closed my eyes and relished the fleeting moment of wine-induced calm. I’m not ordinarily much of a drinker, especially so early in the day, but these were hardly ordinary times.
While I like to keep to myself and am usually tongue-tied when it comes to small talk with strangers, I had to admit, it was nice to have someone to talk with about my formerly secret supernatural side. Maybe it was the wine, but I wanted to ask Lila everything.
“So,” I began, not sure exactly how to start phrasing the thousands of questions I had, or even if asking them would be somehow rude. “How do you see, I mean hear… with Hemlock’s thoughts?”
“Can I read minds?” Lila filled in. I nodded, taking another sip. “Kind of. I see shapes from people’s minds. I can’t hear the thoughts. I just understand them. But Hemlock was really different. He pushed his voice into my head, and I heard it like I hear my own thoughts. It was a bit of a shock the first time it happened.”
I wasn’t surprised; butting into someone’s head sounded exactly like something Hemlock would do.
“Maybe you could come with me tomorrow and do your thing with O’Farrell?”
Lila nodded. “Sure, I can try if you want. Though it usually only works well if I’m knitting,” she said.
“Knitting?”
“Yeah, knitting does something to my mind, like it opens up the channels, so it’s easier for me to read people. I’m not sure how to explain it. If I’m not knitting, it’s hazy and easily muddled, unless someone consciously opens their mind to me. It’s getting easier lately, though, so maybe I’m getting better at it.”
A disturbing thought occurred. Lila knitted a lot. “All that time you’re knitting here, you’re reading my thoughts?”
She laughed. “Not exactly. Though I have, I confess, accidentally seen a bit of you from time to time, but that’s when it kind of just slips out. Don’t worry, I haven’t read anything really personal or embarrassing. I’m not a snoop.”
I suddenly felt very exposed.
“I do like to knit too. I need something to do with my hands all day long,” Lila said.
“There’s always work,” I said. “Like dusting, or filing, or packing up the mail orders. Or maybe you could make something to sell in the shop, like hats or something.”
“I can only knit in straight lines,” she said. That explained why she only ever made scarves and afghans.
The shop bell chimed and our conversation stopped short. Neville Norton marched straight up to the counter.
“Good afternoon, Belinda,” he said. “Lila.” He nodded in the fairy’s direction, looking at our wineglasses with scorn and God’s own judgment. “I’m assuming by this party you pair are having you might have, once again, forgotten you have somewhere to be?”
I absolutely had not forgotten where I was supposed to be. I clapped my hand to my forehead, feigning a memory lapse. “Of course, Neville. It completely slipped my mind.”
“I thought so,” he said. His smile was good-natured, but I could still sense the annoyance in the old man. The Blackthorn Springs Hedge Maze committee meeting had met six times so far, and I had been able to weasel out of each of them.
“That’s why I’m here,” he said with a false smile. “Your personal escort so you have no excuse not to join us.”
If this murder hadn’t distracted me so much, I would’ve probably had ten excuses by now. Still, I didn’t really want to upset anyone, and on some level, I did want to belong to the community, even if, on the other, usually much louder level, I wanted to stay home alone and not talk to anyone. That was generally for the best anyway; I’d long since learned that my place in the natural order was on the outside. But I’d committed to the maze, and I guessed I had to go through with it. Even if that meant being personally escorted to the meeting by Neville Norton.
“We’ll have to finish this a little later,” I told Lila. I drained the last of my wine in two gulps. There was no way I was going through this without some liquid fortification. “Mr. Norton, I’ll meet you out front, if you like. I’ll get my coat.”
“You’re not going to slip out some secret back door and disappear on me now, are you, Belinda?”
I chuckled politely, making a mental note to check if installing a secret back door in the shop was in any way feasible.
“Are you okay with closing up for me again, Lila?”
She nodded. I leaned in close to whisper, “Maybe keep checking up on anyone supernatural and what they’ve been up to lately.” Even though Neville had moved outside, well out of earshot, taking on a new job as a pair of secret sleuths seemed like something we should whisper about.