WHAT?” WILLOW SAID to the assistant on the other end of the phone. Her laptop showed it was 6:57 A.M., and as much as she’d wanted to stay in bed and ignore the phone, it wouldn’t stop ringing. Lucia pushed the drapes to the side and switched on the office lights. “I just need you to repeat that; it’s early.”
Lucia slid into the room like a cat and wrapped her arms around herself. “What’s going on?” she whispered.
Willow held her hand in the air as Peter Sable’s assistant said for the second time, “Zoe’s dead. Suicide, possible overdose. Her body was discovered at her home.”
Willow covered the speaker of her cell phone and said to Lucia, “Go wake up your sister.” To Peter’s assistant, she said, “When?” anxiously rubbing her silk nightgown between her fingers.
“Around midnight.” The assistant sniffled.
“I appreciate you calling,” Willow said. “And I’m so sorry to hear this.”
“We received a message from Mya yesterday,” the girl said, not at all receptive to Willow’s graciousness.
“I don’t know anything about that.” Willow frowned.
“She asked Zoe to stop using something she sent to her. Said there was a dangerous mistake.”
Lucia returned to the office with Mya, who was still wiping the sleep from her eyes. Willow stared at Mya until she had to look her in the eyes, and Willow could see right then that Mya already knew what was happening. “What’re you suggesting?” Willow said.
“I’m not suggesting anything,” the assistant said.
Willow said, “All the world knows what Zoe was going through lately. Let me speak to Peter, right now please.”
The girl said, “Zoe’s dead; he’s too busy to talk right now.”
“Then what is this about?”
“He asked me to schedule a time and he’ll only speak to Mya,” the assistant said.
“If he speaks to anyone, he’ll speak to me,” Willow said. “You tell him to let the guy, you know, the, the—coroner, yes, let the coroner do his work and determine what happened. He’s paranoid—you can tell him I said that too. And tell him for matters like these he’d better be the one to make the call to me.”
Mya leaned on Lucia and whispered to her. Lucia nodded.
Willow hung up the phone. They all stood together in the office for an achingly long time, the only sound coming from the percolating coffee in the kitchen.
Mya interrupted the silence. “She’s gone, right?”
Willow nodded and said, “I need coffee.”
“Come on,” Lucia said, and they followed her to the kitchen, where she removed three clay mugs from the cabinet and brought them all fresh cups of coffee.
They sat at the round kitchen table, and Willow had no idea what to say to Mya. She’d left a message for a client and didn’t say anything to Willow. How many more mistakes could one daughter make?
Mya placed one hand on top of the mug and let the steam escape between her fingers. She said, “I was going to tell you. I thought I had time.”
“Tell us what?” Lucia said. “What’s going on?” she said to Willow.
“I spoke to Jennifer Katz yesterday, right before I found out about my shop, and she mentioned Zoe’s behavior. I just knew it was the perfume. I called her on an impulse; I thought it was the right thing to do. I left a message and told her to stop using the product considering everything she was going through,” Mya said.
“I knew it,” Lucia said, “I knew you shouldn’t have put your hair in it.”
Mya’s face turned red and she shouted, “Too bad you weren’t president at the time, Lucia! Could’ve saved the day and stopped your sister from another fuckup. That’s what you’re saying, right?”
“Yes, Mya!” Lucia shouted back. “That’s exactly right. You should’ve found another way, that’s what I do know. Not your hair. You killed her. She’s dead, don’t you understand? She’s dead, dead, dead.”
“Stop saying that.” Mya shoved Lucia so hard she almost tipped backward.
“Stop it,” Willow said quietly, but she could tell Mya was about to respond again, so she pounded on the table and yelled, “Stop it, you two!”
They both stared at her.
“Nothing gets solved like this. And keep your hands to yourself.”
Mya glared at Lucia. Sometimes they had fought like this as girls, and Willow had just tuned out the noise because the stakes were low: a borrowed purse ruined or a cut in line for the bathroom. She couldn’t ignore them now, however. Willow said, “Is it the new formula? Yes or no?”
Mya sipped her black coffee and then paused. “I wanted her to feel irresistible at first, so she wouldn’t notice a difference, and then I wanted her to become repulsive. Only to others though, not herself. I had no idea it would turn that way.”
“She killed herself,” Lucia said. “Except not really. But there’s still a mother out there who thinks her daughter was so low that she committed suicide.”
“They can’t prove anything,” Mya said.
“They have the perfume,” Willow said, “and your message.”
“I didn’t spell it out,” Mya protested. “If anyone asks, I’ll clarify what I meant and say that she’d have a breakout in the sun or something like that.”
“Was she on drugs, any that you know of?” Lucia asked. She still hadn’t touched her coffee.
“I don’t think so,” Willow said. Mya shook her head in agreement.
“So what happens if the toxicology report comes back clean?” Lucia’s eyes were as large as quarters. “Her manager knows.”
“What it did to her can’t be traced in her system,” Mya answered. “You know that.”
They all sat silently for a moment. Mya said, “They’ll find a way to charge me.”
“Should they?” Willow said.
Mya’s mouth dropped and her eyes narrowed. “Let’s not forget that you told me it was okay to make it. You agreed, no one else, and it was your decision, your business too. You’ll go to jail with me.”
“Stop being so dramatic,” Lucia said. “Mom had no idea what it would do. Only you could’ve.”
“I didn’t know it would do that. She must have used too much too fast.”
“Can we just figure out what’s next, please?” Lucia massaged her left temple.
“Peter Sable will call me,” Willow said.
“I just hope they find drugs in her system,” Mya said. Lucia looked at her like she’d said something heretical, but Willow actually agreed with Mya on that point: it would make all of this go away without a fuss.
“And until then?” Lucia asked.
“Just wait,” Willow said. “We’ll hear about it as soon as they know.”
“What if Peter exposes us?” Lucia said.
“Might not be much to expose,” Mya replied. “With the crop dying and all.”
Of all the things Mya could’ve said, she didn’t need to bring that up.
“I never meant for this to happen.” Mya sounded as low and guilty as she had when she ran over Spots.
Willow said, “Maybe I didn’t like Zoe, but I didn’t want her dead.” She looked for Mya to agree with this sentiment, but her daughter’s face showed little remorse.
“Zoe disappeared,” Mya said softly, as if it had just occurred to her, and she looked at Lucia. “I’m next, aren’t I?”
“Stop talking like that,” Willow said.
“I mean it.” Mya sounded desperate. “Great-Grandmother Serena promised this, you know she did. Maybe not this exactly. But this is how badly she didn’t want the formula changed.”
“She promised grave consequences,” Willow said. “She felt she had to protect the formula from anyone who wished to do harm.”
Lucia said, “We know the story.”
“But exactly how severe are those consequences?” Mya said to Willow. “She left that part out.”
“She did,” Willow admitted. “Frankly, I never wanted to find out.”
“I’m hungry,” Lucia said. “Sausage biscuits?”
Mya shrugged and Willow said, “Whatever you want.”
Lucia fried sausage patties with extra sage in the cast-iron skillet and baked frozen biscuits in the oven. The fat sizzled, and Lucia slammed drawers and banged plates together.
Willow said, “Look at me.” And Mya did. “No matter what happens, you have to promise me, absolutely promise me, to never use hair in another spell ever again, for the rest of your life. Not your hair or anyone’s. Will you promise me that?”
Mya nodded and paused before she said, “Could the curse kill me?”
Lucia quieted her movements in the kitchen.
Mya covered her face with her hands and massaged her temples. “It’ll drive me away, won’t it? I’ll end up like Iris.”
“I just don’t know,” Willow said, and she felt heartbroken by this answer. She wished she could promise Mya some other outcome.
Lucia placed a platter of sausage biscuits before Willow and then said, “I’m not hungry. I think I’ll shower.”
“Go ahead,” Willow said.
Lucia returned her clean plate to the cabinet, but before she left the kitchen, she turned and said, “This is serious.”
“I’m aware,” Willow said. She helped herself to the breakfast Lucia had made without saying another word. Willow willed herself to forget that beautiful girl’s dead body on the other side of the country.
Mya said, “It’s a moonshine morning.”
“What about your snakebites?” Willow said.
“Some things bite worse.” Mya opened up the liquor cabinet where they stored the cinnamon-infused moonshine. She brought out the Mason jar, poured some moonshine into her coffee, took a deep gulp, and then tightened her mouth.
Willow nodded at Mya’s coffee cup. “Fix me one, will you?”
“Gladly,” Mya said, and took Willow’s mug to the counter. She watched Mya pour in a generous amount of the clear liquid, leaving little room to top it off with coffee. Her daughter’s hands shook; the alcohol spilled down the side of the glass, and she wiped it off with her bare hand. Mya returned the cup to Willow but wouldn’t sit down.
“I’m freaking out,” Mya said. Willow didn’t reply. “Should I be freaking out, Mom?”
Willow drank her coffee. It was strong as an unbroken horse. The fire in her throat subsided and Willow again answered “I don’t know.” What else was there to say? “Just stay close to the house for a while.”
“How long?” Mya finally seated herself next to Willow.
Willow said, “Until we know for sure it has all passed.”
“That could be the rest of my life,” Mya said. “And the way things are going, that might be a very, very short wait.”
“Please don’t panic.” Willow put one hand on her daughter’s arm.
“I mean it,” Mya said. “I’m not being dramatic, I can feel it.” She walked to the sink to wash off her hands. Willow waited for her to return to the table, but Mya continued to stare out the window above the sink even after she turned off the water.
“What’s wrong?” Willow said.
“It’s just . . . ,” Mya said, but trailed off.
Willow hurried to the sink and looked over Mya’s shoulder to the driveway out front.
A black town car parked in front of the cabin and Mya said, “Is that from Quartz Hollow?”
“Out of town,” Willow said, and she waited for it. As soon as the driver opened the back door and one shiny black brogue hit the grass, she knew exactly who’d arrived.
In a sudden panic, Mya said, “Is that a cop?”
“No,” Willow said.
“Who the hell, then?”
Willow walked out the front door, coffee mug in hand. Her desire was to speed down the steps to him, but she knew for certain this time that the visit was for business, not pleasure.
Mya came outside on the porch and stood behind Willow like her mother was a human shield. “Mom?” Mya said.
“James Stein.” Willow walked down a few steps. “What brings you all this way, and so early?”
James smiled at Willow and pointed a finger at her, his seersucker suit perfectly tailored and without a single wrinkle. His driver brought one small bag to him, and James put one hand on the driver’s shoulder and said, “Go back to town and check in, and I’ll call you shortly.” His driver nodded and returned to the car.
James walked over slowly and stood at the bottom of the steps. Willow met him down there, and he took the coffee from her and said, “You read my mind.” She let him taste it, since he was being so forward. Who doesn’t call before showing up, at least to give a woman a chance to shower? His mouth twisted and he would’ve spat it out, she was sure, if Willow and Mya hadn’t been standing there.
“You ladies like your coffee with a punch,” he said, and he handed the mug back to Willow and wiped his mouth with a white pocket square.
Willow laughed. “It’s the mountain way.”
“That’s new to me, I’ll admit,” James said.
“It’s been that kind of morning.”
“That I understand.” James leaned to the side to look past Willow.
Willow turned. “This is my older daughter, Mya. Mya, this is James Stein, head of AGM Studios.”
“Nice to meet you,” James said.
Mya walked down the steps. “Did you know he was coming?”
Willow could tell the truth to Mya and say she had no idea, or she could apologize to James for her daughter being so rude, but neither sounded great. She decided to say nothing at all.
“I don’t usually do this, drop in on people,” James said.
“Well, now you have,” Mya pointed out.
Willow frowned. “Go inside if you can’t be pleasant.”
“It’s not a problem.” James placed his black bag on the step. “I believe I’ve brought something you might want, Mya.”
“Me?” Her eyes flared opened and she nudged Willow. Mya leaned over and whispered, “Do something.” But by that time James had retrieved a small leather box and opened it. Wrapped inside in terry cloth and bubble wrap was the vial of perfume Mya had sent Zoe.
Mya snatched it from his hand. “How’d you get this?”
Willow examined the bottle and saw that her daughter must have been right about Zoe using too much: it was half-empty.
He closed his bag and said, “May I come in first?”
“Yes, of course,” Willow said. As she passed by Mya she whispered, “Destroy it.”