Chapter Two

Present day

 

“Mrs. Hurst called. She wants a reading today. And don’t forget it’s our turn to host the Northern Lights Coven,” Star yelled out from the kitchen of the Tea & Tarot café where she was supposed to be watching a batch of apricot jam simmer. Seven to one she had her head buried in that dog-eared notebook she dragged around, working on yet another song.

At least Mrs. Hurst liked our apricot jam, her only saving grace. I wasn’t alone in thinking that. No one in town could handle more than a small dose of the old curmudgeon, who managed to find fault with even the most perfect of sunny days. I paid closer attention as Star added, “Oh yeah, and Judith Finch wants a stronger love potion. Says the last one’s not working.”

“She needs a heck of a lot more than a love potion if she wants to capture Laurence’s attention—the guy’s ten years younger and headed for parts unknown,” I muttered under my breath, sorting through the newly arrived assortment of crystals, tarot cards, seer stones, spell books, fragrant incense cones, tiny drawstring velvet bags—nice, royal blue this time—and dozens of tiny fancy jars for housing sweet-smelling unguents for the tourists.

Tulip, my presumed helper, had drifted off as per usual. She was busy clicking away on her laptop. My daily prediction—if it wasn’t for me and my military maneuvers, the Tea & Tarot café would fall into utter ruin. At least I had the meeting of our coven to look forward to. Life being what it was in Snowy Lake, it required a lot of female support.

“Who do you think you were in another lifetime, Charm?” Tulip took that moment to look up from her ceaseless blogging to ask another of her inane questions. Okay, maybe not fair. A lot of people counted on her to make sense of their dreams. Oh, and she was darn good at reading omens in clouds. Has a nice following too.

“Probably Cinderella. Looks like I came back as a drudge yet again. Must have liked it so much last time, eh.” I softened my complaint with a smile directed at my triplet and hurried into the kitchen to make sure the other hapless McCall wasn’t leaving the jam to scorch.

“Star!” I yelled. There she sat perched on a stool, ubiquitous pen in hand, dreamily gazing off into space. The fruit she was meant to be tending was giving forth its essence of sunshine and happiness, the fragrance waltzing through the air, making my mouth water. Okay, a mid-morning snack of a fresh muffin with apricot jam was in order. I was also the self-elected quality control officer of our fine establishment, hence my curvy hips.

“It’s fine.” She rolled her eyes. “I just stirred it. It’s almost ready to go. Just needs the pectin added. And the jars are in the oven, sterilized and ready for filling, thank you very much.”

“Good,” I grunted. I took the cheery red oven mitts with the white hearts embroidered on the backs, reached into the oven and brought out the huge black roasting pan full of steaming hot jars. I placed them on the counter on clean tea towels, ready for service. Hmm, she’d even remembered to place the lids and inserts in a pot of hot water on the back of the stove. Will wonders never cease?

“Okay, you stir in the pectin and I’ll line up the jars. Ladle sterilized?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Star saluted, knowing full well it rankled.

“We’ve only got today to set things in order,” I chastised her. “Granny’s coming home tomorrow and I want everything properly done and in place. She’s worked hard enough for us over the years—time we made her days easier.” Even though at sixty-five she appeared to have the energy of a bulldozer, I didn’t take chances with my family.

“You’ll get no argument from me.”

“Yeah, right!”

Star was nothing but a conflicted bundle of nerves and energy. Uncertain of which direction her life should be headed—Nashville, LA or stay. Well, join the club, missy. Every thinking, breathing human being feels that way, at least some of the time. I should know. I can read minds. Or at least so far as to help someone find things. Images and the like, but I sensed their longings too. And we weren’t so different, we humans. Well, except for Mrs. Hurst, who I sincerely wished would stop the readings already. Her mind would try a saint. All the positive energy I directed her way seemed to get lost in some gigantic black hole hovering over her starched hair.

A soft chirp of greeting alerted me to company. Ling Ling, our gorgeous white Himalayan with pretty apricot-colored ears, pranced into the room, tail high and waving like a victory flag. Star reached down and stroked her soft fur, to be rewarded by loud purring.

“Someone needs to take baby Ling Ling to the V.E.T. at three. It’s on the calendar.” Star pointed to the white board I’d attached to the wall to keep track of everything and anything to do with Tea & Tarot and family.

Ling Ling shot across the linoleum as if a horde of berserker fleas were after her, nearly colliding with the doorframe before her fluffy white tail vanished.

“Now you’ve gone and done it! You know she can spell, right?”

“Yeah, sorry. I’ll find her and take her.”

“Good luck with that. Best reschedule and keep quiet about it this time.” I shook my head at my sister’s forgetfulness. She flipped me the bird for my trouble. “Okay, let’s get at it. I’ll fill the jars and you apply the screw tops as quickly as humanly possible. I don’t want one speck of dust finding its way inside.”

“Ah-h sure, but first, what do you think of this?” She picked up her scribbler. “I’m calling it The Ballad of Snowy Lake Johnny. Here goes.” And with that lovely lilting country and western voice of hers, she sang, “A sweet, wild man came a’ callin’—told me he’d keep me from fallin’. He said my heart was safe in his hands. He’d be my man and my biggest fan.”

“Star!” No luck interrupting—I was serenaded with the next verse.

“Then Sara Jean turned his eyes sweet blue. And though he’d sworn to love me true. He turned his back and left me dry. For a new woman who made me cry.”

When she got to the chorus, she began singing with entirely too much glee, “Snowy Lake Johnny’s a sweet, wild man. He turned my head and warmed my bed. All before we found him dead.”

“You know, that chorus might be considered rather incriminating in the wrong circles, sis.”

“What do you know?” Instant anger at my proper consideration. Whoops. Should have prefaced it with a compliment or three. But no one could flounce out of a room like Star. I thought I knew the back of her better than the front.

I got down to work. In short order, the jam was ladled into its fancy jars and properly sealed, left to set overnight on bright yellow-checked tea towels. I’d apply the jars’ decorative labels as soon as I printed them. With a final look of satisfaction at my lined-up soldiers, I rejoined my siblings in the café that doubled as a storefront. A half-dozen cozy round tables with stools took up one side of the cramped space, including the small booth for readings, while our sundries for sale were laid out on a series of shelves and took up the other half. Upstairs, one suite was rented out and I lived in the other one. Being one day older gave me jurisdiction over Star and Tulip, who still lived with Granny Toogood in her house situated three blocks away on Moosehead Drive.

“You know, the saskatoon bushes are ripe. Anybody want to go picking later?” I asked, pretty much knowing the answer.

Star groaned the loudest. “I hate mosquitoes. This year they’re as big as dragonflies, I swear.”

“Two words. Bug spray.”

“Yuck. I hate that stuff. I’ll smell like a chemical factory.”

“Better than smelling like a homeless person with no access to soap, which is what we’ll be if we don’t step up our game and bring in more income.”

“We do all right.” Star got that mulish look. “We’ve paid our own way. And I was hoping that maybe I could take a little loan and head to—”

“Absolutely not! Every red cent goes into this café to keep it on a sound footing. Maybe one day we’ll even be able to franchise it, have a string of cafés all across Canada.”

“That’s your dream, Charm, not mine.”

Tulips looked up from working on her blog. “I have one word for you both for making a lot more money—edibles. We could learn how to add marijuana to our muffins, brownies, slices and cookies. And sell them for three times as much. We should perfect the process now, before the October seventeenth deadline and the law makes it legal. We could beat everyone else to the game. Advertise online. If I mention them on my blog, it’ll bring in tons more traffic. In a year we’d all be filthy rich. I’ve been researching how to make cannabutter, proper dosages—everything. Even ganja-bread houses for Christmas. Just say the word and I’ll start the experiments rolling. They’d fly off the shelves like hotcakes.”

“Don’t you mean fly off the shelves like potcakes!” Star quipped.

“No! Absolutely not!” I was equal parts horrified and stunned.

“Charm, Mrs. Hurst is on the phone again,” Tulip said, trying to get my attention.

I hadn’t even heard it ring in my shock at her suggestion. Had she forgotten our family history? What hard drugs had done to our parents? And wasn’t marijuana a gateway drug? I had no idea, but I wasn’t taking chances with my family, even if it did look like a harmless leaf. Belladonna also looked harmless, but it most certainly was not. Beauty aid or agonizing death. Go figure taking a chance with it. I was up on those things, my love for reading Agatha Christie mysteries my favorite pastime in the precious hour before sleep.

My fingers trembling, I took the old-fashioned phone from Tulip. There was no point in relying on cell phone service in Snowy Lake. Half the time it didn’t work, so why pay for it? One less expense was a good thing.

I cleared my throat before speaking. “Charm here. What can I do for you, Mrs. Hurst?”

“I must see you right now! My pearls—left to me by my grandmother Doris on my mother’s side—they’ve gone missing. And I’ll just bet Suzanna’s the guilty one. Never trust a maid that smiles. Always trying to hide something.”

“Suzanna wouldn’t do that.” I rubbed at the sudden pain in my neck, watching my mid-morning snack vanish. I still needed to bake my favorite muffins—lemon glazed. Who says muffins don’t require icing? The lady in question, however, only lived one block away from our café, which was part of the problem. What was that quote about familiarity breeding contempt? Make it double—no, triple—in Mrs. Hurst’s case. “Okay. Come right on down. I don’t want you blaming anyone else. I’m sure you just misplaced them.”

“Well, we’ll see about that.”

We most certainly will. My gift—tracking anything down—would sort it out. Now, if only my gift included giving a customer an automatic side order of niceness, we might have been getting somewhere.

True to form, Mrs. Hurst was pounding on the front door not two minutes later. Even on our one day off, I couldn’t afford to ignore her needs. She was one of our best customers.

“Is that apricot jam I smell?” she asked, bustling through the doorway, making the windchimes rattle with concern. I barely had the time to unlatch the screen door. No idea how she does that. Most times the tiny angel figurines sang out to announce a customer, not screamed their disapproval to the high heavens.

She didn’t give me a chance to reply, but motored on. “Because if it is, I want to place my order right now for a dozen jars. No, just a minute, make that two dozen, if I get a proper discount.” She waggled her thick eyebrows at me to make her implication clear. I got it. Generous as she is nice. “I’m going to send some back with my niece who’s coming to visit tomorrow. She can dole them out to the rest of the family.”

“Your niece Georgia?” I inquired, leading the way to the back corner and the small booth there, with its midnight-blue fabric canopy. We preferred to take turns doing readings in private. Tulip was the best at dream interpretation, Star at tarot and me at tracking down lost articles. Star, our resident glitter-mistress, had added one extra-large gold star over the opening, of course.

Our patron was in fine form that morning. Her impeccable navy-blue shirtwaist dress kept her ample figure constrained and her starched crown of dyed-black curls was aligned in rigid rows. Her wolf-like gray eyes kind of spooked me, I admit. The woman was always looking for fault or something to pick at. She sat down and placed her hands palms-up on the small wooden table. She was rumored to be the wealthiest person in Snowy Lake, though she never had many customers in her store. Must be selling her antiques online. Used furniture would do better in Snowy Lake.

“I’m in a hurry. Let’s get on with it.”

“Just think about what it is you lost.”

“I know what to do.”

“Of course,” I murmured, ignoring her impatience. Taking a deep breath, I laid my hands atop hers. I took another deep breath, then released it, letting go of anything clutching at my mind.

I closed my eyes and waited. Out of the darkness, an image appeared, unfocused at first then clearer as it coalesced into something recognizable. A thick strand of soft white pearls. Where are you?

The image expanded outward and upward like a camera aperture opening, exposing a set of dresser drawers and a bit of beige carpeting. Cold chills crept up my forearms, adding a queer vibration. I shivered and pulled my hands away from hers with dread. Other vibrations were coming across the channel that had opened, unstoppable even though the connection had been severed. The sensation slammed into me with such force that I grasped the edge of the table to keep myself upright. This was new. Sure, I’d always gotten a few bad vibes off her—I think everyone did, according to gossip I tried to ignore—but nothing this intense.

“They’ve fallen through a crack at the back of your dresser between the carpet and the wall.” My lips were stiffened by dread, the words coming out odd and squeakily.

“You’re sure?” she asked, her tone skeptical, her beady eyes boring into mine.

I worked at keeping calm, not wanting her to see the state I was in. She was like a feral cat chasing down her prey. I shivered. “As sure as I can be.”

“You don’t mind waiting, then, until I check before paying you? That will buy you time to consider a proper mark-down for the jam.”

I squirmed at her condescension, sweat tricking down my sides. Such a lovely old soul. But it did keep my mind off the unwanted experience.

“No problem. Same deal as always.” I pretended nonchalance, uncertain of what had just occurred and praying it never happened again. A few negative vibes were one thing, but this had been something far more powerful. And scary.

“And deliver the jam soon as it’s ready. Oh, on second thought, I’ll take a jar now.”

I gave a curt nod. She got up and I dimly heard her ordering Star to bring her the jam. I stayed in the cocoon, chewing on my thumbnail. Was something bad going to happen? I’d never had a premonition of such magnitude. They were usually more along the lines of someone calling then the phone ringing a minute later, and it being them. This, whatever it was, had no sense of direction, just an overwhelming sense of foreboding. Okay. Shake it off. I had stuff to do.