The Case of the Love Spell

  The Case of the Love Spell: A Hillcrest Witch Mystery

  A Hillcrest Witch Mystery

  Amorette Anderson

  Published by Amorette Anderson, 2018.

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  THE CASE OF THE LOVE SPELL: A HILLCREST WITCH MYSTERY

  First edition. September 6, 2018.

  Copyright © 2018 Amorette Anderson.

  Written by Amorette Anderson.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter One

  I am not crying. It must be allergies that have my eyes watering so badly.

  Private investigators don’t cry, in front of new clients, especially. What would Jumper Strongheart have to say about this?

  Momentarily, I picture the personal development guru I’ve been obsessed with for the last five years. He would say... something inspirational. Something motivating. Something brilliant. Like...?

  I’m not Jumper Strongheart, so I come up blank.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, wiping at my eyes furiously with a crumpled, already-damp tissue and then shoving my thick glasses back into place. “Sorry. I don’t mean to get emotional. It’s just that I’ve worked so hard at this business over the last few years. Ever since leaving the police academy...”

  “Didn’t you fail the police academy?” My new client, a weathered guy in his fifties named Gunther, arches his brow.

  I sniffle.

  He presses onwards. “After shooting your captain in the arm?”

  I press my lips together, clearly not willing to speak on that embarrassing subject. Instead of confirming or denying his statement, I reach under my glasses and give my eyes a last little wipe while shooting a glare Gunther’s way, warning him off of the subject matter.

  His dark hair, streaked in grey, is swept back into a low ponytail. Despite the Colorado mid-summer heat, he’s wearing a flannel plaid shirt, jeans, and work-boots. He looks every inch a small town property manager: Professional yet ready to get down on his knees and fix a sprinkler head if needed.

  For as long as I can remember, I’ve seen Gunther cruising around Hillcrest in his pickup packed with tools and landscaping equipment. He’d found himself a real niche within our little box-canyon community.

  The older man is oblivious to my warning signals. Instead of steering clear of the sensitive subject, he goes right on talking about it. “Weren’t you even dating your captain at the time—when you shot him—or something crazy like that?”

  I lower the tissue, and let it fall into a little pile with other crumpled Kleenex on the floor. I’ve already packed up my mini trash can for the move. It sits in the corner of my office along with my few other work items—half of which are knitting supplies to keep my busy when business is slow.

  Which happens to be a lot.

  “Well, Gunther... that’s neither here nor there, is it? We digressed. We should be talking about you—and whatever you’re here to ask me.”

  I’m sitting on my Swiss ball, and now I give a little bounce as I adjust; Jumper Strongheart says that chairs are bad for your posture but this ball sure is hard to balance on.

  “Weren’t you going to ask me something, before I started talking about my own troubles?” I sniffle, and resist the urge to wipe my nose on my shirtsleeve since I’ve run out of tissues. That would certainly not be professional. I press onwards despite the distraction of my running nose. “I’m just going to miss this office, is all.” Sniffle, sniffle.

  I look around the little room.

  Gunther is perched on my office’s single chair. He follows my gaze and looks around the mostly bare walls. I say ‘mostly’ because one wall is still lined with yoga mats and a few other exercise balls, but the additions that I made when first moving in have been removed. A large photograph of my calico cat, Turkey, and a printout of my certificate from the online personal investigator program that I’d graduated from five years ago, at age twenty-two, are now sitting in the corner of the room along with the boxes. The place looks empty.

  “It’s so small,” he says.

  “It used to be a supply closet for the yoga studio downstairs,” I admit. “Well, it still is, in part. Sherry’s been renting it out to me for three hundred a month, but this month I can’t afford—” I stop myself before my eyes start watering again over my financial troubles. I clear my throat. “Let’s get back to you. You said you wanted to talk to me about Claudine Terra, right?”

  “Yes.” He leans back a little bit and nods.

  I’d heard about the old woman’s death the day before, just a few hours after her niece found her. Hillcrest is a small mountain town; word gets around fast. Apparently, she’d died in her sleep of natural causes.

  “What is it about Claudine Terra that you want to talk about?” I ask. “If you want me to look into her will or something, I’m afraid I can’t do that. Those are usually kept with her lawyer, and I’ve gotten nowhere with Ken Wilbur in the past. He is very unhelpful.”

  He’s always been a real jerk, actually, but that would be unprofessional to say out loud. “He always tells me to bug off and treats me like I’m not even a real personal investigator. I mean I did graduate from a program.” I motion to the certificate in the corner.

  Gunther shook his head. “No—that’s not it.” He glances over his shoulder at the door. “Does that thing lock?” He asks.

  “No one’s going to barge in on us,” I assure the now nervous man.

  “How do you know?”

  “You’re the first visitor I’ve had in two months,” I say, before realizing how bad that makes my business look. I clear my throat. “You took care of Ms. Terra’s house, the Terra Mansion, is that right?” I ask.

  Gunther looks down at the floor. Something about my question bothers him, but I don’t know what. I make mental note of this and press on. “I’ve heard that she passed away in her sleep,” I say. “And that her niece found her yesterday morning. Poor Lucy. What a way to start your Sunday off. Sheesh.”

  “Claudine didn’t pass away in her sleep,” Gunther’s voice is low but intense, nearly a growl. His muscles bunch around his massive neck and shoulders, and he makes two fists. For an instant, he looks like a cornered bear.

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “What if she was killed?” He says. “Murdered.”

  My eyebrows shoot up. This was not what I expected.

  “Killed?” I ask, just to make sure I’ve heard him right.

  “That’s what I said.”

  Woah. This is way out of my league. Like way, way, way out of my league.

  I nearly lose my balance on the Swiss ball, toppling back as I take in the news. Before I roll too far back, I tilt forward and make a wobbly rocking motion and then stand, as gracefully as one can when getting off of a squishy inflated ball.

  I place my hands on my hips. “Gunther, have you gone to the police?” I ask.

  He’s shifting his jaw back and forth now with pent-up tension, and his hands are still in fists. “No. I’m going to leave that up to you.”

  “Me? I think you have the wrong idea ab
out what I do.”

  “You’re a private investigator, aren’t you? You wanted to be a police officer.”

  “And I failed out of academy.”

  “But you’re involved with all this stuff. Look—I don’t want to be tangled up in this—at all. I don’t want to have my name dragged through the mud. It wouldn’t be good for my business. I thought I’d come to you, and you could—”

  “Gunther, you have to talk to the police,” I say, interrupting him. “Not me. I do little stuff, like digging up long lost cousins, and tracking down people that skip out on rent. Murder is a whole other...”

  “I’m not asking you to figure out who murdered Claudine,” he says.

  He reaches into his pocket then, and I watch, scared suddenly. All this talk of murder has me on edge. For a split second, I imagine that he’s going to pull out a gun. When I see him pull out a slip of paper my heart rate slows from racing to a brisk jog.

  “Here,” he says, handing me the note.

  I read it aloud: “Claudine Terra did not die naturally. She was killed.”

  I frown. “You want me to bring the police this note?” I say. “How am I going to explain this?”

  “You’re smart, right? You can figure it out.”

  “Smart?” I ask, stunned for a moment by his compliment. “You think I’m smart?”

  “Of course. You look like you’re smart, at least.”

  I push my glasses up on my nose. They’re quite large, and the frames are leopard print. Oh, and did I mention they are completely fake? I bought them at the grocery store, for 8.99, after reading Jumper’s book, ‘Fake it ‘til You Make it.’

  In the book, Jumper suggests wearing a piece of clothing or accessory that makes you feel like the person you want to become. Since I felt self-conscious about my intellect when jumping into the business-owning waters, the fake glasses gave me a confidence boost in the intelligence department.

  It seems, given Gunther’s compliment, they were working.

  “Thank you,” I say. “Yes, I guess I can figure out some sort of story to tell them...” His compliment has taken away my focus. Suddenly, I remember the issue at hand.

  “Gunther, if you know something and have reason to believe that Claudine was killed, you really have to tell the police yourself. You could get into trouble for holding back information. And if I just give the police this note without mentioning your name, I could get into trouble for obstruction of—”

  “Don’t bring me into this,” he says, desperately. “Besides, how do you know I wrote that note?”

  “Because you took it out of your pocket and handed it to me. Like five minutes ago.”

  “Maybe I found it on the sidewalk.”

  “Yeah right.”

  “Please, don’t bring me into this,” he says. “Technically, I haven’t told you that I know anything. I just brought up a question: ‘What if Claudine was killed?’ And then I handed you a note that I found...”

  I sigh. “Okay. I can see that you really don’t want to be involved. And you’re right, I suppose you haven’t actually said that you know anything.” You’re just acting like a heck of a weirdo, making fists and getting as pissed as a bear sitting on a bee’s nest, I think to myself.

  Gunther looks relieved. “Thank you. Like I said, I don’t want my name involved in this, if there’s an investigation. Oh! Almost forgot. I brought something up with me. It’s a gift—in exchange for keeping quiet about my visit. I really appreciate this. I’m feeling better already.”

  He stands and clomps to the door, tracking mud from his boots all over the squeaking floorboards. As he pulls the door open, I hear om-ing. The yogis below us are at it again.

  Gunther returns to my office with a cardboard box in his hands. Since I already have two packed boxes stacked in a corner of the room that will need to be hauled out of here, I don’t really want to acquire a third. Cash, on the other hand, would be just fine with me.

  “What’s this?” I ask, stepping up towards the box that he’s just set down on my desk, and peering in. The box is the size of a small microwave, and it’s half filled with what look like antiques.

  “For keeping this visit just between you and me... I brought you a few knickknacks that Claudine left me in her will.”

  “You were in Claudine’s will?” I ask, dumbfounded. How close were these two, exactly? “How common is that?” I ask, beginning to rummage through the box. “Do the people you work for often include you in their wills?”

  “I... managed Claudine’s property for over twenty years,” Gunther says. He sounds sad. In fact, he looks, suddenly, like he might burst into tears.

  I decide not to press him. I don’t want him to cry. I wouldn’t even be able to offer him a Kleenex if he did; I used the last of them during my allergy attack.

  Instead, I lift up a delicate China tea pot. “This is beautiful, Gunther,” I say. “And it might be really valuable.” I set it on the desk, and peer into the box again. I see a silk kimono, a lovely jewelry box, and a worn, antique looking book. “All of this stuff might be valuable, actually. Are you sure you want to...”

  “Yes,” he says. “It’s important to me that you keep this visit between us, and I need you to bring my concerns to the police’s attention. I value your help. Maybe this will help you pay your rent for the month, so you won’t have to move out.”

  I’m lifting the silk kimono up into the air, admiring the finely printed fabric. “This is true vintage,” I say. “Just this wrap alone would probably pay for a month in this closet... er, I mean, office.”

  I’m trying to kick the habit of referring to my space as a closet. It is an office. A real office. I square my shoulders. “Thank you, Gunther,” I say. “You can count on me.”

  “Be sure that the police listen to you. Give them the note,” Gunther reiterates before clomping back to the door.

  Just like that, he’s gone.

  I return my attention to the box. This changes everything. Everything! One by one, I remove items and set them on my desk.

  On top of the folded kimono, I place the china teapot. The next item I pull out is so heavy that I feel my muscles straining—which doesn’t say a lot, since I’m not all that strong. Sure, I go to Zumba every Saturday morning, but my arms are still a long way from muscular.

  I set the heavy, black mass of metal down on the desk with a thump. It’s a bowl of sorts. Very round, with a narrow opening at the top. Pearls are imbedded in the dish’s rim. I’ve never seen anything like it; it’s like a cross between a ceramic vase dug up from the ruins of Pompeii and a cast iron skillet.

  Puzzled, I move on. The little jewelry box is next. I open it and see fat pearls, tucked into the folds of creamy satin like peas in a pod. I reach into the box and touch the pearls, only to discover that they are just several of a whole long, ropey necklace of pearls burrowed amongst the fabric.

  I smile as I set the jewelry box down with the other items.

  Is that all? I recall the book I’d glimpsed, and dig into the box one final time. The book is lying flat against the bottom.

  I lift it up. “The Art and Science of Becoming a Witch,” I whisper aloud.

  Hunh. It’s an odd little book. It’s thin, but has a bulky, hard, clothbound cover of green.

  The title is embossed into the green cloth in a flowing, golden script.

  What was old Ms. Terra into, anyways?

  I knew she was eccentric, but I didn’t expect her to have a book with this kind of title.

  I feel a little bit curious about the book, and I open it to give the pages a quick perusal. The yellowed pages are thin and brittle, and the print is tiny and old-fashioned looking. A glance at the copyright page tells me that the book was printed in 1912. Wow! I close the book, deciding to look at it later in the evening.

  I don’t have time for that right now.

  Right now, I have to decide how I am going to hand this hokey, suspicious looking note off to the Hillcrest Police Departm
ent Captain, Christopher Wagner.

  My cheeks start blushing at the thought of it.

  The thing is, Chris and I have a sort of... history.

  Okay, we have a HISTORY—all caps. The kind of history that makes a girl blush when she thinks about it. We were intimate with each other—meaning, well, we couldn’t keep our hands off of each other. It didn’t matter that I was a cadet in Hillcrest police academy, and that he was my captain and trainer. Well, at first it didn’t matter. But then things went south, and it mattered... a lot.

  By ‘south,’ I don’t mean as in a vacation to Florida for fun in the sun. I mean, things started circling the toilet and then got flushed down. Way down.

  I guess I wasn’t cut out for police academy.

  The official reason for my failure was my ‘problem with authority.’ But is it a problem when a girl calls it like it is? The Police Chief—Chris’s boss, essentially—is a condescending buffoon. So I told him that. It didn’t go over well, to say the least.

  Then, there was the whole issue of the Taser training, which I refused to do. I don’t care how ‘educational’ it is; I will not allow myself willingly to submit to being tazed.

  Thirdly, we had the fiasco at the shooting range—which I really, really don’t want to think about at this exact moment in time.

  Or ever again, really.

  I teeter totter down the stairs with the heavy box in hand, being careful not to let my flip flops slip on the tilting wooden staircase. I’ve done that more than once, and I don’t want to see this fine china teapot—or the other items—go sailing through the air and crash into a million pieces at the bottom.

  Once outside, I load the whole box of antiques into the milk crate strapped to the back of my bike. The box tilts to the side instead of fitting squarely, but it will have to do. My trusty pink town-bike is my only mode of transportation, and I can’t manage the box in my arms and steer at the same time.

  I start pedaling to the police station, and by the time I arrive my pale yellow sundress has unfortunate perspiration stains around the armpits. It isn’t the physical exertion of the ride that has me ‘glowing’ with sweat—it’s the thought of seeing Chris.