Witch on Ice Read online

  “Didn’t you tell me Griffin covered for you last night? He told Damon he was with you the entire time.”

  “Yeah, so?” That reminded me. I had to ask Griff what was going through his head when he did that. Did he think I was guilty?

  “I see it runs in the family,” she mumbled, flagging down our waiter.

  “I have no idea what you’re rambling on about, but I’ve been confused enough lately without you adding to it.” My head was like a kaleidoscope in a salad spinner.

  “Never mind.” We both asked for our lunch in a to-go bag since Sage was now running late. She slipped on her coat then reached for my hand. “As much as Misty provoked her, Violet could never do something like this. I don’t know where your sister is, but she’s innocent. I’m sure of it.”

  “Are you insinuating that I’m not?”

  She laughed. “Of course not, silly.”

  It wasn’t until Sage left when I realized how strange it was that it was never once mentioned how unusual Misty’s death was.

  And if this wasn’t something Violet could ever do, who out there would?

  I huddled against the wall in the restaurant lobby and dumped half the blueberries into my purse. Having a frog wasn’t unusual, but the same thing couldn’t be said about carrying one around in a bag like a teacup poodle.

  Fernando’s skin was warm to the touch; the scarf was keeping him nice and toasty. Reassured, I zipped my purse back up and tucked it underneath my coat. Then with enchiladas and berries in hand, I took to the sidewalks, heading in a different direction. I had a sudden craving for a latte, and while I was at the coffee house, I might as well casually ask about the loud argument Sage had mentioned.

  When I arrived at Bigfoot Café, I did a double take through the window. Griffin sat at a corner table with his back toward me, bent over his keyboard and typing furiously. Knowing that he was writing his secret books intrigued me more than it should have.

  I took a couple steps forward while my attention remained on the mad typist, and oof! I collided into something unforgiving. In more ways than one.

  “You idiot!”

  “I am so sorry,” I said, trying to place the woman’s scarf-covered face when my gaze traveled to the brown snow. I wanted to smack my forehead. Her coffee was splattered all over the ground, courtesy of moi. I bent down to pick up the empty cup, but she elbowed me aside and snatched it herself.

  “You need to watch where you’re going,” she hissed, attempting to scoop up the java slush. What the heck? Someone, please tell me she wasn’t going to drink that.

  “I know. I was being careless. Please, let me buy you another.” Clouds of smoke billowed out of the cup. What in the world? “Just let me know what you’re drinking.” Was it coffee or fog machine juice?

  “Don’t worry about it.” She stood, straightening her coat. “You’ve done enough already.”

  Wait, I remembered her now. And her name. “Clarisse, right? You came into Violet’s Soap and Tea Emporium yesterday.” More like trespassed. I should’ve recognized her snooty tone instantly. People like her rubbed me the wrong way. Just because she probably had a dozen servants at her beck and call didn’t mean the entire world was bending over backwards to do her bidding and that regular rules didn’t apply to her. I took a steadying breath. Despite all that, knocking into her was my fault. “I’m really sorry. Please, come inside. It won’t take long. Let me get you another… whatever-it-is, and you can be on your way.”

  She smiled, flipping a one-eighty. “No, I’m sorry. For snapping at you. Nothing was done intentionally.” She smoothed down her perfectly straight hair. “I’ve been on edge since, well, you know. The distasteful incident. Things like that just don’t happen around here. I’m sure you understand.”

  Clarisse sauntered off with her dirty cup before I could respond. I knew it was Misty we were talking about, but “distasteful incident” sounded more like she was describing a plate of bad shrimp rather than a freakish death in Bigfoot Bay.

  I shook it off and went in the café, only to notice the junior barista staring at me. She was probably wondering what had happened outside while I was wondering why she wasn’t catching up on homework.

  Griffin was still busy in the corner, earbud cords hanging down, lost in his own world. There was only one other person in the place, talking on the phone and eating a dinner plate-sized donut. Normally, during an ice festival weekend, the town would’ve been packed to the gills, but the huge boon to business hadn’t occurred due to my grisly discovery the night before.

  I stepped up to the counter. “Hi. I’ll take a medium latte, please.”

  She nodded, pulling a cup from the stack and scribbling on it with marker. “Anything else?”

  “Out of curiosity, what did the woman right before me order?” Baby Barista pointed to the sign that listed out the specials. The drink of the month was a smoky latte: A special blend of dry ice, expresso, and mocha syrup. Ah, no thanks. How was that even safe? “Just the latte, please.”

  She turned to start on my drink. “She’s not someone I’d want on my bad side. I’d be careful if I were you.”

  “Oh, you’re talking about that little thing outside? It was just an accident. It’s all good.”

  She shrugged. “If you say so.”

  Not sure what she meant but okay. “Hey, by chance were you working that day a bad argument broke out between Violet—she owns the shop on—”

  She glanced over her shoulder. “I know who Violet is.”

  Of course. Silly me. “So, were you here when she and Misty Evans got into it?”

  “Nope.”

  “Who was?”

  She shrugged again. Well, that was helpful.

  While she frothed the milk, I eyeballed the place. The click-clack of the keyboard echoed through the café, even drowning out the woman jabbering away on her phone. Griffin hadn’t slowed his fingers once since I’d arrived. They were going to cramp up something fierce if he didn’t let them rest. But then what did I know? I wasn’t a typist. Or a writer.

  I focused on what I did know as I studied the dessert case. The sweet symphony that arose from blending flour and sugar and butter was something I could understand, unlike the mental fatigue and carpal tunnel that surely would result from fast and furious typing sessions.

  As I pondered my next foray as a baker, I spied a chocolate chip banana loaf on the bottom shelf. I peered closer and chuckled. It looked exactly like Amy’s “homemade” bread.

  “Do you need a lid or will you be drinking it here in the bathroom?”

  “No lid, and very funny.” She set the cup on the counter, and I fished out a wad of singles from my pocket. “Keep the change.”

  I ignored her wisecracking snort and tiptoed over to Griffin’s table. Not that it was likely he’d hear me approach but I didn’t want to rush over in a gust of air and alert him to my presence. I was too nosy, er, curious for that.

  Ever so slightly, I glimpsed over his shoulder, hoping to catch a sentence or two. Some sleuth I was; my reflection prompted him to lower his laptop screen but not before I caught a few words that made me blush. When he said he wrote thrillers, I hadn’t taken him literally.

  He swung around. “Sammi! To what do I owe the pleasure?”

  “Um.” I cleared my throat, no doubt growing redder by the millisecond from my amateur spying attempt. I had no business seeing what I just saw. “I, um, stopped in for a coffee and noticed you over here. I didn’t mean to interrupt your flow or anything. You seemed really… focused.”

  “No worries. I could use the break. Take a seat.”

  I pulled up a chair. “Okay.” I held up a bag. Oops, wrong one. I set the blueberries aside and showed him the one from Caliente instead. “Hungry? I have chicken enchiladas if you want them.”

  “I’m good but thanks.” He took a sip off his coffee, keeping his eyes on me.

  I gestured to his computer. “Is that a new book you’re working on?”

  �
��It is.”

  “What did you say your pen name was again?”

  “I didn’t.”

  Darn. I scrunched up my face and he chuckled. “How do you expect to keep your writing a secret when you type in a public place?”

  “Everyone knows I write; they just don’t know what.”

  “But you know how everyone is around here. It’d be easy enough to peek over your shoulder and see.”

  “Like you?”

  His amused smile made me lean back and cross my arms. For a town that thrived on gossip, I hadn’t been benefiting from it much since I’d arrived.

  “It’s not like I saw anything. Much.” My cheeks rekindled, and his lips curved higher.

  He finished his coffee, setting his cup at the edge of the table. “And how have you been holding up?”

  “I’m sure the same as you. We were both there last night.” It suddenly seemed wrong to complain about anything. At least I was walking around with a normal body temperature.

  “I wasn’t only referring to that.”

  “Then what else?”

  “I can imagine how overwhelmed you must be. Coming back home to something like this, on top of dealing with your fiancé’s unfaithfulness and—”

  “Hold up.” I raised my hand. “Is that why you told your brother you were with me during all my unaccounted-for hours? Because you felt sorry for me?”

  “We both know you didn’t have anything to do with Misty’s death. Damon just needed to have it on record.”

  “You didn’t answer my question. You’re saying you felt bad for me? So, covering for me had nothing to do with you thinking I’m guilty?”

  “Of course, I don’t think you’re guilty. Would you rather I did?”

  Well, when he put it like that. I watched as the only other customer stood, slipping her phone into her pocket. Without her jibber-jabber, it was eerily silent in here.

  “Need a refill?”

  I jerked in my chair, the voice scaring the bejeebers out of me. The barista was standing near our table, smiling sweetly with a pot of steaming coffee in her hand.

  Griffin waved his hand over his cup. “No thanks, Clare.”

  She went back to her post, and I whispered across the table. “She’s a bit young to be the only one manning the place, don’t you think?”

  “If your sister can own her own store, I think Clare can handle managing a coffee shop a few days a week.”

  “Yeah, but…” I stole a glance at her stacking up napkins. She might as well have been playing with paper dolls. “Violet is twenty-three.”

  “And so is Clare.”

  My eyes bugged out. “No way.” Huh. Didn’t anyone in Bigfoot Bay age? “So anyway, about my fiancé… It’s not what you think.”

  “If it’s about him not being good enough for you, then it’s exactly what I think.”

  “Griffin.” My purse twitched in my lap, and I could sense Fernando getting restless. I rubbed the leather lovingly as if stroking him directly, silently assuring him that everything was okay and I was doing whatever I could to get us both out of this mess. “Trust me. He’s more than good enough.”

  He steepled his fingers, tapping his bottom lip. I wanted so badly to explain, to fight harder for Fernando’s honor, but I was already in a hole and worried about digging myself deeper.

  “Talk to me, Samm. What’s going on?”

  “What do you mean?”

  He sighed. “For one, you’re rubbing your purse like you’re expecting a genie to pop out.”

  I withdrew my hand. “It’s exactly like you said—I’m overwhelmed, just not for the reasons you think. My sister’s avoiding me, and I can’t go home until I see her. Not to mention falling into a bizarre murder investigation within twenty-four hours of my arrival.”

  And especially not to mention the whole reason I returned to Bigfoot Bay to begin with. If Griff thought there was something off with me merely because I was rubbing my purse…

  “We don’t know that it was murder.”

  “Damon’s not ruling it out.”

  “You really haven’t talked to Violet yet?” I shook my head. “Aren’t you worried? She’s not one to leave her store for too long.”

  “As I said, we’re fighting. She’ll turn up eventually, but I really need to find her before your brother does. Would you be able to help me out with that too? I figured since you’ve already covered for me once…”

  Uh-oh. Judging by his knitted brows, I’d pushed it too far.

  “Did you know Damon has a thing for Violet?” I said, changing the subject.

  He laughed. “Who didn’t?”

  Hmph. Obviously not me until recently. “Don’t you think that’s a conflict of interest?”

  “Samm, he’s a cop with a serious case to solve. That’s where his head’s at right now. What, you think he wants to speak with her so he can ask her out on a date?”

  Actually, they’d probably make a good couple. If he wasn’t a lowly human male, that is.

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” It was clear I wasn’t going to get any more support from Griffin without raising suspicion. I’d have to take care of things on my own.

  “You didn’t sneak around the footbridge this morning, did you?”

  “No, I overslept.”

  “Good. I’d feel better if you lie low for a while, especially when it’s dark.”

  “I’m not on house arrest.” I’d already decided to be at the bridge before dawn, taped off or not. I was determined not to slack off again, but it was best not to tell him that.

  “I’m referring to your safety, and you know it. Whatever happened to Misty—”

  “Might not have been a murder, is what you said.”

  “Exactly. It’s still unknown. And until it’s not, I want to know you’re safe. Even if it turns out to be a fluke accident…” He gripped the table edge. “Where is this guy of yours anyway? In light of the circumstances, he should be here. Protecting you.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I don’t need protecting. I’m fine.” I was about to make a crack about the Middle Ages and damsels in distress but thought better of it. He looked really peeved. “Let’s change the subject, okay?”

  “Fine, as long as you promise you won’t be wandering around a crime scene before the sun is barely up with the crazy hope of running into your sister.”

  “That’s really specific. What about before the sun is up at all, does that work?”

  I swore he growled. “Sammi.”

  “Can you keep it down, please?” I whispered, spotting Clare’s eagle eyes. She was dragging a rag over the counter, averting her stare the moment I’d noticed. I scooted my chair closer. “Whatever happened, happened to Misty,” I said. “Yes, it was freaky and unexplainable, but it’s not going to happen to anyone else. I guarantee it.”

  “And how exactly can you do that?” I dropped my head; I shouldn’t have said that. “You know more than you’re letting on, Samm. Why do you need to find Violet so badly?”

  I wrung my hands. “Maybe because she’s my sister. Maybe because she’s the sole reason I even set foot in this wacko town again, and now she’s gone and I can’t even leave.”

  “It’s not as bad here as you seem to think. It never was.” His voice was soft.

  I stood, clutching my purse strap in one hand and my two bags in the other. My latte remained untouched, minus one sip, on the table.

  “If it’s about me not belonging here, then it’s exactly what I think.”

  I took off, storming past Clare, feeling both her and Griffin’s eyes on my back as I slipped out the door. I was dead set on locating my sister, and I didn’t care what I had to do to accomplish that before Damon and his comrades did the same. If she was linked to Misty’s death, unless they had magical investigative techniques, they wouldn’t be able to pin it on her anyway. But they could delay her, and I couldn’t let that happen. I needed to wring that counterspell out of my darling sister and fast.

  Ferna
ndo was counting on me. And sweet home Chicago was waiting for me.

  Chapter Nine

  I smacked hard into a slab of cement, and I massaged my throbbing arm. Thankfully, my head still appeared intact. As my eyes acclimated to the surrounding darkness, an obnoxious sound snapped me into sitting position. I hadn’t landed on cement, after all, but the bedroom floor. I’d fallen out of bed. Welcome back to my toddler days.

  Another noise—ring—had me scrambling to stand. It was Violet’s phone sounding from the other room. I caught the time as I ran out: 2:07 a.m. Who the heck was calling at this hour?

  I patted around, knocking something off the counter in the process. “Hello?” I grumbled.

  “This Eve?”

  “Eve?” I shook out a few more sleepy cobwebs. Eve… oh yeah. See what the place was doing to me? Only a couple short days and already I was forgetting my name. “Yes, this is Eve. Who’s calling?”

  “Sal. Your neighbor gave me the number.” Fernando’s brother. My spine straightened and my mind cleared, as much as it could for the middle of the night. “I need to talk to Nando.”

  Nando? Aww, cute. “Actually, I was hoping to talk to you, Sal. By chance, have you seen a—”

  “I need to talk to Nando,” he repeated with more impatience.

  “Ah, he’s not here.” I glanced around the dim room, wondering if Fernando could hear me flat-out lying to his brother.

  “You making excuses for him?”

  “Excuses for what?”

  “You in Bigfoot Bay?”

  “Why do you think that?” Had Sal tracked me down? My throat tightened. I hadn’t even told Mrs. Geller where I was. Did I have to worry about some deranged stalker showing up on Violet’s doorstep on top of everything else?

  “Your phone number.” Oh. Blasted landline. If it were a cell, there wouldn’t have been a blinking neon sign signaling my location. “He better not be hiding out there.”

  “Hey, I’m just here to see my sister. Speaking of—”

  “Look, family or not, my patience is wearing thin. You see Nando, you tell him I want my money. Now.”

  My insides were strapped to a roller coaster. The nickname didn’t sound so cute anymore. “Are you saying he owes you money?”