Sweet Tea & Spells (A Southern Charms Cozy Mystery Book 3) Read online

  He brushed another strand of hair away from my face. “You look…different,” he murmured, studying me.

  I swallowed hard, ignoring the flaming heat in my cheeks. “I let Ali Kat give me a makeover.” His attentive gaze made me squirm. “Is different a good or bad thing?”

  Mason studied my appearance like an experienced detective. “Good. Definitely good.”

  The air around us crackled with tension, and my knees shook. I grabbed onto his arms to stay upright, pulling our bodies closer. His breath hitched, and he cupped the back of my neck. Leaning in, the hot air of his breath caressed the line of my jaw, on my neck, and up to my ear.

  “Not yet and not here,” he whispered, his lips brushing the sensitive lobe. With a sigh, he pushed my shivering body away.

  He was right, a crime scene was no place for unexpected flirtatious banter. The new distance cooled the heat between us, and I cleared my throat. “So which is it? Am I staying or going?”

  Mason relaxed. “I’m beginning to wonder which was more dangerous, you or my last job? I guess you can stay on the case as long as you work with me and not on your own. And I hope you’ll say yes to my next question.”

  “Yes,” I joked, reveling in the detective’s return.

  With unusual patience, he waited for me to take him seriously. Once I quieted, he made his request. “Have dinner with me tonight.”

  For a person used to throwing up barriers between us, his offer confused me. There were so many things we needed to say. I wanted to tell him all about the bridal shower, what I’d witnessed in the Hawthorne’s kitchen, and my first experience teaching. He needed to tell me where he'd been and why it changed who he was now that he was back.

  “At the Harvest Moon?” I asked.

  “No, my place.”

  The last time I witnessed the product of the man’s cooking, I told him to throw it into the trash. “So you're telling me I need to cook some food and bring it over?”

  “A gentleman would never invite you to a meal at his home without providing the food himself,” Mason teased. “Are you saying yes?”

  I nodded my head in affirmation and pointed to his scruff. “I think a gentleman would shave.”

  He scratched the whiskers on his chin. “It's something I'm trying. I needed it while I was gone, and I want to see if it's too hot to keep.”

  Oh, it was definitely hot and he needed to keep it. “You have to let me at least bring the dessert. A lady doesn’t show up empty-handed.”

  “But she shows up at crime scenes?” Mason teased.

  “Fair point,” I conceded.

  He bumped me with his hip. “Bring whatever sweet thing you want, but just you would be enough. For now, walk me through your take of the situation.”

  I filled him in on all of my observations, and he shared with me the facts from the wardens’ side. Duke did sustain a head injury, resulting in some blood loss. However, the doc ruled it out as the cause of death since the chef had died from asphyxiation.

  “A lack of oxygen?” I asked. “Was there bruising around his throat?”

  Mason approved my inquiry with a slight nod of his head. “Good line of thinking, but no. No bruising as if someone tried to choke him with their hands or by pulling something tight around his neck. The whole thing is really bothering Doc because there’s no physical evidence on the body that suggests how he basically choked to death.”

  I crouched down next to where the body had lain, sorting through the little bit of facts I’d gleaned during Big Willie’s confusion. “There was no blood or skin underneath his fingernails, which suggests that he didn’t fight someone off.”

  Mason joined me in my thinking position. “He was hit over the head, so maybe he was knocked out. It’s possible that someone restricted his flow of air in a way that wouldn’t leave behind obvious clues.”

  “True,” I sighed. Eric’s question from the spell class popped in my head at that second. “Unless the unthinkable happened, and someone found another way to limit Duke’s respiratory system.” An all-too-familiar instinct gnawed on my gut.

  The detective frowned. “I’m not following.”

  “Someone could have cast a spell to somehow remove the oxygen around him,” I offered, wanting the idea not to be true. “But that’s a crazy theory, right? Who would risk their own life casting something like that?”

  Mason ran his hand over his stubble, making a scratchy sound. “I’ve seen people do worse in bigger cities. There are lots of witches willing to risk their souls by using magic to do bad things. If we had a spellweaver on hand, maybe there’d be enough magic residue left over on Duke’s body to figure out if a spell was used and who cast it.”

  I gaped at him. “There are people who can do that?”

  He closed my mouth with a nudge of his finger. “They’re even rarer than a tracker, and can be pretty unreliable since magic is tricky even at its simplest. The one we used in my last department cost too much for the consultation and gave us little results. I was pretty sure he was putting us on to begin with to con us out of money, but I couldn’t prove it. And the case we used him for was bad enough that my captain was willing to chance it.”

  We both stood and pondered everything in silence. I walked around, inspecting the entire area free from Big Willie’s complaints. Mason let me examine the scene with care and take my time until I was satisfied.

  “You say you’ve got Sassy on the list. I can see her maybe interacting with Duke, but killing a man?” The fairy annoyed me, but I didn’t believe she could do anything so reckless and evil.

  “You’ve got your own list, I’m sure. Sheriff West shared some of the insights you forced upon him in my absence.” The detective took out his notebook from his pocket. “If you were in charge, what would be your next step?”

  I almost exploded from the spark of excitement of Mason inviting my input for the first time. Not willing to let the opportunity pass, I dove in head first. “Sassy wouldn’t be the first person I’d interview. Duke’s partner, Shelby, should be at the top. Also, I know that Lucky was running a late-night game of cards. Maybe he saw or heard something.”

  The detective ushered me to the back door. “Since he’s just a few doors down, we can start there. How did you know about the game?”

  Visions of Tucker in his drunken state appeared before my eyes. Bringing him up would change the focus of the investigation. I had questions I wanted to ask him first to see if there was a reason to maybe interrupt his life and ruin his impending wedding…again.

  “Lucky’s secret card games aren’t exactly classified. Everyone knows about them.” I bit my lip, ashamed of the second lie uttered from my mouth today.

  “Okay, go get your bike and meet me around front,” Mason instructed.

  “How did you know I parked my bicycle nearby? Or that I had it with me?”

  The detective leaned against the door frame, and the afternoon sun hit him at the right moment, highlighting the intriguing changes in his outward appearance. “You riding around on your magic-powered bike is not a big secret either. Meet you out front.” Letting the door close with a metal clang, he left me with too many emotions about him swirling inside and perplexing me.

  With no walls up between us, what kind of trouble would the two of us get into?

  Chapter Ten

  Mason and I knocked on the door to Lucky’s bar, The Rainbow’s End. In the light of day, I admired the thick wood carved with elaborate Celtic symbology and a large tree. After three loud tries, the leprechaun answered with a frown.

  He glanced back and forth between the detective and me, glinting out of a swollen black eye. “And what may I be doin’ for ya this fine afternoon?” he asked in his Irish accent with a less than friendly tone.

  “How’d you get the shiner?” Mason gestured at the leprechaun’s eye.

  Lucky showed us inside and busied himself behind the bar. Only the top of his red hair showed above the dark wood. “Ran into a wall. What have ye com
e here to ask me?” He stepped onto a platform of some sort, elevating him to our eye level.

  Clearly, the leprechaun wasn’t in a sharing mood, but neither Mason nor I had the time to try and wrangle the truth out of him. I spoke up, “Let’s not get bogged down in unicorn manure. I know you know about Duke’s death, and we need to ask you about your card game last night.”

  Lucky opened his mouth and closed it. He reached for a pint glass and filled it with a dark, thick beer with a hint of foam on top. “Guinness?” he asked both of us.

  “We’re on the job,” explained Mason.

  The leprechaun shrugged, gripping the pint in his hand and holding it up. “Suit yourselves. Sláinte mhaith.” In huge gulps, he finished the entire thing. He slammed the glass down and wiped the foam from his lips with the back of his hand.

  “Who was here in the bar last night?” Mason asked, taking out his notebook.

  “It was a slow night, and where you want me to start is to tell you that the dead man was here.” Lucky took a nearby rag and wiped down the bar. “So was Steve, Henry, Raif, Tucker, and me. That’s who stayed to play poker.” The leprechaun shot a wary eye at the detective.

  Mason shook his head. “I’m not here to bust you over illegal gambling. But I do need to have details about everything. What time did the bar empty of other patrons? What time did the game start? What happened during the game? How’d you get the black eye?”

  Leaning forward with both hands on the bar, Lucky looked like he wanted to fight the detective. His shoulders slumped and he sighed. “You better come with me.”

  Lucky hopped down and led us to the back of the bar. Taking out some keys from his pocket, he unlocked a door I’d never noticed before and opened it. The secret room lay in complete destruction with cards and chips scattered about, chairs knocked over or broken, and a couple of holes in the wall.

  “What happened?” I marveled, taking a careful step inside.

  “Tucker Hawthorne,” exploded Lucky. “He’s what happened. I’ve never had any trouble with him before, but he’s been comin’ to The End more and more frequently. A couple of times, I even escorted him back to his place after I closed down to keep the rest of the town from knowin’, especially that sweet lass of his.” The more the leprechaun got excited, the thicker his accent grew.

  “Start from the beginning,” insisted Mason.

  Lucky righted an overturned chair and ran a hand down a tear in the table’s green felt. “I shut the bar down early around eleven and we came back here. We played a few rounds, and the vampire quit, leaving early. He thinks he’s a cards man, but he was way out of his league. It only took losin’ a few bobs as he called his money for him to figure that out.”

  “So Raif’s not responsible for the damage,” I clarified.

  The leprechaun picked up a piece of a broken chair. “No, we had an hour at least of good gamblin’. That fella Duke is a right bast—um, backside of a unicorn. He did his best to rile up Steve with the prospect of opening up a competing restaurant.”

  I watched Mason write down the cafe owner’s name underneath the fairy’s. “Was Sassy here at any point?” Waiting for Mason to scold me for jumping in, he surprised me with supporting silence.

  Lucky nodded. “She was in earlier before I closed things down out front, hoverin’ and buzzin’ around Duke like he was pecan pie and she was the fork. But I shooed her away before the game started.”

  I leaned into the detective. “Maybe he got some of her dust on him then and transferred it to the old diner when he was there.”

  Mason made some notes and paused. “When and how did the fighting start?”

  Lucky stroked his red beard. “It must have been some time after midnight. Henry and Steve left with their meager winnings at the same time, leaving just Duke, Tucker, and myself. I suggested to young Hawthorne, who was several sheets to the wind by that point, that perhaps him takin’ his leave would be best. Like an ignorant untrained pup, he ignored me.”

  “So he hit you?” I asked.

  “Not at first.” Lucky stopped cleaning up the room and faced us. “Duke started in on Tucker, something about how he should hand over all his money right then and there and make it easier on himself. The way those two spoke, it seemed as if they knew each other.”

  “Well, Duke’s company did cater the bridal shower,” I explained. “Although I’m pretty sure he’s not the actual chef doing the cooking.”

  Lucky pointed at me. “That’s what young Tucker said. Told Duke that he would expose him if he didn’t stop.”

  “Stop what?” both Mason and I asked at the same time.

  The leprechaun pointed at the table. “He didn’t say much else. Tucker launched himself across the table at the other man, and the fight started. I did my best to stop it and earned this from one of them.” He pointed at his black eye. “I think you people forget that though we leprechauns are not tall, we harbor a considerable amount of magic. We’re not all rainbows, pots of gold, and cereal with fake marshmallows in it.”

  Having known Lucky most of my life, it surprised me he brought up his personal powers. “What did you do?”

  He pointed at the holes in the wall. “That’s where I tossed them. Told them they better leave unless they wanted me to do worse.”

  “Did they leave?” I catalogued the injuries I’d noticed on Tucker, trying to match them with the leprechaun’s story.

  “I shoved them out the side door into the alley there and wiped my hands of what happened after. It’ll be a while before I let Tucker back in.” Lucky picked up a broken tumbler, inspected it, and tossed it on the floor to shatter.

  Mason checked the timeline he wrote down. “At some point after midnight, those two fighting men left your bar and one of them had their life taken.”

  The leprechaun blinked. “I can tell you exactly when. At precisely eight minutes past one in the morning.”

  “How can you know that?” challenged the detective. “That’s pretty specific.”

  “Because of the wail of the banshee.” Lucky waved his hands for us to leave the room. He locked the door behind us. “I heard her cry long and loud at exactly eight past one.”

  A loud cry. Or maybe it was heard as a howl like the one Beau asked me about. “A banshee,” I muttered.

  “Surely you’ve heard of them, a chara.” He patted me on the back. “They are not stuff of legend, being one of the fae folk attached to a family and magic bound to mourn their passing. It was a banshee’s keening I heard, and no doubt about it. I recognized the shriek from my days in the Old World.”

  “I think my roommate heard it, too,” I said.

  “Chances are many in the town did. It is a sound not easily ignored nor forgotten. I was happy that none of my glasses shattered. Are ye sure you don’t want a pint? You look a bit peaky.” He gestured at the bar.

  I shook my head, the gears inside of it turning fast. “Are all banshees women?”

  The leprechaun nodded. “In my recollection, they are.”

  “And they are connected to a family, you said?” I pressed.

  “Aye.” Lucky scratched the bald spot in the middle of his head. “They come back again and again for generations of deaths.”

  A line of connection formed between Duke and a likely suspect. “And if a person was the last of the family, once they were mourned, perhaps the banshee would be free.”

  Mason stepped up next to me. “You’ve got an idea who it is.” He took out his spell phone and flipped it open.

  “Yeah, I think I know someone who might fit the description of being stuck with Duke and wanting something bad to happen to him.” I watched Mason check the text.

  The detective closed his phone. “That was Zeke. Flint alerted the wardens that someone on the watch list was trying to leave Honeysuckle.”

  “And I’ll bet her name is Shelby,” I exclaimed.

  Mason thanked Lucky and pulled me out of the dark bar and into the warm light of the afternoon. “I think
you’d better accompany me. It seems you know more than I do, and I could use your help.”

  Mason took me to the guard house at our border. When we approached, we both noticed a large wooden gate blocking the road. I imagined the invisible magical barriers were at their maximum strength as well.

  Flint came out to meet us once we parked on the side of the road. “We’ve been monitoring who comes in and out since this morning. She’s just a slip of a thing and could have made it past us. Except I was on duty.” He pointed at the small structure.

  Mason thanked the gnome and checked on the car she’d driven, calling in the license plate to the warden station.

  “How’s Goss doin’?” I asked.

  Flint smiled. “My wife is doin’ fine, although she’s not so hot on the enforced bed rest.”

  “When’s she due?” I’d learned a while back that the gestation period for fairies was way shorter than humans from TJ in an outburst of jealousy.

  The gnome’s face went pale. “Soon. And I’m not quite done with the cradle yet.”

  One of the traditions of his people Flint wanted to bring to his family was the hand carving of the baby’s cradle. The task took the length of a pregnancy, resulting in beautiful handiwork and elaborate designs. The finished product would be presented to everyone who attended the naming ceremony to show how dedicated he was as a father to taking care of his family.

  “I’ll bet what you have right now is more than enough,” I promised my friend.

  He shook his head. “Nothing will ever be good enough for my Gossy and my baby.”

  Mason got off his spell phone and approached us. “Yeah, the car she’s driving is registered to Duke Aikens. Looks like she was trying to flee. Where is she now?”

  Flint pointed at the guard house and walked the two of us over. He asked the other gate guard to take a break, leaving Mason and me to question a shaking Shelby.

  “I know what you’re thinking. You think I did it. That I killed Duke.” She looked up at the two of us from her seat with tears falling down her face. “But I didn’t, I swear.”