Witch Is When the Penny Dropped (6 page)

Chapter 8

Dinner with Jack Maxwell. I should have been more excited than I was, but I was still stinging from my encounter with Luther. And besides, I didn’t totally trust Jack—I always had the feeling that he was trying to get one over on me—like with the bowling. Not that he’d ever manage it. Still, it had to be better than staying in my flat and moping. And it was certainly better than going over to Kathy’s, and having her take the mickey.

It could prove to be an interesting evening because Jack had said he intended cooking dinner himself. Now it was perfectly possible that he was a good cook—many men are—although curiously, I’d yet to meet one. Somehow, he didn’t strike me as the culinary type. He was more the ‘fish, chips and mushy peas’ type. Maybe I was being unfair—I was about to find out.

His flat was a fifteen minute drive from mine. I’d toyed with the idea of taking a taxi, but decided I preferred to have an excuse not to drink. I’d done with drink for a while after my post-Luther binge.

“Come in.” Jack greeted me at the door with a welcoming smile. “You found it okay?”

“Yeah. I’m a P.I., remember.”

“Dinner will be about thirty minutes. Care for a drink?”

“Just soda. I’m driving.”

He led the way into the living room which had a minimalist feel to it.

“You have a lot of bowling trophies.” I almost managed to say it without smirking. “Pity you missed out on that last one.”

“Are you going to rub that in again?”

“Oh yes. Plenty more mileage left in that yet. Did you have to hire a separate van to transport these?” I ran my hand along the top of the trophy cabinet.

He smiled. “I’d better go and check on dinner. Have a seat.”

“Why don’t I give you a hand?”

“No!” He looked panic-stricken. “Sorry. I mean—No, it’s okay. I got this. Take the weight off your feet. I’ll only be a minute.”

I didn’t take a seat. Instead, I studied the various photographs which he had on display. One was of a couple in their fifties or sixties who I guessed were his parents. Another was of Jack and another man who looked like a slightly younger version of him—his brother, I assumed. There were several photos of Jack being awarded a trophy. Those bowling shirts really didn’t do anything for him. I was pleased to find there weren’t any photos of Susan ‘Sushi’ Shay or any other women come to that. Perhaps he’d hidden them away before I arrived.

When he wasn’t being ‘Detective Maxwell’, Jack could be good company. I’d discovered that on our first so-called date—the one where Kathy had rigged the raffle. He was interesting and funny. And although he wasn’t in the same league as Luther on the ‘phew’ scale, he was still pretty hot. Not that I’d noticed.

And he could cook. I mean really cook. The meal was one of the best I’d had for many a month. I’d been expecting fish fingers and chips with ice cream for dessert. Instead, I’d been treated to a culinary feast.

“Well,” I said, after the last spoonful of lemon tart (to die for). “I have to say that was delicious. Thank you.”

“You sound surprised.” He grinned.

“I am a little.”

“That’s rather sexist.”

“I suppose so. I haven’t come across many men who know how to cook. Peter’s not bad—”

“Peter?”

“My brother-in-law. But he’s not in this league.”

“Why thank you, kind lady.”

Just then a phone rang. Maxwell took it from his pocket, checked the number, and said, “Sorry. This is urgent, I have to take it.”

“Sure, no problem.”

Whatever or whoever it was, he didn’t want me to overhear, so he walked off in what I assumed was the direction of the bedroom.

A good looking guy who could make me laugh and could cook? Why was I wasting my time with Luther? Jack Maxwell seemed to have it all—even if he could be a bit of an asshat at times.

The sound made me jump. It had come from the kitchen. Jack’s flat was on the ground floor. Had someone climbed in through the window? Jack was still in the bedroom, so was unlikely to have heard it. I’d better take a look.

“Gordon?”

“Jill?

Gordon Blare looked almost as surprised to see me as I was to see him. I’d hired Gordon a few nights earlier to prepare the meal I’d planned to share with Luther Stone. He was a cordon bleu chef who prepared meals for paying clients in their own homes. I hadn’t trusted myself to cook a meal worthy of the evening I’d envisaged spending with Luther, so I’d hired Gordon.

“I didn’t realise you were here,” I said.

“Busted.” He shrugged.

Maxwell had brought in a chef and intended to take credit for the meal himself. Despicable! What? Of course it’s completely different to what I’d done. I’d fully intended telling Luther. Totally. Probably.

“Oh?”

I turned around to find a red-faced Jack Maxwell staring at us.

“You were going to let me think you’d made this yourself, weren’t you?” I grinned.

He held his hands up. “Guilty as charged.”

“Can you actually cook?”

He shook his head. “I do a mean beans on toast, but that’s about it.”

Gordon left, and Jack and I laughed it off. In some ways it came as a relief to know Jack was every bit as useless in the kitchen as I was.

Just as on our previous date, he was good company. Away from the job, Jack Maxwell was someone I really liked. And he seemed to like me too. The evening ended with goodbyes, and a peck on the cheek. Not very exciting granted, but maybe it was the start of something? Maybe.

***

It was Saturday morning, but I still had to drop in at the office—I had a cat to feed. Surely if Winky could talk, send messages by semaphore and fly a remote control helicopter, he could feed himself? But then, maybe that wasn’t such a good idea because he would have been the size of a barrage balloon.

“Morning, Winky.”

He didn’t look up—he was too busy typing away on my computer. I’d told him not to use it and I’d changed the password a dozen times, but I was wasting my time. That cat could hack his way into anything.

“I hope you aren’t ordering things, and paying for them with my credit card again.”

“Shush! You’re interrupting the artistic juices.”

What was he up to now?

“Is that a new eye patch?”

“It is.” He looked up. “What do you think?”

“I like it. The sequins work surprisingly well.”

“That’s what I thought. It’s part of the new disco range. I bought a couple.”

So he
was
using my credit card to buy goods again. No wonder my bill was always so high.

“Stop ordering stuff. I’m broke.”

“Chill out. I’m not ordering anything. If you must know, I’m writing a book.”

“You?”

“Why not? If the old bag lady can do it, then I’m sure I’ll have no problem.”

“What kind of book?”

“It’s a fantasy/adventure.”

“A novel?”

“Yeah, why not?”

“What’s it about?”

“Before I tell you, I’ll need you to sign this.” He pushed several sheets of A4 paper across the desk.

“What’s this?”

“Just an NDA.”

“You want me to sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement?”

“It protects us both.”

“Don’t you trust me enough to take my word?”

He shook his head.

“Okay.” My curiosity had got the better of me. “I’ll sign your stupid NDA.”

“On pages five, seven and ten.”

I signed three times and passed it back to him.

“Right. So the plot is this: There’s this young boy who finds out he’s a wizard, and he goes to this school for wizards—”

“Hold on! That’s already a thing.”

“What is?”

“That story. It’s already been done.”

“Impossible. This was all my idea.”

“I’m pretty sure someone got there first.”

“Well, even if they did, it can’t be as good as the book I’m going to write. I’ll sell thousands—maybe even millions.” He scratched his chin. “There’s just one thing. I’m struggling for the main character’s name.”

“Harry?”

“Nah. I was thinking of something more along the lines of Bruce. ‘Bruce and the Mysterious School for Wizards’.”

“Catchy.”

“Yeah—I thought so.”

I was on my way out of the office when I got a call from the girls at Love Spell. Hilary confirmed they’d arranged a date for me with a human—it was scheduled for Thursday evening at a restaurant called Kaleidoscope—one of three restaurants they used for all first dates. If nothing else, I’d get a free meal out of it.

***

I’d promised to give the twins a hand in Cuppy C for a few hours. Now I knew the ropes, I actually quite enjoyed my time behind the counter. It made a change from the cut and thrust of being a P.I. After all, what could go wrong in a tea room?

“I asked for skinny,” the disgruntled witch said.

“Sorry. I’ll swap it.”

“I asked for a single shot—this is way too strong.” An unhappy werewolf complained.

“Sorry. I’ll get you another.”

“Jill, why don’t you take a break?” Amber nudged me out of the way. A little disgruntled, I went over to join Pearl who was also on her break.

“I thought I’d got this tea-room lark cracked,” I said.

Pearl laughed. “You might kick our asses at witchcraft, but you’re pretty useless behind that counter.”

“Gee thanks.”

“It’s okay. We like to have you around. It makes us realise how good we are. It would be horrible if you were better than us at everything.”

“I guess.” That didn’t make me feel any better about being such a klutz.

“Did Amber tell you about the fancy dress competition?”

“No, but then we’ve never had a minute.”

“It’s a week on Sunday. You have to go.”

“I don’t think so.” I’d never seen the point of fancy dress competitions.

“It will be a hoot. And there’s a cruise for two for the winner.”

Even I had to concede that was a pretty good prize, but not good enough to make me want to put myself through that kind of torture.

“What are you and Amber going to go as?”

“We haven’t made our minds up yet, but we definitely aren’t going to go as some kind of silly pair. Mum saw salt and pepper costumes, and said we should hire those. I’m not going to dress up as a condiment for anyone.”

“If you win I assume you’ll go on the cruise with Alan?”

“No. Amber and I have agreed if either of us wins, we’ll go together.”

There were times when I wondered why the twins had got engaged. It seemed to me they would come up with any excuse to leave their fiancés behind.

Amber had managed to get away from the counter, and she came over to join us.

“I’ve been telling Jill about the fancy dress,” Pearl said.

“You totally have to go.” Amber took a bite of the cookie she’d snagged from the counter.

“I hate fancy dress.”

“You’ll love it. Did Pearl tell you what the prize is?”

“Yeah. Still not interested. I’ll come and cheer you two on though, if I can get away. By the way, how’s Barry? Has he come out from under the bed yet?”

“He’s over at Mum’s house.”

Chapter 9

Oh my! I have a new love in my life. No, not a man. I’m in love with Aunt Lucy’s fruit scones, which are too delicious for words. I feel a little disloyal to my beloved blueberry muffins, and of course my custard creams, but right now all I want is a second scone.

“Help yourself to another if you like.” She must have read my mind. No, seriously, knowing my family, she probably had.

“I shouldn’t.”

“Are you sure?”

“Well, go on then. They are rather small.”

Aunt Lucy laughed. We both knew I’d just redefined the term ‘small’.

“I’m glad you came over,” she said. “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”

I nodded. I couldn’t speak because my mouth was otherwise engaged with pure scone delight.

“It’s about Barry.”

Oh no. What had he done now? If she was going to tell me she and the twins could no longer look after him when I was in Washbridge, what would I do? I couldn’t take him back with me.

“Look!” She pointed out of the window.

Barry was trying desperately to scale the wooden fence into the next garden. Not that he had any chance of doing so—it was at least six feet tall.

“What’s the matter with him?” I said after I’d washed down the scone with a glass of milk.

“The neighbours have bought a lady dog. Barry seems rather keen to meet her.”

“That’s nice.”

“Yes. Well it would be if he’d—” She lowered her voice as though Barry might actually hear us. “If he’d had the ‘snip’.”

“Snip? Oh, right. The snip.” I screwed up my face at the thought of it. “That explains it.”

Now it was Aunt Lucy’s turn to look confused.

“Last time I was here, he wouldn’t come out from under the bed. He kept going on about the ‘snap’. I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.”

“I think it’s something you need to get sorted.”

“Me?”

“He is your dog.”

“Yeah, but—err—won’t he hate me?”

“Probably, but not for long. Give it some thought.”

I was going to try my best not to. Poor old Barry.

“How did your showdown with Miles Best go?” I asked in an attempt to take my mind off snipping.

“He wasn’t
best
pleased.” Aunt Lucy laughed at her own pun. “He said if I didn’t continue to bake cakes for him he’d tell the twins that I’d been supplying them to him.”

“But you didn’t even know they were going to his shop.”

“It’s okay. I think I know how to convince him that threats won’t get him anywhere.” She gave me a knowing wink.

***

It was Monday morning, and I’d managed to get out of my block of flats without bumping into Luther again. I was about to set off for the office when my phone rang.

“Morning, Jack. You’re bright and early.”

“Don’t say I never do you any favours. You’re going to hear anyway, so I thought I’d let you know that an order has been granted to exhume Reginald Peel’s body. Or at least whoever’s body is buried there.”

“Did Ron change his mind and agree to it?”

“No, but then we didn’t need him to. Look, I have to go. I just wanted to say I enjoyed the other night.”

“Me too. Even if you did lie through your teeth about who cooked the meal.”

“You enjoyed it didn’t you?”

“It was delicious, but I can’t believe you’d stoop so low. I would never do anything like that.” What? White lies don’t count.

“Next time we’ll dine out. How does that sound?”

“Sounds great.”

“Right. Got to dash.”

Now we’d find out why Ron Peel was so upset at the idea of disturbing his brother’s remains.

***

Mrs V had abandoned the laptop and was back to knitting. At least, she would have been if she hadn’t been so busy trying to control the three unruly men who were seated in the outer office. As soon as I walked through the door, they leapt to their feet.

“Sit down and wait!” Mrs V pointed a threatening knitting needle at them. “Stay!”

I gave Mrs V a puzzled look.

“These three
gentlemen
are all here to see you. They do
not
have an appointment.”

“Miss Gooder, I’m Stephen—” One of them stood up.

“Sit down!” Mrs V gave him the evil eye.

He sat.

“Jill, can I have a word in your office?” Mrs V said.

Once in there, I said, “Who are they?”

“Publishers.”

“Which publisher?”

“They aren’t together. They’re from three different publishing companies.”

“Really? I suppose you’d better send them in.”

“Separately?”

“Might as well get it all over with at once. Send them all in, would you?”

While Mrs V went to collect them, I looked around for Winky. He was usually on me as soon as I walked in the door—not because he was pleased to see me obviously, but because he wanted feeding. I spotted him under the sofa—staring at the three men who Mrs V had just ushered into my office. He was up to something, but I’d have to wait to find out what.

“Right gentlemen. Pull up a seat, and tell me what all the fuss is about.”

They all began to talk at once.

“Whoa! Why don’t you all introduce yourselves first? Left to right.”

“I’m Peter Entwhistle and I represent Black Python Publishing.”

“I’m Colin Malone and I represent White Arrow Publishing.”

“And I’m Stephen Jefferson. I represent Blue Cocktail Publishing.”

“So, it’s not all black and white then?” I laughed at my own joke.

They didn’t. They just shared a puzzled look. It was so difficult to find an audience for my sophisticated humour.

“What can I do for you gentlemen?” I said.

“I understand you are representing the author of the book which is being auctioned,” Jefferson said.

The three of them shared a remarkably similar bad taste in ties, but Jefferson’s just edged it.

“What book?”

“White Arrow is keen to make an offer.”

“I think you’ll find we have the better distribution, and will offer the best advance,” Entwhistle said.

“Advances aren’t everything,” Jefferson interrupted. “We can offer the best royalties going forward.”

Wow! I knew knitting was popular—what with Wool TV and all—but who’d have thought it was this popular? Mrs V was going to make a killing. I wished she’d warned me that she’d named me as her agent. I guess she thought I’d be better at dealing with hard-nosed businessmen like these.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen. You will all have an opportunity to put forward your offers, which I and my client will give careful consideration to. Before you do that though, maybe you should tell me what other wool publications you have in your stables?”

I’d succeeded in confusing them again. They looked at one another, and then back at me.

“Wool?” Malone said.

“Yes. My client will want to be sure you have experience in marketing books in the same genre.”

“Well that’s where we excel,” Entwhistle said. “You’ve probably heard of the ‘Joe the Wizard’s school days’ series of books.”

“Really, Peter.” Malone interrupted. “Are you trying to compare those to our, ‘Edward the wizard’s school adventures’?”

“Neither of those can hold a light to the, ‘Paul the wizard does his homework’ series,” Jefferson said.

I glanced across at Winky who had a huge grin on his face.

“So let me get this straight. You gentlemen are all here today to bid for the right to publish the ‘Bruce’ book.”

“Yes, indeed,” Malone said. “Am I right in thinking that you represent the author, Win Key? Tell me is that Edwin or Edwina? The letter didn’t make it clear.”

“I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to give you any more details about the author. He or she is a very private person.”

They all nodded their understanding.

“Look, gentlemen, no decision is going to be made here today. I’d like you to submit your offers to me in writing by the end of next week.”

“But, Miss Gooder, if I could—”

I put my hand up to stop Malone mid-sentence.

“That’s my final word. Best offers in writing by next Friday. Now if you don’t mind, I have other business to attend to.”

The three of them trailed out of the room. As soon as they’d gone, Winky leapt onto my desk.

“Forty per cent,” I said.

“What?”

“That’s my cut.”

“In your dreams. Five per cent.”

“Thirty.”

“Ten.”

“Twenty.”

“Ten or I get the old bag lady to do it.”

“Okay. Ten it is.”

After I’d fed Winky, I had a few words with Mrs V.

“Who were those horrible men?”

“No one important. It’s all dealt with now.”

“I wasn’t going to waste a perfectly good scarf on them. They were simply dreadful—no manners at all.”

“How’s your book coming along? I see you aren’t writing today.”

“I have something else on my mind at the moment. Wool TV have asked me to do my first ever studio interview for them.”

“How exciting.”

“I know. I’m really thrilled, but also very, very nervous.”

“Who will you be interviewing?”

“That’s just it. They won’t tell me. They insist they want spontaneity. They don’t want me to go in there with pre-set ideas or prepared questions.”

“Wow! That really does sound scary.”

“And what’s even worse, is that it’ll be going out live.”

A recipe for disaster if ever there was one.

“I’ll let you know when it’s going to air as soon as I know.”

“Yeah. That would be good.”

***

I’d promised to meet Daze in Cuppy C. She wasn’t in the tea room when I arrived, but Amber and Pearl were. They were both in tears of laughter.

“What’s going on?”

Neither of them could speak, so they pointed out of the window.

Best Cakes owned by Miles Best and his girlfriend, Mindy Lowe, was directly across the street. I could see both of them inside their shop, but I couldn’t for the life of me make out what they were doing. It would have been pointless asking the twins who were helpless with laughter.

I walked out of Cuppy C, and made my way across the road.

Then I started to laugh too.

Miles and Mindy were running around the shop, desperately trying to grab the cakes which were floating in the air. They were fighting a losing battle. The customers in Best Cakes were either looking on in disbelief or holding their sides from laughter.

Aunt Lucy—what a card!

Daze had arrived by the time I got back to Cuppy C. Amber had managed to compose herself enough to bring drinks and cakes to our table. The twins could see we were in conference, so didn’t join us. The last time I’d seen Daze was to hand over the papers I’d managed to grab from Alicia’s flat. Alicia Dawes was a level two witch who had poisoned me, and who I believed was working with The Dark One (TDO).

I’ve had my people go over the papers,” Daze said. “There’s little doubt that Alicia is working for, if not with, TDO.”

“Are you going to bring her in?”

“It wouldn’t do any good. People like Alicia would rather die than talk. But at least now we know, we can keep her under surveillance. I have people on that now.”

“Anything else of interest in there?”

“The most interesting thing was what
wasn’t
in there.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, considering the file had your name on it, there was no mention of you in any of the papers. But then, my people believe that some papers have been removed.”

“What do you think that means?”

“I have no idea, but we did get a few other names though, and they’re now under surveillance.”

“So are we any closer to TDO?” I asked.

“Right now? No, but I’m hopeful the surveillance on the names we uncovered might turn up something.”

“What are you and Blaze working on at the moment?”

“Don’t mention that useless lump to me.”

Whoops. I’d obviously said the wrong thing. Blaze was Daze’s little sidekick—a kind of apprentice Rogue Retriever.

“What’s he done?”

“Fallen asleep, that’s what he’s done. When he should have been watching a werewolf who’s been killing humans. We’d had him under surveillance for some time, but he got away—so we’re back to square one.”