Making Magic (25 page)

A group of people stood at the edge of the stage.

“You selling that dulcimer? The one you played?” one of them asked.

“Wait a minute, I was here first!” someone else shouted.

“Can I have a business card?”

“Are you selling those online?”

“Do you build psalteries?”

Jake stooped down to talk to the group, amazed by the reaction.

His fellow musicians were crowding up to ask about his instruments. It was exactly what she had hoped would happen.

But she hadn’t said the words. She rubbed her throbbing temple and searched for another tissue. It couldn’t have been her.

Could it?

This could not be real.

Jake had hoped to sell a couple of instruments after the concert, maybe see some traffic come into the shop, but this was amazing.

He stood in the door of the shop staring out at the street with Rita humming away inside. Nearly all his instruments were gone. There was one bowed psaltery left and he had barely hung on to his favorite hammered dulcimer. But he had sold everything else and nearly run out of business cards for the shop and the band.

Amazing.

A crowd of fellow performers and aspiring musicians had almost overwhelmed him at the festival stage then showed up at the shop before he could even unpack the truck. Rita was in a dither trying to deal with them until he could get inside.

It had exceeded his wildest dreams. He had prepaid orders for a half dozen mountain dulcimers and three more hammered dulcimers—
three
. In addition, the band had several offers to perform at various venues and two couples had approached him about their weddings.

But he had lost control during the concert, lifting Thea a little off the ground. She seemed to have that effect on him. At least this time he hadn’t sprained her ankle.

Why hadn’t she freaked out about finding herself floating inches off the ground? Instead, she had simply covered it up and acted as if nothing unusual was going on.

On top of that, how could that ankle of hers that had been so swollen Wednesday night suddenly look so slender and shapely the next day? He hadn’t pinned her down about that one yet, but he needed to—and about what she had said to his mom to make her behave for an entire night.

If that Greg guy hadn’t gotten in the way, he would’ve asked her about it by now.

Even though confronting her about this meant he might have to reveal his odd talent to her, he knew that he wanted to, because he wanted
her
. He’d wanted Thea Woodruff since he could remember. That kiss they shared on stage still hummed in his blood and had his hair, and other things, on end.

Dusk was approaching and the air was soft with the promise of a warm summer night. He wondered if Thea was still over at the festival with that jerk.

“I guess this means they’re going to have an election to replace the sheriff soon, after all, hmmm?” Rita said.

A few of those same people who had approached him after the concert, had also asked when he was coming back as sheriff. A couple of others had actually expressed a concern that he might leave his office for the music. “I guess so,” Jake said.

“I’m not in the least bit surprised,” Rita said. “But I am happy for you. And all those folks told me your concert was wonderful. A couple of them said Songs in the Wood should record an album.”

“It was pretty damn incredible,” he said. “But the best bits were Thea Woodruff on that flute—and her Irish whistle.”

Rita nodded. “Yes. They mentioned her too.”

“Did they?”

“You
do
know it’s all over your face when you talk about her, don’t you?” Rita said.

For a moment he wasn’t sure what she had said. “What?”

She laughed. “All I have to say is, I want some of whatever magic you’ve got going on these days.”

Jake watched his mother and Sarah leave the psychic’s shop and head across the street. “I can handle the rest of the day. Why don’t you go on home?”

“Why’s that?” She followed his gaze out the window. “Oh. I can cover for you, if you want to sneak out the back.”

Jake put his hand on her shoulder. “You are priceless, Rita. No, you go on. I’ll be fine.”

“Hah. You’ve got more patience than most, at any rate,” She squeezed his arm and went to get her purse.

“Thanks, Rita. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Jake stepped back into the shop and waved as Rita left. She turned up the sidewalk without acknowledging the two women passing her. There was no love lost between Rita and Sarah.

His mom looked like a prim Southern lady in her summer dress and Sarah was decked out like an old-time granny witch as they walked up to his door. His mom peered into the dimness of the shop searching for him. When she spotted him, she motioned Sarah to follow in behind her. It seemed Sarah was her backup today. This was going to be interesting. Or painful. Probably both.

“Ladies,” he said with a smile. “I thought you would be running your booth over at the festival, Sarah.”

Sarah glowered at him. In fact, the organizers had barred her from setting up at the festival this year because of all the complaints over the past few years. Sarah had tried to turn a fun fortune-telling experience into an expensive swindle for some of her customers.

“She has more important things to do,” his mom replied.

“I bet,” he said.

Sarah Rae Scott was younger than his mom, but tried to look much older, playing up the granny witch stereotype. She had been running one con or another since she was a teenager, when her grandmother had taught her to do cold readings. But his mom was right, she didn’t look well. In fact, she reminded him a little of the guy who had put a bullet in him not so long ago—sallow, sweaty face and tiny pupils. Sarah was either on something or really ill or both.

“You can scoff, Sheriff Moser,” Sarah said in her raspy old lady voice. “But your father told me who was stealing those innocent babies and—”

“Oh, wow, let me use
my
powers to ask Dad who that might be,” Jake said, putting his hand to his head. “I’m getting a vision. It’s a lollipop…a
sucker
. No, wait. It’s just one of Sister Sarah’s customers.”

“Jacob Moser!” his mom shrilled. “This is not some kind of joke.”

“No, mom, it isn’t. You let this piece of work drag Dad’s memory through her personal—” he pointed to his temple, “—garbage dump.”

Sarah shouldered her way forward to stand in front of him, hands on hips. He could see the powder she put on her face to highlight the wrinkles around her eyes and mouth. But he could also see that her skin was yellow beneath it.

And her hand, not nearly gnarled and misshapen enough to belong to the crone she pretended to be, shook as she pointed a finger at him.

“They’re planning something involving a baby. As soon as that Woodruff spawn is born—”

“You are
not
going to stand in my store and call Grace Woodruff’s baby ‘spawn,’” Jake said in a hard voice, taking a step toward Sarah. He could’ve sworn he heard her hiss. “I can’t believe you let this
charlatan
say these things,” he said to his mom, ignoring Sarah.

“I told you, Marilyn. He’s under
their
control,” Sarah said. “Annie knew that mountain like the back of her hand. There’s no way she got lost—”

“Out!” Jake drowned out the rest of Sarah’s drivel and took another step forward forcing her right out the door. Sarah and Annie had been thick as thieves for a long time. That was strange enough, since Old Annie was a bit of a recluse. Sarah had always insinuated that there was some conspiracy involved in Annie’s disappearance—something about a secret that they were hiding up on Woodruff Mountain.

Of course, Old Annie had been the one hiding secrets—a hidden lab her sons had used to produce meth, a secret those boys had tried to kill to protect.

He watched Sarah scurry back to her shop, looking over her shoulder as if waiting for his mom to follow. Business was slow in town. Almost everyone was down at the river exploring the festival grounds so the sidewalks were relatively quiet. He was thankful that no one had heard the exchange.

But if those two kept spreading this garbage about the Woodruffs getting rid of Old Annie, he was going to bring them both up on charges. At least neither his mom nor Sarah knew enough about social media to try and libel anyone online.

He turned back to his mom, still furious. “The only good thing I can find to say about this situation is at least you’re not drinking.”

The remark hit home. She turned away to follow Sarah. He should be past feeling guilty for telling the truth, but he didn’t want to push her away. He moved to stop her.

“I’m sorry. Look, would you like a cup of coffee, Mom? Rita just made fresh.”

She hesitated and he pulled the chair out from behind the counter to put it next to his stool. She stared at it a moment then walked over and sat down with a sigh.

Despite what he knew about co-dependency and all the emotional weapons his mom had at her disposal, he still wanted to talk to her, to see if he could reason with the mother he remembered—who was still in there, somewhere.

And he did know how she liked her coffee. He made both of them mugs and carried them back into the front of the store. Handing her one, he settled down on his stool and picked up the notes he had made about all the projects he needed to work on—an abundance of new business.

“Our performance went well today,” he said. “Got lots of orders.”

“So you’ll be quitting as sheriff then.” It wasn’t a question.

“Probably. I’ve been thinking about it for a while. The timing seems right,” he said. “I’ll likely never be rich doing this, but I’ll be happy.”

She laughed without humor. “You’d never be rich as sheriff neither.”

“Pardon?” he said, raising his eyebrows at her lapse into mountain speak.

“You are too good.”

“Too good… What do you mean, Mom?”

She pointed the mug at him. “I mean you aren’t willing to take all the payoffs and kickbacks and whatnot that come with the job.” She sipped at her coffee.

“What?”

She looked at him. “Are you trying to tell me they never approached you?”

“Well, no. I mean, yes.” He peered at her. “Shit, Mom, are you telling me Dad did?”

“No need to swear, Jacob.” She stared at her caramel-colored brew. “You think we were rich?” Her voice sounded different—more contemplative, less accusatory.

He had to stop and think about that. “No, not really.” He took a long sip. “But we weren’t poor either.”

“They approached him. And they never really stopped,” she said in a soft voice. “It was a constant thing. He got so depressed.”

“It can be discouraging,” he agreed, thinking of the sly innuendos and subtle offers. Then there were the less-friendly shoves that forced him to shove back. Greed and dishonesty were the default in government, big or small. But his father had never shown any signs that kind of thing was going on, never sharing that part of his experiences. Jake wished he had. He might have reconsidered running for the office.

Jake stared out at the oncoming dusk, a sudden suspicion icing through his veins. His dad had never really recovered from Becca’s death. Add the pressures of the job to his mother’s alcoholism and maybe his death hadn’t been the stupid accident that they always thought it was. Maybe he
had
walked into that bullet.

“You’re a lot like him, you know,” she said.

The thought made Jake shudder.

“Those people who kept asking me about you coming back to the job?”

He nodded.

“The Millers. You remember them?”

He had a flash of a little girl—big brown eyes, soaked to the skin—who he had found with her foot wedged between two rocks in Little Mine Creek in the pouring rain. “Kaitlyn.”

She nodded. “They aren’t too happy about you stepping down.”

“Hmmm.”

“And Marsha Wilhoit?”

Jake remembered the terrified woman with the bruised face, held against her drunken husband’s chest with the barrel of a pistol digging into her ear. He had talked the man down and talked Marsha into filing charges—eventually.

“Yeah.”

“She cornered me at church and made me promise to ‘talk to you about leaving’.” She put prim quotes in the air.

The thought of anyone “cornering” his mother made Jake chuckle. “Is Trip still…uh…”

His mom nodded. “Going to the meetings regular. And going to church…” She smiled. “Not so regular.”

“Glad to hear it.”

“That’s what kept Ron going. Those people.” She sipped her coffee. “I understand you wanting to get out, though.” Her voice was faint. “I know I’ve said otherwise, but I understand.”

“Thanks, Mom.” He heard the slightest sound from her and found her eyes watering.