Every Witch Way But Wicked (A Wicked Witches of the Midwest Mystery) (23 page)

“What’s
Charmed
?”

“It was a television show about witches,” I said irritably.

“What does that have to do with anything?”

“It doesn’t,” I replied. “I was just explaining that I can’t make things magically happen – just because you want them to – like on television.”

Ken regarded me, his gray eyes dangerously slitted in overt anger. “I just think you’re not properly motivated.”

What was that supposed to mean?

“You will be,” Ken promised. “You will be.”

I opened my mouth to ask him what he meant by that, but I realized too late what was about to happen. It was like it was happening in slow motion, and yet I was still incapable of stopping it. Ken raised his hand, and I could see a tree branch in it. Darkness overcame me at the exact moment I realized he was going to hit me with it.

Not again. Aunt Tillie would never let me live this down.

I probably have brain damage. That’s the first thought that went through my head when I started to regain consciousness. I’ve passed out twice in the past six weeks – and now I’ve been knocked out. That can’t be good.

The second thought was that the head blow had obviously rendered me blind. The third was that, even though I thought my eyes were open, they actually weren’t. When I did open my eyes, I wasn’t surprised to see Ken looming over me from my prone spot on the ground.

“Gah!”

“It took you long enough,” Ken griped. “You were out for more than an hour.”

I tried to struggle to a sitting position, but the endeavor was harder than it should have been since my hands were tied behind my back. What the hell? “Why am I tied up? And why did you hit me in the head, you ass?”

“You weren’t being helpful,” Ken said simply. “I had to motivate you to help.”

“And you thought hitting me in the head and tying me up – and leaving me on the ground with bugs crawling on me, ugh -- would help?”

“Sorry about the bugs,” Ken said. He actually sounded sincere. “Hitting you in the head was a necessary evil. I tied you up because I figured you would wake up while I was gone. I had no idea that you would stay out so long.”

“I’ve had a problem losing consciousness lately,” I admitted ruefully.

“Maybe you have a tumor?” Ken suggested helpfully.

“That would be nice,” I muttered. “Wait, you tied me up and left me here? Why?”

“I had to get some help in persuading you to do what I want.”

Crap. Had he gone back to town and grabbed Clove or Thistle? I looked around the small clearing, hoping against hope that Clove and Thistle were still safe. When my gaze landed on the individual Ken had grabbed, I felt my heart sink.

“Well, this is just another grand situation you’ve gotten us in.”

“Aunt Tillie,” I grumbled. “You went to the inn and grabbed my Aunt Tillie? Are you crazy?”

Ken rubbed his jaw tiredly. I couldn’t help but notice that he had a darkening spot between his ear and chin. Aunt Tillie must have put up a fight. He was lucky she hadn’t clawed his eyes out and served them in a soup for lunch.

“I was actually hoping to get your mom or one of your aunts, but they were busy in the front of the inn,” Ken admitted. “I waited for a half an hour, but they never came back. I had to settle for your Aunt Tillie.”

“That must have went over well,” I mocked him, glancing at Aunt Tillie. She had been ridiculously quiet during this whole situation. She was probably plotting something. Of course, I couldn’t tell because she was wearing those stupid sunglasses.

“She’s got a lot of energy for an old lady,” Ken said.

“Who are you calling old?” Aunt Tillie barked.

“I didn’t mean any disrespect,” Ken held up his hands in surrender. He was scared of Aunt Tillie, this was good. Of course, I was scared of her, too. Especially given the fact that she was being unusually quiet. I wouldn’t want to be Ken right now. I wasn’t thrilled with being me, either.

“This guy is an idiot,” Aunt Tillie said, raising a gnarled finger and pointing it at Ken angrily. “You have no idea the rain of shit I’m going to bring down on you.”

I had to give it to her; she was an imposing sight – despite the sunglasses.

Ken swallowed hard. “I just want my money.”

“Your money? It was stolen money. You didn’t steal it. Myron did. You’re so lazy, you’re trying to steal from a drunk who did all the hard work,” Aunt Tillie admonished Ken in a raspy voice.

“That’s not the point,” Ken protested. “I put up with Myron’s drunken ass for years with the promise of that money being dangled over my head for the entire time. That’s my money. I earned it.”

“How did you earn it?” Aunt Tillie challenged. “Did you try to help Myron with his drinking problem? Or did you kill the one person who was trying to help him? Your own wife. You killed your own wife. You’re a dick.”

“Do you have Tourette’s?” Ken asked. “You’re swearing like a sailor, and I’ve never even heard you so much as curse once before.”

“What can I say? You bring it out in me.”

“All your niece has to do is find my money,” Ken growled. “That’s all I’m asking for.”

“How do you suggest she do that?”

“You can use one of your witchy tricks,” Ken suggested. “She cast a spell earlier, but it didn’t work. I don’t think she was really trying, though.”

“You cast a spell for this idiot?” Aunt Tillie turned towards me. She didn’t look happy.

“No.”

“I didn’t think so,” Aunt Tillie turned to Ken again. “She’s a pain in the ass, but she’s not stupid.”

“Well, then you need to cast a spell to find my money,” Ken hedged.

“No.”

“I said you had to.”

“No.”

“What the hell?” Ken looked like he wanted to kill someone. “I’m the one with the knife. You do what I say.”

Aunt Tillie crossed her short arms over her ample chest and fixed her jaw in a grim line. “No.”

“Goddamn you,” Ken took an ominous step towards Aunt Tillie. She didn’t shift her position. I had to admire her – even though she’s evil incarnate on a daily basis – she was especially persnickety today. Ken must have read the obstinate slope of her body, because he stopped moving towards Aunt Tillie and instead headed back towards me. He grabbed me by the back of my hair and pushed the knife towards my throat. “I will kill your niece if you don’t help.”

“If you even think about touching her, I’ll shrivel your balls to the size of walnuts and turn them black,” Aunt Tillie said evenly, but I could sense the tension that had suddenly come over her. “Then, when they fall off, I’ll feed them to you.”

Well that was a pleasant visual.

“Let her go!”

I was relieved when I heard the new voice. I couldn’t turn to see who had entered the clearing behind me, but I felt his warmth the minute he stepped into the empty circle beside the creek. Landon.

Ken looked up in surprise. “Who are you?”

“I’m the man with the gun telling you that if you don’t let her go, I’m going to shoot you,” Landon said. His voice sounded deadly serious.

“And what? You brought the pixie twins as your backup?”

The pixie twins? Clove and Thistle.

Ken pulled me around so my back was to him and I was facing Landon. Clove and Thistle were standing behind him, and Thistle’s hands were clenched at her sides. Clove was moving carefully along the outside of the circle in Aunt Tillie’s direction. When she got there, she put her hand on Aunt Tillie’s shoulder. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Aunt Tillie grumbled. “He’s the one who’s going to be sorry. He interrupted my nap.”

Yeah, that was the big crime of the day.

“How did you know I was here?” I asked Thistle curiously.

“We had a little help,” Thistle said. “Someone saw him forcing you into your car at knifepoint.”

I met Thistle’s hard gaze with uncertainty. Who could have possibly seen him taking me? Everyone was at the town square.

“Your friends from the paper saw,” Thistle supplied.

Edith and William.

“And they found you at the celebration?”

How had Thistle and Clove heard Edith when I wasn’t near? That had never happened before.

“They did. Then we found Landon,” Thistle slid a glance at Aunt Tillie. “We had no idea he had her, too, though.”

“Yeah, he was trying to motivate me to help,” I said bitterly.

“He should have brought you a bag of candy then, instead of a bag of crazy,” Thistle said.

“I won’t forget that,” Aunt Tillie warned.

“I know,” Thistle sighed. “If anyone knows that, I do.”

“Can we focus on the crazy guy with a knife to my throat instead of Aunt Tillie?” I asked.

Landon hadn’t moved a muscle, I noticed. His gun was trained on Ken – and his gaze was fixed on the knife at my throat. “You have nowhere to go,” Landon said. “There’s only one option here. You surrender and go to jail. Or, you hurt her, and I’ll kill you. That’s if these three don’t get to you first.”

Ken looked around the circle in obvious fear. I couldn’t tell if he was more scared of Landon and his gun or Aunt Tillie and her anger, though.

“I have a better idea,” Ken suggested. “I take Bay with me. When I get far enough away, I promise I’ll let her go.”

“You killed your wife,” Aunt Tillie argued. “Like we’re going to trust you.”

“I don’t see where you have a lot of options,” Ken said lamely.

“I was just going to say that to you,” Aunt Tillie said, climbing to her feet menacingly.

“What are you doing?” Ken asked nervously, glancing at Aunt Tillie warily.

“I’m going to show you exactly what my anger is capable of,” Aunt Tillie warned. “Let her go, or this is going to become a really dark world for you.”

Ken started visibly shaking. I heard the gravel behind us crunch – despite the fear that was quickly overtaking me. I couldn’t tell what was going on, though. All I knew was that Ken’s grip on my hair had loosened as he turned to look behind him. Then I heard the sickening crunch of something crashing into his head this time.

“What the hell!” Landon exploded.

I took advantage of whatever crazy scenario was going on behind me to crawl away from Ken. The harsh ground dug into my knees through the denim of my jeans, but I pushed all thoughts of pain out of my head. I fell forward at Thistle’s feet. She was on her knees working on the rope tying my hands within seconds.

“What’s going on?” I gasped.

“You have to see it to believe it,” Thistle said.

I felt my hands spring free and I jumped to my feet anxiously, almost toppling over when the blood started rushing to my feet for the first time in more than an hour. Thistle grabbed my arm for support.

When I turned around, I was stunned to see that my mom and aunts had joined the melee – and their way of helping was to conk Ken over the head with a big branch. I think it was the same one he had hit me with. That was poetic justice. Since my mom was holding it, I had a feeling she had done the deed herself. Landon kept trying to dart in between the arms and legs that were steadily beating Ken – I think Twila got a few kicks in, too – to get a handle on the situation.

He drew back suddenly when Ken reared up and grabbed Twila’s arm and tugged her to him. Great. I was free, but he had a new hostage. Twila looked understandably petrified.

Marnie and my mom wisely took a step back. My mom raised the branch to hit Ken again but Landon stilled her with a look. “Don’t do that again.”

“He’s got my sister.”

“If you hit him the wrong way, he could cut her throat,” Landon warned.

“That didn’t happen when I hit him when he had Bay,” my mom argued.

“Just calm down,” Landon snapped. He looked around at all of us wearily. “You’re all unbelievable.”

“How did you find us?” I asked them curiously. My gaze was fixed on Twila’s frightened stare.

“We weren’t looking for you,” Marnie said. “We knew something was wrong when Aunt Tillie wasn’t on the couch for her afternoon nap.”

“See,” Aunt Tillie muttered. “I told you he interrupted my nap.”

“Is that really important now?” Thistle looked infuriated at Aunt Tillie, but I could tell she was really scared for her mom.

“Okay, let’s get a handle on this situation,” Landon said calmly, although I could tell he was anything but calm. “Why don’t you all take your Aunt Tillie back to the inn, and Ken and I will have a nice and civilized talk?”

Like that was going to happen.

“No,” Aunt Tillie said obstinately. “Why don’t you go to the inn and have a drink, and let us handle this?”

Landon looked at her in disbelief. “Are you kidding me? I’m the one with the badge. I’m the one with the gun.”

“If you feel that’s important, you can leave the gun with me,” Aunt Tillie suggested. “You can keep the badge, though. That’s not going to be any help. I promise I’ll get the gun back to you when we’re done here.”