Chapter 87: Chapter Eighty-Seven - Snow Way

'Tell no one,' the catnapper had written on the note they’d left me. So what’s the first thing I did? I called Dad and Boxy. Look, I had to. I told them everything. Okay, almost everything. But without Studmuffin, my heart felt like it was splintering over and over again. Unlike me, Dad and Boxy would know what to do. At the moment, all I knew how to do was pace Sunray’s waiting area, wring my hands together, and let worry chew me up from the inside out.

Not a good time.

I also seriously considered telling Travis. He and Studmuffin were besties. He’d want to know, but he was currently not speaking to me, which broke my heart even more.

Ugh.

The second Dad pulled into the parking lot, I launched myself at him. Once he was out of Bernie, he held me without saying a word, just like he always had before whenever I cried my eyes out. Just him here with me was enough to make me feel a little better though.

And warmer. It had to be like forty degrees outside, which was strange since July in Georgia usually felt like a jalapeno’s armpit.

“Pinkies up, Sunray,” he reminded me gently once my tears turned to sniffles.

It was an old saying of my grandma’s when things got really, really bad. The thought process behind it was that if you raised your pinkies high enough in the air, it was impossible to feel down in the dumps. At this point, I’d try anything, so I raised one pinkie high. So did Dad.

“Did you check the cameras like I told you to when you called?” he asked.

I nodded. “There was nothing out of the ordinary. Our last customer was a mom with a little boy by the register. Studmuffin oversaw the transaction since he’s the boss. He was giving the boy a why-aren’t-you-in-school look, which turned the boy into mush. I don’t know how the little boy’s smile fit on his face, it was so big, but I doubt he’s the catnapper.”

He pulled away from me a little, dropping his pinkie to his side. “You didn’t see anyone else suspicious?”

“Not a thing,” I said and dropped my pinkie too.

With a deep frown on his honeymoon-tanned face, Dad touched the silver chain necklace holding my Duplicitous Dragonfly amulet. “And this? Isn’t it supposed to glow when it detects duplicitous magic?”

“Yep, and I didn’t see it glow once today.” The last time it glowed, someone had summoned the Ring of Everlasting Night out of my shirt pocket. Since my dragonfly amulet hadn’t glowed today, I supposed that meant no one had summoned Studmuffin from Sunray’s. So if they didn’t summon him and none of my customers swiped him, then how did his catnapper do it? More importantly, who was it? Perhaps even more importantly than that: “How did Studmuffin let himself be catnapped?”

“You’re right,” he said, bundling his light jacket tighter around him. “I imagine I’ve only seen a fraction of what magic he can do.”

I nodded. “Like vanish and reappear. Only we recently found out he couldn’t vanish from Nadine’s house after she duct-taped me to a chair there.”

That startled Dad’s eyes wide. “What?”

Oh no. I hadn’t caught up Dad on the latest murder case in Belle’s Cove. Judging from the velocity of his dropping jaw, maybe I shouldn’t just yet.

“Um, it sure is cold out here. Let’s get inside.” My chattering teeth underlined, highlighted, and circled that sentiment. So did the goose bumps sprouting up my bare arms and legs.

Dad wrapped his arm protectively around my shoulder and led me inside the shop’s waiting area. “Duct tape, Sunray? Really?”

Yep, me and my big mouth. Best leave out the bomb and the exploding house part for now. “Studmuffin freed me. I’m fine.”

“Except you’re not, and you don’t have Studmuffin to help take care of you right now.” He sighed wearily as he turned to face me, his blue eyes stark with concern. “No more murders. Promise me.”

“But I haven’t killed anyone. Yet,” I added, because I wasn’t so sure I could be held responsible for my actions once I found out who catnapped my familiar.

“You know what I mean.” Dad rolled his eyes.

It was such a me thing to do that I almost laughed.

“No more murder investigations,” he clarified. “That’s not your job, and with you taking college classes soon, you’ll already be strapped for time. No more putting yourself in situations where you getting duct taped to a chair by a murderer is a normal thing.” He ducked down so I could clearly see his worried face. “Promise me, Sunray. Please?”

I wasn’t so sure I could. Like it or not—and I really did like it—I’d been roped into these investigations because I genuinely wanted to find justice for the victims. And because I was stubborn.

“Sunray?”

“Yes, Dad?”

“I can hear you not promising me.”

I winced. “You noticed?”

“Multiply all of your worry for Studmuffin by one hundred. That’s what I feel about you all the time knowing that you’re going after murderers and getting duct taped to chairs.” He sighed, so deeply that I wondered just how much gray I’d given him in his salt-and-pepper hair.

I smiled innocently. “But the whole duct-tape thing was just one time though.”

“Putting you in the hospital was just one time too, and that was more than enough.” He settled his warm hands on my shoulders. “We get Studmuffin back, and then no more, Sunray.”

Well, I could sure see his point. If I’d never tried to clear my name of murder, I might not have even heard of the Ring of Everlasting Night. I might not have been forced to make a trade between the ring and my beloved, studly familiar. Of course, I might not have tried to make nice with the Black family, done magic again, or applied to college either. Coulda, woulda, should was often a slippery slope that might just put me someplace I didn’t want to be.

Did I want to be in this exact situation I was in right now? Nope. Zero out of ten, would not recommend. Did I like where I’d been before this exact situation? I really did. I was starting to finally feel like the me I was always supposed to be, witch warts and all.

Oh wait, those were just more goose bumps. I was freezing.

I swiped up a cup of coffee from the countertop, still hot and steaming from this morning. That reminder alone brought tears to my eyes again. My little fluffer-stinker was a major part of why I felt like the me I was supposed to be, and now he was gone.

“I can still hear you not promising me, Sunray,” Dad said.

I could only nod, my voice all tied up behind a knot of emotions. That was the best I could do for now.

Just then, Boxy pulled in outside and bounded toward the waiting area like both his feet and cane had caught fire. When he burst through the door, letting a downright frosty draft in with him, he said, “Have you ever talked with him psychically? If you can get a psychic link, you can just ask him where he is!”

My jaw dropped. A little ball of hope sparked inside my chest. “I hadn’t even thought of that, Boxy.”

Dad beamed at his oldest friend. “Every once in a while, this guy’s good for something.”

Boxy flicked his one good eye to Dad and grinned. “Watch it, Captain. I’m keeping an eye out on you.”

Dad fake screeched, and they both chuckled.

Weird guys.

Shaking my head, I went quiet while I concentrated. I’d never tried reaching out to my familiar like this before. Usually it was Studmuffin yapping away in my head, and somehow he just heard me when I spoke back.

Studmuffin? Are you there? I need to know you’re all right.

Other than the agonizing worry ripping down my heart like claws on curtains, there was only silence.

Defeated, I slumped my shoulders. “Nothing. Wait, did you try, Boxy? Does he talk to you like that too?”

“Sometimes, but until today, I’ve never tried to get that psychic link going first. He always just appears inside my head.” Boxy frowned at the spread of coffee, spiced teas, and the mostly eaten tiramisu cake with delicate violet ruffles. “It’s all him.”

Dad stepped forward and patted him on the shoulder. “We’ll get him back, you two. Keep that hope alive.”

“In exchange for the ahem though?” Boxy asked me with a little eyebrow wiggle.

In case it wasn’t obvious, “ahem” was code for the Ring of Everlasting Night. In case it wasn’t obvious yet again, we weren’t exactly aces when it came to thinking up code words.

“I’ll check my grimoire and see if it can offer up some sarcasm for me in the psychic-speak department.” A sudden memory of the produce section at Safe-Mart flitted through my mind, and I pulled in a sharp breath. “Forever.”

“I don’t think it’s necessary to check your grimoire forever, Sunray,” Dad assured me.

“No, I mean Forever. Remember the lady up on our rooftop who helped us with the time-travel spell? The one with dark hair like Cass’s who had a backward-walking white cat?”

Boxy nodded. “She’s not one you could easily forget.”

“Well, she told me once which lemons to get and that there was only one cow tongue left for the time-travel potion, and she told me all this inside my head.”

Dad sank down into a chair at one of the little tables, his face a little greenish. “I liked it better when I didn’t know there was cow tongue in that potion we drank.”

Boxy snapped his fingers at me, his eyes wide. “Good one, Vic. Check with Forever and see if she can help get a psychic connection going. In the meantime, I’d like to see some of our camera footage for today.”

“Anything in particular?” I asked. “I already looked at a lot of it.”

“Midafternoon. Right around the time it started getting colder outside.”

“Because you think the temperature and Studmuffin’s catnapping is related.” I nodded as I waved them both behind the register at the far end of the waiting area. “Well, there are no coincidences anymore. I’m convinced of that because stressed spelled backwards is desserts.”

“Look at this genius right here,” Dad said, sweeping me into another hug. “I mean, just look at her.”

“Yeah, it’s a wonder she’s related to you.” Boxy winked at Dad and then pointed to the rest of the tiramisu cake. “Now, speaking of stressed and desserts…”

With most of the cake divided between us, we wedged in behind the register counter. This was a narrow space meant for one person, not three who were stuffing themselves with cake.

“Who’s elbowing me?” Dad grumbled. He spun around with his cake plate and one pinkie high above his head and then stopped with his plate hand on my head and the other posted awkwardly on the countertop. “Why do I feel like I’m playing Twister all of a sudden?”

“I guess we didn’t all have to come back here, but now I’m stuck,” Boxy said, crowded into the dead end by the wall. “Oh well. Good thing I like you two.”

Shaking my head, I brought up today’s footage again on our three old TVs behind the register. We had three cameras, one for each TV. One camera was located outside above the garage and pointed to the parking lot. It was recently cleaned due to an explosion of cow tongue time-travel potion that had magically turned into chocolate. (No, I didn’t lick it clean though I admit I was tempted because chocolate). The second camera was located at the rear of the building and pointed at the staircase leading up to my apartment. It had been glitchy lately but seemed to be working fine now. And finally, the third camera aimed right at us, secured to the ceiling over the cash register.

“Which camera would you like to see?” I asked Boxy.

He pointed with his fork to the one above my head. “That one.”

“Why that one?” Dad asked. “Did you see something today, Boxy?”

Boxy bent and peered closer at the TV. “We’re about to find out. Right there, Vic.”

I pressed stop on the remote. The clock on the image showed 1:47, and there was no one in the waiting area. Then, quick as a one-eyed ninja, Boxy entered through the front door.

“Well, I’ll be…” Boxy stood up straight again and rubbed his chin.

Pausing the video, I looked at him closely. “What are you seeing that I’m not?”

“For starters, that’s not me.”

“But…” I whipped back to the TV, hit rewind, and let the video play again. “Oh no. The potion. The potion that makes you look like someone else… Are you sure that’s not you?”

“That Boxy entered through the front door. I was in the garage. I happened to look over at our door there.” He pointed to the one with the postage-stamp windows that separated the garage from the waiting area. “I thought I was just seeing my reflection like I have a million times before. It happened so fast, I didn’t think anything of it.”

“But something made you think of it again,” Dad said. “What was it?”

“A chill at the back of my neck, one that had nothing to do with the freezing weather.” Boxy shivered. “I didn’t know what it meant until you called about Studmuffin gone missing, Vic.”

“Continue the video,” Dad urged. “See what this Unfoxy does next.”

My hands shaking, I did. Unfoxy strode toward the cake and helped himself to a large slice. Then another. And another.

“Another sign that’s not me,” Boxy said in a low voice. “I like to spread my dessert out, not cram it in all at once like someone I know.”

Dad slid him a sideways look with half of a smile. “The same can’t be said for beef jerky though.”

Boxy shrugged. “Obviously.”

After all the cake eating, a single blue spark burst from the top of UnBoxy’s head. During my first view of this video, I’d just thought it was a reflection from a window outside or something. Now, though, it looked like magic.

Duplicitous magic.

I clutched the dragonfly around my neck, the amulet cool to the touch. Why hadn’t it worked? Why hadn’t it glowed to detect what was surely something duplicitous?

“Now what was that?” Boxy gently took the remote from my hand to rewind and watch the magic spark again.

Dad looked over at me, the lines on his face deepening, and his gaze dipped to my dragonfly necklace. “Can I see it?”

“Sure.” I brought it up over my head and handed it to him.

He turned it over and smoothed his fingertip over the back of the dragonfly. “It’s not here, Sunray.”

I sucked in a breath. The inscription. The one from Chloe on the back that read: For the greatest stepdaughter who ever lived. He was right—it wasn’t there.

“UnBoxy swapped it out with magic or…” I shook my head hard as disbelief swallowed me whole. “This Duplicitous Dragonfly is a fake.”

“Look.” Boxy pointed to the screen. Shortly after the dark-blue spark of magic, a curled black tail appeared at the far corner of the video. Unfoxy turned, and a gleefully evil smile split across his face.

“Oh, ew.” I shivered. “Boxy, please don’t ever smile like that.”

“I promise,” Boxy said. “I wish I could scrub that smile from my eye. I’ve never seen myself smile like that.”

Dad didn’t say a word. He just backed away from behind the register.

I started to turn to see what was wrong, but white static briefly waved across the video. After that, both Unfoxy and my familiar’s black tail were gone.

I blew out a heavy breath. It was one thing to know Studmuffin had been catnapped. It was quite another to see the moment it had happened. I wasn’t a fan of either, thank you very much.

“Ummmm,” Dad said from across the waiting area.

“Let’s play it again. Maybe we’ll see something we missed.” Boxy rewound to the moment the blue magic had appeared.

“Uh, can someone remind me what month it is again?” Dad muttered.

“It’s July.” I stared intently at the screen but then realized what a strange request that was. It wasn’t like Dad to forget something like the month. “Why—whaaaaat?”

My question had morphed when I spun around to see what was wrong.

Outside, big, fat snowflakes drifted down. In July, one of the hottest months in Belle’s Cove, Georgia. Why—whaaaaat pretty much summed up my feelings about it.

Boxy must’ve seen it too because he said, “No. Way.”

“More like snow way.” Dad nodded absently while he continued to stare out the window. “Anyone want to volunteer to roll up my car windows?”