Page 54 of Big Witch Energy

“Oh, sure, I don’t have anything to do tonight,” Caroline said, nodding. “Wait, what?”

***

They decided to be a little more methodical about their breaking and entering this time. They waited until dark, wore dark clothes, and carried gloves in their pockets. They had drinks at a McPartin’s, a tourist-oriented Irish pub across the street from Clark’s, watching the lights blink out of the windows one by one.

“Why are we doing this again?” Alice asked, sipping her bubbly water. She was pale and a little twitchy, but that seemed normal before one committed burglary for a second time in a few months. Fortunately, the locals had learned to accept slightly odd behavior from the three of them since they started spending time together. Caroline’s heart was warmed, knowing that people seemed happy that Alice had found friends, but she found she didn’t particularly like being written off as one of the town’s many eccentrics.

Riley took a long drink from her cider. “Because Clark’s been too quiet lately. And I don’t trust that. I’ve thought about doing this for a while, plus there was something Ben said, when he was at the house earlier. About Clark approaching him to move out of Gray Fern and find some newer, fancier house on the island so the property management company can rent out Ben’s place for the season. Why would he push that so hard, unless he was planning something, using Gray Fern as a base?”

“He’s hassling Ben and the kids?” Caroline frowned. “Yep, gloves are coming off.”

“Were the gloves ever on?” Alice asked. Caroline snorted.

“So you and Ben, huh?” Riley grinned.

“I wouldn’t have thought it would happen again in a million years, but somehow… Maybe?” Caroline said, staring at the motion of the staff behind the bar—fluid and unhurried.

“It’s driving you nuts, drinking at someone else’s bar, isn’t it?” Riley asked.

“Yeah, because it’s better-run than ours,” Caroline griped, watching the easy way the waitresses moved between tables, handing off much-needed items and cooperating in a way that the Wiltons never quite managed.

“Shouldn’t we tell somebody?” Caroline asked. “Warn people that one of the few lawyers on the island is a criminal mastermind?”

“We’ve talked about this. What are we going to do?” Riley asked. “Go to the police and complain that Clark used his position as my lawyer to orchestrate a break-in at my house to steal my haunted tchotchkes?”

“I wouldn’t lead with that,” Alice murmured. “Also, your hypothetical calls to the authorities are becoming pointedly sarcastic.”

Caroline asked, “Is there some sort of magic we can do to, I don’t know, bind his actions? His intentions? Track his location like a magical ‘Find My Friends’?”

“I think we’re treading some pretty precarious magical waters here,” Riley said. “We have to keep our intentions pure or they’re going to bounce back on us times three.”

“So. No giving him a magical rash, got it,” Caroline grumbled.

***

The hours passed and the lights winked off across the street at Tanner, Moscovitz, and Graves. The ladies turned their heads away from the window as Clark stepped out of the front door and locked it behind him. They waited another hour to make sure that Clark wasn’t going to come back for a forgotten file or something and then one by one left the table, taking different routes to end up behind the law office, at the back door. They each had already pulled on their ski masks, just in case Clark had security cameras they hadn’t spotted so far.

Riley’s “rich and colorful work history” career had led to a diverse array of skills, including lock picking. The back door offered her little challenge, which honestly made Caroline worry for Clark’s clients. They listened for any noise in response to their entering, but nothing. They moved through the darkness, careful to stay away from the windows as they passed through the door marked Clark Graves, Esq.

There were a few “ghost pings” hitting Caroline’s system from around the perfectly nice, if boring office done in navy and cream. They seemed to be attached to a few antiques on the desk, and the brass clothes horse in the corner. But the ghosts were distant, and sort of sad—as if they, too, were bored by hanging around Clark’s office.

Alice hung back as Caroline and Riley quietly rifled through the contents of his desk. Riley knelt in front of the locked right-hand drawer, tools at the ready.

“This looks familiar,” Caroline whispered, holding up a notepad with the firm’s griffin logo on it. A piece of that logo had been included on a fragment of a note Kyle had left behind at Shaddow House after he’d broken in.

“Bingo,” Riley whispered as the drawer gave way. Riley’s fingers danced across the top of the files. She pulled one marked, “Gray Fern.” Instead of boring paperwork involving rental agreements, Riley pulled out printed photos of Shaddow House clearly taken from the upper floors of Gray Fern Cottage. None of the photos included anything terribly interesting. Riley walking into the house. Edison walking out in the morning. Strange shadowy figures in the windows, but nothing exciting enough to post on the internet as proof of the afterlife!

“Why the hell is he printing copies?” Caroline scoffed. “What is he, seventy?”

“Digital fingerprints are harder to destroy?” Riley guessed.

“Well, the fact that he’s surveilling Shaddow House shows this is about more than just a property management dispute over Gray Fern,” said Alice, her ski mask still in place.

“He’s got to be working for the Wellings,” Riley wondered aloud. “I mean, why else would he be so interested in Shaddow House?”

Behind them, the light switch flicked on. Caroline froze.

Shit.

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