Page 49 of Perpetual Potion (Hedgewitch 4)

“I bought a few things from your shop,” Susan said, her tone still icy.

And bang — there it was. Her aura shimmered green around her, with maybe a few reddish-orange spikes of irritation, but definitely nothing that seemed to indicate any sort of guilt. I’d already thought as much, and yet it was still nice to get that visual confirmation.

“Oh, right,” I replied. “I keep hoping that one of these days I’ll finally be able to keep track of everyone here in Globe.”

“I suppose you will…if you hang around long enough.” She pushed a button on the remote she held so the trunk lid to her SUV’s cargo compartment slowly began to close, and added, “Well, have a nice day.”

“You too.”

She got in and started up the engine, and so I went ahead and did the same in my Beetle. I really would have liked the opportunity to pick her brain about Danny Ortega, but I could tell she obviously wasn’t in the mood for an intimate discussion.

Well, at least it seemed as though Susan’s aura had told me she wasn’t hiding any deep, dark secrets and so I supposed I could cross her off my list of suspects.

Which meant that I basically didn’t have a list of suspects at the moment.

Trying not to sigh, I backed out of my parking space and headed for home. When I got there, Archie was sleeping in the patch of sunlight that always poured through the living room windows in the late morning. However, as soon as I came inside and set my shopping bags down on the dining room table, he cracked an eyelid.

“Salmon?” he inquired.

“A whole boatload,” I replied.

“Good,” he said, and promptly went back to sleep.

I shook my head and started unpacking the groceries. It was almost ten, and so I knew I wouldn’t be able to open the store right on time. Even though I knew that wasn’t too big a deal, especially on a weekday morning, it still irritated me. My darn Capricorn in Neptune rearing its ugly ahead again, probably.

But actually, by the time I was done and back downstairs unlocking the shop door, it was only about eight minutes after ten. Could have been worse.

Almost as soon as I was back behind the counter, Danny Ortega appeared. Seeing him was actually something of a relief, since I hadn’t seen or heard anything from him since our little talk in his backyard two days before.

“I don’t think Susan is our killer,” I said, and he shrugged.

“I could have told you that.”

“Maybe, but I still feel better now that I’ve seen her aura. I bumped into her at Walmart this morning.”

Danny drifted toward me and paused in front of the counter. He made an odd little dipping movement, as if he’d started to lean his elbows on the glass top and then stopped when he realized he’d sink right through the thing.

“I’m surprised you saw her there,” he remarked. “She always acted as though going to Walmart was slumming.”

Personally, I’d once thought the same thing, but after moving to Globe, I’d had to readjust my perspective on the matter, since shopping options in town were so limited. “Everyone needs groceries,” I pointed out.

“True.” Danny was quiet for a moment. Actually, he looked oddly pensive…for him.

“Something wrong?” I asked.

He let out a melancholy sigh just this side of theatrical. “Oh, you know,” he said vaguely, and gestured toward the store window, or maybe the street beyond. “They moved my body to the funeral home this morning. I guess the medical examiner is finally done with it, and so they’ve scheduled my funeral for Sunday morning. Father Estevez is squeezing in the service after morning mass — kind of a favor for my parents, I guess, since they donated a lot to the fund for restoring the church a while back.”

It sounded like money talked no matter what town you lived in. Since I didn’t think I should comment on the way Danny’s parents had leveraged their influence to get his funeral scheduled to their liking, I only murmured,“I’m sorry,” and let it go.

“It’s all right.” His gaze moved past me, although I couldn’t really tell what he was looking at. “I suppose I should just be glad that I left a will, so there’s no confusion about what needs to be done. But knowing that I’m over there” — he waved a hand roughly in the direction of White Funeral Home, the only one in Globe — “makes it all seem so final. While I was at the coroner’s, it was sort of out of sight, out of mind.”

I could understand that point of view. “But it’s not final,” I told him, keeping my tone gentle. “You’ve only shifted into a different kind of existence. And once we discover who’s responsible for your death, you’ll have achieved the peace necessary to move on.”

Those reassuring words didn’t seem to have much of an effect on him, however. A frown creased his brow, and he said, “What if I don’twantto move on? I like it here.”

Although I could understand where he was coming from — Danny Ortega was obviously a man who’d been bound up in the physical things of this world, without much thought for anything spiritual — I knew I had to convince him that so much more awaited him in the next life.

“You’ll like it there, too,” I assured him. “Everything I’ve heard from those on the other side makes it sound as though it’s a wonderful place to be. You have nothing to be afraid of.”

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