Miss Nobody

Chapter 20

BLOOD, CUM OR SPIT?

Afternoon Day 7

I almost choked on the soup and coughed and sputtered. I tried to recover myself behind my cloth napkin.

The Sheriff came back into the room, he sat unknowing of what he walked into. He looked around. "What did I miss?"

"Jane was just telling us she's pregnant," Keiran inserted himself, throwing his napkin on the table.

"Oh, that's a personal question, let the girl have some privacy, Elenora." The Sheriff looked at her.

Is there a reason he's letting them think I am pregnant instead of denying it? Is he covering for Jonny or himself? His face revealed nothing.

Elenora nodded. "Of course dear brother." She turned her attention back to me. "My dear brother Bishop is usually right about these things. I appreciate your patience with our prying. I'm afraid we love to live vicariously through the lives of others but we sometimes forget our manners." She raised her glass to me and drank.

As the soups were cleared, slowly, Elenora announced, "We will take our coffee in the conservatory tonight." She stood and everyone followed her lead.

Harriett and her daughter left the room ahead of Elenora.

Elenora linked the Sheriff's, Bishop's, arm and walked with him. They whispered to each other.

Keiran walked next to me, slowly taking up the tail as we headed to the conservatory. "I guess I have no reason to be jealous," he whispered to me.

I looked at him confused.

He pulled me aside into an alcove in the hallway and whispered, "I know I said I'm with Cherry but you have to understand, if I don't do what she says she will tell everyone about you."

I looked at him sharply. "What do you mean? What about me?"

"She says you were fucking Chef, she has proof, she's going to tell everyone if I break up with her," he whispered quickly.

I sighed heavily. Fuck.

"If it's Chef's baby-" He put his hand gently on my stomach. "-I'll help you raise it, we can go back to Seattle. I can get my old job back."

I stared at him like he grew antennae. My laughter bubbled up suddenly, extra loud in the large cavernous hallway, echoing off the stone walls.

The Sheriff came into view and looked at me. "Why'd you break her Keiran?" he whispered loudly as I laughed hysterically. "She's had a long day, I'll take her home." He led me past an amused Elenora. "Thank you for the lovely dinner, Sister. See you next week."

I laughed. "Thank you." I managed to sober up a tad as we left Elenora's fancy house. I was still giggling as we drove back to the Lodge.

The Sheriff laughed with me, tears streaming down our faces, my stomach and cheeks ached.

We both finally calmed down as he pulled in front of my laundry tower. "I thought we were supposed to get some kind of Magic Detector?" I wiped the tears from my eyes for the last time.

He pulled something hand-sized from his pants and showed me.

"A stud finder?"

He shook his head. "It's been charmed. It needs a power source though."

"Blood, cum, or spit?" I said without thinking. Gross.

"A charging cord and a wall outlet." He showed me the hole where the cord went.

"Oh." I reddened. "Chef's room might have something. He had all the power tools."

"Lead the way." He pulled a long, heavy flashlight from between the seats and shone it into the dark woods.

I led him onto Chef's path, thankful the Sheriff's light was nice and bright and that he had a gun on his hip for those bears everyone kept mentioning.

The yellow tape was lying on the floor in front of Chef's rooms.

I hesitated.

The Sheriff stepped around me and entered, his light flashing in the windows.

I followed behind him before he disappeared and I was left standing in the dark. I caught up to him as he shuffled through Chef's toolbox.

He found a plug that matched and plugged his charmed stud finder into the wall.

I didn't believe him but I needed to see how this all played...

A bright light blinded me, a surge of energy and I was thrown back against a wall, blacking out from the impact.

Morning Day 8

The birds chirped cheerfully. Someone kissed up my cheek, a rather wet kiss. Grunts and sniffs were loud in my ear. A man moaned from somewhere behind me. The beautiful bright sunlight was shining on my face and it was so lovely and warm. I yawned and stretched pleasantly and woke up fully when I felt the cold hardwood floor under me. I sat up, my body stiff, and looked around.

Ormus was sniffing at my hair and nudging me with his cold nose.

I patted him as my eyes adjusted.

The Sheriff moaned from somewhere. He had hit the small refrigerator, making a large dent, and now laid uncomfortably against it.

I scrambled up from the floor and checked him for any visible injuries.

He looked at me. "It still works. There's a lot of Magic here." He grinned and got to his feet. He noticed something in the living room and I followed him.

The closet door was off its hinges like a small bomb had exploded from inside. The pictures of the Goddesses were strewn all over the floor.

I gathered the pictures and stacked them neatly in my hand. Ormus sniffing at the ground by my side.

The Sheriff noticed Chef's hidden bookshelf of Magic Tombs and handwritten journals. He turned back to me and I noticed one of Chef's big books was missing.

"Did you know about this?" He pulled out a book and looked over the cover.

"I've only known for a couple of days. Chef didn't tell me about it when he was alive." I picked up the last of the pictures and stood next to the bookshelf.

"Who else knows?" He shuffled through the books.

"Jonny." I shrugged and put my hand in the space where the copy of the Codex Gigas should be. It was the largest book of them all. Who else? "Could be anyone working here." I didn't want to mention Jess or Cherry by name unless it was absolutely necessary. No use in dragging them into this mess.

"It's missing?" The Sheriff nodded to my hand.

I nodded. "How did you know?"

"I've seen some of these books before. Chef's been collecting these since I was a kid. My father dealt in rare books." He slid the book back into its place.

"So you've always known about the...weird? Even before you became a cop?" I put the pictures in my pocket.

He was thoughtful for a moment. "The books were just stories, for a long time. But once you see it, you can't unsee it. You know?"

I left the closet area and stood in the middle of the room. "Yeah. I do."

"And then I became an officer and got access behind the scenes. The things that civilians never get to see."

Even in the dimly lit room I could see his haunted look.

"Magic is bloody. Gruesome." He looked me over. "How do you do your Magic?"

"Sex Magic has candles and...oils. Some Magic words." I shrugged.

"Have you always known how to do it?"

"No. At least I don't think so. My training, as much as I can remember, started in my dreams. I would meet with a group of people and someone would train us. Teach us." I blushed. "It sounds ridiculous saying it out loud but it's very ethereal...everyone's in flowing gowns." My phone beeped with an incoming text.

"Hm," was all the Sheriff could say. He stepped into the closet and examined the broken door. "If Chef's death has anything to do with Magic then someone else around here knows how to do it."

I read the text from Jess: It's interview day!

"Fuck." The last thing I wanted to do was be on video.

"Everything okay?" The Sheriff came out of the closet and looked at my phone.

"Jess wants to interview Cherry and me for her channel." I put the phone in my bra.

"Jess is a nice girl. She's dating my new Deputy. She seems good for him so far." He paused. "It could be a good idea. Get your side of the story out there. Let people see you as the sweet girl you are and not some vicious old-man killer," he encouraged.

Am I just a sweet girl like the Sheriff thinks? Another text and I pulled my phone out, Jess: I have a script that makes everyone look good.

Was this how I stopped the rumors of me being pregnant? I had seen some of Jess's videos, she didn't typically get many views and she's told me, while drunk, that she's bought a lot of her followers. The news was still circulating my story, an amnesia victim now tied to an unexpected death, was making the rounds two times a day.

Maybe it was time to tell my side of it before this got out of hand.

Keiran texted: Sorry about last night. My mother of course adores you and wants you back for dinner. I have to make it up to you or she will never forgive me.

"I'm going to fix this. The books are safer here than anywhere else right now." The Sheriff pointed to the hidden bookshelf and broken closet door.

Cherry texted: Let's get this over with. Jess won't stop hounding me. I want my grandfather to be laid to rest and forget all this awfulness.

I blew out an exasperated breath. Of course, no text from the person I really wanted to hear from. Even though I wasn't going to answer Jonny if he did. Clean break.

I texted Jess back: Where?

Her reply was immediate: Meet us in Room 13