The Flower Bowl Spell (22 page)

“Do you even know who I am?”

“Of course. You’re little Memphis Zhang,
daughter of Wendy Tsu and Noel Zhang, goddaughter of Contessa Cho,
former pupil of my ex-mother-in-law, Gertrude LeBrun.”

“That’s right. You’re related to Gru. Or
were. Ex.”

He starts to stroll away from the front door,
and I follow. “Divorce, even from a handfasting, is just legalese.
We’re never clean of each other once a compact has been made.” He
laughs, as if the idea of divorce couldn’t be more delightful.

“You know it’s almost Halloween, right?” I
ask.

“If you mean, do I honor the witches’ New
Year of Samhain, don’t worry—I
represent
, as the kids say,
my beliefs with the appropriate decorations and candies and such.
Just between you and me, I’ve always had a weakness for Christmas.
All that tinsel.”

“So the Christmas decorations,” I say. “Are
they guards?”

He wags his head from side to side,
considering this. “I suppose. Better than some electric alarm
system that never works. I won a prize the year I moved here for
Best Christmas Spirit, so I just decided to keep ‘em up. Now the
neighbors like it. Makes giving directions to their own homes
easy.”

“The girls said you left them up because
their father criticized the lack of a crèche.”

“Did he?” Tucker’s voice is too innocent. “I
forgot all about that. That man never ceases to have an opinion.
When Viveka first joined up with him I thought I’d be bitterly
disappointed, but he’s kept us entertained many a year now.”

Even with Tucker’s general joviality, I find
this assessment of Jesus Christ unsettling. It must show on my face
because he grows suddenly serious. “She’s not here, you know.”

I poke around the house with my mind and even
though I haven’t been able to find her these last few days, I know
he’s telling the truth. Viveka is nowhere near Santa Cecilia. “But
she was,” I say.

He nods.

“Where is she then?”

“A tropical island, probably drinking a
virgin mai tai and learning the local dance traditions. Piece of
work, isn’t she?” Tucker flashes his smile again. “Come! You’re
hungry and so are the girls. We’ll order from my favorite Chinese
restaurant. The food is delicious and they claim it’s all
organic.”

I follow him to the kitchen, taking in the
elegant furnishings. The house is like a showcase except for a few
signs of real life here and there—wadded tissues, cups with cold
puddles of coffee at the bottom, piles of books, CDs, and DVDs. The
semblance of normalcy reminds me of Gladys’s house, a similar
attempt to get some distance from the occult.

“Maybe she’s distancing herself, but not me,”
Tucker says, rummaging in a kitchen drawer. Great. A mind
reader—the real deal. “I’m rich and I like nice things. New things.
Rather unwitchy of me, isn’t it?” He pulls out a tattered, greasy
take-out menu for a place called Simply Fried. Several dishes have
been circled emphatically with ballpoint pen to the point of
ripping through the paper. When he asks what I’d like, I defer to
his choice and wait while he calls in the order.

“I’ve never met someone with a talent for
communicating telepathically,” I say after he hangs up the phone.
“And reading thoughts to boot. I don’t really like it.”

“People rarely do.” He sits on a barstool,
leaning on the counter, his tall, thin frame folded over. His hands
rubbing together make a rasping sound. “I could tell you a
secret.”

“Okay.”

“I can only read thoughts that have to do
with me. Keeps me in line, don’t you agree?”

Interesting. I decide to test it out and
think,
Gladys was murdered
. I raise my eyebrows and he
raises his back.

“What was your thought?”

“You know Bright Vixen? She was in Gru’s
coven.”

“I remember.”

“She’s dead. Murdered. And it was done with
magick.”

His face falls and I feel a surge of
certainty. I can trust his good intention if nothing else. “Tell me
everything.”

“Well, there was this effigy—”

“No,” he interrupts. “Go back further.”

“Okay. Viveka showed up at my door.”

“No. Further. Tell me about you.”

Well, why not? Who doesn’t like to talk about
herself? I tell him about my childhood, about growing up as a coven
kid. How Gru took Auntie Tess and me under her wing. How I can see
things and read things that others can’t. How I gave it all up and
why, and how it suddenly came back to me unbidden. And the way
Viveka left her daughters, his granddaughters, with me, which would
have been fine if I didn’t have the strongest of hunches that they
are in great, grave danger as long as they are with me. I tell him
about Tyson (leaving out the kissing part) and Alice and the hotel
break-in by Tucker’s own son-in-law. I only stop talking when the
doorbell rings and our organic Chinese meal arrives.

Tucker waves away the money I offer, which is
actually his since it’s the money Viv gave me. He sets down a bag
of steaming food and before I can say anything else he asks, “What
about your beau?”

“What about him?”

“Why him?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why did you choose him?”

“I love him.”

“Come come, Memphis. You’re a witch. You
should be sleeping around, rocking and rolling through the astral
festivals.” He gives me a rueful look. “Settling down with an older
man. Hm.”

“That’s my business,” I say, sorry to be
rude. “What I want to know is, if you’re so close to Viveka, why
didn’t she leave the girls with you? I thought you’d had a falling
out.”

“No. She had a falling out with her
grandmamma Gru, and her mother Sadie…” His eyes shine a little with
what I recognize is grief. Of course for all his bravado about
divorce, he still feels the loss of his ex. “Sadie and I were only
meant to be in the creation of our daughter. It’s true, Viveka and
I are not as close as we once were, if we ever were. But the fact
is she simply could not leave the girls with me. She had to leave
them with you and only you.” He pats me on the hand. “Now, would
you mind going to their room and getting them? We can’t have the
perfection of this delicious food go to waste.”

“And then you’ll tell me what you’re talking
about?”

He opens his arms magnanimously. “Everything
I know is yours. And you still have to tell me about that
effigy.”

I think I should tell him right now, but he
reads my mind. “Later. Let’s not let the food get cold.”

I make my way upstairs. The girls’ bedroom is
lovely and girly, like a movie set. Twin canopy beds with ruffles,
a tea-party table, lots of toys and scarves and dress-up clothes.
Romola and Cleo have built a fortress of pillows and blankets
underneath a gauzy yellow tent that hangs from a ceiling hook near
the center of the room.

“Food’s here,” I say.

“We just ate,” Romola says.

“I know, but your grandfather ordered some
anyway.”

“Simply Fried?” Cleo asks as she puts on a
blue princess dress over her T-shirt and shorts.

“Yup.” I’m in no hurry to eat either, and
crawl into their tent with them. Tucker’s unassuming suburban
McMansion is fairly buzzing with magickal mojo. Gladys’s place had
it too, but that was different: a combination of swirling forces of
trouble and confusion. This place is one constant hum, and I draw a
parallel to Gru’s Mendocino homestead, a place where I’ve always
felt safe. I conjure up what I love about Gru’s—the abundant
lavender plants, the damp earth, the fallen redwood needles in her
yard. The smells of cooking foods, which almost make me swoon with
their purity.

I think I know what Tucker is up to with his
out-of-the-blue inquiry into my love life. His motivation is not
simple distraction and redirection, though that’s part of it. The
choices a person makes, if
choices
is the right word, in
love and sex and all that fun maddening stuff, highlight her
quintessential nature. Does she settle? Is she a perfectionist?
Will she lie, kill, cheat, run away? Tucker is probably trying to
figure out why I was the one chosen to watch over his
granddaughters, as am I.

Still, the questions are troubling,
especially given the recent snogging with Ty. He’s right, we do
have a connection. But is it with hexed Ty or real Ty? And either
way, what does it mean for me and Cooper? It’s true that witches
don’t always settle down or handfast. Even if they do, they are
often totally down with open relationships. But I’ve never been
completely comfortable with that, and I seriously,
seriously
doubt Cooper would be.

Now seems as good a time as any to try
locating Tyson. I close my eyes and get a hazy vision of him riding
in a jeep next to a long-legged girl, with two of her friends in
the back. He is putting on the charm, making nice. Sunglasses on,
of course. The sun is setting to their right—they are heading
south, away from us. I wonder if he’ll bestow any kisses on
them
, the slut.

“Are you all right, Memphis?” Romola asks.
“You’re staring for a long time.”

“I’m fine. Thanks.” I lie back on a pillow
and remember to smile. “It’s been a long day, wouldn’t you
say?”

“Yeah.” She settles down beside me and we
gaze up into the yellow fabric, darkened by the dying light of the
day. I guess we’re going to stay the night here, although I have
the feeling Tucker won’t let me leave the girls with him. He said
as much.

“Memphis.” Cleo stands over us. “We forgot
the kitty.”

It takes a few seconds for me to figure out
what she’s talking about. “Oh, shit. I mean shoot. Sorry.” Bright
Vixen’s cat. “Go eat food with your Grandy, okay?” I jump up and
run down the stairs.

The critter does not want to dislodge from
underneath the car seat, its sharp claws digging into the
carpeting. I finally manage to drag it out and it only growls a
little.

Inside, Tucker and the girls have set out
plates and small bowls of soy sauce. The scene is picturesque and
cozy, happy and safe, and I am filled with a warm glow in my
belly.

“Well hello, pussycat,” Tucker says as I
settle the overweight tabby on the floor. “Would you like some
tuna?”

Bright Vixen’s cat gazes up at us, a look of
pained boredom in its yellow eyes. Its body begins to heave and
ripple in the way cats do when they’re about to deliver a
hairball.

“Uh oh,” I say.

“Crap,” Tucker mutters. He’s about to get up
from his chair but it’s too late—the deed is done. We assess the
contents of the cat’s stomach. I can’t believe what I’m seeing and
I look to Tucker for confirmation.

His face turns dark and then an ashy pale.
“Oh no.”

That’s enough—I have to believe what I
see.

“Is that a doll?” I ask, knowing it’s
not.

Romola cups her hand over her nose. “Yuck. It
smells!”

“It’s not a doll.” Cleo reaches for my hand.
She’s right. It’s not a doll, but I wish it were. Bright Vixen’s
cat has just vomited up the body of a dead fairy.

Chapter Nineteen

Done with its business, Bright Vixen’s cat
looks up at us with glum, challenging eyes before skulking away at
a shambling trot. We watch it disappear out the kitchen doorway to
wander the house. The room brims with an awful silence as we each
take in the little body it has left behind.

“Well, whatever it is—it’s
disgusting
,” Romola says.

Tucker glances up at me but looks down again
quickly, and in that moment he seems to recover from the shock.
Color returns to his face. “Quickly, girls, before the food gets
cold.” He ushers Romola and Cleo to the table. “I’ll just get this
cleaned up.”

Stepping around me, Tucker pulls open a
kitchen drawer and produces a clean dishtowel. He wraps the dead
fairy in it with a care bordering on tenderness. I follow him like
a hurried cortege of one through a door in the pantry that opens
onto a set of descending stairs. These lead into a modest yet
formal wine cellar more than half-filled with bottles—three walls
lined with shelves, one row in the center.

At the landing, Tucker turns the corner to a
short narrow door under the stairs. He nudges it open with his
shoulder and ducks down a little on the way in. A light floods the
doorway with a warm, orangey glow. The room is much too large to
fit under the stairs. I step back to make sure my eyes aren’t
playing tricks on me. They aren’t.

“Come, come,” he says, and I go in, shutting
the door. Whereas Tucker’s house up to this point has looked like a
Pottery Barn catalogue photo shoot, this room is the home’s junk
drawer. I see broken chairs with legs missing or splats blown out;
glass jelly jars with no tops; shredded garments; candle stubs with
hardened wax dripping over table ledges; dried herbs long past
their magickal-effectiveness due dates; crumbling books layered
with dust, some covered in crinkling library cellophane; dirt and
cobwebs everywhere. Against one wall, concealed by leaning scrolls
and towers of books, is a large cabinet. In the center of the room
is an oval wooden table that looks like it could seat twelve.
Tucker lays the fairy down upon it. He pulls a pair of goggles and
a flashlight off a pegboard, which is covered with tools every
red-blooded American man would long to wrap his hands around.

Tucker begins to mutter, his voice congested,
and I see that the goggles have gone misty. Gently, he turns the
little body over so it’s lying on its stomach.

“Fairies,” he says, his voice such a quiet
rumble that it takes me a moment to discern what he’s saying.
“Fairies in some ways more closely resemble bats than humans or
insects.”

“I’ve read about that,” I say.

He nods. “Since they are mammals, they give
birth rather than lay eggs, but their wings have, over the
millennia, taken a more insect or birdlike shape. It’s all a part
of their mating rituals.”