Page 80 of Real Fake Hauntings

After a few moments, she blinked, as if to wake herself from a trance. “There’s nothing buried here.”

I barely restrained myself from stomping on the ground. I knew it!

“No body?” Shane asked sharply. “How can that be? Why isn’t the earth displaced?”

Key got to her feet and dusted off her jeans. “There’s a pocket of air, but nothing inside.”

“So what, it just disappeared?” Alex asked, confused. “Or did he turn into a zombie and crawl out?”

“Someone dug him up, then went through great pains to make it look like they didn’t,” Ian answered.

“But why?” Shane asked.

They all turned to me.

Time to explain my theory. As fast as possible, so we could move on to catching the evil old hag before she continued her reign of terror. “Ms. Bagley was an evil dark witch, and when she died, her spirit began haunting the shop. I think someone killed Crane in order to transfer her ghost into his body.”

Key looked horrified. “You had an evil ghost haunting the shop?”

“The muffins were safe, I swear.” Unlike the cookies. “The drinks too. She only haunts things like mugs and books.”

“Mugs?” Alex asked. He made a face. “Ew.”

“Nothing anyone drank from,” I assured them. “I kept track of her.”

“What does that mean?” Shane asked, looking not entirely shocked by the whole thing. I had an inkling he’d figured something was off ever since we’d tested my blood. “You kept track of her?”

“If I take the item she’s haunting out of the shop, she disappears for a while before her spirit snaps back to another item.”

“And you think someone transferred her to Crane?” Key asked.

We all glanced down at the patch of uneven grass. “Yes.”

“Could she be silent to mess with you?” Ian asked.

“I did a spell to confirm before coming here. There is nothing haunting the shop itself, and Bagley should’ve snapped back by then.” I wriggled my hands. “It could be my spell wasn’t powerful enough, but it makes so much sense. She would’ve known what we do with the keys and watched us put in the alarm code every time.”

“Why leave Crane’s body behind in the shop if they wanted to transfer Bagley into it?” Shane asked.

“Maybe something went wrong?” Key suggested.

“Crane did weigh a ton,” Alex said, eyeing the ground. “If they meant for Crane to walk out but then he died, it would’ve been a pain to drag him out.”

“Would’ve been a pain to dig him out, but they did it,” Shane said.

“Two people.” Of course two people were involved.

“If it was two people, why leave the body in the shop?”

“Maybe it was one person then, but then they got someone to help with this grave?” I thought of all the effort it would take to dig someone out overnight with enough stealth so neither Ian nor the dogs realized something was wrong, and I couldn’t help but look at Key.

Everyone else must’ve come to the same conclusion because Key took a good look at us and stepped back. “What?”

“Earth mage,” Shane said.

TWENTY-FOUR

“How did they get the body out of here without anyone noticing?” Alex said. “We were here until late last night.”

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