Page 19 of Home Is Where the Witch Is
“You here to find out about your siding?” Becker was already thumbing through the pages of notes she had in a diary on the counter, ready to look up the last details she had on Rosie’s order.
“Yep. I think last you said it was all in Rome?”
“Lemme see,” she mused, perusing the book. “Uhuh. I can see here that Lisa’s written a note that it’ll be delivered here next week. Unless you’d like me to have ‘em take it on up The Ridge for ya?”
Rosie perked up considerably at the good news. “That would be amazing, thank you! I’ll be happy to pay the extra freighting cost.”
Beckett waved her offer away, looking up when the bell announced another customer had joined the mix. Maude Merriweather, local busybody and chicken-herder extraordinaire, was slowly approaching the counter.
“Now here’s trouble,” Beckett joked. "What can I do for you, Maude? More chicken wire?”
“You know it!” the woman huffed, reaching the counter and leaning on it for support. “The Dames have been peckin’ for their freedom lately! I can’t say as what I think’s gotten into them, unless it’s the strange folk who’ve been stayin’ at my place.”
“Strange folk?” Rosie asked, her anxiety kicking in as Beckett went out back to retrieve the chicken wire. She had a horrible feeling she knew exactly what ‘folk’ Maude was talking about.
“Weirdos, to put it plain!” Maude huffed again. “The Beep ’n’ Sleep ain’t got no vacancy on account of it bein’ full of people who seem to have come from all corners of the globe all of a sudden and for no good reason. I even had one fella tell me he was here from France, right before he tried to get fresh with me. Can you believe it?”
The portly woman huffed once more indignantly, and despite the seriousness of the situation, Rosie couldn’t help but be a little amused. Maude had to be the only motel owner in the county who’d worry about having all her rooms full.
“Don’t suppose you’d be willing to give me a hand gettin’ all this over to the Beep ’n' Sleep?” Maude asked hopefully, eying the wire Beckett was bringing to the counter. “I doubt I’m gonna be able to fit all of it in my car, and seein’ as you justhappento be here…”
It gave Rosie the perfect excuse to check out what was happening at Maude’s place firsthand. She patted the older woman on the shoulder kindly. “Be happy to,” she said, glancing behind Maude to where Maggie was bent over looking at the koi pond. “And I have just the muscles needed to help out. Lead the way, Maude.”
The weirdest partabout seeing what was going on at the Beep ’n’ Sleep was seeing the place at full occupancy. In all her time in Mosswood, Rosie had never seen more than a handful of people there all at once. She cast a sympathetic glance at The Dames—Maude’s motley crew of chickens—as she got out of her car. There was no wonder the poor things were stressed and trying to escape their coop. There were people everywhere. Much more, it seemed, than the number of rooms Maude had could cater for.
Rosie wasn’t sure why people had opted for staying here. It risked the Secrecy, and the Council had made it perfectly clear there was protected (and invisible) designated camping space set up adjacent to the old Mill. But yet… here they were. Some witches had opted for staying in their rooms, TVs and music blaring. Others had dragged their porch chairs out into the space between the motel and the mechanical workshop Maude also ran, pulling them into a huge circle with a fire going in the middle. Laundry was hung out to dry on the porch rails between the rooms, and over bushes.
Ohhellno.
“Grab that wire, will you Mags?”
“Okay, Mom,” Maggie chirped, turning to Maude politely. “Where would you like it?”
“Bless your heart. Just by the coop, thanks. And when you’re done, you go on into the office and get yourself a popsicle out of the ice box. On the house.”
“Thanks, Maude!” Maggie beamed, moving to grab the wire out of the car.
“Thank you,” Maude said to Maggie, before glancing in Rosie’s direction. “And you need to head home and put your feet up, Missy. I reckon you’ll?—”
A loud, blood-curdling scream that filled the area like an air-raid siren interrupted Maude’s well-meaning lecture.
Everyone jumped, looking around for the source of the noise until seconds later a woman came rushing out of one of the rooms. Her eyes were as wide as saucers, her face pale. She waved her arms in the air hysterically as she ran away from whatever it was that had horrified her so much, and Rosie noticed that both of her hands were coated in something that looked a lot like blood.
“He’s dead!” the woman sobbed, pulling away from the first person who tried to stop her from running. “Murdered!”
“Who?”
“Aata!”
Rosie’s mind instantly flashed back to Aata’s desperate face as he had grabbed her backstage during the Ordeals… his words haunting her. “You need to listen…”
Without even really thinking about why, Rosie was rushing in the direction the woman had come from. The door to the room was wide open, the tiny motel room a tableaux of destruction beyond it. The covers had been pulled off the bed and were strewn across the floor. Poor Aata was half-sprawled across the mattress, legs stretched toward the pillows while his head and arms were draped over the side farthest away from the door. A smattering of toxic-looking vomit was spread across mattress beside him. He definitely hadn’t died of natural causes.
Leaving the room, Rosie made her way over to the distraught woman who had found the body.
“Did you see what happened?”
“No,” the woman sobbed, eyes streaming. “I just went out to get some beers and when I got back he was… likethat!”
