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  From his spot next to Paige, Casper lifted his head and glared at Scott.

  Paige knew there was no way out of the line of questioning other than the truth. Scott would know if she kept lying. Her shoulders slumped and she nodded. “Yes, but it wasn’t a drug. At least not the kind you’re thinking of.” She paused, took a long breath, and plunged into the deep end. “It was a potion.”

  To Paige’s relief, Emma finished with the customer and went into the back room. Scott watched the woman go and then looked back at Paige. “What are you talking about? What do you mean by potion?” His tone was so hard that she felt almost like he’d hit her.

  “It’s something I got from Lucy.” Last chance to bail. Come up with some other explanation, even if he doesn’t believe it. But Paige didn’t want to do that. It was time to come clean with her brother. She could feel it. She hated keeping secrets from him. “Lucy’s a witch with a talent for potion-making. She made me a brew that would help Officer Burns be more interested in what I had to say. I wanted him to be open to the idea that Sarah didn’t kill Peggy.”

  Scott blinked several times as though someone was puffing air into his eyes. He opened his mouth but closed it again, reminding Paige of the fish she’d caught when she was six. It had upset her so much to think of the fish “drowning” in the air that she’d thrown him back into the water. To Paige’s relief, her dad hadn’t scolded her. He’d boomed out a belly laugh and gave her a hug.

  Scott’s silence was so deafening she felt she had to fill it. “Aunt Nora was a witch too, and she has this logbook that contains the spirit of Captain McDougall, the pirate who died in a shipwreck off the coast of Comfort Cove. He’s the one whose gold Aunt Nora had hidden in her house, remember?”

  Scott blinked some more but didn’t answer.

  Paige hesitated. Maybe she should stop. Then she shrugged. In for a penny . . . as they say. “There are . . . other witches around too. Um, actually, I have . . . abilities. I have flashbacks of things that really happened. And I have some newer abilities that started when I got hit by lightning. I talked to Peggy Jenkins’s spirit a couple of times.” She stumbled to a halt. That was enough, she decided. No way was she going to call out her sister-in-law. That was for Sarah to decide on doing with her own husband.

  Scott had stopped blinking and gulping. His jaw was a firm, hard line, and in fact, every muscle in his body seemed taut and ready to explode. Paige waited for him to start yelling at her. To tell her she was a nutcase and witches didn’t exist. She was ready for the tirade even though it was surely going to tear her heart out. But Scott didn’t yell. Instead, he looked past her with a million-mile stare. “A ghost? I thought I saw a ghost when I was a kid.” But suddenly, he seemed to snap back to reality. Through gritted teeth, he said, “Stay off the case. I need to think.” He rose and stormed out of the shop before Paige could do or say anything.

  Too late. She hadn’t even gotten to tell him about the scissors.

  She got up and slowly crossed the room to look out the window. She just caught the taillights of her brother’s car turning the corner down the street. A knot formed in the pit of her stomach. Somehow, she’d thought that when it came time to tell Scott the truth about her powers, it would be a relief and that sharing the deepest part of herself with her brother would be freeing and feel good.

  But at that moment, Paige didn’t feel so great. In fact, she wondered if she’d made a horrible mistake.

  Chapter 19

  When it was time for Emma to leave for the day, she gave Paige a quick hug. “I can tell you’ve been upset this morning, dear. Don’t worry. Everything will work out for Sarah. The truth will set her free.” She smiled and patted Paige’s hand before leaving.

  At least Emma hadn’t overheard Paige’s confession to Scott about being a witch and didn’t know that’s what was really upsetting her. Of course, Paige was also worried about Sarah.

  It was a curious thing. In the past, Paige hadn’t cared if her brother got mad at her about something—usually speaking her mind loudly, getting into some kind of trouble, or overstepping her bounds. But it felt different to have him angry with her about being a witch because it was one of the things she treasured most about herself. She wanted her brother to love it too.

  Wincing, she moved to answer the ringing phone. Sarah spoke loudly over voices in the background. “You need to get to the salon, now.”

  “But Emma’s not here.”

  “Then close the store. I need you to get here immediately.”

  Sarah wasn’t usually bossy, but her current tone didn’t brook any argument. Paige’s interest was sparked. What was so serious that her sister-in-law needed help right away? She looked around the bookstore, which hadn’t seen a customer in a while, and shrugged. “Fine. Be there in five.” She crossed the floor to where Casper sat near a bookshelf. “I’m going out for a little while. I’ll pick you up before I go home, okay?”

  “Yes,” he said with a nod. “Me hungry.”

  She chuckled. “I still have some cat food back here somewhere.” She dug around the storeroom until she found the sack and sprinkled some kibbles in his bowl. “There you go. Knock yourself out. See you later.”

  Since Terrific Tresses was just around the block, Paige hurried there on foot rather than firing up the car. When she arrived, there were a lot of older female customers inside, along with Donna, Sarah, Karen, and a few other hairdressers. As soon as Paige’s foot was through the door, an explosion of sound nearly deafened her as everyone started babbling at once.

  Sarah clapped her hands and then raised them, making a downward motion to shush the women. When the noise had dimmed to a dull roar, she turned to Paige. “We have to tell you something.” She gestured toward a woman with slightly blue-tinged hair seated at Karen’s station. “Ethel mentioned she had to get a new prescription for her pain medication and couldn’t because the pharmacy said she shouldn’t be out of pills yet. She said she never took any extra ones or lost them and figured the person who originally filled the prescription counted wrong and shorted her.” Sarah looked around at some of the other elderly ladies. “But then everyone got to talking about it and saying how the same thing had been happening to them.”

  Ethel pointed to the woman at Donna’s station. “Delores had it happen to her twice.”

  Delores nodded vigorously, curlers bouncing around on her head. “I thought I was losing it. Two months in a row I had to go without my pills for several days at the end of the month because they wouldn’t refill them early.” She shook her head. “My rheumatism is so bad I can hardly walk if I don’t have my medicine.”

  The other ladies all tsked and made empathetic faces at their friend.

  Sarah turned to the woman at her own station. “Beulah, you had a similar experience, right?”

  Beulah, a tiny woman who Paige knew to be a spitfire, crossed her arms and jutted out her sharply angled chin. “Yep, me too. My son said I must be getting senile when I told him about my missing pills.” Her frown deepened and she spat, “I may be old, but I don’t have dementia. I passed the tests for it at the doctor with flying colors.” She shook her tiny, wrinkly fist in the air.

  “So, you’ve all been losing pain pills?” Paige was sympathetic but wondered what it had to do with her.

  “Yeah, and also, they were all Peggy’s clients,” Sarah confirmed. “They’re with different hairdressers now that she’s gone, of course, but before that, they all saw her for their weekly beauty appointments.”

  “Okay,” Paige said, drawing out the word.

  “That’s because Peggy made us go to her,” Ethel said. Then she popped a hard candy into her mouth.

  Paige was shocked. “Wait. What did you just say?”

  All the ladies nodded, almost in unison.

  Beulah said, “Yep. If we wanted to use her escort service, Peggy said we had to be her salon clients and we couldn’t talk about it in public. She wanted to keep it on the down low.” She smiled up at D
onna. “Peggy did a nice job on my hair, but she just never used enough hairspray.”

  Paige knew from talking to ghost Peggy that the woman was double-dipping into the elderly ladies’ pocketbooks. And maybe if they got too chatty about the business, she could take it out on their hair.

  Donna looked relieved. “So, it wasn’t anything I did that was making my clients leave and go to Peggy.”

  Sarah shook her head. “Nope. You must have just noticed it more than the rest of us because you had more weekly clients.”

  Paige chuckled internally, knowing Sarah wanted to say elderly clients, not weekly clients. “So, Peggy’s escort service was pretty popular, huh?”

  Heads and curlers bobbed like mad again. Delores grinned. “Of course, Zach is everybody’s favorite.” Murmurings of agreement ran through the crowd, and the women waggled their eyebrows in appreciation of the handsome beach bum. Paige thought they were all just too cute.

  Sarah got to the point and turned back to Paige. “After they were talking about it, they realized the pills always went missing after their dates with Peggy’s escorts. We thought maybe this could all be tied to Peggy’s murder.”

  Paige nodded her understanding. “I need you all to think. Was it always after a date with Zach that you realized your pills were missing? Or do you think that all the escorts are stealing the pain pills?”

  “All of them,” Beulah said. “I should know. I played the field.”

  They all nodded aggressively.

  Dorothy from Claire’s sewing class shook her head. “It never happened to me, but I only went on one date. I wanted to go out with Zach, but Peggy said he was reserved for her really big tippers. She put me with that snake Riley. He didn’t rip me off as much as he did Bonnie, but that was the one and only time I ever used Peggy’s services.”

  Beulah nodded. “I hate to admit it, but it makes sense. Those boys were stealing our meds. It breaks my heart to think they’d do that to a bunch of old ladies. Especially Zach. He was like . . . their leader.”

  “Oh!” Sarah cried. “Maybe that’s why Peggy was upset with Zach that day they argued. She might have found out about the pills.”

  Paige leaned against Sarah’s station, going over the new information in her mind. “When Peggy said her deal was off with Zach, maybe she had found out about the drugs. They were probably doing it behind Peggy’s back.”

  “I have an idea,” Beulah said. “We should organize a sting!” She jabbed a bony finger in the air. “At the Yacht Club dance tonight.”

  “There’s a dance?” Paige said.

  “Why do you think we’re all here getting gussied up?” Delores patted her hair and grinned. “I’m going with Bodi. Bonnie will be there with Zach. We can snoop around and keep an eye on them to see if they do anything suspicious.”

  Paige looked around at the sweet, excited faces. “But if Peggy’s gone, how are you all still getting dates?”

  “Jordy,” Beulah said. “He’s taken over the business.”

  That would explain the calendar Paige saw on Jordy’s desk. A chill ran down her back as she pictured Zach and Jordy at the memorial. Selling drugs on the black market was surely more lucrative than the cut of the tip money Peggy was paying him. Could Jordy be in on it too? Maybe the side drug business was the motive for Zach or Jordy to kill Peggy.

  Sarah tapped Paige on the shoulder, pulling her out of the trance. “Are you okay?”

  Paige nodded and thought about Scott and his concern that he might get into trouble as a result of his sister’s investigation. He’d told her to stay off the case, and that probably included the sting plan to trap Zach and the others stealing the women’s pills. “Let’s keep this plan between us,” she announced. “The fewer people who know what we’re up to, the more freedom I’ll have for snooping.”

  “She’s right!” Ethel stood and raised a fist in the air. “Let’s take a pledge to keep this to ourselves. We’ll catch the pill-stealer and prove none of us is senile.”

  The other ladies all raised their hands and agreed to the pledge, including Sarah and Paige, though they grinned the entire time. Sarah got everyone’s attention again, and they made their plans for the evening. When that was done, the customers went back to their magazines and the hairdressers started working again.

  “Can I talk to you alone for a minute?” Paige led Sarah to a quiet corner and whispered, “I told Scott about Lucy and me today.”

  Sarah seemed jittery, probably thinking they were onto something that may be connected to the murder and to clearing her name. “About what?”

  Paige put a finger on the tip of her nose and wiggled it.

  Sarah’s jaw dropped and her eyes grew to the size of organic bagels. “You mean about . . .”

  Paige nodded and hurried to add, “I didn’t say anything about you. It just got to the point where I needed him to know. It’s gotten too hard to keep it from him without really feeling like a liar all the time. In this case, I couldn’t share everything about the investigation with him, and that was putting you in danger. I need to be able to tell him everything so we can work together to get to the right answer.”

  “What did he say? Was he mad? Shocked? Happy?” Sarah bit her bottom lip.

  “I think he was sort of in disbelief.”

  “Makes sense. I’m not going to tell him about me yet, though. I want to see how he reacts to the news about you.” She elbowed Paige and grinned.

  Paige lifted her hands. “That’s fine. I’ll sacrifice myself for the good of your relationship.” She elbowed Sarah back and then took a serious tone. “We’re close to solving this. I know it. You’ll be in the clear before you know it.”

  Sarah smiled. “I hope so. It’s been nerve-racking.”

  Paige could tell her sister-in-law hadn’t been sleeping well. She’d tried to cover it with makeup but there were purple bags under her eyes. On a whim, Paige gave her a tight hug. “Don’t worry. I’ll find the real killer soon.” She winked. “Maybe tonight at the Yacht Club.”

  Chapter 20

  Paige found herself being grateful that the senior crowd eats early. She wanted to get the party at the Yacht Club over with to make sure it didn’t interfere with her getting to Maretti’s for Marco’s dinner. The last thing she wanted to do was let him down.

  She took Casper home and changed into a dark-green and white maxi dress with strappy sandals. She even curled her hair and spent a minute admiring herself in the mirror. It was the perfect Christmastime outfit.

  “You pwitty,” Casper said.

  Paige curtseyed and thanked him. “I’ll be home late tonight. Don’t make trouble.” The cat lifted a paw delicately and licked at it, giving the impression he’d never in a million years think about doing anything naughty. Paige grinned. He may be a bit dim, but the cat was a good companion. Except for the hairballs.

  The Yacht Club wasn’t far from the beach bar, and Paige felt like a wealthy person when she drove up to the front of the building and a valet escorted her up the steps and then took her car away. She went through the front doors and entered a short hallway with a coatroom on the left. The hall opened into a huge, grand room with soaring ceilings and three big chandeliers dripping in sparkly crystals. Two Christmas trees with toppers that touched the twelve-foot ceilings graced the room, one on each end. They were decorated tastefully in silver and gold ornaments with glittery tinsel and white lights.

  In fact, the entire room seemed draped in twinkling white Christmas lights, with the main lights dimmed. Candles flickered on the garishly set round tables that stood at intervals. There was a big dance floor at the far end of the room, and a string quartet played Christmas music while couples danced slowly.

  Uniformed waitstaff circulated with silver platters, reminding Paige of Peggy’s memorial. In fact, she was almost certain some of them were the same people. Maybe Jordy had hired them from the Yacht Club. She snagged a glass of wine from one and moved into the room, scanning to see who was there. Ethel, Del
ores, and Beulah were all with their escorts, but Paige didn’t see Zach and Bonnie. Jordy held a glass of wine and talked to an elderly woman Paige didn’t recognize.

  Jordy joined Paige after a few minutes, grinning and giving her a flirty look. He escorted her to a table where Ethel, Delores, and their dates sat, and conversation turned toward the cooler weather and a new taco food truck in town.

  Dinner was served, but Paige only picked at the salad and spaghetti. She was used to Marco’s cooking, and the club’s pasta tasted like it had been made with canned sauce. When Ethel, Delores, and Beulah excused themselves to the ladies’ room, Paige joined them.

  The women reapplied their lipstick and chattered about how lovely the Christmas decorations were. But something had been niggling at Paige’s mind. She looked under the stalls to make sure she was alone with her fellow conspirators and then blurted, “What happened to the escort named Riley?”

  The women exchanged glances, all of them snickering. Beulah said, “He worked for Peggy for about a month. But one night, he took Bonnie out and she invited him back to her house. He stole a bunch of cash and jewelry from her and then skipped town.”

  Delores chuckled. “Bonnie was so gullible. He told her he’d help her fix the bathroom faucet, and she totally believed him. Then she was too embarrassed about being outwitted by a twenty-something guy and didn’t report it to the police or anything. We all found out, though. Nothing stays a secret for too long in Comfort Cove.”

  Ethel nodded. “We gave her a real needling about it.” She grinned. “That’s why she only goes out with Zach now. Bonnie trusts him.”

  They made their way back out to the main room, and Paige spotted Bonnie and Zach. Zach wore black linen pants and shirt, and Bonnie wore a black cocktail dress with silver rhinestones on the hem and neckline. Her glasses sported sparkly silver stones too. She beamed at Zach, who held a pint of beer and looked bored.