Spellbound
Kate Hoffmann
Contents
“That’s it. That’s her shop. She calls herself a witch, mixes up potions all day long. My wife spends fifty dollars in there every week for oils, and lotions, and teas, and who knows what. It’s your job to put an end to it.”
Will Ross shoved his hands in his pockets as he stared across the street. When he took the job as police chief in the remote village of Barstow Ferry in northern Maine, he’d wanted to find the kind of peaceful existence that wasn’t possible as a vice detective in Boston. He hadn’t expected to deal with a lot of serious crime. But he hadn’t really signed on to run witches out of town, either.
But the president of the village board had handed him a list of priorities upon his arrival, and Kelsey Quinn had been at the top of his list, right above repositioning the moose crossing sign on Main Street and driving 100-year-old Barney Boulet around town on his birthday.
“Have you talked to her?” Will asked the board president. “Maybe you could just ask her not to sell to your wife anymore.”
“Are you crazy?” Ben Murphy asked. “She’ll put a curse on me. She hexed Wibby Phillips and he tripped on the porch steps and knocked out his two front teeth. Used to play the trumpet. Now he can’t blow a note.”
“Are you really sure she was responsible? I mean, I don’t really believe in spells. Maybe this Wibby just slipped on a patch of ice?”
“I don’t care what you believe. The village board voted. You need to close her down. Chase her out of the village. That’s all there is to it.”
Will drew a deep breath. “All right. I’ll see what I can do. But there is the matter of the law here. If she’s not breaking any laws, I really can’t touch her.”
“I wouldn’t even think of touching her,” Ben said, wandering off down the street and waving his hands. “Get it done!”
Will started toward the “witch’s” tiny shop, set between a tavern and the post office. If he had to imagine a shop that a witch might run, this would be it, with its pointy little roof above the door and its leaded glass windows. In fact, it resembled one of those old filling stations from the 1920s, with gingerbread decorating the facade and red tile covering the roof. The building looked completely out of place among the more solid, weather-worthy properties on the street, as if it had been dropped into place during some moment of magic.
“All right,” he murmured to himself. “This is going to be your first official act. Better make it good.”
In truth, Will hadn’t wanted to leave Boston. But several very close encounters between himself and a speeding bullet had convinced him that his number might be coming up faster than normal. The last incident had been so close, the bullet had grazed his ear as it had flown by before it had hit his partner in the arm.
So when Dave Simon, his partner, had taken a job in his hometown in Iowa, Will decided it was time for him to make a change, too. For some reason, fate had marked him and the only way to escape the inevitable was to go somewhere where criminals didn’t exist, or didn’t carry guns. So Will had found a new job on the border between Maine and Canada, in a place called Barstow Ferry, a quaint little village on the St. John River.
When he reached the front door of the shop, he pasted a charming smile on his face and tried to think optimistically. He’d dealt with violent drug dealers and trigger-happy wise guys. He could certainly handle some old lady who thought she was a witch.
Kelsey Quinn looked up from the herbs she was grinding with her mortar and pestle. A man stood in the doorway and she stared at him for a long moment, wondering what he wanted. Most of her business was with the women in town. When a man stopped by the shop, it was usually to warn her off doing business with his wife.
“Can I help you?”
He paused
