That Old Witch!: The Coffee Coven's Cozy Capers: Book 1 Read online

  Char’s eyes immediately scanned the room as she sucked in a reproachful breath. “Do you have to yell?” she hissed. “I was told that in confidence. And they’re not shacked up anymore. They actually tied the knot.”

  “Well, excuse me,” quipped Phyllis, waggling her head. “Who told you he married the girl?”

  Char leaned forward. “Well, Amy Bartley lives next door to him. Her mother is in my bridge club, and she said that Amy told her that Ruben moved the girl in about a year ago, and three months ago, they flew off to Vegas and made it official. That girl is young enough to be his daughter.”

  “I wonder what he sees in her?” asked Phyllis.

  Char let a puff of air out her nose. “I’ll tell you what he sees in her. Her triple Hs, that’s what he sees in her.”

  Phyllis covered her face with one hand and lowered her head. “Oh Lordy, here we go.”

  Char waved a hand in protest. “No. I won’t go there. Today is Kat’s day. I won’t even get started on that. Of course, I think it’s silly what some men will do when they hit middle age, but that’s neither here nor there. I’m just a fuddy-duddy old grandma, what do I know?”

  Phyllis rocked back on her seat and threw her hands in the air as if to scream Hallelujah! “Don’t even get me started on grandkids,” she bellowed.

  Linda looked around uncomfortably. “Where’s Vic?” she asked Char in an attempt at changing the subject.

  “Oh, I left him at home. He didn’t think it would be proper etiquette to bring him to the funeral.”

  Linda nodded her head knowingly. “Yes, I suppose that makes sense. Though if it was just the three of you, I don’t think it would have mattered.”

  Char shrugged. “How were we to know that no one else would show up?”

  Phyllis looked over her shoulder towards the kitchen. “Linda, where are my grandchildren?”

  “Well, Mercy and the girls are all in class right now.”

  “And how about my grandson? Where’s Reign?” she asked, craning her neck towards the kitchen.

  “Reign went out for a jog. He’s trying to get in shape. He’s started dating, you know,” said Linda in a hushed voice.

  “That’s what I heard,” said Phyllis. “Don’t let him pick someone I wouldn’t approve of.”

  Linda rolled her eyes. “You’re going to stay out of my son’s love life, Mother. You’ve caused enough damage to the poor boy to last forever. You leave him alone, got it?”

  Phyllis threw both hands into the air. “See what I’m saying? Grandma doesn’t know best if you ask them. Got it, got it. Jeez.”

  Eyeing her mother seriously, Linda walked backwards towards the bar. “I’ll go get your order started and have your coffee out in a jiffy.”

  “Thank you, Linda, dear,” said Char with a polite smile. She looked at her friend. “Well, I don’t know about you, but that was one of the strangest funerals I’ve ever been to.”

  Phyllis unrolled the napkin full of silverware on the table and placed it across her lap. “How so?”

  “That new priest. He was so rude.”

  “Oh, him. Yeah, I didn’t appreciate all that pagan mumbo jumbo. Father Bernie is so much more relatable to the residents of Aspen Falls.”

  Char sighed. “Yes. I cannot wait until he comes back.”

  “Where’s Father Bernie at anyway?”

  “He’s on a retreat until the middle of May. Father Donovan’s just a loaner from Bakersdale. He’s been here for about three weeks, and none of the parishoners likes him.”

  “Well, he certainly doesn’t understand that Aspen Falls is different than other parishes, does he? You’ve got to cater to a wider range of people here.”

  “Exactly. And to perform services for a witch, you’d think he’d have been a little more open-minded. I just thought the whole service was laced with his own agenda. Kat was probably rolling over in her urn.”

  The two women looked down at the gold-colored container on the table. “Hard to believe that’s all that’s left of her,” whispered Phyllis. “What are we going to do with her ashes?”

  Char shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m not ready to think about them yet. We’ll figure something out. I’m still thinking about how much I’m going to miss her. We had some really good times together.” She blotted the tears that formed in the corners of her eyes.

  “I’m really going to miss her, too,” said Phyllis wistfully. Then a slow smile played around the corners of her mouth. “Do you remember during the first semester of school at the Institute, when we snuck into Beverly Schmidt’s room while she was sleeping and stole all her bras so she’d have to go to class without one?”

  Char giggled. “Of course I remember! That was all Kat’s idea. She thought that was so funny.” Char pointed her finger at Phyllis. “I also remember that it backfired on her. That evening at the mixer between us and the Paranormal Institute for Wizards, Kat was slow-dancing with Charlie Daniels, but when he saw Beverly come in without her bra, and she was perkier than every other girl at the dance, he dropped Kat like a hot potato.”

  Phyllis’ elephant-sized laugh filled the dining room. “Oh man,” she said through her laughter, tears filling her eyes. “That was hilarious. The joke was on her, huh?”

  Char nodded. “And then there was that time that Gwyn Prescott, Loni Hodges, Kat, Auggie Stone, you, and I came downtown at midnight Halloween night and put all the police cars on top of the buildings around Aspen Falls.”

  Phyllis’s eyes nearly disappeared into her cheeks as she guffawed. One hand covered her stomach, and the other covered her eyes. “That was hilarious! That one made the papers if I remember correctly. They had to bring in a team of second-year witches from the Institute just to get the cars off the tops of the buildings! Everyone at school talked about it for weeks!”

  “That one was Loni’s idea!” said Char, chuckling.

  “Oh golly,” said Phyllis as her laughter began to subside. “I haven’t thought about Loni Hodges or Gwyn Prescott for years!”

  Char harrumphed. “Loni lives in Aspen Falls, you know.”

  “You don’t say!” said Phyllis. “Well, then, why wasn’t she at the funeral?”

  “I’ll tell you why. She’s gone batshit crazy from what I’ve heard. She rarely leaves her house. I know she keeps up with Kat, but after that little incident after graduation, I haven’t heard from or spoken to her or Gwyn. Nor do I want to.”

  “I haven’t spoken to them either. After the mess between Auggie Stone and me, I sort of fled Aspen Falls and never looked back. Being back in town after all these years has been quite the trip down memory lane, that’s for sure.”

  Char leaned forward and covered her friend’s hand with hers. “I’m so sorry about everything Auggie put you through. I had no idea.”

  Phyllis patted her hand. “Thank you, dear. I’m sorry for what she put you through as well.”

  Char nodded. “It wasn’t all her fault.”

  “I know,” agreed Phyllis, “but it might as well have been.”

  “Well, at least I have him still. You poor thing. You went through so much more. If only I’d known…”

  Phyllis frowned. “I managed. I just can’t believe she didn’t get locked up over that whole mess with Vic.”

  “I’m a little surprised too, but you know those Stones. They always manage to get their way.”

  “Yes, I suppose they do,” agreed Phyllis. “Well, I’m just so glad that I’ve got you, Char. And I’m even more thankful that I don’t ever have to think about any of those girls again!”

  3

  “This is the good room?”

  Gwyndolin Prescott sighed. “Yes, Mother. This is the good room.” She set the two suitcases she carried down on the threadbare carpet, unwound the hanging bag from around her neck, and dropped herself onto the faded pink floral armchair beneath the window.

  Hazel Prescott’s droopy eyes widened. “If this is a good room, I’d hate to see the bad rooms!”

&
nbsp; Gwyn ignored her mother’s complaints. She was too tired from being on the road for the last seventy-two hours. It had been the longest three days of her life, driving her mother from Scottsdale, Arizona, to Aspen Falls, Pennsylvania. But they’d made it. Finally. All she wanted to do now was sleep before she had to report for duty in the morning.

  Hazel tapped her cane against the floor. “They call this carpet? I’ve seen thicker rugs on Dean Martin’s head.”

  Gwyn sighed. “Mom, it’s a retirement village, not a Hilton.”

  Hazel nearly spat out her dentures as she pointed her cane at the window. “You call this a village? A building built around a tree does not make a village.”

  With mighty effort, Gwyn pushed herself off her chair and looked out the picture window to the courtyard. A mammoth scarlet oak tree stood proudly centered above the cobblestone patio. Black cast-iron benches surrounded the tree with matching end tables at each of the four corners. A pair of senior citizens sat quietly reading beneath the shade tree.

  “Mom, the courtyard is lovely. Do you remember promising not to complain if I took you out of Scottsdale Manor?”

  Hazel frowned at her daughter. “I promised not to complain if you took me somewhere better. This isn’t better.”

  “It’s better, Mom. And it’s part of my salary package. Free room and board for both of us. It doesn’t get much better than that.” She strode over to the suitcases, hefted them up again, and carried them to the hallway off the small kitchenette. “Come on. I’ll let you pick the good bedroom.”

  Hazel followed behind her daughter, twirling one finger in the air. “Oh, the good bedroom. Yippee.”

  Gwyn had to suck up all the patience she had left not to bark at her mother. It was her mother’s fault that she’d been forced out of her job at Scottsdale Manor. She hadn’t told her that, of course, but the retirement community had asked her to find a new home for her mother. They thought she required more care than they could give. And they weren’t referring to her medical care. Hazel was a handful.

  Not only did she have a tendency to wander off and get herself into predicaments, as the Manor liked to call them, but she was also an accomplished poker player and used her special gift on more than one occasion to swindle money out of unsuspecting residents. When the families discovered Hazel was taking money from their parents and complained to the management, a strict no-gambling rule was implemented at the Manor, which made Hazel want to find a new place to live. Of course, Gwyn couldn’t just up and quit her job and move—where would they go? Eventually, the Manor had asked her to find Hazel a new place to live. At that point, she realized she had no other choice than to quit.

  That was when the job search began. Not many companies wanted to hire someone of Gwyn’s advanced age. She’d probably sent out fifty resumes before she’d discovered that the retirement village in the small town where her old alma mater was located was hiring an activities director. And one of the criteria was experience dealing with the paranormal. Hot damn! Gwyn had filled out the online application that very day, and within a week she’d had a phone interview with the board of directors. She almost couldn’t believe it when they’d called the very next day to offer her the position.

  Packing up had been a breeze. Gwyn and Hazel didn’t own much. They’d been gypsy wanderers the last twenty years or so. With Gwyn being a single mother, once her daughters had become adults, moved away, and started their own families, there was really no reason to be tied down to the house in which she’d raised them. And by that time, Hazel was aging rapidly and needed someone to keep an eye on her around the clock. So, Gwyn did what she thought was best and sold the house and all her furniture and unnecessary possessions and gone to live with her mother. When the money from the sale of her house had begun to dwindle, she’d realized it was time to get a job. But she wasn’t sure how she’d make a job work with Hazel’s needs, and that’s when she’d gotten started working for assisted living centers, nursing homes, and retirement villages. As long as the place would let her mother come and they could live together, Gwyn happily took the job.

  But the older Hazel got, the more problems she seemed to cause. Of course, it had taken a year or two at each location before management got snippy enough to pull the plug on Hazel’s residency, but it was always inevitable. This time was no different. Gwyn had seen the writing on the wall for a while, but she’d grown to like Arizona’s climate and the friends she’d made at the Manor, so it had been a disappointment to have to leave their comfy little apartment just as she’d gotten comfortable.

  Now she looked around wistfully. The beige walls with cheaply framed pictures of snow-capped mountains and wildlife bored her. The kitchenette was small and filled with miniature appliances and cheap cupboards whose doors didn’t seem to fit right. The living room had only enough space to fit a small boxy sofa, the faded armchair, and a twenty-seven-inch flat-screen television on a pressed-wood rolling stand. Both bedrooms had extra-wide doorways to accommodate wheelchairs and medical equipment, but the rooms themselves were tight. There was just enough room for the bed, nightstand, dresser, and a closet. Gwyn didn’t want to complain, though; at least the room had come furnished.

  “Which one’s the good room?” Hazel snapped from behind her, pulling Gwyn out of her little reverie.

  From the doorway, Gwyn looked back at the other room. Her eyes were vacant from exhaustion and weary resignation, so she couldn’t readily tell the difference between the two rooms, though someone had told her on the phone that one of the bedrooms was bigger. Standing in the doorway, she thought both rooms both looked equally small.

  Hazel’s head swiveled from left to right. “They look the same to me.”

  Gwyn pointed to the room behind her. “That one has two windows,” she said, trying to muster up a glimmer of excitement.

  Leaning her weight on her cane, Hazel lifted her other arm and jazz-handed the air. “Well, wooey!”

  “Mother!” The chastisement in her voice was distinct. She was too tired to try to hide it.

  Hazel shrugged. “Fine. I’ll take it.”

  Gwyn lugged her mother’s suitcases to the room across the hall and put her bags on the bed. “Why don’t you start unpacking, Mom? I’m going to run out to the car and carry in another load.”

  “What?” asked Hazel, cupping her ear.

  “I’m going out to the car to get another load,” Gwyn hollered into her mother’s good ear.

  The fleshy pouches of extra skin beneath Hazel’s sunken eyes lifted as she made a face. “They don’t have any bellboys for that?”

  “No, they don’t have any bellboys. I’ll just be a minute. Can you be good for just a minute?”

  “What do you mean, can I be good? I’m always good,” shouted Hazel. Her hearing wasn’t as good as it had once been, and her voice had gotten louder the worse her hearing had become.

  “Just don’t wander off. Stay in the room. Okay?”

  Hazel didn’t acknowledge her daughter’s words.

  Gwyn walked around her mother to look her in the face. “Don’t wander off, please. Stay in the room, okay?”

  Hazel lowered her chin and frowned. “I don’t need a babysitter, Gwynnie.”

  “I know you don’t, Mom,” she sighed. She knew her mother didn’t like being treated like a child. She hated having to treat her like one, too. Gwyn mustered up a smile and a spoonful of fake enthusiasm. “I just want to explore the place together. Okay?”

  Hazel thought about it for a second. “Fine. We’ll explore together. Hurry up, though. I’m hungry.”

  “We’ll look for the dining hall when I get back.” Gwyn stood with her hand on her hip in the doorway of her mother’s new room, watching her mother’s slow movements. It didn’t matter where they were or what they were doing, they were together, and she was thankful for that. Quietly she pondered whether it was safe to leave her mother unattended for the few minutes it would take her to go to the car.

  Hazel’s hand paus
ed as she unzipped the suitcase on the bed. She looked up at Gwyn. “Well, don’t just stand there. Hurry up, then.”

  Gwyn sighed. “Yes, Mother.”

  At the intersection of the corridors, Gwyn looked down the hallway in all four directions. She couldn’t believe how quiet the hallways were. Is it always this quiet here on a Sunday afternoon? she wondered. Scottsdale Manor always bustled with activity on Sunday afternoons, with families coming and going. Music poured out of the dining room, enticing families to join the scheduled events and proving to them that their loved ones were in good hands.

  But this place was a ghost town. Even as Gwyn and Hazel approached the dining room, the only sound she could hear was her mother’s cane tapping the floor and her feet shuffling as they walked. As the new activities director, Gwyn made a promise to herself right then and there that she’d fix that. It would be her first order of business to implement a family fun day every Sunday.

  “Where is everyone?” Hazel asked from her stooped walking position.

  “We must have missed family hour,” suggested Gwyn. She didn’t want to call attention to the fact that she guessed they didn’t have a family hour here. That would only give her mother one more gripe.

  “You sure this is a retirement home and not a funeral home?” snapped Hazel.

  Gwyn looked down at her mother. Hazel Prescott had shrunk over the years. Gwyn remembered a time when she and her mother had been the same height, and then Gwyn had surpassed her by an entire inch and stopped growing. Now, she looked down and could see the top of her mother’s short grey hair. Granted, it was due in large part to her mother’s stooped posture, but even when she tried to stand taller, Hazel still stood several inches shorter than her daughter now.

  Gwyn ignored her mother’s dig. She was always worse when she was hungry. “Let’s get you some food, Mom.”

  They turned into the dining room. It was a bright, pleasant enough space that smelled of disinfectant and tomato sauce. A wall of windows and sliding patio doors lined one side of the room, facing the courtyard. A piano sat against one wall, beneath another set of generic mountain and wildlife paintings. The far wall had a big-screen TV on it with a handful of sofas and chairs arranged around it. The rest of the room had nearly a dozen square wooden tables, each with four wooden chairs and padded navy seat cushions and seat backs. Not bad. When the first thing out of her mother’s mouth wasn’t a crack on the dining room, Gwyn knew her mother agreed that it was nice.