Southern Curses (Max Porter Mysteries Book 6) Read online

  Leon inched back. “I do have to protect myself.”

  “He’s right,” Drummond said. “If I could get to him, I’d make him sorry.”

  “Don’t let these precautions distract you. Instead, please, think this through.”

  “I have,” Max said.

  “Really? Because for a long time, over a century now, the Hull family has had a lock on their power in this area. Nobody could beat them. If you were a witch, if you dabbled in the mystic arts, or even if you performed the most meaningless of spells, they knew about it, and they either allowed it or they visited you and made you aware of their rules. Forty years ago, to be a witch in North Carolina was much like being a serf in a monarchy. You lived your life and hoped not to fall under the gaze of the Duke or the King or whoever owned you. You tried to follow the Royal family’s rules, but they often rewrote those rules at a whim.”

  “I get the picture.”

  “What you fail to see, though, is that it’s all changed. Bringing you and your wife to the South started it. Since your arrival, you have bested them. More than once. And that has weakened their stronghold around here. Now is the time to strike.”

  Max rolled his eyes, making sure Leon saw his expression. “I’ve heard all of this from Mother Hope. Repeating doesn’t make it so.”

  “But it is so. It’s the truth.”

  Drummond flew around to the front door attempting to get a better view. “That guy wouldn’t know the truth if it stood up and bit him.”

  “Okay, I’ll play along for a moment.” Max strolled to the witch’s chair and plopped down, sticking one leg over the armrest. He grinned inwardly at Leon’s visible discomfort. “Let’s say I go along with all of this. I free Dr. Connor from her curse and somehow you convince her to destroy Tucker Hull. All that goes as you plan and then what? Who takes over? Mother Hope? I’m sure she’d like that kind of power.”

  “Who else is there?” Leon scoffed. “You can’t seriously be considering Cecily Hull?”

  “I’m not considering anybody. This is all hypothetical.”

  Leon paused and drummed his fingers on the back of his head. “Mother Hope said you’d never co-operate. She said no matter what I presented to you, that you would still find reasons to doubt me. I should learn to listen to her more. She’s always right.”

  “Sorry to disappoint. But I don’t think you should go around saying she’s always right. She’s been wrong about me many times.”

  “We’ll see.” Leon moved in front of Max. When Max tried to stand, Leon shoved him back in the seat. “She said you would be rude and obstinate. She said you would refuse to help us. She was right about all of that. But she also told me how to make you help us.”

  “Should I bother asking or will you simply tell me? Oh, I know, let me guess. Either I help the Magi Group with their Dr. Connor problem or you are going to kill me.”

  “No. Sadly. That would’ve been much easier. No, if you refuse to help us, I’ve been ordered to kill your wife.”

  “You sonofa —” Max launched off the chair with his fist flying.

  Leon sidestepped. “She said you’d try to hit me.”

  “Lay a hand on my wife and I’ll kill you all.”

  “Don’t put me in that position, then. Find Dr. Connor’s body, free her from the curse, and let the world return to a semblance of balance. That’s all we want.”

  “And if I don’t, you’ll kill Sandra?”

  “I’ll do my best to make it quiet and painless. Then I’ll send you to follow her.”

  Chapter 17

  Max spent the night in his car. He parked in the empty lot of a defunct strip mall, leaned his seat back, and shut his eyes. His mind, however, refused to be shut off. Despite the chatter in his head, he managed to get a few hours of rest. The remainder of the night, he worked out their next steps.

  As dawn approached, he sent messages to Sandra via Drummond. They agreed that they couldn’t meet at the warehouse. Too much traffic going in and out of an abandoned tobacco warehouse would get noticed. Sandra suggested the Forsyth Public Library, and Max liked the idea. Drummond wanted nothing to do with another library, so he went back to the Other to finish healing and to check on Dr. Connor.

  Serving all of Forsyth County, the public library was on West 5th Street in downtown Winston-Salem — roughly seven blocks from their office. Max drove away from the city before doubling back. He entered a paid parking structure and headed out on foot. Two cabs and several blocks of walking gave him the hope that he had ditched anybody following him.

  “How’s PB?” he asked Sandra as they settled in a back corner of the library’s references section.

  “Resting. He’s with Maria, and she promised to keep good care of him. She’s looking better, too. Starting to come back to reality.”

  “Where is he? What doctor did you get? He’ll be okay, right?”

  “He’s fine. He’s staying at Maria’s house.”

  “Her house? You can’t put him there. Or her, for that matter. You know we’re being watched. We can’t —”

  “Stop,” she said and waited for him to close his mouth. The library was mostly empty so early in the morning, but not entirely. Max wondered if Sandra had suggested this location because she knew he’d be forced to control his mouth. She went on, “I know you’re worried about PB and everything that’s going on, but it’s not all on you. I know exactly what our situation is, and I made the call.”

  “But —”

  “No. You listen. I had to get that boy stable and taken care of, and just because you said to go get a doctor who wouldn’t report a gunshot wound, doesn’t make it happen. I don’t know any doctors like that. I’m sure they’re around, but if I did what you wanted, then by the time I found a doctor, approached and convinced that person I’m not a cop and I really needed help, and then got that doctor to wherever I left everybody, PB would’ve been dead. So, I decided to go to Maria’s because it solved our problems. Being in her home would calm her down and get her thinking again. She would have a needle, thread, and ways to sterilize the needle — all easy to find because it’s her home. And I was right. She pulled it together, got what we needed, and I sewed PB up. He’s resting, watching some TV, and lapping up Maria’s attempts at mothering. Before you start in about them being watched, they are both minor enough in all of this to be left alone.”

  “You don’t think the Hulls will snag them to use as leverage against us?”

  “Not with everything else that’s going on. In another situation, I’d worry. But if the Hulls or even Mother Hope attempted a kidnapping, they’d be exposing themselves to attack from the other side. Not to mention that I will put a curse on them which will never be broken.”

  Max’s muscles tensed and his pulse tapped at the back of his head. “Don’t say that.”

  “What? That I’d curse them?”

  “You need to back off the magic, hon. You’re not a witch, and you shouldn’t become one. I’m sorry. I know you’ve enjoyed learning about it all, but that was research to help us in our fights against witches. You can’t start being one. It’s a dangerous road.”

  Sandra placed a hand on his knee. “Honey, that’s sweet, but you don’t need to worry. I’ve got the whole thing covered. Besides, I’ve not had many friends or really much of a life since we moved down here. At least now, I’ve got Maria.”

  “Remember what Madame Vansandt said to Maria. Witchcraft is a Pandora’s Box, and you are on the verge of opening it.”

  Sandra leaned in and looked Max sharp in the eyes. “I’m fine.”

  He had heard that tone many times before. It meant shut up because I’m not changing my decision. So, he kissed her cheek. “Okay, hon. No problem.” That meant you’re wrong but I don’t want to fight now.

  “So, what’s next?” Sandra said, implying she knew he had planned something. With that simple question, both of them felt better and let their “almost” argument float away. It wasn’t dead, though. They knew t
here would be a time for that fight, but they had higher priorities at the moment.

  Max glanced at all the books. “Research.”

  “Good. We can find Dr. Connor’s body and be done with this.”

  “No. Not yet. First, we’re going to find Madame Vansandt’s eye. We need it for leverage. We need it desperately.”

  “What can I do to help?”

  “Go find Jammer J and get him to PB. The poor kid must be a wreck of worry.”

  “I doubt that. Those kids are tough.”

  “Still, Jammer J will want to be there for PB. After you’ve got that done, I’ll need you to do their job today. Follow Mother Hope around. See if she does anything pertinent to our case.”

  “Okay.”

  “No matter what, don’t get involved in anything you see Mother Hope doing. Just write down what happened and let me know.”

  “You got it.”

  “I’m serious. There’s a real threat from all these enemies. Don’t let them know you’re watching them.”

  With a mock salute, Sandra said, “Aye aye, Cap’in!”

  As she hugged him, Max had a strange, cold sensation wash over him — one that had only happened a few times in his life. The thought flashed in his head — this is the page turning. He had experienced that same sensation, that same thought, the day he proposed to Sandra. He had experienced it again the day he took the job that brought him to North Carolina. On those occasions, he understood why he felt that way. Life was turning to a new chapter. It was exciting, adventurous, and full of promise.

  But this — this terrified him.

  Chapter 18

  As usual in Max’s life, the only real option was to keep moving forward. That meant packing away his fears to focus on his research. Lucky him, he sat in a library.

  Though the situation had complexity, there was really only one missing component to all of it, only one thing that constantly stood out as a mystery — ZSRLH. Cecily Hull had brought that to them when she could have taken it to any of her own people. Why? Max liked to think it was because he had the reputation of being the best, except that did not seem likely. She brought it to him; she had a reason.

  He tried to put himself in her shoes. She had been actively working to destroy Tucker Hull so that she could take over the family business. She knew this code was important and that it somehow held a big secret. Perhaps she didn’t trust those who work under her. Not with something this important.

  “But then why the bull story about hacking family computers?” Max whispered to himself. Could be that she simply didn’t want anybody to know the truth — not that the truth was damaging but rather that the more cards she held to her chest, the more control she had over a precarious situation.

  And she knew we were being watched. Max leaped to his feet and headed into the stacks. Of course. It wasn’t by accident that she visited Sandra on the same night as Mother Hope. She knew all about Max’s curse and had to act fast.

  It was just as Leon had said — somebody had to hold the power. With Tucker appearing to be weakened, she had to make her moves, too. Even if she could trust her own people, she still had to employ Sandra and Max — they were her best chance of solving things before her enemies. She had to force them into a position between her and Mother Hope or risk Mother Hope getting full control.

  Max trailed his fingers along the spines of books until he found the one he wanted — a biography of Libby Holman. “Nobody’s controlling us,” he said and rushed to a table to work through the book again — particularly going over the chapters regarding the murder of Z. Smith Reynolds.

  He spent two hours checking and re-checking each fact, each detail, and each opinion presented in the case. Nothing jumped out as new or unexpected. Nowhere could he find that nugget of information that would shine like the sun breaking through stormy clouds. None of the texts helped.

  Texts? He resisted the urge to smack his forehead. Instead, he quietly placed the books back where he had found them in the stacks and sat at one of the public access computers. He brought up Google and clicked on Images.

  Pictures had often helped him discover a breakthrough. Photographs and paintings were often a more reliable historical record than texts. Too many people tried to rewrite history by actually rewriting the texts. But the photos and paintings — those often told the truth. Even in the modern world of Photoshop, Max found that images of a world, when taken as a group rather than individually, created a clearer picture of history than any single eyewitness account. Witness memories were notoriously flawed.

  He started as broadly as possible by typing “images of Z Smith Reynolds and Libby Holman” into the search bar. Two seconds later, he scrolled through thousands of photographs, portraits, and other images. There were playbills from Libby’s Broadway days as well as album covers and other notices of her work in the entertainment industry. There were pictures of the actual 45s with Libby’s name on the label and photos of her on stage dressed to dazzle. Z. Smith had plenty of his own, too — particularly, photographs of him standing in front of one airplane or another.

  Max narrowed the search down to the years 1931 through 1933. Smith’s murder was in 1932, so Max thought it best to pick up the year before and after as well. Sure enough, plenty of images flooded the screen — many of them from old newspapers, most of them regarding the murder and Libby’s legal troubles afterward.

  Clicking through page after page, inspecting each photo carefully, Max was not surprised when he hit the photo five pages deep. It jumped out at him, and he knew instantly this was what he had wanted to find. Clicking on the photo enlarged it and added the caption — Libby Holman with close friend, 1933. It depicted the widow sitting on the patio of somebody’s home. She had dressed down and wore a somber expression, but none of that captured Max’s interest. The woman standing behind Libby had stopped Max’s search — the woman wearing the eye patch.

  She was a tall woman, her head nearly cut out of the photo, and she looked forward as if able to see through the camera, through the photo, directly at Max. That look bothered him — it tickled the back of his thoughts. He had seen that look before.

  “Has to be in one of the books,” he said. He blasted out of his chair and hurried back down the stacks to where he had left the Libby Holman biographies. Flipping through, he reached the middle section with glossy photos.

  His mouth dried as his pulse quickened. He knew he would find it. After years of researching things, he knew the taste of victory.

  In the second book on the third page of photographs, he found it. Z. Smith Reynolds, his new wife, Libby, and four friends all draped on furniture by an enormous fireplace. Sitting bolt upright in the middle of one couch, that same tall woman glared directly through the photo — except in this image, she had both eyes. According the caption, her name was Marlyn Chester.

  He checked the date and clapped the book shut. “Got it!”

  A few minutes on the computer revealed that Marlyn Chester had lived her entire life in North Carolina, settling in High Point around 1955. She had a husband and a daughter, and she died in 1972 on her sixtieth birthday. The husband died shortly after, and the daughter, Candice, inherited the house. Further searching showed that Candice still owned the property.

  “Probably still lives there, too,” Max said as he copied down the address.

  He got in his car and hopped on Route 74 South straight through High Point. Candice lived on the southern end of the city in a cluster of homes nestled near the junction of Routes 74 and 85. Though next to the highway, the area felt secluded owing to the tall grass lots and copious trees that broke up the view. The sound of traffic could not be masked completely, but the location seemed better off than Max had expected.

  Candice Chester’s home, a single-story rancher, sat on a small rise with a narrow driveway. When Max walked up to a screened-in porch, he had the sensation of being watched — not the surveillance feeling that dogged him everywhere he went, but rather he thought
Candice observed his approach. He rang the doorbell once and she opened as if she had been posed to open it all along.

  Like her mother, Candice had the height to make her a good basketball player. She shared her mother’s stern glower, too. “What do you want?” she asked. Despite her imposing posture, her light Southern voice lessened the abruptness of her tone.

  “Ms. Chester, my name is Max Porter, and if you’ll give me a few minutes, I’d like to ask you some questions about your mother.”

  “My momma?”

  “I do research for people, and some of my work brought up your mother’s name. Please, I’ll only be short time.”

  “No. Good day, Mr. Porter.”

  As she closed the door, Max blurted out, “Would you like to know how your mother lost her eye?”

  Candice paused. “What kind of research are you doing, exactly?”

  He saw it clear on her face — she already knew most of the story. If she hadn’t, he would have seen curiosity or concern. But instead of pushing further, asking what he knew or why he thought he knew anything, she countered with a question of her own — one that would reveal more about himself than provide any answers.

  He considered trying to be charming or thoughtful or even threatening. However, his gut told him that none of those approaches would work. Instead, he decided to use a tactic Drummond had taught him long ago. He called it the truth.

  “Ms. Chester, you have a choice to make. You can let me in and talk this through with me, or you can turn me away. But I’m not the only person looking into all of this. I just happen to be the best, so I’m here first. Soon enough, the rest will follow. Ask yourself this: do you want to work with me — a guy who simply is looking for answers and poses no threat to you — or do you want to work with the Hulls?”

  She shoved open the creaking screen door and gestured to two cushioned chairs on the porch. “You want some sweet tea?”