“But that’s… that’s impossible!” I felt all the blood draining out of my face. “There must be some mistake…”
Okay, so, technically it wasn’timpossible. My prints were in the system — courtesy of my adoring mother, who had me arrested when I was seventeen for breaking into our trailer. I was mostly moved out by that point, but I’d (foolishly) returned to New Jersey to retrieve the last of my belongings before I left for my first semester of college. I didn’t have much worth taking — most of my stuff was already in Salem — but I’d wanted the silver charm necklace Aunt Colette gave me for my sweet sixteen.
Little did I know, Mommy Dearest had long since pawned it for cash. When I confronted her about it, she called the cops on me. I’d been summarily cuffed, shoved into a cruiser, and processed down at the local precinct before the police chief realized I was a minor and let me go.
I hadn’t seen my mother since.
I didn’t have a criminal record. I’d never been charged with anything. But apparently my prints were still accessible to anyone with a badge and a search engine. How’s that forjustice?
Detective Hightower’s head tipped to one side as he examined me, his handsome face solemn. “While I was waiting for you to arrive this morning, I had a chance to look around your shop.” He hesitated briefly. “Were you aware there’s a dagger missing from the display case in your back room?”
“What?”
“The empty sheath is still there. There was even a little card-stock sign by its holder explaining the history of the weapon, the occult practices it’s been used in over the centuries. Hope you don’t mind, I took the liberty…”
Caden reached down and pulled out a second, much smaller evidence bag. It contained a tiny handwritten placard covered in Aunt Colette’s familiar sloping script. I must’ve seen it a thousand times over the years, but I’d never really taken the time to study it closely before.
Athamé dagger — unknown pagan origin, circa 1500s. A ceremonial, double-edged blade traditionally used to direct mystical energy during a blood sacrifice.
Beside the description, there was a sketch of the occult knife, sharp lines of ink depicting its curved, engraved handle, along with the distinctive pentagram at the base.
“Gwendolyn… can you explain how a knife from your shop, bearing your fingerprints, came to be embedded in the chest of Elizabeth Proctor?”
“I…” I cleared my throat, trying to remain calm. “I have no idea.”
“What was your relationship to the victim?”
“I told you already, she was my neighbor.”
“And were things alwaysneighborlybetween you?”
“What do you mean by that?”
“We spoke to some of the other people who live on your street. They implied things weren’t always entirely friendly between you and Mrs. Proctor. They specifically mentioned an incident last week. It seems they witnessed you two engaged in some sort of heated disagreement?”
Hellfire.
Dan and Rich had totally narced on me!
“According to our sources,” Caden continued. “Mrs. Proctor was seriously shaken up by the altercation. Needed a cup of tea to calm down afterward.”
“It wasn’t an altercation,” I insisted.
“What was it then?”
“A minor tiff.Minor,” I stressed.
“Over?”
“I can’t even remember, that’s how minor it was,” I lied. My heart was beginning to race and my palms were feeling sweaty. I fought the urge to pull them into my lap, not wanting to appear fidgety. (Everyone knew only guilty people fidgeted.)
“The coroner estimates Proctor’s time of death at around 10PM the night before you found her body.” He paused. “What were you doing on Saturday evening?”
“Inventory at the store. I had a big delivery, it took hours to unload it all.”
“Until when, exactly?”
“I don’t know. Late. I didn’t really keep track.”