All Hallows Eve: A Krewe of Hunters Novella (1001 Dark Nights) by Heather Graham

day, too,” she said. “You didn’t like me a whole lot, John. So don’t pretend that you do now.”
    “I didn’t like your Wiccan kick against haunted houses,” he said. “You, I hardly knew.”
    Gloria made a face at him. “I just tried haunting the place, but no one could see or hear me.”
    “Could you two focus on the problem at hand,” Jenna said. “We’re trying to figure out who killed you, and disprove that it was two suicides.”
    “Hard to hang yourself over a tree,” Gloria said. “You need some help.”
    “It’s like with your death they want us to know a murderer is at work,” Jenna said. “That might be because the killers have realized John’s death isn’t going to be accepted as a suicide.”
    “Either that,” John said, “or someone is going about recreating the deaths of those condemned to hang, and maybe even Giles Corey’s death, too. This could get really bad.”
    “Do they want it to look like a Wiccan war? If so, they missed the debate somewhere along the line. John and Tandy Whitehall were close,” Gloria said.
    “Gloria, I need to know what happened to you,” Jenna said. “You didn’t drive yourself out here, somehow make your car disappear, then hang yourself.
    She wasn’t meaning to be cruel, but Gloria seemed the type who wanted things straight.
    And she did.
    Gloria arched a brow with a shade of humor and said, “I don’t know what happened. I was in the shop, just straightening up, and some kind of a bag was suddenly over my head. I was suffocating and passed out. I came to feeling the roughness of a rope around my neck, then agony and darkness. And I was here. On the other side. I wandered out of the trees and was surrounded by gravestones. I saw the mortuary up on the hill and had no idea how I had gotten here. And then, of course, I realized. I was dead. And I’ve been trying ever since to find someone who could hear me.”
    “Any smells?” John asked her.
    “What?” she asked, looking at him, a faint wrinkling forming above her brows.
    “A smell, a feel, a sensation? Anything?”
    “The trees. I remember the smell of trees. Something like a forest.”
    “I smelled the same thing,” he said.
    “Did either of you recognize the scent? From a store, a shop, either one of the big department store colognes, or anything more local?” Jenna asked.
    “I know where something close can be bought,” Gloria said after a minute. “A woodsy scent. At Tandy Whitehall’s shop.”
    “You really think Tandy did this?” John protested. “I’m a big man, and even with a noose around my neck it would take more than a tiny woman like Tandy to take me down.”
    “We know from what you heard, John, that there were two killers,” Jenna said.
    “I don’t believe Tandy did this to me. I really don’t,” Gloria said, looking at John. “We had our differences, but I respected her. No, I may be dead, but right is right, and I won’t attack the woman, even if I am dead.” She seemed to shake off her sadness and looked at Jenna with purpose. “But I know that scent, and it can be bought at Tandy’s shop.”
    “Tandy has disappeared,” Jenna said. “She’s wanted for questioning. Would she have fled Salem?”
    “Never,” John and Gloria both said.
    Jenna’s phone buzzed and she glanced at it quickly.
    Sam.
    She answered and learned that John and Gloria were right. Tandy was still here, with Sam, Devin, and Rocky, and Sam’s assessment was clear. She’s not our killer . So everyone seemed in agreement, Tandy was innocent.
    Jenna looked over at Gloria.
    “I appreciate you finding my body,” Gloria said. “I could have hung there a long time.”
    But it had been the boo-hag who led her. Had it intended for her to find Gloria?
    She texted Sam.
    Check Tandy’s inventory. Find out who bought a woodsy scent that she sells. Find out about the Gullah community.
    She finished her text and looked up.
    “Someone is trying to make this look as if the Wiccans