Inconvenient Murder: An Inept Witches Mystery by Auburn Seal, Amanda A. Allen

spell…”
    “I wasn’t. I’m all handicapped magically.”
    Gabe stared at her for a long minute before he said, “You two just leave the investigating to me.”

9
     
    Sunday Morning
     
    Emily sat in her favorite leather chair by the window of the bookstore while she waited for Gabe. He’d called and said he needed to look around the shop for some clues. Was he going to come with a magnifying glass and a pipe? If he did, that would make her day so much better. She drummed her nails on the soft leather, trying to keep awake. She decided that having a murder investigation around the death of her soon-to-be ex-husband was messing with her nap schedule.
    Her phone buzzed with an incoming text from Melinda. “Can we talk? I need to talk to you.”
    Emily typed a quick response. “Were you sleeping with Owen?”
    After a few seconds, the phone buzzed again. “I think we need to talk about this in person. I want you to understand what happened.”
    Emily replied, “I don’t need to see you in person unless you want me to kill you. In which case, name the time and place.”
    Then Emily powered her phone off. “Needy whore,” she muttered under her breath.
    She closed her eyes and pushed Melinda out of her mind before drifting into sleep.
    The bell rang when the door to the shop opened, and Emily opened her eyes and then stood up, wiping the drool from her chin. Dammit. That had been a really good dream. Who was that guy? She needed to find him and act out her dream. Just as soon as this dumb investigation was over. She knew she couldn’t concentrate on dating until this was done.
    Also, she was pretty mad that her nap had been interrupted, so she scowled at Gabe as he crossed the shop.
    “Your death is damned inconvenient, Owen,” she muttered to herself. He should have had a heart attack and fallen off the ferry on the way home. So much better.
    Gabe raised his eyebrow in response to her comment but didn’t ask any questions.
    “What can I do for you, Sheriff? Did you track down Davis or hear back about Owen’s disease-ridden body? I assume he had syphilis and genital warts.”
    “Not yet. We’ve got the department looking out for Davis and Melinda since I haven’t been able to reach either of them by phone, but if they’re not on the island, I can’t force them to come in yet. And the coroner said he’ll let me know about the autopsy results as soon as he’s got them. He’s rushing it for me. Right now, I’m just following up on a lead. I need to have a look around the shop. And ask you some questions.”
    “I thought I saw Davis’s car pass by the shop earlier, but maybe it wasn’t him. Anyway. You want in the basement again to go over the crime scene?”
    Emily was surprised when he shook his head. “No. Not this time. What can you tell me about the type of herbs you sell?”
    “Uh, almost nothing. We sell herbs from here. I can show where we keep them and get you a list of the different ones, but honestly I have no idea what these herbs do. Mostly we just find them in the bins, weigh them into bags, throw in some extra to make sure we didn’t screw it up and send them off. This is the only part of Aunt Danna’s business we’ve kept running. I’m not sure how she ever made money off this dump.” Emily glanced around the bookshop, noticing again all the dust and the dank smell of old books.
    “You’re renovating, right?”
    “Yep. Ingrid doesn’t want to be seen in here until it’s cute. But Aunt Hazel said if we didn’t keep the witch stuff up, she’d hex us as she and Danna worked so hard for the clientele.”
    “Even though you aren’t good at magic?”
    “Dude,” Emily said, “We’re terrible. Possibly the worst. If the containers that held the herbs weren’t labeled, we’d be screwed. We get a few orders a week from her regular customers. Ingrid knows more about it than I do. She’s lazy but she does like money.”
    “Why do you think Hazel insisted you keep it