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

running? Why does she care?”
    “The coven used to be all buddy-buddy here. They’d have terrible coffee and gossip and do off-the-cuff spells. I think she’s hoping that’ll happen again.” Emily shrugged.
    Gabe wrote some notes down and then said, “Why don’t you show me where you keep your supply?”
    “Yeah, okay. Sure.”
    She led the way to the basement rooms where her aunt stored all the plants and herbs. “I hope my aunt doesn’t have anything illegal down here that you shouldn’t be seeing. Like marijuana. That would be just my luck. I could go to prison on a double charge—first degree murder and selling drugs. I hate that guy. Why did he have to die here? Just to screw with me one more time?”
    Gabe sighed, exasperated. “I don’t think Owen died from a marijuana overdose.”
    “Oh, so you think something in this shop killed him then? Did the coroner tell you for sure what killed him?”
    Gabe was now perusing the shelves of herbs. “I’m not at liberty to say.”
    Emily rolled her eyes. “Please. Maybe I’m not at liberty to let you search my store without a warrant then, Sheriff.”
    He didn’t respond to her threat but continued looking through the inventory, settling on one particular container. He held it up.
    “Can I take this?”
    “Yeah, sure, whatever. Take what you want.”
    “Your cooperation will look good. I’ll also need your computers that have any records of transactions and inventory.”
    “It will look good for me? Are you trying to freak me out? Are you messing with me? I’ll tell Ingrid on you. Also, jerkhole, you know I didn’t do it. Take whatever you want. I didn’t kill Owen. Though, with every passing moment, I’m wishing I had.”
    Gabe cleared his throat. “You might want to refrain from making statements like that in front of me. If I ever had to testify, comments like that wouldn’t help you very much.”
    “Whatever, Gabe. You won’t be testifying against me because I didn’t kill Owen.”
    “I don’t get a choice over who I testify about, Em. You don’t know what any of these are?”
    “I don’t cook and I don’t do magic. Ingrid knows a few. Herbs are boring. This is boring. I’m gonna go take a nap.”
    She walked to the counter and pulled out a laptop from underneath it.
    “Here’s the laptop that came with business. Any records we have will be on this.”
    She turned toward the door to leave and then turned around for one last word. “Oh, if you need anything else from me that requires me to get up from my nap, then get a warrant. My sleep is very important. And lock up when you are done, yeah? There’s a murderer running around. Who knows who’ll be next.”
    She tossed her keys at him, and he caught them out of the air
    “I’m sure you’ll see Ingrid soon. She’s clearly obsessed with you. You can return my keys to her. Oh, and ask her about creepy gallery guy getting up in our faces. Tell her she should file a restraining order so her sheriff can protect her.”
    “What?” he asked, but she didn’t wait to answer.
    She pushed through the backdoor and headed through the wrought-iron gate that separated the back of the shops from the elevator that led to the apartments.
    Owen was such a huge pain. Maybe even more now that he was dead.
    She needed her beauty sleep, so she pushed Owen out of her mind. There was no way she was gonna let a dead guy interfere with her nap. Not even a dead guy that she used to love. She wasn’t going to waste any more time stressing about him. There was a pit in her stomach that refused to go away, despite her bravado.
     
    •
     
    Sunday Evening
     
    “Do you realize,” Ingrid said to Emily, “that nothing in my house is actually good to eat? All I have that you can eat is coffee, wine, and chocolate. I suppose you could eat that sugar scrub I bought yesterday. Every single thing else is expired or useless. What kind of crazy dove buys orange champagne vinegar? Why did I?”
    “You said it