Waking the Witch (Otherworld 11)

"You're not." I gave him the rundown.

"The detective could be a problem. Is he giving you a rough time?"

"He asked me to dinner."

"Seriously? Did you zap him with an energy bolt?"

"Oh, he's not really asking me out. He wants to pick my brain and steal my leads. So I accepted. Should be fun."

"You've obviously got it under control. About those lab and coroner's reports, any chance I can take a look?"

"I'll fax them over."

I ended the call with Jesse only to find that I'd gotten a message in the meantime. If only I'd been this popular in high school, I might have shown up more often. Speaking of school, the message was from a retired history teacher, Mr. Mulligan. Lorraine at the diner had told him about me, and he was wondering if I'd gotten all the local information I'd needed. If not, he'd be happy to provide more background. He'd taught Paula, Ginny, Brandi, even coached Kayla with her homeschooling.

My first impulse was to call back and say "thanks but no thanks." I had plenty of leads to follow up on and no time to waste sitting in some old guy's parlor, sipping instant coffee and listening to a lecture on town history. If the guy had been a friend of Ginny's and Brandi's, sure. But their teacher? Something told me that compared to those two, my attendance record would be exemplary.

And yet ... Maybe I was a little more anxious about my first case than I was admitting. Maybe I couldn't help thinking, What if this is the guy with information that'll solve the case, and I blew him off? Or maybe it was just those damned voices in my head, Paige and Lucas telling me never to ignore a potential source. I called back and asked if I could stop by in the next hour.

NEXT, I HAD files to fax to Jesse. Easier said than done. While I didn't expect a small-town motel to have a business center, I thought they'd at least have a fax machine in the office. They didn't. Nor did the town have a copy center.

I remembered the library and arrived there to find it had closed at four and wouldn't reopen for two days. Someone was kind enough to suggest the real estate office--apparently they ran an unofficial copy shop on the side. But it had closed at four, too. In fact, except for the diner, the whole town seemed to have shut down.

When I called Jesse, he said that was fine--he'd pop by tomorrow on his way home from Portland. Next stop, Mr. Mulligan, retired teacher.

THE ADDRESS MR. Mulligan gave led to a place outside town. The sign on the mailbox read J&C Hogs. I checked the address, but it seemed right, so I started up the lane to a sprawling ranch with a massive detached garage. The garage door was open. Through it I could see three gleaming black motorcycles. Harley-Davidsons. Hogs.

I swung off my bike as a man walked out. His grease-stained shortsleeved shirt showed off an impressive set of muscles for a guy who had to be in his midsixties.

"Ms. Levine," he said, wiping a hand before extending it. "Chuck Mulligan."

I shook his hand. His gaze had already slid over to my bike, and our fingers hadn't fully disconnected before he was walking toward it.

"You didn't really call me out here to wax nostalgic on past students, did you," I said. "You heard what I was riding."

He smiled, face creasing. "Guilty."

"Only you realize I can't stay and chat," I said. "Not with a Harley man."

"Those are clients' bikes. Mine's a BMW."

"Even worse."

He laughed and crouched beside my bike, checking it out.

"So you must be the C in J&C Hogs. Who's the J?"

"Janice. My wife. She just put me on the sign so I'd feel special. It's her business." He paused. "Was her business, I should say. Still not used to that. She passed away last year. I took over after I retired."

He pushed to his feet. "Let's get inside. I'm sure you'll be more comfortable there."

"Actually, I'd be more comfortable there." I pointed to the garage. "If that's okay."

"Certainly."

We spent the next half-hour looking at bikes and talking about them. His wife's business had been customizing Harleys--making them faster and fancier.

I'd have been tempted to move on to business a lot faster if I didn't see how much he was enjoying the opportunity to talk about his wife and her work. I understood that, so I let it keep going until he steered things on track by saying, "Have you met Paula Thompson yet?"