“Mine arrived about three to four days ago; I’ve only gotten one since Layla started looking again. When I first moved here, they stopped, but I had also stopped looking. I haven’t dug into his death again either, but maybe since Layla has, Ghost wanted to make sure I didn’t get involved too?”
“Layla, what did your parents think about you receiving the note?”
“That Willow was the one who sent it to me,” Layla murmurs, carefully glancing at Willow, who remains quiet as if she suspected that’s what her in-laws—nearly in-laws—would think. “Okay, what do we know?”
Layla is quick to change the topic, and I’m glad she’s here. I inspect Willow’s kitchen, grabbing her little notepad from the side of her fridge. “We know the murderer’s handwriting, that they know where you both used to live and maybe even currently live. They also must know that Willow is allergic to bananas. How many people know about your allergy?”
“Two families: mine and the Barrows,” Willow says.
“So, someone in our family is a killer?” Layla exclaims, her eyes going wide and her hand gripping Willow’s forearm.
“Not necessarily. It could mean that someone in the families has a big mouth,” Willow quickly supplies.
“Or that someone is working with the killer,” Layla adds. When I give her a look, she says, “What? If we’re not honest about all the possibilities, then we’ll go around in circles.”
“Okay, how could Ghost get the banana in the tea bag without Willow knowing or smelling it? Layla, could you smell it?”
“Not the banana smell, but I smelled that something was off—missing. It didn’t smell like tea or anything; it smelled like nothing.”
“They could have used scent blockers,” I say. I could smell the banana, but if Layla and Willow didn’t, then there was something else going on. Maybe knowing what I was looking for allowed the natural smells to come through, or the scent blockers wore off by the time I got to them.
“I thought scent blockers were a pill a paranormal could take, not—” Willow says, but Layla interjects. The cub must know more than I thought.
“It can be made into a perfume. Spray it on anything, and it’ll take away the scent.”
“So, they got the banana and scent blockers into her tea bag. How? They are sealed in plastic at the store; how did Ghost get the banana in there?”
“He had to have broken in and put it in after Willow had bought it; when did you get your latest box?”
“I—um, I might’ve used—oh my gosh. I found a couple of tea bags in one of my cabinets. Maybe those were the ones that were laced with bananas.” The blush on her face is never going to go away at this rate, and while it’s worrying that used tea bags she randomly found, I’m not upset with the blush on her cheeks; gosh, that blush is all mine. Not mine. I mean, not mine.
“Anyone could’ve made that mistake, right? I’m not even sure if the ones I found were the poisoned ones because I mixed them in with the others. How was I supposed to know that Ghost would try to kill me in that way? I thought he’d be a hands-on guy.”
“It’s okay, Buttercup. I checked a lot of those bags, and a lot of them were contaminated.” Her ramblings are better than listening to music, but she’s worked up in all the wrong ways, and I can’t watch her get more upset. Layla even has the nerve to let out a small laugh, which she tries to cover with her hands over her lips.
“Oh my goddess, we would not survive on our own,” Layla laughs, and Willow even lets out a strained giggle. I don’t know if the haze of an attempted murder is clouding our judgment or what, but I find myself smiling, too.
“So, when Ghost attacked you in the apartment, he must have left the tea bags then? Maybe you carried them with you from the apartment when you moved, but where could Ghost get the scent blockers?” I wonder.
“A fairy, or a witch, but probably a fairy. They would know how to get a banana and scent blockers into a tea bag without the consumer knowing. Maybe an earth fairy would know,” Layla says between her giggles of insanity.
“We need to find the closest fairy village,” Willow says, leaning her head on her hand, mindlessly running her fingers over all the notes.
“Won’t have to go far; there’s one about forty-five minutes in the opposite direction of Kaler City, a little over an hour from here,” Layla says, pointing as if that would tell us exactly where it was.
“How do you know so much?” Willow asks.
“I dated a fairy a couple of years ago. Didn’t work out.”
“Oh,” Willow mumbles.
“Let’s go this weekend then,” I say, then peek over at Willow. “And don’t even think of going without me.”
“You’ll have to go without me, though; I work this weekend.” Layla rolls her eyes as if working is such a drag. She hasn’t even had a first day yet, and she’s already over it. What happened to the excitement from ten minutes ago?
“Should you be working, though, Layla? Ghost is still out there,” Willow asks.
“Oh, I know he is, but he isn’t going to stop me.”
