The Squawking Dead: A Cozy Witch Mystery (Magic Market Mysteries Book 7) Read online

  THE SQUAWKING DEAD

  A COZY WITCH MYSTERY

  ERIN JOHNSON

  CONTENTS

  Prequel Novella

  1. Crab Puffs

  2. Up in Flames

  3. Dead, Dead, Goose

  4. Blowing Smoke

  5. The Murder Weapon

  6. Lemurs!

  7. Quincy

  8. The Plot Thickens

  9. Phoenix Nest

  10. Mark

  11. The Blow gun

  12. Darts

  13. Stolen Wombat

  14. Libbie

  15. Rebecca

  16. Pushed to the Edge

  17. The Boys

  18. Will and Heidi

  19. Coffee

  20. Monkey

  21. The Jungle

  22. Sloth

  23. WWAAC

  24. Zane Perez

  25. Madeline

  26. The Bodega

  27. The Phoenix

  28. Underground Animal Rescue

  29. Photo Finish

  30. The Photograph

  31. Habits

  32. Records

  33. Hexmakers' Lair

  34. Decision

  The Competition

  Murder

  A Note from the Author

  About the Author

  Get the FREE Prequel Novella

  A magical academy. A suspicious death. Can an inexperienced cop expose the deadly secrets lurking behind bewitched classroom doors?

  Check out rookie officer Peter Flint’s first case with Daisy. Saved by the Spell is the prequel to the Magic Market paranormal cozy mystery series.

  Download Saved by the Spell to solve a mystical murder today!

  1

  CRAB PUFFS

  “Appetizers?” Heidi rolled her wrist, wand in hand, and the round gold trays laden with dragon rolls, shrimp, mini quiches, and cheese and crackers magically lowered to waist height. The chattering group of guests broke apart and clustered around the trays, eagerly scooping up snacks.

  Thank the seas Heidi was such a good friend—and so coordinated. She managed to not only keep her own appetizer tray afloat, but mine as well as we threaded through the hundreds of glittering party guests.

  As a certain curse had deprived me of magic, I’d have had to manually carry that tray around without her. And I’d have either tuckered out or probably knocked the tray over on some aristocrat’s head and gotten myself fired. Which would have been unfortunate. And it wasn’t because I needed the money or all the food and drinks I’d been sneaking—I was here to collect intel.

  A woman in a floor-length leopard print dress pointed a black gloved finger at a mini quiche.

  “Is it vegetarian?”

  I blinked back at her, eyes wide. For one, she’d caught me unprepared—I’d been wondering where one found a floor-length leopard print dress. But two, I’d just stuffed one of those dragon rolls in my mouth and could barely chew, my mouth was so full, much less talk.

  Thankfully, Heidi leaned over and saved my scales once again. “Nope. They have ham in them. Try the cheese and crackers?” My friend magically rotated the tray so they’d be easier for her to reach.

  The guest smiled her thanks, took her cracker, and rejoined her similarly decked out friends. Animal print was apparently the theme for the Night of the Phoenix fundraising event at the Magical Animal Sanctuary.

  “Excuse me!” I jumped back as a woman shoved past.

  “Oof!”

  She stumbled into a heavy man who turned and scowled at her, but the lady, who looked to be about seventy, never paused—just pushed her way through the crowd. I followed her with my eyes for another minute. It wasn’t just her expression—she’d looked pale and distraught— that made me take note of her. I frowned a little as I realized she was maybe the only person at the party in head-to-toe black—well, besides us servers—no hint of animal print. What had her in such a hurry?

  As she disappeared into the sea of party guests, someone else caught my attention. I nudged Heidi with my elbow and jerked my chin at a guy threading his way through the crowd.

  “Would you ever date a guy who wore a tiger print tuxedo?” I had to lean close to her and raise my voice to be heard over the murmur of voices, click of heels, clink of glasses, and the magically amplified harp music coming from the stage in the corner of the big, glass-ceilinged room.

  Heidi giggled, then her dark eyes grew wide and she pressed a fingertip with a shiny black nail to the communication device in her ear. “Oops! No, Peter, that was not a question for you.”

  She flashed her eyes at me, and I grinned as I munched on the last of the dragon roll.

  She swatted at me and mouthed, “Stop eating all the food.”

  I popped a quiche into my mouth before she magically raised the trays higher than I could reach.

  “It’s food. It’s here to be eaten.” I rose on my toes and swiped at the trays while she grinned.

  Her gaze dropped, and she nodded. “Okay.” She looked at me. “Peter wants me to tell you that he’s cold and misses you and that you should stuff some crab puffs into your pockets for him for later.”

  I grimaced. “If there are any left. They’ve been very popular tonight—”

  Heidi shot me a flat look. “With you.”

  I shrugged, then remembered something. “Ask Peter if he’s seen you-know-who.” I rose on my toes and glanced over the heads of the guests as Heidi relayed my message. Overhead, a glass greenhouse ceiling revealed the fast-moving clouds gliding past a bright half-moon.

  The huge room echoed with the voices of the densely packed crowd, and a huge banner that read Night of the Phoenix—embellished with flames, of course—hung from the tall ceiling in front of a red velvet curtain. A stage, raised a few steps above the polished marble floor, stood empty in front of the red curtain, which apparently hid the phoenix’s enclosure from view.

  I frowned as I looked toward it. I’d never seen a phoenix in person and wondered how the extremely rare creature was handling all the hubbub outside its cage. Hopefully the sanctuary had cast a dampening spell to at least keep the noise down for it.

  Heidi nudged me to get my attention and shook her head. “No sign of him. But Peter says he’s also been working patrol along the perimeter, so he could have arrived when he wasn’t stationed at the gates.”

  I nodded. “Thank him for me?” I winked. “And tell him I’ll warm him up later.”

  Heidi shook her head, grinning, her braids coiled into two buns at her nape. “You’ll have to tell him that yourself, lovebird.”

  I glanced around again, muttering to myself. “Where is he…?” Peter and Daisy weren’t suffering out in the cold and Heidi and I didn’t have aching feet just for kicks. We were here for the mob boss of shifters himself, Ludolf Caterwaul.

  We’d decided we needed to learn more about Ludolf to take him down and prevent him from likely killing me by using me as a lab rat to test “cures” on—for the curse he’d put on me in the first place. So Peter and I had gone to the best (and only) reporter I knew, Madeline L’Orange and asked her to dig up some dirt on him.

  She’d said she was still doing research but had gotten word that he’d be attending the Night of the Phoenix fundraising event at the Magical Animal Sanctuary. When a list went around the station, Peter signed himself and Daisy up to work the event as an off-duty officer helping with security. And Heidi had begged a favor from a friend so that we could go undercover for the catering company.

  I frowned as I looked at all the glittering
zebra and leopard prints. Seemed like both an oddly wholesome and tacky event for a man as devious and particular as Ludolf, but hey. Maybe even evil villains enjoyed a good crab puff sometimes.

  Plus, the place was brimming with Bijou Mer’s elite, all gathered at this opulent mansion on one of the top tiers of our magical island. Maybe Ludolf was here to rub elbows with the rich and powerful. I sighed. If he was even attending. Maybe Madeline had gotten it wrong.

  “Come on.” Heidi turned, the trays magically hovering beside us. “Let’s keep looking for him.” She glanced back over her shoulder and grinned. “It’s kind of exciting, isn’t it? Will’s going to be so mad he had to keep the clinic running tonight and couldn’t come.”

  I grinned back. This part was kind of fun, though I doubted Will would be all that jealous. Before an angry outburst outed him as a bear shifter years ago, he’d been one of Bijou Mer’s top surgeons and had attended swanky parties like this one all the time. I doubted he’d want to show his face here as the help.

  I thought over the last month. Being summoned to Ludolf’s secret underground lair in the sewers to have possibly deadly potions tested on me had been less than pleasant. I wanted to figure out how to prosecute Ludolf for one of his crimes—not one of his underlings, who he always managed to shift the blame to—and put him away for good. I’d nearly done so years ago when I’d been a successful lawyer—until I got too close and Ludolf cursed me to silence me.

  I still didn’t quite understand why he hadn’t just killed me back then. He could have. And yet, he kept me around to test potions on. Why?

  He’d already summoned me down there several times. Each new potion threatened to take the last bit of magical ability I had left—being able to speak to animals—or worse, even my life. Every time I thought about it, it sent shivers down my spine, so I fished some salami and cheese out of the pocket of the black slacks I’d borrowed from Heidi and popped them into my mouth. Stress eating—always worked for me.

  I followed my friend as we laced through the partygoers, past laughing groups of glittering elite and clouds of overly sweet perfume. The whole time I scanned for Ludolf.

  “—think she’ll kill the new hubby off tonight?”

  “Oh Harold, you’re terrible!”

  The group of middle-aged men and women to my left tittered. Heidi caught my confused look and leaned close, her voice low.

  “Have you heard about Malorie Rutherford?”

  2

  UP IN FLAMES

  “Malorie Rutherford…” I shook my head. “The hostess? What about her?”

  Heidi’s dark eyes lit up and she edged closer. “Okay, my friend Jilly, the one who owns the catering company? She filled me in. Apparently, Malorie Rutherford has a reputation as a black widow. Everyone thinks she killed her first husband, Richard Rutherford. No one’s ever found the body, but get this—he disappeared exactly fifty years ago, at the last Night of the Phoenix party.”

  I tipped my head to the side. That’s right—the phoenix apparently burst into flames, burned to a crisp, then was reborn from its own ashes every fifty years like clockwork. I arched a brow. “So everyone’s wondering if watching a bird spontaneously combust is going to put our hostess in a murdery mood again?”

  My friend giggled. “Something like that.”

  I nodded. “Alright. Well, give me all the goss. What do people think happened to him?”

  Her gaze shifted over the heads of party guests. “I’ve heard it a few ways. Some people think she fed him to their three-headed wolf. Others think she threw the body into the phoenix’s cage and all the remains burned up.”

  I nodded. “And why did she kill her beloved?”

  “Get this.” Heidi splayed her hands. “Malorie was twenty at the time, and Richard was fifty.”

  I raised my brows. “Quite the age gap.”

  My friend nodded. “Richard Rutherford left his wife and daughter, who was barely younger than Malorie, to be with her. Everyone thought she was a treasure digger. People think she killed him so she could inherit his estate. Within months of his disappearance, she remarried to their gardener.”

  I chuckled and pressed my eyes closed. “Of course she did. Story as old as time. Murder your older husband using a firebird so you can marry the gardener.”

  “Ahem. Er—good—good evening?”

  I opened my eyes and looked past Heidi toward the raised stage. The crowd quieted down as all eyes turned toward the tall, thin man with enormous ears who stood atop the stage, narrow shoulders slumped.

  “Thank you all for coming tonight. I, uh—” He scratched the back of his neck and looked behind him at the curtained-off cage, then scanned the crowd. “I apologize. My wife, Malorie, usually does the—the hosting.” He chuckled nervously, and polite laughter floated up from a few pockets among the hundreds of guests.

  Heidi spun back around to face me and mouthed, “It’s him! The gardener!”

  I grinned and nodded, then we both turned our attention back to the clearly nervous man. He wrung his hands, playing with an empty skewer.

  “But as she’s, um—not available, I suppose….” He scanned the crowd again as if searching for his wife. “Malorie?” He raised his thin brows above the rims of his large glasses and looked hopefully out over the sea of faces.

  His expression fell, and he shook his head. “Ah, well. I suppose you are all here to, uh—to see the phoenix. And as she’s about to start her change—her transformation—we’d best not delay. So, uh—the phoenix.”

  He swept his thin arms toward the red velvet curtain behind him and seemed to shrink, as though he were trying to retract his head down into his shoulders. An awkward silence followed, and then the crowd applauded in a few faltering starts, until it caught on and everyone clapped. The guy was clearly used to his wife taking the spotlight. I wondered if all the gossip about her killing her first husband had caused her to hang back in the wings.

  The curtain jerked skyward, revealing the enclosure behind. Lush, tropical plants and a two-story-tall waterfall filled most of the space. A woman beside me gasped and pointed. Several other cries rose from the crowd. I rose on my toes and planted a hand on Heidi’s shoulder to balance myself as I strained to see what everyone was getting upset over.

  The tall, thin man on stage blinked, then turned toward the enclosure and startled. “Malorie!”

  I caught a glimpse of two women—one blond, the other with dark gray hair—sprawled on the ground, unmoving, inside the phoenix enclosure.

  3

  DEAD, DEAD, GOOSE

  “Help! Someone help!” The tall man’s face had gone pale. “Call an ambulance! Summon the police! Help!” He reached into the pocket of his alligator print tux and withdrew a quill. He dropped it, then reached back in and pulled out his wand. “Malorie! I’m coming, sweetie.”

  His lips moved, like he was trying a spell, his hand shaking badly. He dropped his wand, stooped to pick it up, then spoke again. The magical force field around the enclosure shimmered, and he pushed through, dropping to his knees beside the blond.

  Someone shouted something about the phoenix, and the thin man looked up. He swept his wand, a flash of light erupting from the end, then turned and looked over his shoulder toward all the partygoers. “The phoenix isn’t in here anymore! It’s gone!”

  I rose on my toes as the crowd erupted in cries, some scrambling to get a closer look, others rushing toward the exits. I couldn’t see much, except the man cradling the blond’s head in his lap, rocking. I sucked in a sharp breath and sank back down on my heels. “Snakes.”

  I lurched as someone slammed hard into my left shoulder. Shouts and screams sounded all around us as word spread and the party erupted into chaos. The sharp crash of breaking glass sounded, and the sea of partygoers churned and jostled as most headed for the exits.

  “A killer’s on the loose!”

  “Where’s the phoenix? It’s going to erupt any moment now!”

  “It’s on the loose!
The phoenix could burn us all alive!”

  A woman shoved past me, whimpering. “Who knows what other creatures could be out.”

  Heidi grabbed my hands and huddled close to me, her dark brows pinched with worry. “What do we do?”

  I gulped. “Alright, can you tell Peter what’s going on?”

  She squeezed my hands even tighter, eyes wide, but nodded. She raised a trembling hand to her ear and pressed the magical communication device with one finger. “P-Peter?”

  She nodded at me, and I leaned close and spoke into her ear.

  “Hey, Flint—it’s your girl.” I grinned to myself—wouldn’t get tired of saying that, even in the middle of a real situation. Screams sounded, and more shattering glass made my shoulders hunch.

  “What’s going on?”

  I pressed close enough to Heidi to make out Peter’s faint, deep voice through the device. “Two women appear to be dead inside the phoenix’s cage, and the bird itself appears to be missing—it’s total chaos in here. We need an ambulance, and if you and Days can get in here, that’d be great.” I glanced up at the stampeding guests. “Also, all of our fancy-pants witnesses and suspects are headed toward the exits right now, so you should probably lock the gates before they all hightail it out of here.”

  “Stay safe. We’ll be right there.”

  Static sounded, and I leaned back, feeling more reassured. Peter would handle everything. In the meantime, I squeezed Heidi’s hand. “You okay?”

  She blinked, looking slightly stunned, then nodded and straightened. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.”

  I nodded at her. “Head back to the kitchen and wait there. It’ll be quieter and safer.”

  “What about you?”

  I glanced toward the phoenix’s enclosure. Behind it, a suspended wooden pathway, like a rope bridge, threaded through more lush tropical plants. Glowing eyes peeked out from behind large leaves, and from the depths of the sanctuary, monkeys screeched, bears roared, and wolves growled, no doubt alarmed at the chaos. I certainly hoped the panicked guests weren’t right and that even more creatures besides the missing phoenix were on the loose.