Hallow Haven Cozy Mysteries Bundle Books 1-3 by Mara Webb (hardest books to read TXT) 📗

“Leave them be,” Effie groaned. “Just because I am clearly struggling to come to terms with my ex-boyfriend being a killer, a very handsome, shockingly hot killer…” she drifted off for a second. “And you happened to date a guy that was in the same band as Max who is equally terrible, doesn’t mean we have to poke at Miller and Sadie until they figure out that they are into each other!”

This time it was Miller that looked as if he might speak, but then didn’t.

We were inside The Sand Witch when Scott rushed in. “Kate, there you are!” he panted. “The guy setting up the sound said that you told him to mute any bass players that may need to get onto the stage, he said something about bass players all being sexy liars?”

“Well they are,” Kate huffed, clearly thinking about Tim. “But I guess they should be allowed to play if necessary.” Kate and Effie wandered out of the café and Miller and I were left alone.

The café had been shut for the day as we needed to use it as a headquarters. It would be open again in an hour or so when the guests began to arrive. I felt suddenly awkward as I looked over at Miller, replaying everything Kate and Effie had just said.

Was it obvious that we were into each other? I mean, Miller was so… I don’t even have the words in my brain, how could I say anything? I wanted to know so desperately what he was thinking, even just so I could prepare a response.

“Sadie,” he said.

“Yes?” I thought back to meeting him for the first time in the storm shelter at Pete’s Za. Even then he had caught my attention to the point of distracting me from the danger all around me.

“I wanted to… I have to tell you,” he stuttered. He pressed his fingers to his face, drawing them downwards as if trying to will himself to speak. Recently he had grown out his facial hair a little, it only seemed to enhance the shape of his jaw even though it was somewhat hidden.

“If this is about—” I started to say, hoping I would think of an end to my sentence. Miller dropped his hands from his cheeks and rushed towards me, closing the gap between us until we were toe to toe. He kissed me, cupping my face and closing his eyes. I closed mine too, lost in the moment and smiling against his lips. It was happening. It was happening right up until it wasn’t.

The pressure of his mouth on mine disappeared. His hands were no longer on me, and I was no longer close to him. I could hear birdsong. I opened my eyes and began to panic. I was in the clearing on the hill. Something had transported me from The Sand Witch, something magical, and now here I was in the clearing surrounded by the four members of the band that we were looking for.

“It worked!” Max yelled, jumping up and down. “When Effie took that book back, she obviously didn’t realize I had photocopied a bunch of the pages,” he cackled.

“Wh—” I gasped.

“Oh, hey Sadie,” the police officer smiled. It was as if we hadn’t had a confrontation on this very hill hours earlier, like it was all water under the bridge.

“What are you guys doing?” I asked. I was lying on the rock and had a terrible feeling that I wasn’t here for a social visit.

“Well we tried our ritual with Jake, it didn’t really work. Or maybe it did, but not quick enough. Then we tried it with the wife,” Max explained. I was already so irritated that he had referred to Mrs. Hall as ‘the wife’, that I was struggling to pay attention. “But you obviously came and interrupted the whole thing. Now it looks like there is some last-minute entry to the contest and he’s gonna pull the rug from under us.”

“But who would know better what to do than the peacekeeper?” Tim said. “You don’t want there to be any more trouble, do you? So why don’t you help us get what we want and then everything will be good again?”

“Yeah, just let us win this thing, get rich and fly off on a world tour on our private plane. You’d never have to worry about us again!” Max smiled.

“Your plan is to just ask me if I will ignore that you killed two people?” I said.

“Well technically we only killed Jake, or rather I did,” Max nodded. “Evie actually killed herself. Tim and Evie were sort of together, it was part of the plan so that Jake would find out and become heartbroken and then we could use his tortured, artist soul for our spell. It turns out he was in love with someone else anyway, and then Tim broke it off with her and she took an overdose.”

“Yeah, that one was rough,” the police officer nodded.

“Where are the bodies? Where are they both?” I asked.

“We just put them at Tim’s house,” Max replied. “We figured we could give them a proper burial later on, you know, to be respectful.”

“You think anything you’ve done is respectful?” I huffed.

“I had some feelings for Evie, I’m not a total monster,” Tim said defensively. “I wrote her letters! I even tried to write her a love song during one of our jam sessions a few weeks back, didn’t I?” he asked Max. Max nodded in agreement and I realized that it had been Tim’s handwriting on the scraps of paper on Max’s desk.

“Wait, so you were dating Evie Hall before you met Kate?” I asked. “Did you think what would happen to you if Kate found out about this? If I were you, I’d be begging to be in jail right now. When Kate gets her hands on you, oof!” I was smiling now.

Something shiny flew through the air above us and hit a tree behind Max. The four