A Ghoulish Midlife (Witching After Forty #1) - Lia Davis Page 0,20

I’d pushed it away and ignored it.

Chapter Six

Clint put his arm around me, pulling me out of the memory. “Come on. Let’s go over here and let them do what they do.”

I let him drag me away from the crime scene while my stomach rolled with grief. I’d known William for years. All my life now that I thought about. But I’d never known he was a necromancer. How had he hidden it?

I tried to think about the last time I’d seen him. At Aunt Winnie’s funeral. What had he been wearing?

I closed my eyes and leaned against the cool brick wall of the bookstore around the corner of the alley and sucked in air, trying to calm my racing heart.

He’d worn a suit, buttoned up with a necktie at the funeral. I wouldn’t have seen his mark then. Come to think of it, William had worn suits often. He was a college professor, and had the tweed elbow patch thing down pat. He’d favored a bowtie.

And that was how I’d never seen his witch mark.

Holy shit. He’d been a necromancer.

Why hadn’t they told me? If I’d known, maybe he could’ve helped me work through everything when Mom died.

But would I have listened? No, I wouldn’t have. I was so horrified at what I’d done that it scared me from using my dark power. Training with someone wouldn’t have changed my mind.

Just being around William’s body was torture. I hated being around the freshly dead. Even though I knew there was nothing in William to resurrect, still, his corpse teased my powers. They wanted to animate his body; create a ghoul.

I’d done that once. Never, ever again.

Glancing over to the body, that was covered with a sheet, I hugged my waist. The Combs were good people. They were caring and everyone in town loved them. Now poor William was dead. But how? Why go after William?

“Ava!”

Hearing Sam’s voice took a huge weight off my shoulders. He’d help me get to the bottom of this. The truth, not whatever washed-out version we’d end up telling the police. If this murder was magically charged, we had to figure out how and why.

“Sam,” I said in relief. He knew all about me, including what I really was. Even the people I’d grown up with who knew about magic and knew I was a witch didn’t know my true nature. Sam did.

I grabbed his arm and pulled him farther around the front of the building. All of the looky-loos were crowded around the mouth of the alley. I belatedly realized Clint had been keeping them out of my hair.

Thank you, Clint.

“The body belongs to William Combs,” I said in a hushed voice, looking around to make sure nobody was near. “And he was a necromancer.”

Sam’s face paled. He knew the full extent of what that meant as well as I did. “I thought your kind—”

I shushed him and he continued with a lowered voice. “Your kind were super hard to kill. And that’s what made your dad’s death so strange?”

“We are.” I crossed my arm and looked toward the crowd. “He was stabbed directly in the heart. That’s one way to do it.”

“Who could kill a necromancer?” he asked with one hand on his gun. He looked around like a gun would be any good against who-the-fuck-ever killed William.

“I have no idea. Another witch, maybe?” I shrugged and tried not to let the fear run all through me.

“Can you take something off of the body and do a tracking spell?” he asked.

I knew what he was asking. Necromancers could take a piece of the victim’s flesh around the wound to see how he died. It was a tricky spell and took a lot of focus. “No. I’ve never been trained. Maybe William could’ve done it, but I’m not that person anymore.”

“Bullshit,” he muttered. “Remember, I knew you before your mom died. I know you’re the most powerful necromancer anybody’s ever seen.”

I cut him a nasty glare. “I could’ve been the best. But that would’ve required years of training and intense focus to get to that point. That doesn’t mean I can just snap my fingers and do it.” I pulled my sleeve down and wiped at my nose, not self-conscious about such a yucky act in front of Sam. “Besides, I don’t think that prophecy is always true. I’m not that powerful of a witch in general.”

If I were, I’d be able to bring my mom back and not as a soulless ghoul.

The prophecy