Dark Lily: Shadows, Book 4 by Jenna Ryan

why a man who’d surely come to Bokur to work on the hotel renovation now had a fatal knife wound in his chest.
    Mitchell went with the standard cliché. “Accidents happen. Guy fell while he was hacking at some weeds—”
    “Vines,” Gaby inserted. “You know the kind, Fred. They wrap themselves around your legs and won’t let go. Stubbins nicked his wrist, rammed his shoulder into a pointed branch and got completely tangled up and lost his balance. The knife did the rest.” Wrapping her arms around the baffled deputy’s neck from behind, she whispered a gentle, “Sometimes tragedies are just that. Tragedies. Remember what happened to your uncle after Mardi Gras this year?”
    Fred blinked double time. “Yeah, that’s right. Uncle Leonard. He fell off the back of Morgan’s boat. The only body part we never found was his…”
    “Yes, that part.” She stopped him with a pat and a steady look for Mitchell as she straightened. “Things go how they go. Bert Stubbins lost his mojo and his life in the swamp today. I think we can leave it to our new police chief to sort through the details of what needs to be done next.”
    “Right.” Fred stared expectantly at Mitchell. “What happens next?”
    Mitchell thought fondly of the New Orleans Dumpster he’d lived in as a rookie. “Next,” he said, rubbing a tired eye, “we keep Stubbins out of sight until I can contact whatever family he had. My information suggests he came to the island with a friend, a guy named Baxter. Have you heard that name anywhere, Fred?”
    The deputy shook his head. “Don’t recall it.” He still looked shell-shocked. He glanced at Gaby, who’d come around to the front of his cluttered desk. “I, uh, guess you’ll be wanting me to have a talk with Harley. About the shed, I mean. Chief here mentioned how it burned down this morning.”
    “Did he now?” Amusement marked her tone. She trailed a finger over the clutter. “Maybe it was a lucky thing after all that Captain Morgan pulled out earlier than usual. Not that Mitchell’s being here will bring Mr. Stubbins back or help me recover what I lost—books, flooring, the antique secretary I had sent from Nightshade—but it’s good to know we have someone with experience on the force. Someone who can investigate things, like the cash that was stolen from the Lily last night.”
    Mitchell watched her move around in mounting fascination. After her dip in the mud, she’d showered and changed into a pair of white shorts, black wedge sandals and a snug black top with spaghetti straps that exposed far more skin than it covered. Cop things first, however. “Gaby, if money was stolen from you last night, why didn’t you tell me about it this morning?”
    “Because this morning you were leaving. Now, you’re not. Apparently.” She laid a hand on his shoulder in passing. “The air outside’s gone still.”
    Honest to Christ, keeping up with her was worse than a game of shadow tag. But in terms of the big picture, the more aware of her abilities he became, the better he understood Phoebe’s fears. There was a reason Leshad wanted her so badly. And that reason extended to Stubbins’s conviction that diving onto his own knife was preferable to facing Leshad’s wrath.
    “Is another storm coming, Gaby?” Fred fidgeted with his fingers. “Or d’you think maybe Celia’s pissed about her shed, and she’s making the island give me and Harley the silent treatment?”
    “Isn’t Celia dead?” Mitchell knew damn well she was, but he wanted the deputy’s take on her current status.
    Yet, even as Fred nodded, Gaby shook her head. “You say you believe, Mitchell, but you don’t, not all the way.”
    “I don’t believe far enough to accept that a spirit can elbow aside nature to make its displeasure felt.”
    Gaby turned her gaze to the station window. “Celia and others like her can do more things than you might imagine. But she’s not the one who’s displeased. I am. It was my