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Chapter Three

“W ell, fuck, Wanda,” Nina groaned. “What am I supposed to say when that hag of a winged monster has one of the cutest kids ever? Can’t we just offer to adopt her and leave Neerie the Narcissist wherever she is? The kid’d be better off with us and she’d have tons of playmates. Charlie’d love her and Olivia already does. She’d forget all about the nutjob who gave birth to her by the time we were done with her.”

We were in the murder basement, me trying to convince Marty and Nina to help me find Neerie, and it wasn’t going as well as I’d hoped.

Both of my BFFs were hesitant, for obvious reasons. They thought Neerie was off on some conspiracy theory jaunt and neglecting Tamlin for her own selfish pleasures.

But I wasn’t so sure. Neerie took pride in Tamlin, and when I’d witnessed her with her daughter, she was always attentive.

Marty shifted in her office chair. “I’d almost agree with you on this one, vampire. Tamlin is precious, and she’s the sweetest thing, and I have to wonder if she hasn’t been a victim of her mother’s kookiness, which worries me. Plus, Olivia does love her, and that works in our favor. But I think people would ask questions about us adopting her and that could get uncomfortable. So no can do,” she teased.

I nodded, even though I didn’t think adopting Tamlin was such a horrible idea…

Marty looked at me, her beautiful blue eyes full of sympathy. “I vote yes, but want it noted in her file, Neerie is a dreadful person and I don’t like her. I don’t like how she’s treated your generosity. I don’t like the way she orders the PTA moms around like she’s the head b-i-t-c-h in charge, and I really don’t like her muffins.”

I chuckled. Last year, out of the goodness of his heart and his love for my children, Arch had made blueberry muffins, too. He’d wanted to contribute to the success of his grandchildren’s cause. But if you listened to Neerie, she was the only one who made them correctly.

Oh, the fuss she’d made about where Arch had placed his muffins on the center table, without knowing that was where Neerie put her baked goods. I thought I’d never hear the end of it.

And Marty was right. Neerie’s muffins weren’t nearly as good as Arch’s.

This year, in preparation for a tantrum from Neerie, Arch made banana nut and gave them to me to put on the tables to avoid, as he said, “saying something he’d regret and embarrassing his grands.”

Looking at my BFFs, I gave them my puppy dog eyes. “Listen, you two, I have no love lost for Neerie. She’s mean and pushy and abrasive, but her daughter is darling. I realize I’m asking a lot, considering she’s been rude to both of you, but I can’t help thinking about Tamlin’s eyes today and how sad she was that her mother wasn’t in attendance.”

Nina made a face. “That was the product of brainwashing. Neerie’s brainwashed that sweet kid into believing she’s mother of the fucking year.”

I rolled my eyes at my friend. “Neerie has her faults, but she’s a good, conscientious mother, Nina. I think she keeps her cray in check when Tamlin’s around, but that’s beside the point. A little girl’s mother is missing…”

Nina threw her hands up in the air in clear defeat. Not that I doubted for a moment Nina would cave. She’d die before she’d let a child suffer a scratch, let alone the loss of her mother.

“Fine, I’m in. But I’m only doin’ it for you and the kid. Neerie can kiss my skinny ass, because I think what’s really happened is she’s run off with one of her conspiracy theory junkies. I bet we find her holed up with her tin foil hat and empty pizza boxes in some hotel in Jersey.”

“She calls herself an alternative thinker, FYI,” I said, repeating what Naida had told me.

“What the fuck ever. I’ll help you find the alternative thinker .”

Naida had sent me a list of the conspiracy groups Neerie was involved with online, with a note tacked on that read: If you thought I was worried about nothing, read some of the posts on the groups she’s a part of. Please, please help me. I can pay. I swear. If you say no, I won’t ask again, but I’m begging you…

Seeing some of those posts definitely left cause for concern, but I couldn’t see all of the comments because they were private and they had a vetting process to join.

If Naida could find out what Neerie’s Facebook password was, that would surely change the game.

I hopped up and rushed to Nina’s desk to give her a hug, wrapping my arms around her neck, inhaling the scent of her strawberry shampoo. “Thank you, Dark Lord. I love you. You’re my favorite BFF.”

Nina scoffed as she gave me a stiff hug before pushing me away from her in typical don’t-go-soft-on-me fashion. “Bullshit. You say that to Marty, too. Now where do we start? You want me to look into these Facebook groups she’s on until Naida can find out if she can get her hands on nutjob’s password?”

“How can we do that? You have to join those groups, and I’m pretty sure the way you troll the jerks online who women-bash on some of those reels you watch on Facebook, you won’t be able to resist creating some chaos with a flame war. You’ll get booted out before you can say ‘inbred halfwit’,” Marty said, quoting one of Nina’s favorite pet names for the men who had the courage of a keyboard and an Internet connection.

Nina simply grinned. “Listen, those incels deserve to be shot down by my sarcasm. Somebody has to call them out for talkin’ to women the way they do, knowing damn well they wouldn’t do it in real life because they’re pissy babies. The fuck I’m gonna let some keyboard cowboy think he can say dirty shit to a chick when she’s just baking a cake without getting his ass handed to him. If I see it, I’m gonna say somethin’, because I’m that bitch. It warms the cockles of my nonexistent heart to call ’em out.”

I went back to the chair at my desk and shook my head. “You do know your slam dunks to their egos won’t stop them, right? You’re only fueling the fire.”

Nina shrugged. “I don’t give a ripe shit what it fuels, Wanda. I just like poking them for being freaks, and I like doing it in big bold letters with their names attached. They might not stop, but you can bet they cringe when I call them basement dwellers with teeny-peeny’s, and that makes me smile and smile. I don’t go back to see if they answer me. I don’t care. I just like pissing in their Wheaties. But that’s neither here nor fucking there. Tottington can help. I already asked him to contact the dude who helped us with the last case to see if he could hack into Neerie the Nag’s social media accounts.”

Clapping my hands together, I cheered. “Oh, that’s brilliant! But wait…who do you suppose it is he’s contacting?”

Nina scrolled her phone, popping her lips. “I have a strict policy: Don’t ask, don’t tell. In other words, if it gets me what I need, I don’t fucking need to know how it happened, and neither do you.”

I made a gesture with my fingers, zipping my lips and throwing away the key. “Noted. Okay, so we say yes to Naida then? I’d like to offer her at least some hope.”

Marty snickered, tying her glossy blonde hair up in a bun—that meant she was ready to get down to business. “I don’t know if hope’s the right word here, good buddy. This is our third case and we’re not exactly winning awards for best in mystery solving. But I’m all the way in.”

That was fair, but there was nowhere else to go but up, right? So we’d missed an important clue our last go round. We’d missed one in our first, too, but that didn’t mean we couldn’t improve. No one was perfect.

Right? Right?

I figure if I keep telling myself that, manifesting it, it can come true.

Nina held up her phone then, her smile beautiful as always but smug as the day is long. “Told ya Tater Tott could help. We’re in. Are you ready for Neerie’s password for Facebook? Make sure you don’t have any liquids in your mouth.”

I immediately set down my tea. “Ready.”

“Bigfootisreal417&%.”

Marty hadn’t heeded Nina’s warning. She spat her tea across the room when she sputtered a laugh. “I can’t wait to see what groups she’s a part of. Should we don our tinfoil hats before we go poking around?”

After I finished laughing, I had to acknowledge something very important. “You know, we laugh, but did any of us think half of the things we’ve borne witness to were real? Mermaids, unicorns, trolls, sirens, zombies to name but a few. Maybe Bigfoot is real and he’s running around in the woods somewhere with Bigfoot wife and all his Bigfoot babies.”

With that sobering thought, we all set out to scour Neerie’s social media accounts, but before I did, I texted Naida to let her know we were going to try and investigate.

“I’ll take her Twitter account,” Marty offered. “Nina, you check her Facebook, and she has a YouTube channel, too. You take that, Wanda.”

As we got down to the business of digging into Neerie’s online life, the basement became quiet until Nina muttered, “Holy fucksticks…”

My head popped up, eyes grainy from all the sites Neerie had subscribed to on YouTube. It was almost frightening how many there were. Everything from the human government has imposters in high places to the moon landing was a hoax and all the madness in between.

I pinched my temples. I don’t know that I had a lifetime of hours to invest all the sites Neerie was involved in. “What?”

“She was supposed to meet this Facebook group two nights ago. It’s local, all humans. They’re tracking Bigfoot. Remember that crazy shit on the news the other night about some fucking ruckus upstate in the woods, where a bunch of morons with guns were out shooting at something and ended up nailing a guy and his side chick, who were meeting in secret to smash smellies?”

Marty blinked, looking around her desktop. “I do! Did you see the interview his wife gave about how she wished they’d shot his man parts and not just his foot?”

Nina jabbed a lean finger in the air with a laugh. “Yep! That was this group Neerie was in. They got some tip from some dingbat that he’d seen Bigfoot and they were ‘investigating.’ They’re called The Truth Is Out There, and this lunatic thought the guy they literally tripped over was Bigfoot because he said it was dark and the man was huge. When the guy jumped up—buck naked, no less—one of the idiots in the group got trigger happy and shot him. I mean, c’mon. Jesus be some common sense, already. Anyway, Neerie was supposed to meet them that night. She said she’d be there.” She took a screenshot of the comment and sent it to us.

My eyes went wide. “But it doesn’t say anything about whether she showed up?”

Nina shook her glossy dark head. “Nope. But there’s another meeting tonight. One without guns, according to the admin. In fact, it’s clearly stated that there’s gonna be a pat-down to be sure no one else gets capped.”

I knew where this was headed. “I know what you’re thinking, Nina, and I’m thinking you’re bananapants. How are we going to infiltrate this meeting? They’ll know we’re not part of their Facebook group.”

Nina smiled again, leaning back in her chair. “How quickly you forget the Vulcan mind-meld. They’re humans, Wanda. I can get in their fucking heads slicker than snot runs down your face on a cold winter day. Easy-peasy.”

“Lemon squeezy,” Marty said with a nod.

I blew out a breath. “Okay, let’s do it then.”

Marty clapped her hands, her bangle bracelets clacking together. “I love a good undercover job! What should we wear?”

“Clothes,” Nina offered dryly. “It’s not a fashion show, Blondie. It’s a damn meeting of the cuckoos.”

Tottington appeared out of nowhere, his stealth-like movements always giving me pause. He held a slip of paper in his hand, his dark suit perfection, his royal-blue tie against a crisp white shirt immaculate. “Dark Lord, I have more information for you about Mrs. Lincoln.”

Nina held out a hand for him to take, giving it a squeeze. “I can always count on you, Tater, can’t I? Whazzz up?”

He dabbed at her fingers before pulling them away, folding his one arm behind his back. “My contact has hacked into Mrs. Lincoln’s email. As instructed, I skimmed all incoming and outgoing correspondence for the last three months. I shall delve deeper, but this one particular message is pause for thought.”

“I hope it’s from the people she follows on Twitter. Or X. Or whatever it’s called these days,” Marty cooed. “Her DMs are chock to the brim with nutassery from members of this group called Paul McCartney is Dead. They believe that Paul died in 1966 and was replaced with a lookalike because on the infamous cover of Abbey Road , he’s barefoot and all the other Beetles are wearing shoes. They claim his bare feet symbolize death…”

“Well, Here Comes the Sun just took a whole new turn for me,” Nina cackled.

But Tottington cleared his throat. “I’m afraid it’s not quite that outrageous, Mistress. It’s from someone named Will Tempe.”

“Okay, enough with the dramatic pause, Tater. Who’s Will Tempe?”

Tottington squinted at the slip of paper he held. “If I’m reading this correctly, he’s little Tamlin’s biological father, and he claims that if Mrs. Lincoln doesn’t allow him to visit with Tamlin, he’s going to make her life—and I quote—‘a living hell.’”

All our eyes went wide in surprise.

But was it simply an idle threat? Or had he really made Neerie’s life a living hell?