Pretty Witches All in a Row by Lisa Olsen Page B

around seven-thirty.  We were a few minutes late, so we missed a couple of the trailers.”
    “What movie did you see?”
    “Oh, that one with the husband and wife and they’re on the run from those killers?”  She gave a roll of the eyes.  “Total garbage, but she really wanted to see it so…” 
    “Do you generally see movies that she wants to see?”
    Rose gave a half shrug.  “It doesn’t matter so much to me what movie we go see, it’s about spending time with friends.  Oh… unless it’s about bugs, I can’t watch anything with bugs or spiders. They give me nightmares.”  She leaned in to whisper that last point.
    Nick leaned in and replied in kind with a whisper.  “Me too,” he smiled, before leaning back.  “Did anyone see you at the movies?” 
    She considered that one for a moment.  “I dunno, probably… maybe, I wasn’t paying attention really.”
    “What time did the movie get out?”
    “A little after nine I think.  We stayed until the credits were over, she always likes… liked to listen to the music that plays over the end credits.”  Rose amended her statement, a flicker of pain crossing her features. 
    “When did you part ways last night?”  Nick asked the question in a gentler tone. 
    “I drove her home after the movie, like I said she wasn’t feeling well.”  Her eyes focused on the counter, remembering.  “I offered to come in and sit with her, try and help her headache go away but she said no, she was going to try and go to sleep early.  That if I came in she’d probably end up with a hangover as well as the headache.  If I’d just insisted… maybe none of this would have happened.”
    Nick was loathe to speak; she seemed lost in thought, and somehow more vulnerable.  “You couldn’t have known…”
    Her eyes flicked up to meet his, an inscrutable expression on her face.  “She’s right, you are kind of cute,” she murmured before her voice regained its normal, slightly sarcastic tone.  “If you like the type.”
    “But you don’t?” 
    “Don’t take it personally; it’s not your fault.”
    Taking a leap, Nick went out on a limb.  “Was Skye your type?”
    The expression on her face changed to a grudging respect.  “Closer, but no, we weren’t sleeping together if that’s what you were asking,” she smiled.
    “Before I forget, where were you last night between the hours of eleven thirty and two AM?”
    “Home, alone.  Sorry, no witnesses, but my security system is monitored; you should be able to check when I came home and turned off the system and when I armed it to go to bed.  It’s with Sentry Security.” 
    “Alright, thanks, we’ll give them a call.”  Nick made the notation in his notepad before he remembered something he’d almost forgotten.  “Let me ask you something.  That incident in the park, were all of the ladies involved part of your coven?”
    “Trying to nail down that mental picture?”  Rose shook her head with a smirk.  “Let me think; yes, I think we were all there, except for Skye, she hadn’t joined the group yet.”
    “Are there any other members that weren’t there that night?” 
    “No, I think we were all there.”
    “We were all where?” Annaliese asked, returning from the kitchen with a plastic tub of cookies.
    “That night we got caught skyclad in Highland Park, were we all there except for Skye?” Rose asked, reaching for a cookie absentmindedly.
    “We’re back to that again?  Or have you guys been talking about nothing else since I left?”   
    “No, we’ve had plenty to chat about.  Can you think of anyone in the circle that wasn’t there that night?”
    “No, we were all there; it was on the summer solstice,” Annaliese replied as if that explained everything.
    “So Sera Ryan, she’s part of the coven as well?” Nick pressed, pen hovering over the notepad as he waited with bated breath for their reply.
    “Seraphine? You could say that, she’s been bucking