The Witch's Throne (Thea Drake Mystery Book 1) (Thea Drake Mysteries) Read online

  I do not stop to catch my breath. I push from the counter, reach for the high cabinet over the fridge. I need the pills.

  Today is still a good day.

  Ghosts do not exist.

  But I need the pills.

  There they are. Exactly where I left them, hidden behind the slow cooker. I dump my cold coffee, fill the mug with water. I am prescribed two tablets, twice a day, plus two more at bedtime if I’m having trouble sleeping.

  I put four on my tongue and gulp them down with water. It trickles from the corners of my mouth, down my neck, under my sweatshirt. I wrap my arms around myself, shivering, freezing.

  Ghosts do not exist.

  But I am still terrified of them.

  JOURNAL OF THEA DRAKE | MAY 28

  I want to get the hell out of this town as soon as possible. You said a week at the most. We’ve been here eleven days. You haven’t gained access to the Throne, and you’re not going to.

  Accept it.

  I checked, and Martin Fisher received your certified letter on May 18th. No response. His phone line is in working order, according to the phone company. He’s just not picking up.

  He’s not going to reconsider.

  He’ll call the police again as soon as he catches you on his property.

  What else can you possibly accomplish here?

  Meanwhile, I have all the information you need in this journal: notes I took on the town, the legend, and Adeline.

  Portico, Oregon

  Sparsely populated, isolated town on the edge of the Siskiyou National Forest in the southwest corner of Oregon.

  Over three thousand tourists passed through last year, most of them during the All Hallows’ Eve Festival.

  Martin Fisher called in eight reports of trespassing in that same year, all for catching people at the site of the Witch’s Throne on his private property.

  The Witch’s Throne

  Mrs. Vera White at the Portico Museum confirmed the local legend that claims any person who sits on the Throne dies within three days.

  She showed me newspaper articles of the six attributed deaths since 1934.

  The last one was two weeks ago, May 14, 2016. Randle Garrety.

  Mrs. White also said reaction was generally favorable to the recent national attention at the arrival of Beverly Donneville.

  Donnevilles’ Involvement

  Dedicated page on their website to Beverly’s readings (with video) at the Throne. Charles and Beverly have made six trips to Portico in the last twelve months.

  Beverly has conducted three filmed readings, all videos posted on their site. (I assume they have compensated Fisher for exclusive access and the right to film on his property, which would explain Fisher’s silence at my attempts to contact him.)

  Donnevilles last visited Portico May 16, two days after Randle Garrety’s death.

  Charles’s book The Witch’s Throne is now available for pre-order with release scheduled for October 27, during the All Hallows’ Eve Festival.

  Given that they left Portico only last week, and the events schedule on their website shows Beverly has appearances in south Florida over the next three days: June 3, 4, and 5, we shouldn’t have a problem with them showing up here again.

  But after they’re done with those appearances, who knows? Do you really want to run the risk of a confrontation with Beverly and Charles Donneville? That’s not going to go in your favor.

  You’ve got everything you need from this place. You’ve done everything you can. There’s no reason you can’t start writing from home.

  Adeline Tenatree

  Unsurprisingly, the “witch” of the Witch’s Throne legend was simply an outspoken, eccentric, and financially independent woman who, throughout her adult life, had the audacity to refuse romantic proposals made by most of the men in town.

  Her name was Adeline Tenatree, and yes, she practiced witchcraft, but as with most histories, the complete story is complex.

  Her father, Alfred Tenatree, was an illiterate fur trapper whose greatest achievement was surviving his migration from Illinois to Oregon in 1843 and registering as a supplier for the American Pacific Fur Company. By 1859, (inexplicably, because no written historical account exists of those interim years) Alfred Tenatree had made a fortune in fur trade and yet another in lumber when he founded the town of Portico, Oregon by clearing a heavily forested area to lay a railroad line. What was little more than a patch of wilderness became a regular stop on the Tenatree line. Benefitting from its founder’s residence and money, the town prospered for over half a century.

  After the Great Depression, however, the Tenatree line went defunct. The town declined until 1955, when a real estate developer built Tenatree Estates, acres of pretty, mid-century ranch homes sprawled between Portico and Highway 199. Old Portico clung to the edge of these developments, a self-sufficient town kept together by those with enough money and concern to do so.

  Still standing today is the Old North Church and Meeting House, named for its position at the northernmost access to Portico’s only main road through town. The church and its cemetery attracted the most attention from the town’s benefactors because of a certain tree stump, located at the opposite side of the crossroads.

  That is where Miss Adeline Mary Tenatree, only daughter of Alfred and Mary Tenatree—and accused witch—is buried.

  Not a bad start, right? Use it if you want. I’ve got more research, and you haven’t written a word. You think I haven’t noticed.

  Look, you won’t talk to me, so I’m hoping you’ll read this and come to your senses.

  You don’t have access to the Throne.

  You don’t have permission to film on site.

  You don’t have cooperation from most of the people in town. (Except for Sosie Powell, of course. I’ve noticed that, too.)

  You’re gone all the time. At that bar, I’m guessing, but then I don’t know for sure, do I?

  The girls have noticed. They’ve noticed we’re not talking. They don’t like it here, either. The rain hasn’t let up for the past four days. They’re cooped up, acting out, turning against each other. I couldn’t find Juliet for over an hour this morning. Mrs. Lowry and I searched the entire inn, including the other guests’ rooms, and finally discovered her in the cellar. Lydia had locked her out of their room, so Juliet hid, pretending to be abducted so Lydia would get into trouble.

  That’s what I’m dealing with every day, George. While you’re gone. While you’re God-knows-where.

  Please…let’s go home. I have a bad feeling.

  CHAPTER THREE | OCTOBER 25

  My mother’s sing-songy “Yoo-hoo!” splits the shell of peace I have created. I jerk, eyes open. I have time to toss the pill bottle in a drawer before my parents invade in a rush of chilly air, stomping boots, and ceaseless bickering.

  “…she better not be,” my mother is saying, “it’s a school day.”

  Behind her, my father fills the doorway with height, girth, and paper grocery sacks. He advances in a wall of muttered profanities, pushes Mom inside, and back-kicks the door closed.

  Mom cradles a disposable foil casserole pan in her arms. She stomps her feet on the rug as if she’s trudged through eight feet of snow uphill to my house before she notices me and starts.

  “Oh! Thea.” Her eyes flash wide with sheepishness, but she rallies immediately with her signature pursed-lip smile. “There you are. Your father thought you’d still be in bed.”

  “I did not say that,” Dad argues behind a bloom of celery leaf. “I said you might have gone back to bed.”

  “I called,” says Mom. She searches pointedly for a clear spot on which to set the casserole. “You wouldn’t answer.”

  “The girls just left.”

  She consults her watch. “I hope they left fifteen minutes ago or they’re late. I worry when you don’t answer.”

  “I’m fine, Mom.” I take the casserole from her. “They weren’t late. It’s a good day.”

  “Of cou
rse.” She eyes the water dribbled down my sweatshirt and, shifting the casserole to one arm, picks a sliver of glass from my sleeve. “Of course, it’s just…you look pale. Are you sick?”

  “No, I’m fine. I promise.”

  “You should eat breakfast.”

  “I did,” I lie.

  “I mean more than coffee. Not there,” she waves my father away from the table by the window where he was about to unload the groceries. “The counter, the counter.”

  He trudges over, but Mom stops him. “Wait, let me clear a space.”

  She swipes at the papers, heaves a great sigh. “My God, Thea, what a mess.”

  “Mom.”

  “Maybe on the stovetop.”

  Dad maneuvers past me into the kitchen.

  “Wait,” says Mom, “maybe I can clear a spot on the table.”

  “Where do you want the bags, Marion?” Dad bellows.

  “Here, here on the counter.” She attempts to clear a space, but my father drops the sacks right on top of it all, smashing a half loaf of bread.

  “Jack!”

  “I’m not standing here all day.”

  Mom tsks, shuffles the papers into a pile. The bills. The electric bill is on top. She picks it up, tsks again. “This big old house. So many expenses.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you not working.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “Why won’t you come stay with us? For a little while, that’s all. A few months, maybe. You could look for a smaller place.”

  “I don’t want a smaller place.”

  “Think of all the expenses it would cut, Thea. You could use the money.”

  “I don’t need money,” I lie again.

  “We’re happy to help. You know that. But it would be so much easier, if you would stay with us. And we could help you more. Keep an eye on the girls.”

  “I’m not moving the girls. They’ve had too much change already.”

  We’re repeating old arguments now, and I don’t think she’s even listening. She’s already dropped the bill and is opening cabinet doors, slamming them closed. Dad winks at me while her back is turned. I smile for him.

  Mom is in the hall pantry now. I hear a thud of something heavy hitting the floor and then my mother’s muffled obscenities. She strides aggressively back into the kitchen.

  ‘Where the hell is your slow cooker?”

  “Marion,” says my dad in his take-it-down-a-notch voice.

  “I don’t like it when you ignore my calls.” she huffs. “You don’t ignore your mother.” She takes in my clothing with a head-to-toe scan. “Why don’t you go upstairs and get dressed? I’m going to set up a pot roast as soon as you tell me where the slow cooker is…?”

  “I am dressed.”

  My father carefully removes items from the grocery sacks and places them in neat rows on top of the clutter. A box of saltines, canned tuna, canned vegetables, condensed soup. Bulk-cooking ingredients for dumping into casseroles, slow cookers, soup pots. My mother is here to set things right. I see it in the tilt of her head, the puff of her hairdo, the swing of her earrings. Her daughter is floundering and needs a kick in the ass. Marion Honeycutt is here to kick it.

  “Thea?” She waves her bejeweled hand before my eyes, no patience for my zoning out. She will not be ignored.

  “I’m not sure. I haven’t used it in a while.”

  She steps closer and palms my forehead. She shares a look with Dad. I am torn by wanting to pull away from her hand and collapsing into tears on her shoulder.

  “Really, are you okay?” She presses her lips in a thin line. “You don’t feel warm, but you look exactly the way you do after you throw up.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Are you sleeping? Maybe you should see a doctor.”

  “For what?”

  Dad comes to my rescue. He has finished his assigned task of grocery placing and has nothing else to do. He wraps a strong arm around my shoulders, pulls me to him roughly.

  “She doesn’t need to see a doctor. Our girl’s tough.” He gives me a little shake.

  “There’s this doctor…comes highly recommended.” Mom crosses swiftly to her purse on the counter and produces a business card tucked into the front pocket, ready and waiting. “Dr. Elizabeth Orlowe,” she reads from the card, as if this is her first time voicing the name. “She specializes in family counseling, grief, that sort of thing.”

  She holds out the card, and I take it. Mom gives me a little encouraging nod, and Dad squeezes my shoulders.

  “She’s fine, Marion.”

  “She is not fine. She is under a lot of stress.”

  “Dr. Orlowe.” I read from the card.

  “I could call for you. You know, if you’re not feeling up to talking on the phone.”

  I see now that I already have an appointment with Dr. Elizabeth Orlowe, who is either a friend of my mother’s, or the friend of a friend, or a former student, or the daughter of any of these possibilities. Somehow, she is in the network of my mother’s acquaintances, and she is willing to provide a standing appointment to the distressed daughter of Marion Honeycutt.

  For thirty-five years my mother taught at the Homer Junior High School. She taught an eclectic mix of the practical arts: algebra, consumer education, and health. Over the course of her career, she instructed three generations of Homerites on how to solve for x, balance a checkbook, and slip a condom correctly onto a cucumber.

  “Marion.”

  My father is gruff but philosophical. He taught history at the same school during approximately the same time frame as my mother. He wore faded jackets with the elbow patches long after the only other two male teachers came and went wearing jeans and short-sleeves with neckties. His famous final exam consisted of one question only: What did you learn this semester? Each student was expected to impress him in their own individual way. In 1980, Donny Harrison famously wrote a one-word answer: Vote., and my father famously gave him a passing D.

  “Grief is a marathon,” he says. “Not a sprint.”

  Mom swats his words away like a buzzing fly. “What about Lydia?” she asks me.

  “What about her?”

  “She looks like she’s lost weight.”

  “I haven’t tracked her weight since she was eighteen months old.”

  “You know what I mean. Is she talking? Sharing her feelings?”

  “Mom, she’s fifteen. She’s not sharing a lot with me these days.”

  “She needs family around her, extra support. Come stay with us, you and the girls, just for a while. Dad agrees.”

  “Dad can speak for himself,” grumps my father. “And Dad thinks you’re doing fine under the circumstances.”

  Mom’s hands go to her hips. Warrior stance. “Well, I’m concerned, and I don’t believe my concerns are unfounded.”

  I inhale slowly, focus. This is a good day. I am going to make it through today without crying or hiding or sleeping for hours. I am not going to throw a tantrum in front of my parents.

  “Thank you, Mom, Dad. Really. But no. The girls and I are fine here.”

  Mom has not heard a word of it. She is still opening and closing cabinets, searching for the slow cooker. Or fuel for her tirade.

  “I mean, what are your plans? You need an income, Thea. The money George left isn’t going to last forever.”

  She eyes me, but I don’t know if she is aware of my financial situation or only presumes to know. It’s difficult to read a bluff from my mother. She spent her adult life outwitting arrogant teenagers.

  In truth, she’s right. After funeral expenses, this year’s property taxes on the Manse, followed by emergency electrical work in August, the money from George’s small life insurance plan is gone. I do not admit this to my mother. I also do not tell her I have been charging groceries on my credit card for the last three weeks. George’s royalty check auto-deposits at the end of October. I can make it five more days. After that, we’ll be good for another six months, at lea
st. I’ll have time to get my act together, figure out what to do about money.

  “Mom, give me a break. I’m not bankrupt yet.”

  She drops the subject but launches into her next confrontation. I see the swell of resolve lift her chin. She clears her throat. “Have you been on the computer today?”

  “No. Why?”

  Surprisingly, my dad answers. He still has one arm around my shoulders. “There was a video. That psychic posted it on her website. She’s doing another reading.”

  “You mean Beverly Donneville.”

  “Right. Her. She’s back in Oregon.”

  “In Portico?”

  “It’s all nonsense,” says Mom. “Barb McTyne emailed it to me this morning. We only watched a few minutes, but that woman was saying things about George.”

  “Barb?”

  Exasperated sigh. “Beverly Donneville.”

  “What did she say?”

  “Ridiculous things! Things that do not bear repeating.” She crosses her arms, shakes her head. “These people, Thea. I knew you’d come to regret it, I knew you’d be sorry for all those scams and the...the charlatans you associated with.”

  “I didn’t associate…charlatans? George was investigating her.”

  “And dragged you along into everything. He already exposed this fake psychic once. Why was he bothering with her again?”

  I pull away from Dad and search the countertops for my laptop. I haven’t seen it in a while, but I know it’s here. I always work in the kitchen while George works upstairs in his office.

  Worked.

  “Thea, honey,” says Dad.

  “What did she say about George?” I ask, pushing piles of paper around, cereal bowls, two mismatched socks, an open jar of peanut butter.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he says. “That’s what we’re trying to say.”

  “She’s an idiot,” says my mother.

  My computer is buried beneath a mountain of school papers and unopened mail on the kitchen table. I haven’t turned it on in weeks.