Murder on the Oregon Express

by Samantha Silver

  Murder on the Oregon Express

  Samantha Silver

  Blueberry Books Press

  Contents

  1. One

  2. Two

  3. Three

  4. Four

  5. Five

  6. Six

  7. Seven

  8. Eight

  9. Nine

  10. Ten

  11. Eleven

  12. Twelve

  13. Thirteen

  14. Fourteen

  15. Fifteen

  16. Sixteen

  17. Seventeen

  18. Eighteen

  19. Nineteen

  20. Twenty

  Also by Samantha Silver

  About the Author

  One

  I had always imagined that running a bookstore would be just like any other regular, boring retail job. People would come in, ask for a specific book, and I would point them in the right direction. Then, they would either buy the book or not, but either way they would leave and be on their merry way.

  Boy, was I wrong.

  I suppose retail is retail. When I lived in Miami, I had worked as a barista at a local coffee shop. I’d had my share of strange experiences and customers, but for some reason, I thought selling books might be different.

  It definitely wasn’t.

  I had only been the owner of Magical Books for two weeks, since I moved from Miami to Sapphire Village, my biological mother’s hometown. My biological aunt had recently died of cancer–although my Grandma Cee insisted she was killed by Others, a group of shadowy figures who steal witches’ souls. Grandma Cee had convinced everyone to let me take over the bookshop so I would move back to Sapphire Village and be closer to my magical family, which afforded me more protection against the Others.

  The rest of the family didn’t seem that bothered about this impending threat, despite Grandma Cee warning us about it constantly. I figured it was the complete lack of any actual evidence that the Others were trying to steal more souls from the witches in Sapphire Village, and I wasn’t exactly worried.

  Right now, I had way bigger issues anyway. My first two customers of the morning had been wonderful; a local woman came in to special order the entire collection of Jane Austen novels, and a woman visiting from Minnesota bought her father an old, leather-bound edition of Don Quixote. My third customer of the morning, who was now standing right in front of me, was a little bit different. He was a man in his early forties, with brown hair and deep-set eyes.

  “I’m looking for a book,” he said as soon as he walked in, not bothering to even say hello.

  “All right, no problem, we have a few of those,” I joked, but the man didn’t even crack a smile. “What book are you looking for?” I asked.

  “It was black.”

  “Oh,” I said, my eyebrows rising. “Do you know the title?”

  “No,” he replied. “I saw a woman reading the book in the park when I was going for my jog yesterday. Every time I ran past her on my loop, she looked like she was laughing at something in the book. It looked funny, so I decided I want to read it.”

  I had a sinking feeling about the rest of this conversation.

  “So, you have no idea what it’s called,” I confirmed.

  “No, I just know that she was enjoying it.”

  “Well, I’m afraid I can’t tell you exactly what book it was, but I do have a few books in the store here that are on the funny side,” I said, racking my brain to try and think of which ones that might be. Maybe The Hobbit? I had taken to reading a number of the books that were in the shop when I didn’t have any customers–I had always enjoyed books, but over the past few years I had never managed to make time for them–but I was still very, very far from being an expert.

  “But I don’t want those books, I want that specific book,” the man protested. “It was black, and it had white lettering on the cover.”

  “If you don’t have any more information than that then I’m sorry to say I don’t know what book you’re talking about.”

  “But this is a bookstore! You sell books! I want a book. How hard can it be?”

  “To find the specific book you’re after, when all you know about it is that it had a black cover with white lettering? Borderline impossible.”

  “Well, you’re terrible at your job,” the man said in a huff, turning on his heel and leaving the store, leaving me half confused, half amused.

  “Do you think that guy’s ever going to find his book?” I asked Muffin, they grey tabby who alternated between living at the store, in my apartment above the store, and outside doing his own thing. He was currently lying in the beanbag chair I’d bought for customers who wanted to browse, as he had very quickly decided that the beanbag chair was his new favorite sleeping spot and had claimed it as his own.

  I laughed as he opened an eye and then closed it again in reply. I looked at the clock: a quarter to twelve. In fifteen minutes, I was closing up shop early to go down and see my cousin Peaches’ art exhibition in downtown Portland.

  Peaches was an artist, and she took a lot of heat over it from members of my biological family–mainly my Grandma Cee and my other cousin Cat–and this was a big moment for her. The Portland Art Gallery was doing an exhibition featuring artists local to the Pacific Northwest, and Peaches had two paintings accepted for submission. So this afternoon, I was closing up the bookstore for a few hours, Cat was leaving her cupcake store in the hands of her very capable employee Maddie, and we were taking an afternoon off to go support Peaches at the exhibit.

  I had to admit, I was excited. I hadn’t actually ever seen any of Peaches’ work yet. Of course, that wasn’t incredibly surprising, seeing as I’d only lived in Sapphire Village for a couple of weeks. And on top of that, in the two weeks I’d lived here, I learned that I was a witch–yeah, it turns out magic is real. Who knew? I certainly hadn’t. And on top of that, I got involved in a murder investigation that almost led to me being stabbed to death. That’s totally normal though, the sort of thing everyone goes through when they move across the country, right?

  Ok, so maybe not. It had been a pretty intense first few days in Sapphire Village, but now I was ready to settle into my new life here, and that meant supporting my cousin in this awesome opportunity.

  As the clock rolled over to twelve, I shut the front door of the store and locked it, changing the ‘open’ sign to ‘closed’.

  “Archibald!” I called out. “The store is closed, if you wanted to listen to another book.”

  Out of nowhere, a man appeared, only he was slightly transparent. In his late thirties, well, when he had died anyway, Archibald wore the typical dress of the early eighteen-hundreds: black pants, along with a white tunic, and a black jacket on top. His brown hair was slightly dishevelled from his last days spent in bed, sick with–well, to be honest, I didn’t really know what Archibald had died of, and I wasn’t sure if it was something you asked a ghost. I didn’t want to be considered rude by asking.

  “Excellent, the uneducated peasants you call customers do not deserve to roam this store while I have yet to finish the works of the undisputed Queen of English literature.”

  I smiled to myself. When I first got here, Archibald had insisted that there had been nothing written since the year of his death that was worth reading; that the nineteenth century had been the peak of English literature. And while my Aunt Francine had apparently agreed with him–when I took over the shop after her death there had been no newer books on the shelves–I definitely did not. I had finally convinced Archibald to listen to an Agatha Christie audiobook, since he was incapable of turning the pages of a book, and now whenever the shop was closed Archibald insisted on listening to more
books.

  He was making his way through her catalogue pretty quickly, and I pressed play on Murder in Mesopotamia on my iPad, which he was around halfway through. Happily engrossed in his book, I grabbed my purse, gave Muffin a goodbye pet that was completely ignored and made my way out the door.

  Making my way down Main Street toward the train station, I saw my cousin Cat coming the other way. As soon as she saw me, she jumped up and waved. It appeared that Cat had dressed up for the occasion: she was wearing a simple, 50s-style white dress covered in sleek, black cat silhouettes, and black flats. Her hair was the same shade of pastel purple as always, and she bounded up to me, a smile on her face.

  “Ready?” she asked. “I’m excited!”

  “Me too, I can’t wait to see Peaches’ paintings,” I replied.

  “Oh, that? No, I couldn’t care less about that. I’m excited about taking the train back into Portland!” When she saw the look on my face, Cat laughed. “I’m just kidding. Of course I’m excited about seeing Peaches’ exhibit. But the train is going to be pretty cool.”

  “If you say so,” I grinned.

  “Oh, are you going to pretend that you’re a big city girl who rides trains all the time now?” Cat asked, sticking her tongue out at me.

  “I’ll let you know I took the Metrorail to work every day,” I retorted. “Taking a train isn’t exactly an exciting event for me.”

  “Yeah, well, the Oregon Express stopped running like twenty years ago until this week, this is a big moment for those of us who have lived here our whole lives.”

  “I know,” I replied. “One day, maybe I’ll even be able to introduce you to this new invention called the automobile.”

  Cat punched me on the arm as we made our way to the old train station. We arrived about five minutes later. The old train station wasn’t much to look at; it was basically just a large concrete platform that ran adjacent to the railway tracks. The municipality was considering doing upgrades at some point in the future, but for now, it was just the same old building that had gone out of use in the 1990s.

  A couple of weeks ago, the company in charge of a large proposed development in Sapphire Village had promised to start running the Oregon Express once more, linking downtown Portland to Sapphire Village in just over an hour. After the events of the last week, the company moved the schedule forward significantly in order to buy more goodwill in the community, and the first train had run the day before. We could have driven, but Cat and I made our way to the ticket window and bought a round-trip ticket to Portland instead at the locals’ price of $15, just to experience the new train for ourselves.

  Now, there were five trains a day running between Portland and Sapphire village, and as one of them pulled up to the station, ready to take us down to the city, I had to admit, it was more impressive than the Miami Metrorail.

  Two

  The train had four cars, painted red. Panoramic windows stretched from waist height to the ceiling, with very minimal space between them. Cat and I stepped into one of the cars. To our left, at the end of the carriage, was a very spacious luggage area, perfect for storing skis and snowboards. Past the luggage area was a small door leading to the next carriage, and to the right was a door leading to the seating area.

  Pressing down on the sleek, stainless-steel handle, I heard the ‘whoosh’ of a hydraulics system and the door opened automatically, leading into a gorgeous interior. The navy-blue carpet underfoot was plush and soft as Cat and I made our way in between the rows of seats. Some rows simply had two seats; others had four, groups of two seats facing each other with a small table in between.

  Since there weren’t a lot of people taking this train, Cat and I settled in on opposite sides of one of these tables. Cat grinned as she looked around. “I have to admit, I’m against the new development but these new train carriages look awesome.”

  “Yeah, they do. This beats the Metrorail any day,” I replied, nodding.

  “If I had to choose between sitting in my car for an hour and fighting for parking, or taking the train, I know which one I’d do,” Cat replied. “I imagine eventually the Oregon Express is going to be very successful.”

  As the train slowly pulled out of the station, Cat and I spent a few minutes in silence, appreciating the view. Pine trees lined either side of the track, the rich greens in stark contrast to the azure blue of the sky. About two minutes after we left, the train passed by Sapphire Lake—the deep blue, calm waters almost took my breath away as I looked at it. On the far side in the distance, Sapphire Mountain’s snow-covered peak jutted upwards toward the sky.

  “Our corner of the world isn’t too shabby, is it?” Cat said with a smile. I nodded enthusiastically.

  “Yeah. I’ve always been a beach-and-sunshine girl, but I have to admit, there’s something about the forest here that’s really pretty.”

  “It’s the connection to nature. It feels a lot wilder here than in the city.”

  “For sure.”

  Just over an hour later the train pulled into Portland. Cat led the way through the downtown streets as we made our way to an old brick building, the kind that would have been a warehouse a hundred years ago. “Here we are,” Cat said.

  “Are you sure?” I asked dubiously. This didn’t exactly look like an art gallery.

  “Yeah,” Cat said, and as we turned the corner I saw that a large roller door was open, leading straight into the art gallery. The interior of the building was made of the same red brick as the outside, with huge ceilings that were at least fifty feet high. Warm light flooded from lamps on the ceiling, shining spotlights onto the white plaster display walls that had been built around the room, creating a sort of a maze. Every few feet a new painting was displayed.

  Cat and I walked in and began to look around. The exhibition had been open for two days, and there were around thirty people mingling around the large space right now. I recognized a couple of people from Sapphire Village, but no one that I knew well.

  I made my way toward the right side of the building, admiring the art. There was a nice mix of paintings and photography, with many of the scenes being nature-based.

  I was halfway around the first wall when I reached a painting of a fox, looking toward the camera, his little pink tongue licking his nose. The background around the fox was white, and the fox’s fur was made to look like orange pine needles in the fall, fading to black toward his paws. It was stunning, and when I looked at the card below with the author’s information, I was surprised to see ‘Penelope Calliope’ as the artist.

  “Do you like it?” I heard a familiar voice ask behind me. I turned and saw Peaches, her long, pastel coral hair tied back in a ponytail, wearing an emerald green cocktail dress. Cat and Peaches were sisters, not twins, but apart from the hair they looked identical. Here, Peaches looked radiant, her eyes shining with excitement as her works were on display.

  “This is amazing,” I replied honestly. “I had no idea that you were so good! I don’t mean that to come off as passive-aggressive as it sounded!” I added.

  Peaches laughed. “I know what you mean. You haven’t seen any of my work, and since all you’ve heard about it is from Grandma Cee telling me to get a real job, I can understand if you came into this with low expectations.”

  “That’s the thing, I didn’t. I really expected your work to be good. But it’s so much more than that! It’s incredible,” I said.

  “Thanks,” Peaches said shyly, and a small blush passed across her face. “I’m glad you like my work.”

  “For sure,” I nodded enthusiastically. “Has the family come by yet?”

  Peached nodded. “Yeah, mom came by the first day the exhibition opened. She started gushing about my paintings to anyone who would listen, and almost got herself kicked out by security for annoying other people,” she laughed.

  I giggled. “Well, it’s good that your mom is supportive.”

  “Absolutely. She’s pretty much the only one in the family who actually thinks I
should do this as a job. Well, her and Cat, but she never admits to it because she’s my sister.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Grandma Cee came the other day too. I think my mom made her do it. All she did was complain that her tax dollars paid for all of these artists’ lives, and then she asked me why I didn’t get a real job. She did say that as far as ‘art’ went–the air quotes were hers, not mine–it wasn’t as ugly as most of the stuff in here.”

  I laughed as I imagined Grandma Cee doing all that. “After that,” Peaches continued, “mom made her wait outside. Luckily for Grandma Cee there’s an exotic pet shop next door, so she entertained herself for an hour by talking to the birds in there.”

  “Well, I for one will be the healthy middle ground between your mom and Grandma Cee. I think your paintings are awesome, but I promise not to bully any other visitors into admiring them.”

  “Thanks,” Peaches laughed. “At least someone in this family is reasonably normal.”

  I looked over to see if Cat was coming by to look at the pictures, but saw she was distracted. I caught her eye a minute later and waved her over.

  “Hey, Cat, check out Peaches’ awesome paintings,” I told her.

  “Did you guys hear that weird sound?” Cat replied as she came toward us, ignoring Peaches’ paintings.

  “No, what weird sound?” Peaches asked. Cat motioned to where she was standing.

  “You can’t hear it over here. But there’s a strange sound coming from one of the vents over there. It’s almost like a hissing noise.”

  “Weird,” I said, just as the grate covering the vent Cat had been referring to fell to the floor. It had obviously not been screwed in. Suddenly, something long and black fell out of the grate and began slithering along the ground.

  “Snakes!” Peaches hissed, her eyes widening. A second snake fell from the vent as well, and then a third. It was like I was frozen in place. A woman near the vents screamed, and a waiter holding half a dozen glasses of champagne dropped his tray, the glasses shattering as they hit the ground.