As it heats water, I cut my muffin into quarters, lean against the countertop near the sink, and try to gather my thoughts. Aunt Willa’s garden boots sit in the mudroom, off the kitchen, under her raincoat and assorted sun hats. I barely taste the muffin as I see a memory of her bustling around, washing herbs she’s picked from her garden, filling the tea kettle, laughing about a joke. My gaze trails to the window next to the ailing fridge and scans the part of the backyard I can see.
The sugar and caffeine hit my blood stream a moment later, and I feel moderately calmer. Aunt Willa’s cup from the previous day still sits on the kitchen table, as if she were coming back for it.
The shock of her death hits me all over again, and along with the lack of sleep and my mild concussion, I feel a bout of anxiety. Once I find Tabitha, I’ll change clothes, check on Mama, and will make plans for the business, the house, the cat.
But right now, all I want to do is wash out Aunt Willa’s coffee cup and pretend that she’s going to rush into the kitchen at any moment, her face lighting up at seeing me.
The squeak of the front door alerts me to Logan’s return. The reunion with my cats is precious, both letting me know they are happy to see me and equally unhappy they haven’t yet had breakfast.
“Thanks again for taking care of them,” I tell him. “Can I offer you coffee?”
He goes to a cabinet and pulls out a mug, as if he’s at home here. “Happy to oblige. Any sign of Tabitha?”
I ignore the irritation at his helping himself, taking out two serving size cans of cat food from the pantry. “Not a peep,” I tell Logan.
Scooping some salmon and rice combo onto dessert plates, I call the missing cat. Arthur and Lancelot inhale their servings but Tabby doesn’t appear. Logan and I both call her again.
“Bring the food,” he says. “We’ll find her.”
He pours an extra cup of coffee and takes it to Miranda, who blushes and thanks him repeatedly. He offers to get Rosie a cup, and I swear her cheeks raise a flush as well, even though she shakes her head no.
As I prowl through the den, guest bathroom, and laundry on the first floor, a host of memories assail me, but the cat does not appear. By the time I reach the grand staircase, Logan joins me, as does his dog.
“How’s your head?” he asks.
“Still hurts,” I grumble, “but I’m fine.”
He shoots me a wry grin. “Of course, you are. You’ve got that Fantome hard head, I imagine.”
I wave the open can of smelly food around, hoping the fancy salmon mixture will cajole the cat from her hiding spot. My cats entangle themselves under my feet, hoping they’ll get a second helping.
The railing of the dark, highly polished staircase is wound with fall garland. The upstairs consists of three bedrooms, a large bath, and a sitting area. There are more steps to the walk-up attic. I hesitate outside Aunt Willa’s room, the worn wool carpet runner scratchy under my feet. “Why do you have a key to this place?” I ask Logan again.
He leans on the wall across from me, sipping his coffee. “Why don’t you come over to the office later and I’ll explain everything?” He points downward, indicating Rosie and Miranda. “Now probably isn’t the best time.”
A nervous flutter in my stomach makes me wish I hadn’t downed as much coffee as I did. Annoyed at his non-answer, I step inside the bedroom, check under the bed, in the closet, and avoid the armoire, the memory of my aunt’s voice ringing in my head. Logan moves to the door frame, watching me with his intelligent eyes.
“I’m going back to Atlanta this afternoon, after Mama and I figure a few things out.” This announcement actually surprises me, but it seems logical and I refuse to admit Logan flusters me a little. “I need to call my boss, set up a few days’ of personal leave for the funeral, and…”
I trail off, trying to come up with more reasons to get out of town and back to my comfort zone. I’m afraid it’s the only way I’ll be able to think through all of this. “I need clothes,” I add to the list. “For the funeral.”
Brilliant. I sound like an idiot.
Logan nods, as if this makes perfect sense, and I’m slightly relieved. And then he says, “I’m sure Edith has black dresses your size at her shop. Can’t you call your boss from here?”
Of course, he would have to be practical. Edith Warhol certainly has black dresses at her clothing store. Plain, boring, perfect dresses for Aunt Willa’s funeral.
Except, I don’t think my aunt would want that. She was such a bright personality, I believe she would be happier in heaven if all of us sang and danced at her funeral. We should wear bright clothes, reflecting the type of woman she was while she was here.
Funerals in Thornhollow are taken very seriously, and every woman in town knows part of her community standing revolves around the food she brings to the wake and the outfit she wears to the funeral.
I brush past Logan at the door and walk toward the second bedroom—mine. I spent lots of nights here with Aunt Willa, most of my summers, too.
Inside, Moxley is lying beside the giant cedar chest against the far wall. “Here, Tabby,” I call and then to Logan, “I have a life in Atlanta, responsibilities.”
Arthur and Lancelot jump on the bed, meowing loudly at me. They are still hoping for more food. Tabby doesn’t show and I eye the chest, as Logan checks the closet.
“Of course, I just thought…” Accusation weights his tone with the unsaid words.
I see my old sketch pad on the nightstand. Another in the bay window. Dresses. I used to love to sketch wedding dresses, always trying to create my dream one. “Thought what, Logan?”
“I was under the impression Willa Ray was turning over the business to you—she mentioned you were coming home to take over. Since you’ve been here, all you’ve done is insist you’re not moving home.”
The letter flashes through my mind. I look out the window, shifting the lace curtain aside. So many memories, this house, my beloved aunt. They all encompass the word home to me.
Protect the family, her letter had said. Protect the town. What did she mean?
Before I can respond to tell him I can’t move home and take over her business, I see a streak of orange below in the garden.
“It’s Tabby,” I say, and jet out the bedroom door.
Chapter Eight
I fly out the back door, and the screen door slams against the house as I race down the steps. “Tabby!”
The backyard is nearly two acres of rolling lawn, maple, oak, and birch trees, a white arch covered in ivy and jasmine vines spotlighted on my right.
Logan emerges behind me. He comes to my side on the path as I scan for that streak of orange. “Where did you see her?”
“Over there.” I point toward the fountain on the left, a three-tiered white concrete goddess with a flowing watery moat that people often throw money in to make wishes. A paper birch stands nearby, the yellow and rust-colored leaves filling the water and carpeting the ground. “But she was headed that way.”
Another point, this time in the other direction. Moxley ambles down the back steps, his short legs carrying him past us, so he can sniff an azalea bush that still holds onto a few weepy blooms.
“I’ll take this side,” Logan says, motioning toward the fountain. “You take that one.”
The path leads past the arch of ivy. “Tabitha,” I call, waving the open can around to distribute the scent. “Here, Tabby.”
Moxley trails across the stone path, nose to the ground, his floppy ears dragging on the wet grass. The humidity is high, the sun gaining strength.
A red maple leaf flutters to the ground at my feet. The tree is probably a hundred years old, and still holding on to the majority of its leaves. As the dog and I wind along the path, a host of burning bushes, like small fires in amongst the boxwood and poplars, offset the lingering mist.
Where would I hide if I were a cat? I think.
“Certainly not under wet bushes,” I mutter to myself. I check around the benc
hes under the arch and a ledge built up with stones, where people often sit for their engagement or wedding pictures. My aunt loves to hold engagement parties and small weddings back here.
There’s a gazebo further down the hill, and I check that, too, hoping to find the cat sitting high and dry.
As the landscape slopes, my shoes slide on the wet leaves. Tabby is nowhere to be found, and the creek bed bubbles in the distance, the fresh rain forcing it to nearly overflow its low banks.
A mockingbird calls to me from the willow near the creek, the long sweeping branches of the tree swaying to and fro in the breeze. While the temperature is rising, I feel a chill. The scent of damp moss and leaves tickles my nose as I grow closer.
The old Holloway homestead stands like a sentry off to the southwest, looking as sad as the willow. Its structure of ancient stones and timber having withstood hundreds of years but are now shabby and falling apart.
How I wish those stones could talk. Not only would it tell of the founders of Thornhollow—my very distant ancestor, Tabitha Holloway having lived here—but it might also tell me what happened to my poor aunt.
In my mind, I see Aunt Willa standing by the creek. She loved it here, and often came to this spot to do her own form of meditation. Said the running water and beautiful trees helped her think when life got hard. I spent many a summer down here playing in the creek myself. There was a time when together we built fairy houses and held luncheons here.
I think back to Mama and her claim that Aunt Willa was arguing with someone. Looking around, my chest tightens, my breathing becomes labored. It’s as if I’m having the same heart attack as my aunt, even though I realize it’s only grief invading my chest.
I rub the center of my rib cage and feel my eyes sting with tears. I haven’t allowed myself a proper cry, but there’s no time for it now. I keep expecting to hear Willa call my name, to see her run out of the house and down to the creek. I wish I could feel her arms wrap around me one more time.
Moxley, who I left back at the gazebo, ambles to the bank, his ears dark with moisture. He noses around at the edge, sticking his face in the water. Afraid the dog will fall in—can basset hounds swim?—I call to him to get back.
He steps closer. Water rushes over his fat paws and his snout.
“Dumb dog,” I mutter.
The creek seems wild today, untamed. “Moxley,” I chastise, “get back here.”
Nose down, he ignores me and takes yet another step, water now nearly to his low-hanging chest.
Mine grows tighter, my fingers cold with a sudden numbness. Mist rises from the water and slips between the trees on the other side of the bank, weaving its way toward us.
A shadow moves in that fog and I squint, moving toward the dog. A deer, I tell myself. They are plentiful this time of year.
I reach Moxley and tug on his collar. He must weight fifty pounds, maybe more, and he doesn’t budge.
I scold him again, as creek water splashes on both of us. “Come on,” I urge. “The last thing I need is for you to end up drowning.”
The dog raises his nose and sniffs the air. Without warning, he lets out a howl. The sad note sends a chill over my already cold skin and echoes through the trees.
The mockingbird flies away, the last of the cry dying amongst the leaves. Across the expanse, the shadow in the woods disappears, too. In my body, I feel the sound of the dog’s bellow, as if it expressed my grief.
Moxley looks at me and then back to the water.
“Cut me some slack, here,” I say to him, sighing. “You fall in, and your owner will never forgive me.”
The drooping, bloodshot eyes rise to mine again. He turns his stocky body slowly around and heads back toward the garden.
“Dumb human.”
“What?” I twist around to watch his progress as he lumbers off. My focus shifts to the ground, my pulse ricocheting. “No, no, no,” I whisper to myself. “Not again.”
The leaves overhead shift and sunlight breaks through. A sparkle in the water around the rocks catches my eye.
“Hey.” Logan jogs up to me as I bend down and reach for the sparkling item. “I heard Moxley howl. Everything okay?”
Lifting the object from the water, my throat feels closed off. The gold chain is broken, the antique key that used to hang from it gone.
“Is that…?” Logan moves closer, his shoulder brushing mine as he eyes it.
Still kneeling, I clutch the chain and scan the creek bed for the key, the rushing water making it difficult to see. “Yes. Aunt Willa’s favorite necklace.”
He must know what I’m searching for and scans the water up and down the bank, but we see nothing of the key. He helps me stand, his warm hand reassuring on my cold one.
He leads me a few feet away from the rushing water. “I didn’t see the cat,” he said.
The chain is as cold as my fingers. Numbly, I try to process what happened. “I’ll keep looking for her.”
His phone rings, the modern sound out of place here in this ancient environment.
“Yes, Norman.” He walks off a few yards to have his conversation. “No, I didn’t forget. I’ll be there in a minute. I’m just across the street.”
He returns, pocketing the phone a moment later. “Sorry,” he says. “Morning appointment I’ll come back as soon as I can.”
All I do is nod, an empty feeling in my chest, as he heads for the back porch. Moxley falls into step behind him.
I pocket the broken chain and start that way myself, my body tired and weary, when movement to my left makes me turn.
As I glance toward the old homestead, I do a double-take.
A naked woman is ducking inside.
Chapter Nine
This is the weirdest day ever.
Well, it’s right up there anyway. Last December, I helped my friends, the Whitethorne sisters, save the world from an evil entity, and it’s hard to compete with that, but today ranks right up there with it.
Brambles and overgrowth thwart my progress to the Holloway house, once a landmark, now forgotten. Samuel Thornton and Tabitha Holloway built it and lived here when they founded this town. An unheard of thing back in the late 1700s, an unmarried couple, kicked out of Colonial Virginia under suspicious circumstances and ending up here, combining their last names to give birth to a new place.
The wooden door, gray with age, is slightly ajar and hanging crookedly from its hinges. Prickly blackberry vines create a canopy over the doorway and around the single stone step. Ivy creeps over the outside walls, and as I push the door farther open, the scent of mold and decay hits my nose.
Several degrees colder in here than outside, the forest has been trying to reclaim the farmhouse for as long as I can remember.
Aunt Willa always talked of restoring it, creating a landmark once more, but she never seemed to have the time or money.
“Hello?” I call. “Are you okay? I saw you outside.”
The interior is shadowy and dark, dank from the previous night’s rain. A broken window on the north wall has let rain leak in, along with several cracks in the ceiling.
Critters have been in here, leaving droppings and nests. This is the last place I want to be, but I must find the woman I just spotted and figure out what she’s doing here.
Could she be the person Aunt Willa was arguing with?
Surely no one, not even a vagrant, would take up residence in this dilapidated place. I wonder if the woman is hurt, or perhaps mentally ill. Whoever she is, she can’t stay.
“My name’s Ava. If you need help, I’ll get it for you.” I make my way past what was once a kitchen, a cavernous fireplace still intact with a large black iron pot hanging over ashes.
The only sound I hear is a constant drip from the corner of the ceiling. I look for signs that someone’s been squatting here and see none. Apparently, only the forest creatures have made this their home.
“Hello,” I call again. “Did you know my aunt?”
Did you kill her? I
think, and stop walking, the idea triggering a flicker of fear low in my stomach.
I debate whether to continue the hunt or to simply call the police and ask them to come check it out.
Shoring up my nerves—because she could be a killer, and because there could be mice and other rodents—I go deeper into the dim interior. My legs shake, mostly because I don’t do mice any more than I do confronting a potential murderer.
Especially one running around in her birthday suit.
My nerves get the better of me and I turn to leave. I’ll call the police. Before I can take a step toward the open door, however, something crashes to the floor beyond the living room.
I stop in my tracks. If this girl didn’t kill my aunt, she still could be a witness. That thought gets me moving toward the hall. I see a semi-closed door off to the side. A shadow shifts behind it.
Gotcha. “Look,” I say using my most reasonable voice—the one I use on hysterical brides when necessary—“if you’re in trouble, talk to me. I’ll do whatever I can to help. Otherwise, I’m going to call the police. You’re trespassing, and it’s quite dangerous to even be in here. You’ll have to explain to them what you’re doing.”
I hear a low chuckle from the other side of the door. “You dunnah want to do that young Ava,” a soft, very Scottish sounding woman’s voice says.
Goosebumps run over my skin and I take a step back.
At least I’ve got her talking to me. Removing my robe, I force my shaky legs to the doorway. I hand the robe through the opening. “Here, take this to cover yourself. Then come out here and tell me who you are and why you’re trespassing.”
“Trespassing?” She’s indignant.
There’s a bright flash—bright enough that it makes me flinch back. A high-pitched screech like someone stepped on the tail of a cat echoes through the room and out into the hall.
Suddenly, Tabby—the cat—bolts through the space between my feet, startling me so bad I jump and trip, trying not to step on her. I manage to fall into a reed chair nearby and it breaks into pieces when we both hit the floor.
Pumpkins & Poltergeists, Confessions of a Closet Medium, Book 1 Page 4
