Making Magic (26 page)

“You’ve always been good.” Her voice shook. “You were always a good boy. That’s why I’ve always worried about you.”

He tensed, expecting something about the Woodruffs.

She took another sip of the coffee. “Because of what I can see.”

“Mom—”

She waved her hand. “This isn’t about the Woodruffs.”

That stopped him short.

“It’s about me,” she said. “Something that happened when you were a little boy.”

She took a longer sip of the coffee. Jake could tell she wished it was something stronger.

“I don’t really know exactly when it happened.” She looked at him and took another sip of coffee. “But I-I started seeing these flickers around people.”

Jake saw the vulnerable look on her face, the sheen of unshed tears. This wasn’t her usual delusions, this was something else.

“What do you mean by flickers?”

She took another gulp of coffee. “Lights. Like flames.”

“Around who, exactly?”

Just then they heard the refrain of Thea’s gorgeous “For The Woodsman” playing from his workroom, sounding a bit tinny. It was clearly a recording.

Jake jumped up. The workroom only had one door and it had been in his line of sight the whole time. He knew what sound he would hear next.

“Jake?” his mother asked as he dashed to the workroom.

The moment the notes of the song went off, he heard the wavering whimpers of another baby.

Chapter Eleven

Although you could hear the music from where they were, the sound was muted and the crowds were smaller. There were still a few people who, like Thea and Greg, were exploring the grounds of Patton Springs Resort and Spa. Hot tubs full of the famous mineral water were scattered in various open-air shelters along the river and around the main building.

Greg sniffed. “Personally, I have never seen the appeal of getting into a tub full of hot water that someone else has used.”

Thea bit her lip for the thousandth time—by now it should have had a hole in it—as they headed back to the festival grounds.

“This area has a lot of interesting history, mainly because of the hot springs,” Thea explained. “They were discovered during the Revolutionary War and the road through town was heavily traveled.”

Greg looked surprised. “That long ago? Why would they come through here?”

“It was the major route for driving livestock south and the town sat on what was basically the superhighway heading south from the east coast at the time. Then there are the hot springs, which a lot of people believe have healing properties. There has been a hotel of one kind of another on these grounds ever since. In the nineteenth century, it was a very fashionable resort to visit, well known around the world.”

“Fashionable?”

It really wasn’t a good thing to let her frustration build up like this; she might hurt him. The thought did give her some satisfaction, though.

“Very. It was
the
place for the social elite of the South to come in the summer. They had golf, bowling, tennis, horseback riding and a ballroom with an orchestra playing every night.”

Greg looked at the modest building that stood on the grounds now. “Really?”

“Yes. It burned down three…no, four times, I think, and was always rebuilt. During World War I it served as a kind of internment camp for Germans who were stranded here when German luxury liners and merchant ships were seized,” Thea finished. “
That
story is amazing in itself. The place has a fascinating history.”

“Why is the town so small now?”

“The interstate highway system eliminated the traffic that used to come through this part of the mountains. But those of us who live here like the size of the town as it is and so do the tourists. It’s a relaxing place to visit. You can enjoy the hot springs and the spa, or go white water rafting, or take plant walks and learn about the ecosystem of the mountains. The Appalachian Trail goes right down Patton Street. And there are all the shops, the antiques and, of course, the music.”

“You sound like a PR rep for this place, yet you stayed away for a very long time,” Greg retorted.

Thea frowned. She needed to get rid of this guy. She wouldn’t let her family or friends to poke at her like this and she didn’t have to put up with Greg doing it.

“I love this place,” she said. “And, as I said before, every day that I had to spend in Philadelphia was torture.”

Greg stopped before they reached the row of vendor tents and turned to her. “I still have trouble believing you. Are you really going to leave corporate law?”

“Yes,” she said.

“There are people who would hand over their firstborn for a position like the one you fell into at Hartford.”

“Fell into?”
I dropped out of Curtis. Gave up my music for pre-law. Suffered through law school. Missed the last few years I could have had with my Pops.
“You know, when you put it like that, it does sound totally crazy.” She started down the row of tents toward town.

He hurried to catch up with her. “I didn’t say it was crazy,” he huffed.

“You didn’t?” Messing with him was fun, but she really needed to come clean and get Greg to head home. This was ridiculous.

“No, but you have a lot of talent. It seems a shame to toss it away on…on whatever it is that you think you’re…” He trailed off, a lawyer without a brief.

“Thea!” someone yelled from a booth. “Al, it’s Thea Woodruff.”

She turned to see Marty Croate waving her over to the Dreaming in Clay booth. She was happy to oblige.

“I have to thank you for that performance you put on this afternoon,” Marty said. “We nearly sold out of ocarinas.”

A man with black hair braided back into a long tail came from the rear of the booth to join her. “Pleased to meet you. I’m Al Croate.” Al was probably short for something in Cherokee.

“This is Greg Whitehead, a business colleague of mine,” she explained as they took turns shaking hands.

“We had tons of kids dragging their parents over here to buy one of our ocarinas so they could learn to play like ‘that pretty red-haired lady’,” Al said.

Thea grinned. “I think that’s about the best compliment anyone could give me. Thank you!”

“It was amazing. The festival has an impact on so many kids. You wouldn’t believe how many get interested in learning an instrument after listening to the bands. But seeing you two perform with such passion—that really made them think,” Al said. “They connect the dots and see that music is
magic
.”

Thea smiled. “Perhaps a few of them will stick with it when they find out about the
practice
part of the magic.”

Al smiled and nodded. “I can understand why people were flocking to buy those polished wood and chrome beauties of Jake’s. They’re as much art as they are musical.”

“From what I heard, he sold almost everything he had today,” Marty said.

“That’s great.” At least Jake’s business had gotten off to a good start.

“I told him he needed a booth out here, but I guess he didn’t,” Al said.

“How’s Emmy doing today?” Thea asked.

Marty’s smiled faded. “About the same. Aaron does something to set her off and that makes her symptoms worse and it just cycles.”

“I plan to sit down with Grace and work out something for her. Try to hang in there,” Thea said.

“Something that doesn’t involve any more of the poison that caused all this, I hope,” Al said, fire in his eyes.

“No more prescriptions. Strictly herbal. I promise.”

Al nodded solemnly and hugged his wife as Thea walked away from the booth.

“What was all that about?” Greg asked.

Thea sighed. “Their daughter has tardive dyskinesia as the result of taking antipsychotics. I’m trying to help them out with an alternative treatment.”

He was silent for a long moment. “Why did you really go to work for Hartford, Althea?”

“I told you. I needed a job. And as you so kindly pointed out, nepotism opens doors,” she said. “And that big bonus check there at the end didn’t hurt.”

His voice took on an unusual edge. “I’m curious. You never really supported anything Hartford, or your father, stood for, did you? You seem to be all about alternative medicine—that herbal stuff your sister produces.”

Thea tensed, but she knew he was fishing. He was hurt and he was trying to understand why. She turned to face him. “What are you insinuating, Greg?”

He took a step back, looking around at the crowd. No one was paying the slightest bit of attention to them. “Nothing, really. It’s just… You seem so different here.”

Greg had never known the real Thea. And, to be honest, she hadn’t made it easy for him to. “I told you. I keep my business and personal life separate—”

“But we were dating. That’s as personal as it gets.”

“We were
not
dating, Greg. I made that pretty clear in Philly. I’m sorry if you somehow got the wrong impression.”

He made a tentative movement, as if to take her by the shoulders, but she started walking back down Patton Street in the direction of the parking lot. He trotted after her.

“What do you think will happen to the settlement—to all those pending civil lawsuits—if they find out an attorney on the case was compromised?”

“Compromised?” She spun around. “Where on earth did you get that idea?”

Greg shrank back. “All this seems very important to you—your grandfather, the family business, this mountain of yours. Your father walked away from all of it. He turned his back on your grandfather, on the business.”

Greg’s obsession with her father frankly bordered on the creepy. Thea laughed and shook her head. “Seriously? You think I would risk that big bonus, my license, my reputation, on some kind of sentimental revenge? You really don’t know me at all. Business is business.” She continued down the sidewalk toward Patton Street. Maybe Greg knew her better than she thought, but he was still guessing.

“Your father was certainly pursuing his own vendetta against the herbal industry. I figured—”

“Maybe the business as a whole, what with that anti-supplement legislation that he’s been lobbying so hard for. But a personal vendetta against the family?” She shook her head. She wouldn’t put it past him, but she had never found any evidence of it.

“Actually, he had this project underway to analyze the herbs your company sells,” Greg said in a lowered voice. “It was supposed to be a secret, but I have a friend who was involved.”

Thea gazed into the store windows they were passing. She took a steadying breath at that revelation. “I never heard about it.” Why would her father be studying Grace’s remedies? What was he looking for?

“And oddly enough, in the middle of everything that is going on, your father shut it down on Monday,” Greg went on.

Thea nearly sighed with relief, but kept her expression blank. “Since that kind of research doesn’t make much sense anyway, I suppose it’s a good business move.” She had told him not to interfere with anything they did, but had no idea he had been analyzing the herbs from Woodruff Farm.

Analyzing the herbal remedies that Grace produced. The thought stopped her in her tracks. She was standing in front of a rack of T-shirts on display on the sidewalk.

Grace had the ability to heal. Did she change the herbs with that gift in some way? And if she did, would it show up in lab tests? What would it show?

“He’s doing a lot of other things that don’t appear to the board to be good business moves,” Greg went on. “Such as dropping his support of the anti-supplement bill and his opposition to that orphan drug legislation.”

It was hard not to show her delight at that news
.
Her dad was
following her instructions to the letter.
“I guess the DoJ finally got his attention.”

“It also seems completely out of character,” Greg said.

“My father never really had any
character
to speak of,” she said. “He is all about the business, the bottom line and the profit margin. I’m sure all of this fits somewhere in there. Nick said the stock price was soaring.”

“Yes, but it’s such a significant change in direction. That worries people.”

She spotted a T-shirt decorated with a huge red treble clef and the words “Here Comes Treble” splashed across it. Trouble had certainly followed her to the mountain. Now she needed to get rid of Greg so she could talk to Grace about all this.

“And I should care about this why exactly?” She turned to face him, hands on hips. “I don’t know why you followed me down here. I don’t know what you expect from me. I’m not going to explain anything else to you. I did what I did for my own reasons. It’s over. I’m going on with my life and you need to go on with yours.”

“And where exactly are you going, Althea? You said you weren’t staying here, even though you seem to have some kind of relationship with that Jake fellow—”