Devil's Throat (The River Book 6) Read online

  Roy sat next to him and leaned over. “There’ll be no coffee with dinner,” he whispered.

  “So how do you know Deem?” Margie asked.

  “Friend of a friend, really,” Steven said. “We’ve never met. We’ve got a problem we’re working on, and we’re hoping Deem can help us.”

  “And what kind of problem is that?” Margie asked. A buzzing sound came from the kitchen, and Margie popped out of her chair. “Oh, excuse me, I’ve got to get that.” She disappeared into the other room, and they heard the sound of something being removed from an oven. At first Steven wondered why anyone would cook in an oven when it was so hot outside, but he realized that the temperature in the house was very cool, almost as cold as a normal Seattle day. Margie lived in a climate-controlled house, so turning on the oven didn’t seem to bother. In Seattle, Steven didn’t have an air conditioner. He rarely needed one, and on hot days a couple of fans – and not using the oven – would do.

  Margie returned and sat in a chair opposite them. “I hope you like pork chops,” she said. “Shake and Bake!”

  “Sounds great,” Steven said.

  “So what are you working on with Deem?” she asked again.

  Steven looked at Roy, hoping he’d take over. Roy turned to Margie.

  “We’ve come down from Seattle,” he said, “and we’re trying to locate my grandson, who’s gone missing. We understand your daughter has a unique awareness of the area.”

  Margie’s face dropped. “Oh, is this one of those things?” she asked.

  “Those things?” Roy repeated. “I don’t understand.”

  “You know,” Margie said, appearing very uncomfortable. “The kooky stuff.”

  Steven wondered how much Margie actually knew about Deem. He didn’t want to give away something they shouldn’t. Why would Deem invite us over if her mother didn’t know? Steven thought. She must know.

  “Both Roy and I have the gift,” Steven said. “We can see things other people…”

  He was cut off by Margie, who was shaking her head from side to side. “No, I don’t want to know,” she said. “I really don’t. Please forgive me for asking.”

  “It’s something that bothers you?” Roy asked.

  “It does,” Margie said. “I don’t think it’s of God. I just don’t.”

  “And what about Deem?” Steven asked.

  “I wish she’d drop it and come back to the church,” Margie said. “I’ve tried to get her to, but she won’t. It breaks my heart, really, to see her throw her life away like this. Not to mention her next life.”

  “Throw her life away?” Steven asked, starting to feel really uncomfortable but not willing to back down.

  “Chasing these things,” Margie said. “Dabbling in evil.”

  The front door opened, and a young girl in her late teens stepped into the room. “Hello!” she said, pulling boots from her feet and setting them in a coat closet. She walked over to Steven and Roy and stuck out her hand.

  “You must be Deem,” Steven said. She held his hand firmly and gave it two quick shakes and released it. She looked incredibly fit. Her shoulder-length brown hair fell about her face in a style he’d noticed on several good-looking women in the area. He knew she must be wearing makeup, but he couldn’t see any. Her clothes were scuffed up a little, as through she’d been working hard.

  “I am,” she said. Her voice had a happy edge to it, definitive and not halting in any way. “You must be Steven. And Roy.”

  “Dinner’s ready,” Margie said. “Do you all want to come into the dining room? Steven, Roy, do you need to wash up? Deem, you should too. There’s a bathroom just down the hall there.”

  Reminds me of my mother, Steven thought.

  They all took turns cleaning up, then they gathered around a large dining table that looked like it could seat ten people. Margie assigned a spot for Roy and Steven to sit.

  She brought out dish after dish from the kitchen: pork chops, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, and – Steven was surprised to see – Jello. They all sat at the table and Margie said a quick prayer over the food. Steven felt incredibly uncomfortable during it. When in Rome, he thought as he closed his eyes, but it didn’t stop the rising of uneasy memories of his upbringing.

  They chatted over dinner, never discussing why they were there, or the gift. Margie’s reaction to the subject before Deem’s arrival convinced Steven and Roy it’d be best to discuss the purpose of their visit with Deem in private.

  During the dinner conversation they learned Deem was the youngest of six, all of whom had moved out of the family home except for her, and that she just graduated from high school.

  “With honors!” Margie added. “And a Sterling Scholar!”

  High school? Steven thought. This is who Eliza’s friend thinks can help us?

  Steven looked at Deem, and he noticed that she gave him a disapproving nod. Can she pick up what I’m thinking, like Eliza? Steven wondered. She nodded at him again. Was it coincidence? Steven thought. Was she just nodding at what Margie had said? Deem shook her head. Shit, I better be careful what I think, Steven thought, or she’s going to think I’m a bozo. Deem smiled.

  After dinner, Deem excused herself and suggested they talk on the back porch. Margie said it was too hot for her outside, and she wanted to clean up dinner anyway.

  Deem’s back yard was immaculately landscaped, and there were padded chairs around a patio table under an awning where they sat. The sun was just starting to go down, and it was still very hot.

  “Oh,” Deem said, rising from her chair, “let me turn this on. It helps.” She walked over to a switch on the exterior wall and pressed it. A light mist began to fall over the patio, cooling things off.

  “Half the time I forget to turn it on,” she said. “I’m so used to this weather. But I imagine you two are melting.”

  “Thanks for that,” Steven said. “It’s a lot hotter here than in Seattle. But we’re used to mist, so you’ve made us feel right at home.”

  Deem smiled. “So, what can I do for you?” she asked.

  “Do you want the whole story?” Steven asked.

  “Yes,” Deem said. “It’ll be quicker than me asking you a dozen questions to fill in things.”

  Steven related the entire tale, going back to their first encounter with Lukas and Michael. Deem listened intently. She seemed focused on every word, as though she was looking for inconsistencies. When Steven finished, she thought for a moment before speaking.

  “And your son is still in the motel room in Overton?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Steven said, “at least he was there when we left about eight hours ago.”

  “Alright,” she said, and seemed to be thinking of options. She rose out of her chair and walked behind it. Steven observed her; he liked how she seemed to think about what she was going to say before she said it.

  “Well,” she said, “I can guess where your son is at. My friend Winn could explain it better, he’s always working on St. Thomas stuff. We’ll go see him in a bit.” More thinking. “You say you rented rooms at the same motel?”

  “Yes,” Roy said. “Almost next door. So it does have something to do with St. Thomas?”

  “Probably,” she said, her head down, thinking. Then she raised her head. “You should move him, physically, to your room,” she said definitively. “A few hundred feet isn’t going to make any difference if what I think is happening is what’s really happening.”

  “And what do you think is happening?” Steven asked.

  “I’ll let Winn explain it,” she said. “You’ll have questions I won’t be able to answer, he’ll be able to.”

  “Michael said moving him could kill him,” Roy said.

  “I think that’s bullshit,” Deem said. “You should move him to eliminate the risk of physical harm. Get that part under control. With him in your room you can watch over him at least.”

  “Alright, so we’ll meet with your friend,” Steven said. “You seem to k
now a lot for your age.”

  “Thanks,” she said. “I’ve been working this area for ten years almost, ever since my dad showed me how. He died a couple years ago. Leukemia. It’s an epidemic in this area.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” Steven said. “Lots of people dying from leukemia around here?”

  “Downwinders,” she said. “From the nuclear testing in Nevada. Above ground tests in the fifties and sixties, underground tests in the seventies, but they vented all the radiation out, so they might as well have been above ground. It all blew over us and southern Utah before it dissipated and blew over the rest of the country. The most common result was the increase in cancer, leukemia especially. I’ve lost count of how many leukemia funerals I’ve been to. But it changed things here, in other ways. It completely fucked with the River. That’s something you should know, while you’re here. The things that are in the River aren’t normal, like other places. They’ve mutated because of the fallout. It’s funny, as a kid I thought what was going on here was normal, because I grew up with it. Then I visited California and I saw what normal really meant. Much more predictable stuff away from here. Here, everything’s abnormal.”

  “Abnormal like what?” Roy asked.

  “You’re probably used to normal ghosts, up in Seattle,” she said. “Well, here in the area where the fallout was the most concentrated, some of them have mutated. They can change when they get angry, or recognize someone is in the River. Winn calls them zombie-ghosts, because they transform. They become corporeal, and they attack you, literally try to rip you apart.”

  “Christ,” Steven said.

  “Yeah,” Deem said, “and you can’t just shoot them in the head. They’re still ghosts.”

  “How do you deal with them?” Steven asked.

  “Winn came up with a kind of gun that disrupts the electro-magnetic field around them,” she said. “They revert back to being a ghost and then fade. Doesn’t kill them because you can’t kill them. But they’re gone for a while, until they get their energy back.”

  “Winn sounds resourceful,” Steven said.

  “Oh, he is,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Definitely.”

  “What’s his story?” Roy asked. “Is he an expert?”

  “I think he’s the smartest gifted around here,” she said, “at least of the ones I know. You either like him or you hate him.”

  “You must like him,” Steven said.

  “Only because I figured him out,” she said. “And I use him as much as he tries to use me. He’s too smart to ignore, in my opinion.”

  Steven thought there must be something about Winn Deem wasn’t telling them. “Sounds like a lot of drama,” he said, hoping she’d say more.

  “He’s very charismatic,” she said, “but he can be a little too charismatic, if you know what I mean,” she said, tapping the side of her head.

  “Do we really want to involve him?” Roy asked. “Sounds like a handful.”

  “Oh yeah,” she said, “you want to involve him. He’s the best at it. Just be prepared to be offended at some point.”

  “Alright,” Steven said. “What about your mom? She doesn’t approve, I take it?”

  “Yeah,” Deem said. “Normally she’d come out and visit, but she’s avoiding coming out here. She knows we’re talking about gifted stuff. She’s not into it.”

  “She knew your father was gifted?” Steven asked.

  “She must have,” Deem said, “but she excels at ignoring things she doesn’t want to believe are true.”

  “She doesn’t try to stop you?” Steven said, thinking of how his own mother had shielded him from Roy for years.

  “Oh, she tries. But I’ve been developing my gift for ten years now, and I’m not gonna stop. The church is a big deal to her. Funny, it was to my dad, too, but he somehow found a way to do both. Don’t know how he did that. I can’t stand church.”

  “Me either,” Steven and Roy said in unison. They all smiled.

  “Let me give Winn a call, make sure he’s home,” Deem said, and stepped back into the house.

  “Seems like a smart young girl,” Roy said.

  “At first I wasn’t so sure,” Steven said. “I mean, high school? So what is she, eighteen, nineteen? Most girls her age are off at college or looking to get married.”

  “She’s got more experience than you, remember that,” Roy said. “And she seems to have a handle on what’s going on down here. This stuff about downwinders comes as a surprise to me. I had no idea there were places in the River where things were different than what we experience up in Seattle. I guess it makes sense. Radiation fucks with humans, so why wouldn’t it fuck with their ghosts, too?”

  “I wonder what else is different down here,” Steven said. “I got the feeling it wasn’t just ghosts.”

  “We might have to find out as we go,” Roy said.

  Deem walked back onto the patio and turned off the switch that controlled the misting. “He’s not answering, but I left him a message. Might be tomorrow before we can talk to him.”

  “Could we just stop by his place?” Steven asked.

  “Nope,” she said, “not unless you want to interrupt him, and I’ve learned it’s best not to do that.”

  “This is pretty important,” Steven said. “I don’t mind interrupting him.”

  “Uh, well,” she said, “he’ll mind, trust me. The only reason he wouldn’t pick up my call is if he’s in the middle of fucking someone. The only thing more important to him than St. Thomas is sex. Trust me.”

  “Alright,” Steven said, wondering again if he really wanted to involve this Winn character.

  “Let’s go move your son,” Deem said. “I’d like to see how the land lies.”

  They all walked back into the house. Steven and Roy thanked Margie for dinner. Deem slipped her boots back on, and told them she’d follow them to Overton in her pickup truck.

  They parked at the motel in Overton, and Steven led Deem to Jason’s room. They knocked, but there was no answer. They tried Michael’s door, but he didn’t answer either.

  “Look, the window’s open,” Roy said, pointing to a sliding window on Jason’s room.

  “I’ll push it open and slide in,” Deem said, “and let you both in.”

  She pushed the window aside, and it stopped at about eight inches. She was able to wiggle through the opening and slip inside.

  “Good thing she was along,” Roy said after her legs disappeared through the window. “Neither you nor I would have fit through that opening.”

  After a moment Deem had the door open, and Steven and Roy walked inside.

  Deem moved to the bed and examined Jason, lifting his eyelids. “Yeah,” she said, “I’ve seen this before. You can move him to your room, that’s not far enough away to be a risk.”

  “Far enough away from what?” Steven asked.

  “From St. Thomas,” Deem said.

  “So you think that’s where he’s at?” Steven asked. “A ghost town? It’s just foundations sticking up out of the dry lakebed.”

  “It’ll be easier to explain when we go out there,” she said, “later, with Winn. He’ll also be able to tell you for sure if St. Thomas is really where Jason is at. Come on, I’ll take his legs if one of you can grab the other end.”

  “It’s OK,” Steven said, reaching under Jason and lifting him up himself. “I’ll carry him.” As he felt Jason’s weight, a wave of fatherly protection washed over him, and he felt a little like crying. He loved his son, and he hadn’t carried him like this in fifteen years. Now he needs to be carried because of what I’ve done, he thought. Steven moved him out of the motel room and the short distance down to their rooms. Roy opened the door to his room and let Steven walk through. Steven carried Jason through the adjoining doorway and laid him down on one of the twin beds in his room.

  “There,” Deem said, following them. “Now at least you can keep an eye on him.”

  Roy sat on Steven’s bed, and pulled his blindfold fr
om his pocket.

  “You want to see if you can figure out what’s happening with him?” Steven asked.

  “Exactly,” Roy said.

  Steven stepped behind Roy and tied the blindfold around his head. The blindfold was Roy’s preferred way to trance; it helped him concentrate. Steven watched Roy while he was in the trance, to make sure he stayed safe and didn’t get up and wander into something dangerous.

  Roy was quiet for a few minutes, but then he removed the blindfold and stood.

  “I can’t detect anything,” Roy said. “It’s not a normal trance, it’s some kind of altered state. Probably why moving him too far might be dangerous.”

  Deem’s phone rang and she pulled it from her pocket. “It’s Winn,” she said, observing the phone before answering it. “Are you done with him or her?” she said into the phone. “We have something important here. Two friends from Seattle, their son might be at St. Thomas.”

  She listened to Winn on the other end of the phone, then replied, “Alright, we’re on our way.”

  She slipped the phone back into her pocket. “Let’s go, he’s available now.”

  “No reason to think Jason won’t be safe here, right?” Steven asked.

  “Safer than over there where it was hard to get to him,” Deem said, “but these rooms aren’t very secure. If Michael wants to break in and get at him, he will.”

  “Alright,” Steven said. “We’ll just have to take the chance.”

  Chapter Five

  They followed Deem as she drove her truck back up Highway 169 out of Overton, and crossed the interstate into the tiny town of Moapa. Houses were scattered here and there, but Deem kept on driving until they reached the far northern end of town. She pulled up to an old airstream trailer. A Jeep Cherokee was parked outside, covered in mud. There were two lawn chairs sitting outside next to a wooden cable spindle that had been turned over to become a table. On the table was a large ashtray that was slowly having its contents blown all over the yard.