Spooky Manner

By Karen Dawson

Rising-star reporter Letha Benjamin had it all: beauty, brains, and a loving family. Everything was going right in her perfect life.
Then a false accusation and scandal left her career in shambles. Letha was left with only one choice to keep her career-now in a death-spiral-alive: paranormal investigator for a third-rate television station covering imaginary creatures. All hype or hoax.
Swallowing her journalistic pride, she teams up with a wisecracking cameraman to take on her first assignment, a haunted house. He hopes for thrills and chills while Letha just hopes she doesn’t look too silly.
But in her new world of the fake paranormal things can go from silly to downright dangerous in a heartbeat. A lesson the investigators are about to learn the hard way when “the ghost” turns its “haunting” on them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jun 19, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329223745

Book preview

Spooky Manner

SPOOKY MANNER

A LETHA BENJAMIN MYSTERY

BY

KAREN DAWSON

Copyright 2015 by Karen Dawson

Cover Design by Mary Campagna Findley

This is a work of fiction. All characters, places, and incidents are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, either living or dead, is completely coincidental.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

Prologue

Once upon a time, in a city much like any other, there was a high rise building that housed an organization like no other.

And that was a very fortunate thing.

Inside this building a door opened to the office of Mr. Warrant.

Sir, do you have a minute?

Of course, the older gentleman answered his subordinate. Did something interesting come up?

The neatly dressed man in his late twenties came forward and handed his superior a sheet of paper.

It could be.

The distinguished looking man took the paper, then leaned back in his leather executive chair and began to read. As he did so, the other man had to stop himself from sighing with envy. How he wished he could afford custom-made suits. However, he knew that as the mere deputy to Mr. Warrant he would have to raise several pay grades before even coming near to fulfilling that dream.

As he waited, he studied some framed photographs. Included were pictures of an older woman and children of various ages. Someone had a very nice family, he thought.

After a moment, Mr. Warrant handed the paper back to him, and asked, Letha Benjamin? You think it might come to something?

It’s the coincidence that I noticed. It may be nothing.

But it could be something, Mr. Warrant mused as he unconsciously smoothed back his neatly trimmed gray hair.

Finally he came to a decision.

I suggest you take this to Ms. Davenport. She’ll take care of you.

This was what Backer had wanted and expected, but knew he had to go through the proper channels. It was safer that way.

Thank you for your time.

Backer exited the office and walked down the hallway until he reached the large desk at the end of it. Ms. Davenport was seated behind it, inputting data into her computer efficiently. From the top of her short blond hair to the tips of her expensive Italian shoes, she had the unmistakable aura of cool efficiency.

The fact that she appeared to be a subordinate was ironic and meant absolutely nothing. The power she wielded, however, that meant everything.

Excuse me . . .

He stopped abruptly as she held up a finger. After she finished inputting her sentence, she turned to him, and straightened her perfectly pressed powder blue jacket. She then folded her hands on top of her desk and asked politely, How may I help you?

Once again, Backer held out the paper.

Mr. Warrant thought you might be interested in this.

Calmly she took it and glanced over it.

Letha Benjamin? Very poorly handled.

SPN was a difficult acquisition, and mistakes were made.

Even as Backer said this, he was fully aware that he was repeating old news to her. Ms. Davenport already knew everything that went on within The Organization.

In response to his observation, Ms. Davenport gave him a brief look which only barely masked her disgust. That look made Backer thankful that the ‘mistakes’ involved hadn’t been made by him.

Mistakes? Indeed. Starting with Michael Webbings, the worst possible choice for the position of transition intermediary. One offhand comment at a party and he panics causing a media sensation, and a substandard resolution. If it can even be called a resolution. I have my doubts. So she landed at Crowning Point? Leo Jackson’s station?

That’s what I noticed. You think it might be a problem?

As you well know, Mr. Jackson is a continuing issue that doesn’t seem to resolve itself. It’s bothersome.

Did you note the last paragraph? Backer asked.

Yes, Andrew Walker. If I remember properly, and of course she did, he was involved in the Mercury Airwaves acquisition two years ago. Things didn’t end well for him, but he is very good at his job, from all reports. It’s a pity he didn’t fit the Business Model.

Neither did Letha Benjamin.

The perfectly made-up face of Ms. Davenport frowned slightly before she continued.

It would seem that Mr. Jackson has a troubling habit of collecting inconvenient strays.

A coincidence?

Ms. Davenport did not answer him, merely giving a slight shrug of her shoulders. After reading a few more lines of the paper in her hand she asked skeptically, The paranormal? Seriously?

They are popular shows on television right now.

True enough. Still it seems odd . . .

There was silence yet again except for the tapping of one of her manicured fingernails against the desktop.

Backer waited patiently, because as all who worked in The Organization knew, you tried to rush Ms. Davenport at your peril. Finally she asked matter-of fact tone, Were you wanting to open a file on the matter?

Mr. Warrant said you would take care of it.

Of course. Consider it taken care of.

Backer, clearly dismissed, turned and walked away, leaving the paper with her.

Ms. Davenport turned to the computer and saved the file she had been working on. After taking out a paper file folder, she removed the cover to an ancient manual typewriter. Placing a sheet of file labels into the roller, she positioned it and quickly typed a subject name. Removing the sheet she applied the label to the tab of the file folder, and the sheet of paper in the file.

It would soon be joined by many, many others.

Chapter 1

It was said that Fairfax Manor was conceived as an act of spite and completed in one of petty revenge.

The builder, George Fairfax, was renowned as a miser of unfathomable proportions. He spent his long life accumulating a vast fortune, after which he was determined to spend as little of it as decently possible.

Decency being a relative term.

His first wife, the gentle but meek Alice, had been forced to merely endure his financial meanness until the day of her death, thus ending an unremarkable and pitiful existence.

However, the second Mrs. Fairfax, a local beauty named Vanessa, was of a different caliber altogether. She had been raised to believe she was owed the finer things this life had to offer. So, to her way of thinking, her rich, much older husband was obliged to meet her expectations, little knowing that George expected his new wife to simply accept her circumstances as his thoroughly cowed first wife had done.

Such opposing viewpoints were bound to result in conflict, which soon came to pass resulting in an epic battle where the final victor was far from certain.

And it all centered on a house.

Mere months after their marriage, Vanessa demanded that George replace their modest dwelling with a grand structure as befitted his new bride.

George, true to his character, was stubbornly defiant against such lofty, and expensive, notions. The old miser held out for quite some time, but at last, to end his wife’s constant carping, he finally gave in.

On his own terms.

Terms which proved to be quite severe.

For instead of a dwelling of elegant refinement, George presented Poor Vanessa, as she came to be known, with a monstrosity of vulgar excess and poor design he dubbed Fairfax Manor. Then, in what all agreed to be a final act of spite, he died, leaving his fortune in a complicated trust allowing his furious wife the funds to maintain, but not change, the architectural atrocity he had created.

Even worse for Poor Vanessa, although Old George never actually lived in Fairfax Manor, most say that he took up residence there after his death and never left.

Since that time, the ghost of George Fairfax has made life a misery for all who dared to live in Fairfax Manor. Even to this day . . .

That’s quite a dramatic delivery, a soft female voice interrupted the tale. Maybe you should be in front of the camera instead of me.

Chapter 2

Drew Walker glanced over at his companion and couldn’t help but feel a little peeved. He was not conceited by any means, but with his full head of dark hair, warm brown eyes, fit physique and rugged good looks, he was used to a more sympathetic hearing from the opposite sex.

Then he met Letha Benjamin.

It had been a memorable meeting, on his part anyway. Simply put, his new reporter had the face of an angel and the body of a Greek goddess. She was currently trying to downplay those assets by wearing large framed glasses, casual attire and her long glorious thick blond hair pulled back in a ponytail.

He hated to break it to her, but the effort was a waste as it didn’t achieve its intended purpose. Besides he thought it was a strange choice of costume for an on-screen personality for a television show. Even an obscure one.

Drew,