At eighteen Lydia, "Sister Phoebe", begins reading palms, a trade learned from her dying mother. Jake Butcher stops, seeking insight into his future. An unpolished Sister Phoebe reads the debaucherous past and future found in Jake's hand.
        Butcher swears revenge. He instructs a loyal employee to begin dating Sister Phoebe, hook her on drugs, and then sell her into white slavery. Within a year Sister Phoebe is disowned by her family, church and the community, a lost soul searching for another crack high.
        Years later Sister Phoebe escapes the clutches of Butcher, flees to South Georgia, and slips the imprisonment of drugs. Worried that Butcher will catch up with her, Lydia moves to Sacramento, living with a seer aunt, and returning to palmistry.
        Jake Butcher, attending a pharmacy convention in Sacramento, is drawn to a sign advertising a fortune-teller in the Historic District. Impulsively Jake enters, hoping to gain some insight into his gnawing feeling that his wile is unfaithful.
        Sister Phoebe recognizes Butcher's palm from twenty-three years earlier. Her uncanny reading leaves Butcher with a number of questions. Lydia wrestles with her moral dilemma: Is it payback time for all of her lost years?: or should she remain trusting in her faith and not take revenge? She compromises her position, urging Butcher to return the following day.
        At Jake's second reading, Sister Phoebe leaves a number of issues open to his active imagination. She warns Butcher the news from his home will be devastating and offers to protect him for a fee. Jake doesn't take her seriously, but soon finds that years of reprehensible behavior are catching up with him.
       PRESAGE, a tale that spans the country and two decades, exposes the reader to the compassion, lessons of faith, and humor of Addison Thomas.