by Lyla Payne
The ghost frowns, then wags her finger at me the way she did the first night we met and she was warning me away from that snake. “Can’t make promises like that. No guarantees about life and death, you know that. I can break the curse. The boy’s destiny will change, but the rest is up to him. And you.”
“And Amelia.”
She doesn’t comment, just glances back out over the water. When she returns her gaze to me it lands like a physical blow. Power crawls out of her, dark and alive, pulsing as if it’s breathing. “I do something for you. You do something for me.”
“What? What do I have to do if you break the curse?” I hold my breath, wanting to cry. Feeling like one of those dumb little princesses in the Disney movies who’s about to make a deal that every adult in the audience knows is a horrible idea. They always do it, anyway.
Why?
For love. Why else?
“The people who owned this land said they owned me. They didn’t. They stole me from my family—my free family—up in New York. Not themselves, you understand, and they didn’t even realize right off. But black children born on plantations didn’t talk the way I did. They didn’t read or write. The Draytons pretended not to know where I came from but they knew. Do you know why?”
“They needed you.” I sort of guess, sort of know, that’s the answer.
“They feared me. And what better way to control a fear than to keep it chained up in your house?” She spits out the words, as though they taste bad in her mouth. The dark power clouding around her grows. Thickens and roils.
Daria hasn’t said a word. Her eyes are huge and she’s stepped so close to me that our arms press together. My whole body trembles, terror sunk into my very core, but there’s something more. That dread that’s been growing in my middle, putting down roots that have curled into my feet, throbs.
The Draytons. She hates them.
I want to run. I should run away from here and never look back. Keep trying on my own to figure out how to save Jack, to help Amelia. To figure out how to fight a curse that’s been getting stronger for two hundred years.
Right. Because that’s going to happen.
I stay.
“One curse for another. That’s what I want from you.”
“I don’t understand,” I stammer.
The voice gets quieter, but stronger. Sure. “I’ll help you break the curse that’s going to keep killing the male heirs of Calico Jack Rackham, including the one in your cousin’s belly. You agree to help me set a new curse, one that will punish the family that stole me from mine once and for all.”
THANK YOU!
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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
You might think that by a fifteenth or sixteenth (omg I’ve lost count and am too lazy to look it up!) I would have thanked everyone there is to thank or just cut and paste these things, but you would be wrong! I never ceases to amaze me how different the process is for each book, front to back, and even when I’m thanking some of the same people they have each grown with me and my projects to the point where I’m no longer sure any of this would be possible if I lost a single one of them.
Eisley Jacobs and Iona Nicole, you continue to not only give me beautiful covers but support in a hundred different ways by delivering graphic or website genius at a moment’s notice.
Danielle Poiesz - if I’ve lost count of how many books I’ve published, that means I’ve lost count of how many books we’ve worked on together because it’s been nearly all of them. There’s nearly no one I would trust so implicitly with my characters, ideas, stories, and occasionally, my sanity. I am so thankful not only for your sound professional advice, but that we’ve become friends within this crazy process.
Shannon Page, thank you for stepping in and copyediting these crazy books. You know how to roll with the punches, and that’s all a writer can ask for these days.
I’ve come to realize that proofreading is one of the hardest things to get right, and that no matter how many eyeballs go on a manuscript, there are things that slip through the cracks. The team I’ve pulled together have the best eyeballs in the business, which means less distractions for the reader, and for that, I’m grateful. Thanks to Mary Ziegenhorn, Cheryl Heinrich, Diane Thede, and Diane Cleary for cleaning these up for me.
There are certain people who might not think they have much to do with this specific book, but without whom my life would be such an unholy mess that creating anything except rocking motions in the corner wouldn’t be possible. In no particular order—Denise Grover Swank, LeighAnn Kopans, Amalia Dillon, on the writing side, along with my wonderfully patient and supportive agent, Kathleen Rushall—you save me. Then there’s my family, blood and not (that includes you, Julia, Jenna, Ryan, and Emma), who put up with my nonsense and make me feel like there’s no one they would rather me be than just me. Andrea Sola, who has likely secured sainthood after nearly thirty years of friendship with me and Paul, a more patient and loving and steady love than I could have ever hoped to find—I love you both.
I love you all.
And I love you, dear readers, whose reviews and tweets and mentions and emails do more than brighten my day. They make it easy to sit down in front of the keyboard and do what I love to do—write stories—with the confidence that there are people out there who are dying to read them.
Also by LYLA PAYNE
WHITMAN UNIVERSITY
Broken at Love
By Referral Only
Be My Downfall
Staying On Top
Living the Dream
Going for Broke (published in Fifty First Times: A New Adult Anthology)
LOWCOUNTRY MYSTERIES
Not Quite Dead
Not Quite Cold
Not Quite True
Quite Curious
Not Quite Clear (October 27th, 2015)
Mistletoe & Mr. Right
Sleigh Bells & Second Chances (October 6, 2015)
SECRETS DON’T MAKE FRIENDS
Secrets Don’t Make Friends (November, 2015)
Young Adult Novels Written as TRISHA LEIGH
THE LAST YEAR
Whispers in Autumn
Winter Omens
Betrayals in Spring
Summer Ruins
THE CAVY FILES
Gypsy
Alliance
Buried (January, 2016)
THE HISTORIANS
Return Once More (September 29th, 2015)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lyla Payne has been publishing New Adult romance novels for a little over a year, starting with Broken at Love and continuing with the rest of the Whitman University series. She loves telling stories, discovering the little reasons people fall in love, and uncovering hidden truths in the world around us – past and present. In her spare time she cuddles her two dogs, pretends to enjoy exercising so that she can eat as much Chipotle as she wants, and harbors a deep and abiding hope that Zac Efron likes older women. She loves reading, of course, along with movies, traveling, and Irish whiskey. Lyla’s hard at work, ALWAYS, and hopes to bring you more Whitman University antics and at least one more Lowcountry ghost tale before the end of the year.
If you want to know more, please visit her at http://lylapayne.com
If you’re a fan of Young Adult fiction—scie
nce fiction or otherwise—please check out her work that’s published under the name Trisha Leigh. http://trishaleigh.com
