Soul Drifter (Divinely Touched Book 1)

by Dyan Brown

  Soul Drifter

  The Divinely Touched Series

  Dyan Brown

  Soul Drifter

  Book One in the Divinely Touched Series

  Copyright © 2019 Dyan Brown

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Synopsis

  Samantha Clark has felt like the odd ball out ever since her sister’s death. Now, three years later, her uncle reveals to her that their family has a secret that is thousands of years old—they are Soul Drifters.

  Soul Drifters are one of five Divinely Touched families selected by God to protect and further mankind’s evolution. When her sister was killed in a car accident, the power to Drift transferred into Samantha—something that hasn’t happened for nearly six hundred years.

  Just as she was looking forward to her own piece of normal by moving to Oklahoma, her new roommate’s brother, Grayson, sweeps her off her feet. Not long after, Cedrick, an angel, tells her she has been chosen to lead a crusade against the Harvested Guild—a group of humans trained to eliminate The Divinely Touched, which will shift the delicate balance between good and evil.

  Keeping secrets from the man she loves and ignoring the wishes of her guide, Samantha trains to overthrow those who are out to eliminate her kind. Fated to find and lead an army against the imminent day of reckoning, she will defend mankind, but at what cost to her and those she cares about? Is the possibility of losing another person she loves worth risking their lives in the process?

  Contents

  Synopsis

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Epilogue

  Thanks for Reading!

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  To my husband, the most amazing man I’ve ever known. You have made my world grow in dimensions I didn’t think would exist for myself. Thank you for believing in me, even when I did not.

  To my mother and my sisters by blood:

  Annette, Aimee and Donna: Remember, only bitches get flowers.

  To my sisters by bond:

  Crissie, Cynthia, Jaime, Jennifer, Joslyn, Kelsey, Kristie, Laura, Paula, Rene, Sahra, Stephanie, Valerie, and Vickie. Thank you for the laughs, the lessons, the humility, and the love.

  Prologue

  LATE OCTOBER, THREE YEARS AGO

  In my last class of the week, Ms. Smithers rhapsodizes about how much we will love the final assigned book of the semester—To Kill A Mockingbird—when a rapid knock at the door precedes an office aide, who enters without hesitation. Hurrying to Ms. Smithers, the aide hands her a note, then leans over and whispers something in her ear. My favorite teacher’s eyes widen, then flicker to me.

  Oh, crap. What now? I don’t remember doing anything wrong, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t inadvertently. That shit always happens to me. Ugh.

  “Sam, your parents are in the office to pick you up,” she says a little too warmly. “Please pack your things to take with you. Ms. Franks will escort you.” All she’s missing is a ‘dear’ on the end of it to complete my dawning uneasiness.

  Something is wrong. Ms. Smithers has always been one of the sweetest teachers, but there’s too much sympathy in her tone. My thoughts immediately turn to my great aunt, who’s had Alzheimer’s for several years now. As I gather my things, I glance around, only half meeting the twenty or so pairs eyes calculating my every movement.

  How nice for Ms. Smithers to point me out, I think sarcastically. Way to make me feel like a leper. Throwing my backpack over a shoulder and tucking a wayward tendril of hair behind my right ear, I dutifully follow a silent Ms. Franks to the front office.

  My parents stand in the narrow pathway beside the chest-high front desk in the administration office. Dad leans against the desk, and Mom rests against his chest, her head on his shoulder, his arms around her. She seems to be holding back tears, one of Dad’s handkerchiefs clenched in her fist, but her face is dry. When Dad whispers something close to her ear, her head bobs in wordless response.

  My gut wrenches. This is not about Great Aunt Margret. After all the time my parents have taken to prepare my sister and me about our aunt’s anticipated death, I instinctively know that’s not what has brought them here. This—whatever it is—is much worse.

  When Dad spots me, he nudges Mom. The few feet between us quickly disappear, and they cocoon me in their arms.

  “Mom? Dad? What’s going on? You’re scaring me!” I pull back a few inches, but I don’t leave the warmth of their double hug. I focus on Dad, knowing he’ll be the one to explain things. Dad’s always been honest and direct with us kids, saying he hoped we’d do the same with him in return.

  “Honey,” my dad starts, “Sahra is in the hospital. She was in a car accident, and it doesn’t look good.” He pauses. “She planned to meet up with friends after her last class, but somehow she lost control of the car and drove off the road.” There’s an obvious lump in his throat, but he continues. “They aren’t telling us much right now. We need to go. Your uncle and Jason are meeting us there. They started heading this way as soon as they heard.”

  My pulse quickens at the thought that Sahra’s condition’s bad enough for Uncle Carl to come to town. I look from my dad to my mom, hoping for some signal not to believe him. There was nothing but worry in my mother’s eyes.

  “She’s going to be all right, isn’t she?” My tone rises with each word as I try to force hope into my voice, but even I don’t believe it.

  My mom cups my cheek in a shaking hand, rubbing her thumb over my cheekbone. Tears fill my eyes but don’t escape, blurring the image of the normally composed woman before me. Her mouth opens and closes a few times. Finally, her shuddering breathing deflates in a heavy exhale. Speechless, she shakes her head and shrugs, the two answers seeming to war with each other.

  No, this isn’t happening, my mind cries. Tears spill over, running down my cheeks. My own breathing grows more rapid, but it feels as if all the air has left the world. My body goes numb as reality attempts to settle over me, but I fight against it. Sahra…

  My dad tightens his grip on my shoulders, audibly exhaling. “We don’t know a whole lot right now. It doesn’t look good, but let’s try to stay hopeful—after all, science has proven positive thoughts are helpful. Come on, we need to get going.”

  Mom pulls me in for a final squeeze, gently kissing my forehead as she’s done countle
ss times before. The action says ‘I love you’ just as plainly as if she’d said it aloud. “Dad’s right,” she says, finding her voice. “Let’s go see Sahra. She needs to feel us around her. Before we get there, I need you to prepare yourself, Sammy. She probably won’t look like herself.”

  I process this information, along with the horrible images of what ‘could be’ floating through my head of how my beautiful older sister looks. If I imagine the worst-case scenario, then maybe I can handle the reality better since I already expect the worst. I breathe deeply and nod, finally feeling partially prepared for what I’m about to face. “All right, let’s go.”

  I was so wrong.

  1

  The one who watches over you will not sleep.

  –Psalms 121.12

  THREE YEARS LATER

  ‘Rest and you’ll feel better’ is the biggest load of bullshit I have ever heard. Sleep is the worst part of my life. There’s no resting while I my sleep. There is no serenity. There is no peace. There hasn’t been for years.

  The strange and familiar sensation grows, blooming inside my head. It’s a tingling that starts in my frontal cortex. At first, it’s small, but then it quickly spreads, radiating down my neck, into my arms, and then washing over my lungs. It’s so strong it feels as if I’m being crushed. When it hits my stomach, it churns within my body, feeling as if it’s tossing me upside down in midair. The sensation swells until it seems as if something is pulling me away from my bed, my room, my house, and up into a darkened void.

  When the crushing, dizzying feeling passes, I stand, still deaf and blind. Thankfully, sparks shoot across my eyes as light begins to filter through. Walls and a door, dimly lit by a far-off glow, come into view.

  Blinking frantically, I scan the tiny place—an apartment, if I had to guess. It seems nice enough, although cheaply decorated. Plush, mismatched sofas surround a coffee table in the center of a room with cream-colored walls. Side tables on alternating ends of the couches hold lamps, though only one glows with a soft light. The furnishings make the space feel warm and homey.

  Better able to focus now, I spot a couple off to the side. It’s a man and a woman—the former in a denim work shirt and khakis, the latter in an old T-shirt paired with sleep pants. It’s apparent they’re in the middle of an argument, but I can’t hear their words. They haven’t noticed I’m here, and I’ve never seen them before. Why aren’t they turning toward me, demanding to know how and why I’m in their home? Sound unexpectedly blasts me, loud as a sonic boom.

  “What the hell do you do all day, you lazy bitch?” His face contorts with his words, dark brown eyes narrowed in unjust fury. The hard lines of labor are carved deeply into his leathery, tanned skin, making him appear older than he probably is compared to the woman in front of him.

  “Jack, please. No…”

  Before I can even register what he intends to do, he backhands her across the side of the head, cutting her aching plea off. The blow knocks her backward, her calves slamming into the end table and upsetting her balance. Her white-blonde hair spills around her as she lands in a crumpled heap on the other side of the table, legs in the air. It happens so fast that all I can do is reach a useless hand out—too late—with a yelp of horror.

  Letting out a whimper, she scrambles up to huddle against the front of the couch while he continues his rant. “How do you think we can afford this? Stupid twit!” He chucks what looks like an older-model iPod against the wall, splintering it into a remarkable number of tiny pieces. “What the hell am I supposed to do with that piece of shit? Download music on it with our imaginary computer and nonexistent internet? Oh, Happy Mother-Fucking Anniversary to me! Just what I wanted—shit I can’t use.”

  Jack makes short work of crossing the room with long strides, coming closer to me. Scrambling to get out of his way, fear pumping adrenaline through my bloodstream, I inhale a sharp breath. A whiff of hard liquor registers past my terror. It’s different from the scent of beer—almost acidic—and the fumes sting my nose. Stale cigarette smoke also clings to him, triggering my gag reflex.

  Defensively, I lift my hands as if to protect myself, but the man—Jack—doesn’t even acknowledge me. He just continues stalking the room while I’m frozen in the corner. I try to meld into the wall, body paralyzed by fear.

  “You do this every time! Why do you always have to ruin shit?”

  I assume he’s directing the question at the woman, though his eyes dart to everything except her. The combination makes the angry asshole seem manic.

  I want so badly to go to the woman and hold her hand—to reassure her that everything will be all right. I need to pull her off the floor and out the door, to get her as far away from the ranting psycho as possible. There’s a twisting knot in my gut that’s growing and burning, a manifestation of a primal instinct screaming at me to run, but I can’t move.

  Jack rakes a frustrated hand through his stringy, unwashed hair before whirling around and storming back toward her. This time when he raises his hand, I’m able to find my voice. I yell, “Hey,” in an effort to distract him while trying—and failing—to suppress my panic. My voice cracks with all the confidence of a mouse confronting a lion, but he doesn’t seem to hear me. His fist cracks down onto the table right in front of the woman, who jumps with a shrill scream.

  Momentary relief that it hadn’t been her flesh dissolves when a whimpering sound—one coming from a different direction than the arguing couple—registers. Straightening to peer over the banister and up the stairs, I spot a pink-pajamaed form with a mess of curly blonde hair tucked into the corner of the landing. Tiny hands cover her ears, her knobby knees drawn tightly to her chest. Her forehead is on her knees, but I’d bet she has her eyes firmly shut to block out the scene below.

  Oh my God… a little girl!

  I carefully edge my way along the wall, making my way to the base of the stairs. As I start my climb, the woman—sweet Jesus, the mother—mutters something about saving for months and a pawnshop. I put two and two together as I make it to the top and reach the little girl, my heart pounding in my chest.

  “Oh, sweetheart, I’m so sorry,” I murmur. “Please don’t cry.” I kneel beside her. To my surprise, she jerks her head up, tear-filled brown eyes huge as she takes me in. She rubs her tears away with the heels of her little hands. She’s way too thin, is my first passing thought, but I brush it away when tentative hope blossoms on the little girl’s innocent face.

  “Are you my angel?” she whispers.

  I blink. She’s so astoundingly serious I almost start to believe this isn’t a dream at all. But no, this is most definitely a nightmare. It isn’t actually happening. Surely I’ll wake up soon. Please, let me wake up soon.

  “I’m Samantha,” I whisper, not knowing how else to respond.

  “Tessa,” she mumbles in return.

  I open my mouth to ask her if she knows why we’re here, together, in my nightmare but realize the futility before the words escape. As my mouth snaps shut, Jack goes from bellowing to a raging fit. He hurls objects at the door at the base of the stairs, shrapnel from the smashed objects flying everywhere in a torrent of broken glass and wood splinters.

  I don’t know why I hadn’t noticed the door before. It has to be the front one. I must have passed right by it earlier. The mom starts to scream, and Tessa slams her hands back over her ears. She presses them down tightly, her tiny body beginning to shake.

  Fear—and something else I can’t name—rolls in the pit of my stomach again. I throw my arms around Tessa to shield her from flying debris and the whole situation below. Surprising me once more, she manages to wiggle her arms around me under my tight grip, snuggling her head into my collarbone. In what I hope is a reassuring gesture, I smooth my hand over her back, wincing when I feel the too-pronounced vertebrae of her spine. She must be four or five years old, but there’s no way she is the proper weight for a child of that age—not a healthy one, anyway.

  “It’s going to be all
right, Tessa. I’m going to stay with you. I won’t let anything happen to you,” I murmur repeatedly, trying to comfort her as best I can.

  Dreams are so fucked up. If she can see and hear me, then why can’t her parents? Although I’m totally cool with that jack-ass—pun intended—not being able to see me. Wait… this is just a bad dream. I should be able to wake myself up—or at least change the situation to make the violence stop—right?

  Frowning in concentration, I try to think happy thoughts, try to make Tessa’s parents stop their argument, try to make the screaming stop, but nothing changes. I try to will myself to go anywhere else in Dreamville, but here I stay, with a child locked in my arms while the detritus of someone’s possessions bangs off the walls. I don’t know how to make this end. Tears prickle at my eyes at how powerless not being able to control my own thoughts makes me feel.

  “Stop, Jack, please!” Tessa’s mom is begging now, her words rushing out like a stampede. Absolute terror laces her words. Her voice trembles, cracking and hysterical. “No, please. I’m begging you. Put the bat down. Please, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I thought you could use it for a radio in your truck. I’m sorry, Jack. Baby, I wasn’t thinking. Please, baby, please just put… Jesus, no, please, no, no, nooo!”