Lightning Strikes Twice
Page 15
Vicky spoke, “You are stronger than you will ever know, love. Missy is over the moon at having full autonomy at the gallery. I’m as excited about this as Mia, not only do I get to see all the works of the masters, but I get to be married to one of those masters as we tour.” She gave a patent pending hungry Vicky grin at me.
I looked to my Abbey and Samantha. “Girls, I don’t want to impose, but we were hoping you could help house sit for us, keep the estate running while we’re gone. Candi will be coming over after we leave on New Years. She will run the financial aspects of the estate and the Gallery while we are gone. Vicky will have our accounts and investments merged by then. We’d appreciate if you could get her situated in Vicky’s old room and give her a hand with Brandon too since Leighton won’t be joining them for a couple months.”
I looked around at our family and June. June always seemed to be around for important points in everyone’s lives, she sort of had a knack for that. You really can’t define that woman, she was just as much family as everyone else surrounding us in the restaurant, like a third daughter to me.
Speaking of daughters, Abbey had shared with me that her bedroom at her new house didn’t feel right without the stars, and she had me paint the familiar stars on their ceiling. I smiled fondly at her.
Then I took a deep breath and brought up the second announcement. “Vicky and I have been talking, she missed Abbey growing up though she viewed it from afar. We’ve decided that we want another child.”
I cringed and looked around, but all there was were smiles. I thought our ages would be an issue, but apparently not to this group. I voiced it anyway, “Our only concern was how late in life we would have a child. But Vicky brought up the fact that there are millions of orphans in the United States alone. The older children, six years old and up have an increasingly diminishing chance of ever getting adopted. And I know that foster homes are no way to grow up. So when we return, we want to adopt one of those older children and give them a home with people who love them.”
Abbey’s eyes were twinkling, “I’m going to have a little brother or sister?” I nodded at my daughter, I was so very proud of her, she was and will always be my miracle.
Vicky grinned an evil grin and said, “Now if everyone would excuse us, I believe there is a hotel suite somewhere in this town reserved for Mrs. and Mrs. Davenport-Jacobs. We’ll see you all tomorrow night at my parent’s for Christmas.”
She grabbed my hands and our fingers just automatically laced, the way they should always be and dragged me out to the car. We hugged everyone goodbye and before I knew it, we were on the road toward the Empire Suites Hotel. I couldn’t drive fast enough as I smiled over at the object of my love, amazed at the woman that Vicky had become and the fact that she chose me, but only one thought was looping in my head.
“Damn, I need to get her out of that dress!”
Books in the Music of the Soul universe…
(All books are standalone and can be read in any order)
Music of the Soul
A Deafening Whisper
Dating Game
Karaoke Queen
Silent Bob
Five Feet or Less
Broken Song
Syncopated Rhythm
Progeny
Girl Next Door
Lightning Strikes Twice
Short Stories in the Music of the Soul universe…
Misadventures of Victoria Davenport: Operation Matchmaker
Books in the Valkyrie Chronicles series…
Return of the Asgard
Bloodlines
Folkvangr
Seventy Two Hours
Books in the Fracture series…
Divergence
Books in the Drakon series…
Awakening
Dragonfall
Sample Chapter from The Bridge: Trolls
Prologue
I squatted on the aircraft warning light on top of the bridge tower peering through the relentless rain, lightning casting stark shadows on the city, the brisk wind biting into the people bustling below. I didn’t mind, I never got cold anymore. I could feel the motion of the river as it passed far below, just as much a part of the bridge as the foundation of the structure itself, just as much a part of me. My pulse was thrumming in time with the cars passing over the deck of the bridge hundreds of feet below the lifeblood of the bridge, giving it strength, purpose.
The black storm clouds blotted out the sky, if it weren’t for the fact that I could feel it now, I wouldn’t have know when the sun finally set over the horizon. Weakening the gateway between the Under-Veil and the mortal world. But I felt it as a thrum of energy now. I dreaded this night above all others, not only did nightfall weaken the boundary, but it was All Hallows Eve. From what little I have learned in the short time I have be bound to my bridge, there are certain nights that the supernatural divider between the realms weakened even more. Allowing bigger and stronger creatures to force their way through.
The larger and more powerful the being that tried to cross over was, the more energy it sapped from them to attempt a crossing. They had to gather their power for weeks or years, and in a couple cases, centuries to make an attempt. That’s why Halloween was the their preferred night as the boundary was twice as weak as even a new moon, when the moon was at its darkest.
Most beings that crossed over to the mortal realm at night were fairly innocuous and followed the rules set forth between the Triumvirate, the mortal supernatural council, and the Under-Veil creatures. They paid their tolls, a gold coin that magically bound them to do no harm to mortals until they returned through the boundary before sunrise. This restriction didn’t stop them from the occasional mischief and or petty crimes.
But there were the darker beings like the ghouls, goblins, and wraiths who did not abide by the accords. Their main reason for crossing over was to cause mayhem and chaos, to bring down suffering and corruption upon the mortals they despised. To feast upon their fear and death. That’s where I come in.
My eyes scanned the Kentucky end of the bridge, preparing for my patrol of the gateway at that end of the bridge. I glanced back at the lights of Cincinnati that were obscured by the heavy downpour. Then my eyes snapped back when I felt something coming, something big. The blood drained from my face as I realized I had felt this darkness and foreboding before. It was him! He was here. I shook the rain out of my dark locks and pulled the black hood of my coat up over me, obscuring my face, and sprang off of the strobing red light, landing lightly on the roof of the tower, I ran toward the edge of the roof, my footsteps echoed in harmony with the thrumming from the unsuspecting people below, going about their business. Then I dove over the edge with stone cold determination in my heart as I plummeted toward the ground.
Most mortals could not perceive the battle that went on at the bridge nightly, we called those people ‘straights’. Thier eyes were veiled to the supernatural and other-worldly beings. They saw only the human disguises they wrapped themselves in. This ignorance made them easy prey fro those who would corrupt, those like the being crossing over now.
I gritted my teeth. Not here, not at my bridge.
The irony of that struck me, as I never wanted this, never wanted the responsibility, never wanted this nightly fight against the corruption and evil from the nether side. But here, exactly a year to the night later, there was no place I would rather be. I loved my city, and this was my bridge. My hands snagged a suspender cable after I fell half way to the deck and I whipped around and swung back up with my momentum in a high arc. I felt my body absorbing the material when the skin of my hands came in contact with it, the mass, properties, and the unyielding strength of the cable. I landed on the main cable, the stranded sheathed steel, bigger around than my body, as I slid down it’s length, sparks shooting from the contact of my now metallic legs as I slid along the casing at breakneck speeds. The lightning casting my shadow starkly on the bridge below for a flickering instant. I leapt off of it at the
low point and flipped through the air to land on the deck with a resounding crunch. Cratering the concrete deck and kicking up a huge dust cloud of pulverized stone.
My body started absorbing the properties of the deck, becoming a living rock statue as I healed the damage I had wrought on my bridge with a bit of my will. I stepped up to the deck as the damage filled in.
When the driving rain beat away the dust, an imposing, foreboding specter stepped through the debris as lightning lit the sky again, illuminating the being. I stared at the demon, the harbinger of death itself, and set myself in determination. The lightning flickered his visage between his true form and his human disguise. I spoke, my voice grating like gravel across concrete, “None may pass on my bridge with ill intent. Either pay the toll, bind yourself to no harm, or face my wrath. I am Evangeline, troll of this bridge!”
The greater wraith smiled in a hideous grin that literally went from ear to ear on it’s sickening dark rotting face, its inhuman smile showing long teeth dripping with saliva. Then it screeched its defiance in a scream that chilled me to my bones. My god, how did I think I could defeat this beast? I steadied myself and drew power from my stalwart friend, from the foundations of the bridge itself then I snarled in defiance as we ran at each other in a clash of violence and blood.
As the first blow landed a small portion of my mind wondered how had I got here. I thought back to that day a year ago that changed my life forever. I could see it like it was yesterday. So much had changed since then.