1929
Maggie took a deep and shuddering breath as she straightened the tweed lapel of Clyde's Sunday best, closing the tortoiseshell buttons of his vest over the crisp white linen shirt.
The air in her lungs grew hot and painful, hitching in her body as it had each day since his death.
She still could not believe he was gone. Maggie felt like she was floating in a sea without a current and couldn't find where she belonged. Her heart hurt. She imagined all those broken pieces floating around inside her body, the sharpness tearing at the softness of her. Her soul abused and wanting.
Needing.
The coroner and morgue attendant stood stoically by as she did her useless things. None of her ministrations would bring him back from the water that had stolen his life.
But it had been the fight that had readied him for the perfect exit. He had been too injured to be a hero.
Heroes aren't made, Maggie thought, they're natural. He couldn't not be what he was. It had been one of the things that Maggie had loved so much about Clyde.
She allowed her eyes to linger over his hands that would remain forever abused and pulled a sob back into her throat while the Funeral Director, hanging in the periphery until that moment, stepped forward, giving her shoulder an awkward pat.
Maggie wanted to hop into the coffin with Clyde.
On that morbid note she extracted his pocket watch, the dull rolled gold of it glowing softly in the subdued lighting of the mortuary.
She slipped it into the vest pocket it belonged in.
But not before reading the inscription that lay etched upon its back: Your beloved, Maggie-girl.
Maggie allowed herself to be led away, one small hand covering her mouth as tears fell like hot rain, the other clutched over a belly that had not yet swollen with child.
EPILOGUE
Clyde rose from the earth like fragrant brown water, the ripples of which fell away as he came through in a languid push of warm energy that called to him.
Sung to him.
He looked around, his mind a slow-moving pond of memories and reality colliding together in a mixture of puzzle pieces that did not fit.
A young man with strange attire and unfashionably long hair stood before him and the pieces that had errantly floated but a moment before coalesced into perfect synchronicity and he knew who this one was.
A necromancer.
He also understood what he was: dead.
Clyde's next thought was of Maggie.
He swung his head, looking about him until his eyes made sense of his surroundings. He saw the year of birth and death on a grave maker that was only ten feet away.
2025, it read.
If that were the year, his Maggie was long gone.
Sadness seeped into the fog of his brain that had not thought in... decades.
But what of the babe?
All those thoughts slipped through his mind without sticking for when the boy spoke, all intellect and will bowed before the summons of him.
Clyde could feel personality within the constraints of power. All of it running off the boy like an errant tide.
Clyde was caught like a bottle in an ocean current of which he was not master.
He was slave to this one who stood before him, not yet an adult. From the looks of him, it was some time away.
Clyde answered without thinking, the word appearing in the frontal lobe of his brain automatically for his use, “Master,” he breathed out of a mouth that would not work.
The boy's eyes widened and he took a step back.
Clyde moved forward.
This is what he was now.
He desperately wished for what had been.
Or an echo thereof.
Bittersweet sadness lay hold of a soul resurrected from his place of rest.
What would wipe that stain away?
Could he live again?
Did he want to?
The man that he had been clawed to the surface and demanded recompense.
The zombie that he'd become obeyed the boy.
His objective would always be freedom.
What you wished for in life, followed a person in death.
THE END
Read on for the exciting first chapter or book four, Death Screams
Chapter 1-Death Screams
Book Four of the Death Series
by Tamara Rose Blodgett
Death Screams
Book Four of the Death Series
Copyright © 2011-2012 Tamara Rose Blodgett
http://tamararoseblodgett.blogspot.com/
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system without the prior written permission of the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
All rights are reserved.
Edited by Stephanie T. Lott
For My Other Mother:
You are the other mother I received,
The day I wed your son.
And I want to thank you Mom,
For the loving things you've done.
You've given me a gracious Man,
With whom I share my life,
You are his lovely Mother,
And I am his lucky Wife.
*
You raised in love a little boy,
And then gave me the Man.
~Anonymous
I love you~
CHAPTER 1
Jade
Agony.
Defeat.
Rage.
Indecision.
Jade trembled, her clasp once loose, now a murderous quaking that she couldn't shake. Sweat began to bead on her upper lip and she rolled the fullness of it into her teeth, biting just shy of pain, to relieve her mental pressure.
Nothing worked.
The Empath teacher, Megan Tulle said, “Come on Jade, concentrate. If you don't master this exercise, you'll never hone in on anything.”
Jade's brows furrowed, she was trying as hard as she could... but the emotion... the rawness of it, was a bath of filth. She just wanted to get away. She pressed, the details finally coming to her. A boy, her age... his... identity, she couldn't place him but he was familiar to her.
Finally she gave up. “I don't know who he is!” she said, exasperated.
Tulle smiled, squeezing her shoulder gently. “It'll come, you've just got to keep working on it. The negative impressions are quite difficult to manage.”
Yeah, Jade thought, shuddering.
She looked around at the rest of the class and saw various degrees of expressions. It would have been funny had she not just swept through the murky swamp of someone that was deeply disturbed. Jade rubbed her hands up and down her own arms and asked Ms. Tulle where that had come from... that hoodie she'd been touching.
“Same place we always get our stuff. Lost and found.” Tulle shrugged a blouse-encased shoulder, her sensible pumps tapping to the low music she played in the class. It was pretty lame, Jade thought, classical.
Jade deliberated. No, she needed to say something. “Ah... Miss Tulle?” she asked as Tulle began to sweep through the desks, checking on the other student's Clairvoyance exercises.
She turned, cocking a brow.
“He's bad, Miss Tulle
, really bad.”
She frowned, moving back through the rows of desks. “What do you mean? I touched the hoodie myself and knew the tone of it but didn't sense...” she shrugged.
Jade tried to articulate her unease, “It's not normal negative impressions. It's got... a touch of death.”
“Death Intent?”
Jade nodded. “Yes.”
“Are you sure? Because that's reportable and with you only a sophomore...?” she let the sentence trail off significantly and Jade's shoulders slumped in defeat. She wasn't sure if she wanted someone that maybe had a super-bad day, threw on a hoodie, then lost it at one of the six high schools in Kent to get nailed by the cops.
Especially Garcia and crew.
Jade's eyes dropped. She bit her lip again. She wasn't one hundred percent sure.
She met Tulle's eyes and shook her head. Tulle gave her steady eyes back. “Maybe we gave you too intense a sample this first time, Jade. We're aware that your skill set has expanded to clairvoyance and possible precog...” The “but” hung there between them and Tulle shrugged.
Jade reached out and touched Tulle, who immediately shied away. “Sorry,” Jade said. How could she forget the first rule of Empath class the prior year?
Never touch another Empath.
It was sorta like flashing your boobs in public. Jade stifled a laugh.
Tulle's eyes narrowed and Jade tried to contain herself. “What's so funny?”
“Nervous tic. I really like to laugh when things get serious,” Jade said, the ghost of a smile riding her full lips. That was definitely Caleb's influence, Jade knew.
It made her warm to her toes just thinking about him, distracting her dangerously from the conversation at hand. She felt a slight flush of heat on her face and hoped her dusky coloring was sufficient camouflage.
“Well, your thought process on this sample is serious, Jade,” Tulle was back to serious business again, studying Jade closely. “Some of the best Empaths in the state work closely with the police. If your clairvoyance is fine-tuned enough to pick up Death Intent then I suggest you start learning the difference. Now.”
With that, Tulle turned and threw the offending hoodie back in the sample tube marked: Clairvoyance Samples.
Jade sighed. It didn't matter that she might have clairvoyance in spades. She had been pegged as a level two Empath but was now showing what the committee of “they” coined as, “expanded and related abilities.” Unfortunately, when she felt violence in the samples she always had the same reaction.
Fear.
She'd lived with fear until her dad was semi-permanently gone from her life and she wasn't about to start embracing it now. Screw that noise. Caleb said she was too compassionate. She just thought she was too weak. Too scared to face someone that could be the very same flavor of attacker that she'd suffered in her childhood.
No repeats, thank you very much.
Speaking of Mr. Stud, she glanced at the pulse-clock on the wall and grabbed her backpack, nothing more than a sling, really. What did they have to carry but the required water bottle and pulse-pad? Hers was a gorgeous pack with the brand name emblazoned on the front in metallic hot pink. She knew it was an extravagance, but Caleb had seen her admiring it at the mall and snatched it up for her birthday last week and she'd been totally smitten with it.
Sweet sixteen.
Even she couldn't believe she was finally at that magical age. The verge of womanhood easing away the soft edges of childhood with insidious progression. She didn't mind, she was ready to be grown up. Ready to be independent and out on her own. Ready for emancipation from her dad. The restraining order could go into permanent effect once the paperwork went through. She so couldn't wait. Caleb felt the same. He'd wrangled his parents into helping so they could push it through. Aunt Andrea wasn't great at pushing, obviously. She'd let the last three restraining orders die out and need to be re-implemented. It'd been a huge hassle.
The bell rang for class dismissal and Jade walked through the Empath class door and saw Caleb before he saw her, his attention on Jonesy, per usual. She soaked in the sight of him, thinking she'd never get bored with Caleb. They'd been dating awhile now, gone through a ton of stuff together, and still, every day was new with him. She was thinking of how different he looked since they first got together a year and a half ago.
She saw how his thick chestnut hair fell forward to just brush the tops of impossibly long, soot-colored eyelashes as he stuffed his one hand in a pocket, the other elaborating some detail to Jonesy (who would forget it ten seconds later), the muscles of his forearm bulging from the movement.
Jade sighed, thinking that she was in lust. Not a terribly keen position to find herself in. Wasn't it the boy's job to chase her around because of her feminine wiles? Her lips curled into a smile. She thought she had that part down pat too. Caleb dug her, she reminded herself. As if on cue, he turned his head and those chocolate eyes pierced her. Pierced her heart, stealing her breath.
She moved forward, his eyes taking in her face, her body, everything, happiness and comfort a warmth cloaking her as she approached him.
*
Caleb
I stopped mid-sentence with the Jonester as I caught sight of Jade's smooth stride making her way across the hall toward me and was bowled over by her as she drew closer. I tightened my expression, I knew she'd put a hand on my skin and know everything but... couldn't a guy have a little mystery? Sometimes the Empath Girlfriend was a blast. Like when we were making out. I liked it then. A. Lot.
But now, in front of the hundreds of students filtering through the hall, I'd like to not have everyone know that I was Jade's puppet. A willing one.
Jonesy smirked. “Meow...” he began.
“I'm not whipped, Jonesy,” I growled out, itching to punch him a good one in the arm. “I'm waiting for the day when you have a girlfriend long enough to look at her like she means something to you,” I said.
Jade caught what I said as she moved in against my body and I tucked her under my chin, inhaling that vanilla smell that was Jade's.
Mouth-watering.
Jade turned her head against my chest to look at Jonesy scathingly. “You know, Jonesy... you could've gone out with Sophie,” Jade said with real feeling.
The LED lights flickered in the hall twice and Jade laughed. “Can't take back the leakage, Jones.”
I laughed and Jonesy gave me a dirty look, struggling for nonchalance. “I don't care who she goes out with,” he said.
“Right, whatever,” Jade said, disgusted.
I spoke against her hair, “Be nice, babe.”
She pulled away from me, her beautiful green eyes sparkling. “It's true. He could've had a great girlfriend instead of the skank-a-thon and been way happier.”
True, I thought. But that might be too much wisdom for Jonesy, whose expression was darkening by the moment.
“Listen Jade,” his eyes sought mine and the message he found was tread careful, pal. “She has sent me nothing but a bunch of lame-ass mixed signals. This is easier. I just date whoever and don't worry about feelings and crap. No hassles, no guessing, no perpetual PMS. You feel me?” he finished, his thumb in his chest.
I felt him. Of course, Sophie was way more high maintenance than Jade. She had a hot-ass temper and so did Jonesy. Like fuel and flame. I didn't know if it would ever work out. What Jonesy didn't recognize was he did care about her. It was in the way he looked at her. And now she was dating a dude in the peripheral group of Dickheads: that would be the Carson Hamilton and Brett Mason brigade. It was a fight waiting to happen. And Sophie wasn't above flashing her new boyfriend in Jonesy's face.
And he wasn't beyond getting into a jealous rage over it.
Denial was a beautiful thing.
“I do feel you, Jonesy. But I think it's you that's going to be feeling it,” Jade said with knowledge. I stroked her back and gave Jonesy The Look. Back off, it isn't worth it. His eyes flicked to mine then back at Jade.
; Don't ask, don't ask.
“Is she going out with somebody?” Jonesy asked in a low voice.
I groaned.
Jade looked at me and smiled evilly. She would put the screws to Jonesy and he'd be feeling some pain.
Jade flicked her hair over her shoulder, a chunk making a black stripe on her bright pink backpack. The new purses of the pulse-age, I thought randomly.
She nodded, shrugging, feigning an indifference I knew was contrived. She totally knew everything about Sophie. “Yeah... I think it's some guy in her AP class.”
“WTF?” Jonesy all but yelled.
Jade jumped and I pulled her in tighter. “Hey man, effing-cool it,” I said, starting to get pissed. He was going to have to take the teasing if he didn't want to commit. He couldn't say he didn't give a hot shit then freak at the mention of a new guy scenting Sophie. Buck up or shut up.
Jonesy straightened. “Okay, you two are so smart. You know what the thing is for APs?” he asked, looking profoundly smug, which made my sense of unease deepen exponentially.
“Ah... no, Jones, can't say I do,” I said.
“Astral Projection sex, dimwits,” he elaborated like, double-duh, as Jade liked to say.
I got a visual of people humping in the air or something, like a cartoon bubble and couldn't stop the irrational laugh which ensued.
Jade put a hand on my chest. “No, Caleb. Not helpful.”
Jonesy glowered. “What's so funny, asswipe?”
Gum snapped behind me and an arm flung itself around Jade.
Tiff.
“How's it hanging, Jones?” she said with a sharp slash of a grin.
“Oh... effing splendid. Did you know...” he began.
“Sophie's having AP sex with Buddy? Yeah,” her gum snapped as emphasis.
I covered my mouth, I couldn't believe Tiff... where angels feared to tread, Tiff entered.
The Death Series, Books 1-3 Page 74
