by W. J. May
Nonsense
(Senseless Series Book III)
By W.J. May
Copyright 2015 W.J. May
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
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Conscience, Book 4
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Book II
Description:
Everyone needs to be a hero at one point in their life.
The small town of Elliot Lake will never be the same again. Six friends have become five and one is to blame, leaving the four remaining to pick up the pieces of their lives and try to carry one.
While mourning the death of their friend, Rylee, and dealing with Kieran’s betrayal, Zoe, Heidi, Brent, and Seth all go to Mexico with Zoe’s father for their winter break. While there, they discover Zoe’s father has kept a few secrets of his own, and after Kieran secretly visits, Zoe begins to suspect that there’s more to the story of Rylee’s death than there seems.
Despite having a good time in Mexico, the past events come back to haunt them when they return to Elliot Lake. With tempers flaring and the sting from Kieran’s betrayal still fresh in their minds, the friends begin to doubt if they can even trust each other. As the group begins to fall apart, something dark and sinister makes itself known in Elliot Lake.
Zoe knows she’s being followed, but by whom, she’s not sure. Kieran tries to solve Rylee’s murder to protect his friends, but can only go so far before risking being caught by the police. However, after Heidi is trapped in a robbery, it becomes apparent that they need to stick together and work as a team once again if they ever want to survive.
An incredulous group of heroes. A traitor in the midst. Some dreams are written in blood.
This is book 3 of the Senseless Series. Join Zoe, Brent, Kieran on an epic adventure of supernatural, love, loss and thrilling mystery.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Zoe
“You four need a quiet winter break,” Dad said, his eyes lingering on me but passing over the four of us. Seth, Heidi, Brent and I sat squeezed into the living room couch at Brent’s house. All of our parents stood in the room, silently nodding their heads. “Somewhere warm, away from Elliot Lake.”
“I don’t really feel like going anywhere.” Heidi played with the Kleenex in her hand. “Rylee’s dead.”
“And Kieran’s run off.” Brent glanced at me before crushing his fingers into fists.
“I say we hunt him down ourselves,” Seth grumbled. His eyes grew wide when he realized he’d said the words aloud.
Brent shot him a warning glare.
“Sweetie.” His mother came to the side of the couch and rubbed his shoulder. “There is nothing you kids can do. Let the police do their jobs. They know what they’re doing.”
My heart filled with adrenalin at Seth’s words, ready to race away and hide. No one, except maybe Brent, knew the entire truth of the story. Right now, I had no intention of ever trying to find Kieran.
Dad cleared his throat. “I know a fellow doctor-friend who owns a holiday house in Mexico. It’s in a small city, away from the big tourist places, but near some great Aztec ruins. It’s safe, like a fortress. It’ll make for a quiet week, with some healthy sunshine. I’ve already booked the time off work and can take you guys down there.” He glanced at the other parents who nodded. “All your folks agreed. There’s one catch…”
No parents? Well, except for Dad. Maybe it was time we let him in on our little secret.
All four of us must have had the same thought run through our heads. “Let’s go,” we all said at the same time.
Dad laughed. “That was easy. Aren’t any of you concerned about the ‘catch’?” He stood and clapped his hands. “We leave tomorrow morning at four thirty. Flight takes off at seven.”
Seth groaned.
So did I, apparently none of us had been sleeping much the past week and a half. Had it really been a week since Rylee died? Since Kieran left? Part of me was relieved but the other half, the broken one, missed him. I was torn at what to think or do. I had no one to talk to about it either. The others were so angry at him and then ticked at me when I just stayed silent in our conversations. I didn’t know if I should tell them about Kieran’s past or concentrate on the fact that he’d killed Rylee. None of us knew what exactly happened that night – except she had died and he’d run away. Maybe in Mexico we’ll be able to talk and start finding some answers.
“Zoe-zey?” Dad tapped my knee lightly.
“Yeah?” I blinked, focussing on him.
“How about you sleep at your mom’s tonight? I’ll pick you up in the morning.”
“Sure.” I didn’t mind. Mom had been awesome the past week. She didn’t ask questions or pry, she’d just hand me the box of Kleenexes when my eyes couldn’t hold back the dams of flooding tears. It was a nice change of pace from Dad always asking if I was okay, and Brent telling me that he was there whenever I needed him. I knew both of them meant well, but there was nothing I could tell them without causing trouble. Of course, I wasn’t okay. One of my best friends had just died, possibly murdered in cold blood by my ex-boyfriend. Kind of ex-boyfriend. We never did have an official breakup, and even though I thought it was clear to both of us that it was over, I wasn’t sure if Kieran considered us broken up. He had given me the crystal Scottish thistle for safe-keeping, saying he wanted the two things most precious to him to be together. It was in my room right now, still shut in its box, burning a hole through my closet floor, wanting to be taken out and displayed. I wasn’t about to set it on my nightstand. The last thing I needed was another reminder of Kieran for me to see any time I looked the wrong way. It would just bring me back to that terrible, terrible night.
The parents started to depart, leaving us to our own devices. I could hear some of them talking outside about us. Seth’s dad was telling Heidi’s mom that Seth had two therapy appointments this week but had skipped out on both of them. He was worried Seth was going through more than normal grieving over a friend.
What’s normal grieving over a friend? It’s only been a week since she died. But he was right. There was more going on with Seth. There was more going on with all of us. And if any of us told anybody, even a therapist, about what was going on, then they would have us committed.
“You all right?” Brent mumbled under his breath. No one else in the room could
hear him, but the question was directed at me. I tuned out Seth’s and Heidi’s parents and focused on the steady heart rate of Brent, realizing it was much slower than my own. My shaking hands had tipped him off that everything wasn’t all right, and I was about to have my third breakdown this week, just because I thought of Kieran and his stupid Scottish thistle.
“Yeah,” I said, leaning against his shoulder. “Just tired.” That wasn’t a lie. I had barely slept at all since Rylee’s death. I just kept dreaming about her mangled lifeless body on the side of the road before seeing Kieran’s face at the moment I realized he was a murderer.
Brent put his arm around me and pulled me closer to him. I wrapped my arms around his waist, glad for the quiet comfort. His face was turned away at an awkward angle and I knew that with his hand on my shoulder, my sweater was now completely see-through to him. I flushed. “It’s okay,” I said. “I’m wearing a t-shirt under the sweater.”
“Thanks,” he muttered, turning back to a more natural position. I saw his cheeks rise in color and almost giggled. It was sweet of him to turn away when he was in danger of accidentally seeing something he shouldn’t. He couldn’t help but gain the ability to see through anything he touched with his hands or feet, but he never tried to abuse that power by attempting to get a peep show.
“I still say we try to hunt down Kieran ourselves,” Seth muttered. “That bastard needs to pay!”
“We can’t just go out looking for him,” Heidi argued. “He knows everything about us, now. We don’t even really know his power.” She looked at me with accusing eyes but didn’t say anything.
None of us even knew he had a power until the day Rylee died. It didn’t follow one of the five human senses like ours did. We’d assumed the five of us had gotten heightened senses, and since he hadn’t grown up here, it hadn’t happened to him. Except he had received an ability. Whether he hid it from the get go or didn’t realize he had it, he had one. He had a strange sixth sense. What exactly it was, not even I knew, but I knew that a lot of the time, he could read my mind, and it seemed like he could also see into the future. “Let’s just let the police do their work.” I sighed. “It’s not worth the trouble we’d be in if we conducted our own search. What good will it do anyway? Rylee’s not coming back.”
“You just want your boyfriend to get away with it.” Seth glared at me.
Brent jumped up and faced Seth before I could do anything. “You take that back,” he warned. “You don’t think Kieran has hurt her, too? She was betrayed just as much as the rest of us. And he was never her boyfriend.”
Seth looked ready to say something to Brent and then shook his head. He had the decency to give him a sheepish shrug. He held his hands up in surrender. “Sorry, Zoe. Guess I was a little out of line.”
“I’ll say.” I glowered at him. “Just because I don’t want to waste time trying to track a ghost doesn’t mean I don’t want justice!” I blinked back tears, hating the way my voice cracked. I wondered if it was noticeable to everyone or just me.
“Look, I apologized. What else do you want?” He scowled at me, not looking at all sorry anymore.
“Just leave, Seth,” I said. “Get the hell out of my damn house.”
He got up instantly, the creak of his chair piercing my ears. “I can smell your guilt a mile away.” He stomped out of the house, each footfall sounding like a loud thunderclap.
Silence from Brent and Heidi followed after the door slammed.
“What is happening to us?” Heidi whispered to Brent and I. “We’re just falling apart.” A tear slid down her cheek.
I sat down, my heart rate slowly returning to normal as my temper cooled. “I’m sorry, guys.” I was on the verge of tears myself. “I don’t know what came over me.”
“I think your dad is right, Zoe,” Brent spoke quietly. “We do need to get away from here. The sooner, the better.”
Chapter Two
When we flew, no amount of ear plugs or swallowing could stop the headache threatening to crack my skull in half. The roar of the engines, the gross sounds of people chewing and drinking, the constant scratch of the pen against a journal’s pages from the girl right in front of me, and the typing on a tablet from a middle-aged man two seats up was deafening to me and I stayed awake throughout the whole flight despite the sleeping pill I took before liftoff.
Seth’s face remained in a constant grimace from the smells on the plane. The poor guy had to use two of the paper bags stored in the seats in front of us. At least it got Heidi and Brent laughing, even though Heidi had to put her hand over her mouth when the airplane food was served out. I had read somewhere that airplane food was really as good as most other food and it was just the altitude or something messing with our taste buds that made it taste gross, but Heidi’s superhuman taste buds were apparently just as affected by the altitude as everyone else’s. It was without a doubt one of the worst flights any of us had ever been on, and we were all relieved when we finally landed in Mexico.
As soon as we got to the house I went straight to my room, changed into jogging pants and crawled into bed. My head hurt, I missed Rylee, and worst of all, I longed for Kieran. As much as I tried to fight it, I still missed the comfort of his presence and his musical Scottish accent. But of course, I couldn’t tell anyone that so I buried deeper under the covers, wishing I could disappear.
Strange sounds finally woke me. I had no idea how long I’d slept, but the headache had left, only leaving the emptiness in my chest. Kicking away the covers, I took a moment to listen to the noises around me and glance around the room I’d paid little attention to before.
Eccentric sounding birds sang outside which let me know it was probably early morning as the rest of the house was relatively quiet. My dad’s soft snoring let me know he was sleeping just down the hall. The ceiling to floor windows gave view to beautiful greenery and a pool. The bright room had the large bed, a dresser and a desk on the far side. The artwork seemed hand painted with bright coral red and turquoise colors. It was all gorgeous. It felt like paradise compared to my room back home. It was almost as if I was in some sort of fantasy, and the real world was a long way away. Rylee would have loved this place. I smiled, imagining her lounging around in a bikini on the beach, trying to seduce her next conquest and doing so with plenty of ease. I blinked back tears. You’re on a vacation, Zoe. You’re supposed to be having fun, not mourning. You think Rylee wants you moping in your room when you’re in Mexico? I smiled. She definitely would not.
I unpacked my suitcase and changed into a bathing suit. I’d slept for over fifteen hours according to my watch. No way am I going back to bed. I slipped on a long white t-shirt and listened to my bare feet as they padded across the hardwood floor to the sliding door that led outside.
The heat hit me like a wave. Unlike the humid summers we had back home, this warmth was dry but already hot for six in the morning. The air conditioning inside had hidden the heat perfectly. By the time I’d reached the pool, I’d already stripped off my shirt and tossed it on one of the chaise lounge chairs, ready to dive in.
The water caressed my skin and the quiet under the surface had my ears and head begging to stay down longer. However, my lungs requiring air won over the quietness. I swam lengths of the pool under the water, only coming up for air before quickly dropping back down again. Twenty minutes later, I paused to hang on the concrete wall of the pool.
Brent sat on the chair beside my discarded shirt. He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees and his fingers tapping some new rhythm against the pad of his thumb.
“Head feeling better?”
“Yeah, thanks.” I glanced behind him. “Everyone else still sleeping?”
He nodded. “I figured you’d be out here. He stared at me a long time before finally taking a deep breath. “We need to talk.”
“What’s up?” Using my arms, I lifted myself out of the pool and grabbed a towel. I sat down beside him. “Is it about Kieran?”
“No. Yes.�
� He ran a hand through his hair, quick and rough. “I don’t know.”
I’d never seen him flustered before. My hand automatically went to his knee and I squeezed it. “Brent, it’s me. Just tell me what’s going on. Is it something bad?” A weird thought ran through my head. “Did Kieran try to contact you?”
“No!” His cheeks puffed as he blew out a quick breath. His voice softened. “It’s not bad. At least, I don’t think so. And Kieran’s not going to try to contact me. He’s dead if he does.”
Brent didn’t know the whole story. He didn’t know what Kieran’s dad had done to him. It impacted his entire life and even though he’d killed Rylee, I was beginning to wonder if it had been an accident. The weather had been bad that night. Could he have hit her with his bike by mistake?
“Zoe? Are you listening?” One side of Brent’s mouth lifted. “Never thought I’d be saying that to you again after the night in the mine.”
I smiled. “Sorry. Guess I kinda got lost in my thoughts for a moment. You said Kieran’s never going to come back.”
“Sorta. I went by his place before we left. It’s all locked up, but I looked inside.” He raised his hands and wiggled his fingers. “The place was military clean but a mess in a weird way. Like he left in a hurry. He’s running and you only run when you’re guilty.”
I shivered despite the warm air. “I guess you’re right.”
Brent’s brows knotted together. “You guess? You think he didn’t do it? We all know he’s guilty. Zoe, you aren’t still in love with him are you?” He straightened, the shock on his face impossible to miss. “He’s a monster. I mean, I know what you said to Seth, but I know you, Zoe. You’re still in love with him.”
