“What are you doing?” I demanded.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” came the muffled reply.
“Get out of there.”
“It’s a free tree.”
“Come inside. It’s raining like crazy.”
I glanced back at Dobkin, who was lying at the foot of my bed with his turtle. His arm was still in a cast, and the bump was still on his head, and all the scratches hadn’t quite healed yet on his face, but Dobkin is a kid who’s proud of battle scars.
“Come on out,” Tyler said.
“I will not. It’s cold out there.”
Before I could back away, he was at the window with his arms around me, pulling me out on the limb, and in seconds I was soaked through.
Tyler looked at me with disgust.
“Ugh. You’re all wet. Get away.”
In response I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him, making sure I got him good and soaked. I pulled away, and that funny little smile played over his lips.
“You find me irresistible, don’t you,” he said.
“Don’t flatter yourself.”
“Truth is truth. Your life was empty without me.”
“My life was sane without you.”
“Same difference.”
“Hmmm.”
He grinned and shifted his body gracefully on the limb. He glanced over and his voice got serious.
“I hear things might go pretty well for Noreen.”
“Really? Oh, I hope so.…”
“She’s got a good lawyer. He’s reminding everybody that she really wasn’t the one who killed Suellen, and that she was the one who saved our lives.”
“Do you think she’ll ever come back here?”
“To Edison?” He shook his head. “No. Too many memories … too much talk. It’s better for her—and her parents—to make a fresh start somewhere else.”
“I’ll miss her,” I said.
“Yeah,” he whispered. “Me, too.”
I watched the pain and sadness go over his face, and I reached up to touch his cheek.
“She really loves you, you know.”
A nod. “I know.”
The silence stretched on. Only the raindrops and the distant rumble of thunder and Dobkin humming to himself inside my room,
“How about you?” Tyler finally asked.
“How about me what?”
“Loving me.”
“Not a chance.”
“You could do worse.”
“And a whole lot better,”
“I doubt it. I’m pretty cute.”
“Who told you that?”
“You did.”
I turned to him and tried to hide a smile, but he hugged me, and I smiled all over.
“I guess I was right,” I said.
He nodded. “About most things.”
I looked at him, and the last few weeks flooded through my mind, and suddenly it was almost hard to remember the fears and the pain … only the relief and the joy. My mind was wonderfully free now … I knew Suellen was finally at peace.
Still, I couldn’t help leaning over and taking Tyler’s hand. I held it up and squinted at it, and saw him watching me intently.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“I have this feeling …” I said.
“Which is?”
“That you’re going to kiss me just about any second now.”
Tyler’s eyes went wide. He looked at me in amazement and slowly shook his head.
“Wow,” he breathed. “You really are psychic.”
And as he took me into his arms, the rain didn’t matter at all.
A Biography of Richie Tankersley Cusick
Born on April Fool’s Day 1952, Richie Tankersley Cusick was destined at a young age to write scary books. In a career spanning three decades, she has paved the way for young-adult horror writing, a genre she continues to publish in today.
Although born in New Orleans—home to some of the country’s most ancient ghosts—Cusick spent her early years in a small bayou town called Barataria, which once provided a safe haven for the fearsome pirate Jean Lafitte. A true Southern writer, she took early inspiration from the landscape of crumbling mansions, Spanish moss, and aboveground cemeteries, and began writing stories at a young age. For years a ghost lurked in her family’s house, making particular trouble around the holidays, when he would strip the Christmas tree of its ornaments and hurl them to the floor.
After graduating from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Cusick took a job at Hallmark and moved to Kansas City, where she once again shared her home with a mischievous spirit. It was then that she started work on her first novel, Evil on the Bayou (1984), based on her childhood memories of life in the eerie Louisiana swamps. Its success allowed her to leave Hallmark and begin writing fulltime.
When Cusick’s novel-writing career began, horror fiction for teens was a new genre. Along with authors like Christopher Pike and R. L. Stine, Cusick pioneered the form, finding success writing chilling stories with only a dash of the gore that defines adult thrillers.
Since Evil on the Bayou, Cusick has written more than two dozen novels about everything from vampires to pirate ghosts. In 2003 she began The Unseen, a four-volume series about a young girl who is tormented by the occult. Cusick currently lives with her three dogs in Missouri, where she enjoys listening to classic horror-movie soundtracks as she writes on an antique roll-top desk once owned by a funeral director. The desk is, of course, haunted.
Richie Tankersley Cusick at age three in front of her grandparents’ house in Rolla, Missouri. From left to right: Richie’s father, Dick; her mother, Lou; Grandma Tankersley; and Aunt Deanie. Richie’s grandmother was the biggest inspiration in her life, and the first one to really encourage her passion for writing.
Richie in her senior year at Riverdale High School in Louisiana in 1970. Richie was editor in chief of the school newspaper, the Scotichronicon, and was also voted most creative of her senior class.
Richie’s official press card as editor in chief of the Scotichronicon. Her responsibilities included writing editorials, thinking up topics, conducting interviews, and assigning stories to the staff.
Richie started playing guitar at an early age, inspired by her uncles and their love of country music. She has always loved singing, and has written several hundred songs.
Richie in her cubicle at Hallmark Greeting Cards, Inc., where she worked as a writer from 1975 to 1984. In addition to writing every type of greeting card imaginable, Richie wrote poems and prose for posters, puzzle backs, calendars, plaques, key chains, buttons, coloring books, mugs, and more.
Richie with her maid of honor and lifelong friend, Lise, at her wedding in 1980.
Richie’s haunted roll-top desk, located in her home office in Missouri. The desk belonged to a funeral director in the 1800s, and has been the source of some spooky occurrences, including eerie footsteps, muffled voices, and ghostly singing.
According to Richie, sometimes the quirkiest little thing can help an author break through writer’s block. In this case, she is using a quill pen and ink.
A sketch of Beverly Island and the summer house from Richie’s horror novel The Lifeguard. Richie loves to have visuals for her book settings, and made these sketches so she wouldn’t get “lost.”
Richie chatting with fans at a book signing in Rolla, Missouri, in 2004.
Richie with her three dogs at her home in Missouri in 2011. From left to right: Halle Berry, Emma, and Audrey. Richie’s dogs are her constant companions, and often get put out when she spends long hours writing rather than playing with them.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information
storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
copyright © 1994 by Richie Tankersley Cusick
This 2011 edition distributed by Open Road Integrated Media
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New York, NY 10014
www.openroadmedia.com
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