He got to his feet, looking wildly from the baby to the parents. “Where’s Joy?”
“I don’t know who you’re talking about, but give me my baby,” snapped the mother. He hesitated, but the child was so clearly not his that he didn’t protest when the father stepped around the hospital bed to take the warm bundle from him.
“What room is this?” he asked. Even to his own ears his voice sounded strange. He supposed he must look crazy or high. He couldn’t understand it. Just seconds ago—
“Two fifty-three.”
It was the right room number. But there was no sign that Joy had ever been here.
“Do you mind if I just—” He reached over to turn the baby’s wristlet so that he could read the name: Geoffrey Kim.
“Please get out of our room,” said the woman. “I don’t know why you’re even in here.”
“I don’t know what’s going on,” said Tan. “My wife and daughter were here just moments ago. Did you see them?”
“I’ll call security,” said the husband, and Tanner held up his hands quickly in a conciliatory gesture.
“I’m leaving.” He must have had a brain blip or something—maybe he had gone down the hall to get coffee and had wandered into the wrong room. But the room number is right. Had he fallen asleep and forgotten it? Had Joy and Rose been moved to another room while he dozed, leaving him there? It made no sense.
On his way to the nurses’ station he peered into every room he passed. He got some outraged looks, but there was no sign of his family. Something’s not right.
“I seem to have lost my wife and daughter,” he told the nurse who sat behind the counter. “Did they get moved to another room?”
“I can look. What’s the name?”
“Sumner.”
He waited as she tapped on the keyboard and scanned the screen. She was a light-skinned African-American woman with short hair and a gentle demeanor. Her name tag read Shirley Harding, RN. She didn’t look familiar to him, but maybe the shift had changed since he had arrived. “I don’t see her,” she said, and then finally took a good look at him. Her eyes widened in pleasure. “I know you! You’re that model, Tristan.”
He nodded briefly. He’d quit the business and no longer used his professional name, but a lot of his ads were still circulating, and he was used to being recognized. The nurse had popped up from her chair to grab a colleague and drag her over to see him. But he didn’t have time now to sign autographs or pose for photos. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I really need to find my wife. Joy Sumner. Can you check again? Is there any chance she might not be in the computer?”
“I doubt it, but I can ask her doctor. Who was looking after her?”
He dredged up the doctor’s name and waited in increasing anxiety as Shirley spoke on the phone. One hand fidgeted with the rowan pendant he wore on a silver chain around his neck. It had been a gift from Joy, handed down from her mother as a protective talisman. He dragged the fingers of his other hand through his hair when Shirley put down the phone and offered a regretful shake of her head. “I’m sorry. Dr. Long doesn’t remember her. Are you sure you have the right clinic? There’s the Pomona Center just a couple of miles away; maybe that’s where she was taken.”
“No, she was here. I was with her, in her room, holding my daughter—” His voice was getting louder in frustration and anxiety, and he saw the second nurse move closer to the desk phone, perhaps thinking to summon security.
“Have you tried calling her?” she asked in a soothing voice.
“She doesn’t have her phone with her.” She had left it in North Carolina to avoid the temptation of calling him and possibly giving her location away to anyone who might be searching for her. Panic was beginning to rise in him, tightening his throat. “Can you page her, maybe? Please?”
The two women exchanged uncertain looks, and he resorted to a cheap move. He leaned over the counter, looked deeply into Shirley’s eyes, and dropped his voice into an intimate murmur. “Please,” he repeated, softly. “I’d be so grateful.”
Color rose in her cheeks, and she reached again for the phone. He didn’t often pull out the soulful seducer act these days, but apparently it still worked. Resonating through the hallway came the request, “Would Joy Sumner please report to the nurses’ station on the second floor. Joy Sumner.”
Minutes passed, but there was no sign of Joy. He rubbed his hands over his face, trying to think. What could have happened for all signs of her to have been erased?
“Thanks for your trouble,” he said finally, when ten empty minutes had passed, and stalked back down the hallway to room 253. The Asian couple was still in residence, and their inquiring expressions turned to hostility when he strode through the door.
“I’ll get out of your hair in a minute,” he said before either could speak. “Just please, tell me, did you see my wife and baby? They were in this room just a little while ago. Joy’s seventeen, about yay high—hold on, I’ll show you.” He had been taking pictures of them less than an hour ago.
But he couldn’t find the pictures on his phone now. Nor could he find the photos from their wedding, earlier that month. There were no pictures of Joy or Rose at all.
Maybe something was going on with the phone’s memory; he’d figure that out later. “Joy has dark-blonde hair and freckles,” he told the couple. “And kind of a button nose. Rose is—” He had to swallow hard. “Rose is our newborn. She’s got brown hair and she’s wearing a yellow onesie with ducks on it.”
The mother darted a troubled look toward her husband. “I wish we could help, but we’ve been in this room since yesterday afternoon. I haven’t seen anybody like that.”
Good god, what was happening? Before they could stop him he stepped over to the closet and flung it open. Joy’s purse and overnight bag were gone, replaced by the strange woman’s things. Even his own leather jacket, which he remembered hanging up, had disappeared. The bathroom was likewise empty of all signs of Joy.
“Sorry, I’m going,” he muttered to the couple, and darted back down the hall to the nurses’ station. “Maybe she’s unconscious somewhere,” he said quickly, before they could forestall him. “Can you have security do a sweep for her?” He described her again, and paced for a frustrating half hour until the head of security came to report that the search hadn’t turned anything up.
“There’s no sign of her,” said the man in the uniform. “Are you worried that someone may have abducted her?”
“It’s a possibility.” Joy had been so certain when Rose was born and they found her completely normal that no one would pursue her and their child. Raven had settled on other means of trying to revive his succubus mistress; he had no motive now for seizing Joy and Rose. Did he? And even if he had, how could he have erased all signs of them?
“Maybe you’d better file a police report,” suggested the officer.
God, what had happened to her? He thanked the man without knowing what he said, and with no other ideas he headed toward the parking deck. Maybe, just maybe, she had gone to the minivan for some reason.
But the minivan wasn’t where he had parked it. For half a second he thought that perhaps somehow she had found the strength to drive somewhere, and then the image in front of him clicked into place and he realized he was staring at his Kawasaki Ninja, parked in the place where he’d left the minivan.
The bike he had traded in weeks ago. The bike that should have been in North Carolina.
He shut his eyes hard, breathed in and out a few times, then slowly opened his eyes again. The bike was still there. The minivan was still not.
A chill dread began to pool in his stomach. Some magic was at work. And Joy and Rose were caught up in it.
He reached into his pocket, and the key ring he drew out brought a fresh wave of cold horror. His keys to the minivan and the Sumner house were gone. And the Ninja key he had handed over to the dealer weeks ago was lying on his palm.
He got out his phone and checked the time a
nd date. No surprises there, at least. So he hadn’t pulled a Rip Van Winkle. He scrolled through the list of numbers, thinking to call Joy’s father, but Steven wasn’t in his list of contacts. Neither was Joy. Or Tan’s bandmates, William, Jeremiah, Blake, Ace. It was as if the last nine months had never happened. He keyed in the Sumner land line number from memory and waited as it rang and rang on the other end. After twenty rings he ended the call.
Slowly, warily, he mounted the bike and flicked his eyes over the gauges. His helmet was nowhere to be seen. He hadn’t gone without one since... since meeting Joy.
His hands were shaking so that it took a few tries to get the key into the ignition. He knew he wasn’t in safe condition to ride. But it was the only thing left to him.
He steered the bike in the direction of North Carolina, praying that Joy and Rose would be waiting for him there.
***End of this excerpt. To read more, get your copy of Among the Shadows in ebook and paperback!***
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Visit the author at amandadewees.com or on Facebook as Author Amanda DeWees.
Acknowledgments
Many of the wonderful people who helped me bring The Shadow and the Rose to life were every bit as important to the writing of Casting Shadows. Any errors in the book, however, are mine alone.
The kind people of North Carolina were helpful and gracious during my research. My friends and family patiently put up with my antisocial behavior and relentlessly writing-oriented conversation. My Facebook friends and followers were greatly helpful in offering input, as were Lisa Blackwell, Lesley Cobbs, Ron DeWees, Matthew Heller, Pamela Kipreos, Diana Plattner, and Emily Sewell.
Jeanna Cornett’s unflagging support and enthusiasm have been invaluable. And my continued gratitude goes to Raven Hart, a.k.a. Susan Goggins, and Maurice Cobbs, for their firm belief in this series and in me. Every author needs a support network as wonderful as mine, but I doubt many writers are as lucky as I am in that respect!
About the Author
Amanda DeWees is an author and editor based in Atlanta, Georgia. She received her PhD in English literature from the University of Georgia and likes to startle people by telling them that her dissertation topic was 19th-century vampire literature. Besides writing, her passions include movies, costume design, ghost stories, and correct apostrophe placement.
The Ash Grove books were inspired in part by the breathtaking scenery of North Carolina, where Amanda prefers to do her writing.
Books by Amanda DeWees
Sea of Secrets (historical gothic romance) (ebook) (paperback)
The Ash Grove Chronicles:
The Shadow and the Rose (ebook) (paperback)
Casting Shadows (also in paperback)
Among the Shadows (ebook) (paperback coming soon)
Also by Amanda DeWees
Sea of Secrets, a captivating historical gothic romance set in 1850s England, is now available in ebook and paperback.
After her brother is killed in the Crimean War, innocent young Oriel Pembroke finds herself alone in the world. Disowned by the cruel father who has always despised her, she has nowhere to turn until she is taken under the wing of a glamorous relative she never knew: the former Duchess of Ellsworth, who has scandalized society by remarrying soon after her first husband’s death. At the opulent seaside estate of Ellsmere, Oriel thinks she has found a safe haven—but the darkly handsome young duke, Herron, believes otherwise. Haunted by the death of his father, he suspects that Ellsmere is sheltering a murderer.
Even as Oriel falls in love with the duke, she begins to fear that his grief and suspicion are turning to madness. When dangerous accidents start to befall both Herron and Oriel, however, she realizes that someone may be trying to stop them from discovering the truth about the past. And when her father comes back into her life, she learns that he may hold the answer to the most horrifying secret of all…
Length: 110,000 words ~ Sensuality level: mild/sweet
Table of Contents
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
Bonus: Excerpt From Among the Shadows
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Books by Amanda DeWees
Also by Amanda DeWees
Casting Shadows (The Ash Grove Chronicles) Page 31
