EXCERPT #2: A STITCH ON TIME

A haunted house from Sierra's past...

Thanks to a lot of speeding—so much for not wanting to get any bad attention on the road—and several shortcuts, I reached my house in less than ten minutes. Oren was already waiting on the front porch. I waved and he waved back, but didn’t make a move to approach.

“I’ll see you later,” Willow said as she climbed out of the car. “Be careful.”

“Don’t forget to tell Oren what happened.”

“Yeah, yeah—”

“Willow, I’m serious. Tell him, he needs to know.” We were keeping tabs on her ability while documenting any changes. This was our first cause for alarm in months.

I waited until she reached the porch and Oren led her into safety, then I sped off. Even in automatic mode, I managed to reach the large two-story weatherboard house in five minutes, trying to ignore the influx of memories. I’d spent an entire night in this horrid place with a girl who ended up hating me afterwards. Even though I’d managed to keep a malicious spirit from hurting us both, Jackie made my life a living hell all through school.

Since that fateful night, I’d visited this address a handful of times to catch a variety of disturbances. It was a hotspot for chaotic spook activity, but this case should have been a routine catching.

I parked the car across the street and ran out, glad to feel the weight of my Smith & Wesson 642 revolver secured in my utility belt. If the spook that dared to hurt Ebony—or anyone else—was still there, I wasn’t going to waste time banishing them. They were going straight to oblivion via salt and holy water tipped bullets. I didn’t bother locking the Fairlane or checking both sides of the road before crossing, didn’t stop until I’d climbed the front steps and charged inside.

The afternoon sun on my black sweater had me sweating, which was made worse by the unnatural heat wafting down the staircase. It almost knocked the breath out of me. Heat didn’t accompany hauntings, but I knew what did—demons.

Roe and Ebony knew this as well as I did, so why hadn’t they gotten the hell out before attempting anything? I continued past the narrow entryway and into the vast foyer.

The last time I’d stepped into this house, it had been neglected, falling apart and contained a spirit intent on haunting the place. A real estate agent hired me to remove the pesky ghost, which turned out to be a former neighborhood man desperate to immortalize himself in the bad history of this address. He’d been easy to remove, which was why I’d thought this location would be a perfect place for training. Especially since it was now someone’s home, and judging by the impressive furnishings, that someone had good taste.

Crying filled my ears, and for a second I thought it was a ghost. My hand automatically went to my gun, until I spotted Jana and Claire huddled together, sobbing uncontrollably. They’d both acted the same way last week when we’d lost Juliet to phantasms. Roe stood to the side, watching a masculine shape kneel on the glossy wooden floor. It took me a few seconds to register it was Conrad Hicks, the vampire hunter. What was he doing here?

“Roe…” I closed the distance between us, not taking my eyes off Conrad.

A STITCH ON TIME will be available on October 14, 2014:

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