Shadow Lake Vampire Society - Wendi Wilson Page 0,82
Happy even. Still in the same home I grew up in.”
“That’s so sad.” I held his hand, wishing there was more I could do.
He leaned over and kissed the top of my head. “Don’t worry about me. I’ve had twenty years to process my grief.”
I started to lean into him, but as I did I spotted someone staring at me from the shadows.
A dark shape hunkered between the dumpster and the funeral home’s west wall. The man was scraggly and unkempt, but the most unsettling thing was he stared at me as if he knew me.
When he caught me looking, he lifted his hand and waved me toward him rapidly.
Who was this man, and what did he want?
My heart began to pound, and of course, Levi sensed it right away. He whirled to follow my gaze. “What is it?”
“There’s someone back there.”
Levi was on his feet, coiled to strike, but I put my hand on his arm. “There are people everywhere.”
His eyes darted around, taking in much more than mine ever could. There was a crowd gathered, some smoking, some talking. None could see the man from their vantage point which meant, if we went back there, no one would see us, either.
Levi froze, keeping his eyes trained on the perceived danger. “Go to the car, Piper. Lock the door. I’ll deal with him.”
My eyes darted from the man to the parking lot, but I didn’t go. Instead, I followed Levi, toward the man’s hidey-hole.
The man seemed unafraid, but he also seemed half crazed. His hair was wild and white like an Albert Einstein wig. His gray beard was straggly and patchy, sticking out in places that you wouldn’t expect and disappearing in places you would. He wore gray coveralls that were soiled and thin at the knees. When he opened his mouth to speak, I saw he was missing several teeth.
“Girl, come here. I’ve got somethin’ important to tell ya.” He flashed that jack-o-lantern smile again. “It’s real good.”
Levi stepped between the man and me, his tone and body tense. “Get to the car, Piper.”
I didn’t listen to him before, and I wasn’t going to listen now. I didn’t think Levi would kill the man right here in broad daylight, but I wasn’t going to take any chances. But the man didn’t seem to have any fear.
“Hey, girl. I know you. You were here before. I have something to tell you. Something about your dad.”
Despite the heat, a cold chill settled over me. Did he say… my dad?
Before I knew what I was doing, I pushed around Levi and got up in the man’s personal space as anger pumped through my body. No way would he play some kind of game by invoking my dead father. Not today.
“Piper.” Levi reached for me, but I shrugged him off.
I wanted to poke him in the chest, but I had no idea what he might do. So instead, I put my hands on my hips. “What did you say about my father?”
He smiled that empty smile again. “I know about him, but what’s it worth to ya?”
The nerve of this guy. “You tell me or my boyfriend here will rip your arms off. How about that?” I could feel Levi behind me, and I knew he looked intimidating as he towered over both of us. He literally could rip this man’s arms off, but of course I was bluffing. Still, it seemed to work.
For the first time, the man considered Levi and his smile fell. “Fine. I’ll tell, but if you find it’s worth your time, you might part with a fiver to buy me lunch?” One wild eyebrow arched.
“We’ll see. Now talk.”
“I work here,” he said, thumbing toward the back of the funeral parlor. “I have for thirty years. I clean, do odd jobs. I see things.”
“Like what?” Levi asked.
The man’s eyes darted up before landing back on me again. “I saw you. You were here for your dad’s funeral. Sad.” He puckered out his bottom lip in a mockery of sadness before sucking it back in again. “Anyway, I thought you should know. He wasn’t in the box.”
I felt my heart stutter. “What do you mean? Are you saying…?” My words ran dry, but the man had plenty.
“I mean, they buried an empty box. Someone took the body. Someone who was worried that evidence the police didn’t find might someday be revealed. They came at night. Two men.” He held up two fingers. “They took the body, and the mortician was so upset he says, ‘It’s an empty casket, they won’t know,’ and put bricks in instead.”
I stared at him, unsure if I could believe any of this or not. Words tumbled out as I spoke more to myself than anyone else. “Who would take my father’s body?”
“You tell me, little lady. But I will tell you this. I heard one word as they snuck off: Siskiyou.” He cackled, the sound wheezing from his lungs. “If there’s one thing I learned working here, it’s this: Secrets from the past don’t always stay buried.”
I felt Levi’s hand on my shoulder, but little else. It seemed as though I was having another of those out of body experiences.
The vampires not only killed my father, but took his body to their hideout in the Siskiyou Mountains.
I no longer cared that they were fearsome and scary. I wanted to know the truth about my father, and I wanted revenge.
We hope you enjoyed that sneak peek of Shadow Lake Vampire Society Book Two: The Count!
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Acknowledgments
Katie and Wendi would like to thank all of our readers for taking a chance on our first co-writing project. We hope you all love the book and these characters just as much as we do!
We’d also like to give a big shout out to our beta readers—T.L. McDonald, Samantha Britt, G.K. DeRosa, Kat Stiles, Cynthia Csepel, Susan Brown, and Sandra “Jeanz” Richardson. You guys are the bomb.
And thank you to Molly Phipps of We Got You Covered Book Design for crafting such an amazing cover. You are truly talented, girl!
About the Author
Wendi Wilson is mom to two rambunctious boys, a cat, a dog, and two crazy ferrets. She lives in Idaho with her husband and kids. She writes every spare moment she gets- those moments not already consumed by volunteering at school, team parenting various sports teams in baseball and football, and reading as many books as humanly possible. You can join her mailing list at WendiLWilson.com
Katie French is an Amazon best-selling author in Young Adult Sci-fi and Fantasy. Her book, The Breeders, was a semi-finalist in the 2014 Kindle Book Awards. Other than that, her major award includes a "Best Mom Mug" which is cute, but really, she'd rather just have the cash.
She works as a high school English teacher, and, yes, she will correct your grammar. In her free time, she writes manically, reads great books, and takes care of her three fairly mediocre children (whom she loves very much if they are reading this).
You can join her mailing list at www.katiefrenchbooks.com and receive two free full-length novels, so do it already. Contact her at [email protected].
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