LITMIR.BIZ

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faces turned up earnestly. “Bloody Bones crossed to the stairs. Bloody Bones looked up and could see the children through the walls.”

      “Like X-ray vision?” Mikey Ferguson squeaked.

      “Shut up.” James, his older brother, threw him a harsh look.

      The branches overhead shivered. There was a moon but it wasn’t visible over the height of the maze’s hedge. Only the faintest trickle of light wavered through the leaves.

      “I’m on the first step,” Kyle intoned, hesitating for maximum effect. He gazed across the beam of the flashlight at the kids he and James had brought to the center of the maze. They were supposed to be babysitting, but that was boring as hell. “I’m on the second step.” He drew a shaking breath and said slowly, “I’m on…the…third step…”

      Mikey shot a look of terror over his shoulder and edged closer to James, whose smirk was fully visible to Kyle.

      Tyler, that little pissant, started to snivel.

      “I’m on…the…fourth…step…”

      “How many steps are there?” Mikey cried, clutching at James’s arm.

      “Shut the fuck up.” James tried to shake him off.

      “I wanna go home!” Tyler wailed.

      “I’m on…the fifth step!”

      “I’m calling my dad.” Preston, the overweight prick, clambered to his feet, his normally toneless voice quaking a bit.

      “The phone’s in the car, moron.”

      “I’m on the sixth step, I’m on the seventh step, I’m on the eighth step!” Kyle declared in a rush.

      The boys leapt to their feet as if yanked by strings, crying, heads jerking around, searching vainly for escape but the hedges loomed, branches sticking out like skeletal arms.

      Kyle’s voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m on the ninth step…”

      James started to worry a little. They couldn’t have these dumbasses charging off in all directions in the dark. “Siddown!”

      “I’m on the tenth step…and now I’m walking down the hall…I’m outside your door…I’m pushing it open…cree—eeaa—kkk!”

      It sounded sorta dumb, James thought, the way Kyle did it, but it sure as hell did the trick. The kids started scattering like cockroaches, shying away from the dirty old statue of that lady, screaming and blubbering. James and Kyle started laughing. They couldn’t help themselves. That ratcheted the boys to near hysteria, and Mikey stumbled right into the statue—the idiot—and knocked the damn thing to one side. The bulldozers had been at the site. The school was being razed and they were taking down the maze as well. That’s why Kyle had come up with the idea in the first place. One last spooky hurrah where they could scare the snot out of the little kids.

      “Moron, you knocked over the old lady,” James said in a long-suffering tone.

      He went to pick up his younger brother while Kyle corralled Tyler and Preston, who were crying like the babies they were. Mikey had practically turned to a statue himself. He stood frozen, staring. He slowly lifted one hand as James approached, pointing toward a mound of earth that had humped up when the statue tilted.

      “Bloody Bones,” he whispered, his finger quivering.

      James looked in the direction he was pointing. From the ground a skeletal human hand lay upturned, its bones both dirty and oddly white, its fingers reaching upward, as if for help.

      James’s eyes bugged out. He started shrieking like a banshee and couldn’t quit.

      Kyle gazed on in raw fear. “Shit,” he quavered.

      Little Mikey grabbed James’s hand and hauled them both out of the maze. The rest of the gang thundered behind them. They all ran for their lives, the cold touch of Bloody Bones feathering their napes all the way.

      Chapter One

      I feel it…that change in the atmosphere, subtle but strong, like the slight tremor of a gentle earthquake with its aftershocks. I know what it means.

      I knew it would happen.

      Was waiting.

      Flinging off the covers of the old bed, I listen to the howl of the wind as it rushes from the west, driving inland, churning up the water. I don’t bother with clothes as I open the door from the old keeper’s quarters that lead into the lighthouse itself. Quickly I take the circular stairs, running up their rusted steps, ignoring the metal as it groans against my weight.

      Faster! Faster!

      My heart is pumping and all the restlessness I’ve tried to contain, the impulses I’ve kept at bay, are now set free.

      The stairs curl more tightly as I ascend to the landing where the once-vibrant beacon lies dormant, its huge lens giving off no illumination, warning no sailors of the impending shoals.

      I fling the door open and step onto the weathered grating. Rain spits from clouds roiling in the heavens, wind tears at my hair, and the night is dark and thick with winter. A hundred and thirty feet below the surf churns and boils in whitecapped fury around this small, craggy island that has been abandoned for half a century.

      No one inhabits the island.

      The lighthouse is off-limits to the public, guarded judiciously by the Coast Guard and a tired, twisted chain-link fence as well as the dangerous surf itself.

      A few have dared to trespass.

      And they have died in the treacherous currents that surround this sorry bit of rock.

      Even in the darkness, I turn and view the mainland. I know they’re there. I’ve taken as many as I can. Their fortress can be breached, though I bear the scars of battle and I must be careful.

      Tonight, no lights glow from their windows. The forest covers them.

      As I face the sea, I tilt my head, lift my nose to the wind, but I smell nothing other than the briny scent of the Pacific crashing a hundred feet below. I close my eyes and concentrate. As the wind tosses my hair into my eyes and my skin chills with the frigid air, the blood in my veins runs hot.

      I imagine the scent of her skin. Like a rain-washed beach. Tantalizing…

      I can almost smell her. Almost.

      Even without her scent, I now know where she is. I’ve learned of her by another who has unconsciously shown me the way.

      Good.

      It’s time, once again, to right an age-old wrong.

      This time, there will be no mistake.

      A frisson slid down Becca Sutcliff’s spine. She inhaled sharply and glanced behind her. The girl at the counter of Mutts & Stuff slid her a look from the corner of her eyes. “You okay?”

      “Someone’s walking on my grave, I guess,” Becca murmured.

      The girl’s brows lifted and Becca could practically read her mind: Yeah. Right. Whatever. She rang up Becca’s purchases and stuffed them in a bag. Thanking her, Becca shifted the packages she was already carrying to accommodate them. Yes, she was filling a need, shopping like it was an Olympic sport, a result of the messy, lingering aftermath of unsettled feelings that still followed from her split with Ben. And now Ben was dead. Gone. Never to come back. And it all felt…well…weird.

      She headed back into the mall, slightly depressed by the cheery red and pink hearts in every store window. Valentine’s Day. The most miserable day of the year for the suddenly single.

      Okay. She wasn’t completely unhappy. She’d known for a long time that she and Ben weren’t going to make it. They’d never been in love. Not in the way she’d wanted, hoped, planned to be. When she’d learned he was seeing

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