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Overview
Two sisters team up with a pair of hottie hunters to learn the truth about the Blurred Ones--and what makes them a taboo category of the supernatural.
No one will tell Eva and Frost the truth about the Blurred Ones. Not their hunter friend, and definitely not the parentals. Maybe it's because Frost spent time in a psychiatric ward and Eva never ceases to think with her hormones. So, when the girls see an opportunity to meet Albert Knox, the most infamous Blurred One of all, they lie about their true plans and head out on their field trip to San Antonio. When the sisters get to town, though, a ghost woman keeps attacking them in their hotel room, and they end up getting one of their classmates killed. Eva thinks she can use her feminine wiles to woo Knox, but he has a couple of more minions than they thought--and she ends up getting tossed through a window. If the sisters and their newfound hottie hunters don't take down Knox soon, he'll permanently attach himself to Eva in a binding ritual.
Hush, Now Forget is the perfect blend of mystery and spook. With sisterly banter and conversational writing, ghostly legends, mystery, heartbreak, murder, and possession, this book will keep you flipping the pages desperate to find out what happens next.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781948095006 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Monster Ivy Publishing |
| Publication date: | 10/24/2017 |
| Series: | Sisters of Bloodcreek , #1 |
| Pages: | 330 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.74(d) |
| Age Range: | 13 - 18 Years |
About the Author
Cammie Larsen loves all things creative, especially something that tells a fantastic story. She's doing what she can to bring more beauty and insight to the world while building her own life's story. For now, that includes helping run Monster Ivy Publishing, volunteering at her local church, and hanging out near and far with her hubs, kid, and two giant dogs. She's an editor, graphic designer, and contributor to The Faithful Creative Magazine.
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
FROST
Bloodcreek Road twists and squirms like the water moccasins in our creek back home. Usually, I have to watch the road to not get carsick, but not today. Today, we've got a mission in the crosshairs.
Prepping for our Spanish class' field trip to San Antonio.
I scan today's news for a particularly juicy headline on my phone. I need something Maggie, our pseudo-aunt hunter friend, can't ignore. Something violent, something unexpected ... and something that was definitely caused by the supernatural.
"How about this one?" I tap the shiny new screen of my phone. "'Newlyweds Found Dead After Eating Each Other's Faces Off While Honeymooning in Chicago.'"
Maggie's aged eyes crinkle at the sides as a bulky tractor slows our progress on the road. "Now that's not the most romantic way to begin one's nuptials."
"It's only a few hours up north."
"It's like you're trying to get rid of me."
I shift uncomfortably in the passenger seat of her car. "Eva and I will already be on the road by the time you leave."
Behind me, Eva, my younger sister by just thirteen months, is already doing "phase-two" of Mission Get-To-San-Antonio — hiding any and all weapons Maggie loaded us up with before we hopped in the car. Maggie may be a gem by all intents and purposes, but she tends to forget that things like switchblades and hunting knives can get both of us expelled from school.
Eva conceals the last pair of salt grenades, but by doing so, she noisily rattles a cup holder.
Maggie's experienced hunter eyes narrow, and it's only a matter of seconds before she realizes we ditched the majority of her contraband back at the house. Maggie will never support the school's policy of zero weapons — not when there are things like banshees and wendigos on the loose — so, in an effort to mask my fear with affection, I seize my friend's meaty arm. "Think you'll go?"
Maggie's slow smile tells me she appreciates the gesture and she pat-pats my hand with her calloused fingers. When she peers through her newly cracked windshield, it's like I can hear what she's thinking: I could escape the humidity for a while. But Chicago will be even farther away from my girls....
With Eva and me gone, though, we all know she'll be bored. No shooting lessons or reminders of how to do CPR. No lectures on putting on temporary tattoos to prevent the possession of demons or ghosts. Maggie's never been good at sitting around, so it doesn't come as much of a shock when she ultimately huffs. "Might as well."
We veer around a cluster of hail-damaged mobile homes, and I'm so excited, I grin at a pair of bikini-clad mannequins someone's posed atop a cherry-red convertible. It won't be long till Eva and I are neck-deep in all the answers regarding our "special brand" of the supernatural.
When we make a sharp turn to the left, though, Eva lurches from her seat to hide what must be the last of Maggie's stockpile.
"Just what are you doing back there?" Maggie quasi-growls.
Eva's lies are as smooth as baby oil. "Looking for Mentos."
But now, Maggie's eyes are narrowed at my fingers, which have somehow wrapped around the "oh-crap-bar" above my head. My saving grace comes in the form of the mother of all potholes.
We've arrived at our school.
Too-thin siding houses a library and a biology trailer, and tobacco cans line the sidewalks like rope lighting at a fancy hotel. There's a shack for baseball gear, too, but that's where all the pot-smokers go when they're tired of bettering themselves.
After sailing into a parking spot a few cars over from the bus, Maggie throws her Buick into park and flings her door wide open with the gusto and flair of a bull-rider. "You girls all packed up and ready to go?"
Eva and I stumble onto the asphalt, scrambling for our essentials.
"Got your switchblades?" Maggie's hopeful gaze lingers on Eva's fringed bag that matches her maroon-blitzed fingernails.
I laugh, loud, because Maggie has the sort of voice that travels. Hopefully no one overheard. While Maggie refuses to show us what's inside her fanny pack — her mysterious "Pack o' Wonders" — she was a little too generous with her silver bullets before we left the house.
Eva and I side-eye each other, her dramatically eye-lined charcoal eyes to my blue.
Got rid of it all? I tilt my head like our orange tabby, Gato.
Her eyes twinkle as she gives an almost imperceptible bow. The sun glitters off the dozen or so rings on her fingers, reminding me of her biggest pair of fuchsia headphones. Truth is, we're the complete inside-out of each other — Eva's the fun one, while I'm the one who typically follows all the rules.
Now, though, Maggie keeps tapping her fanny pack like it's her prized rodeo buckle. Like she's tempted to pull out something else — handcuffs with devil's traps? — but she must see that there isn't enough time. One of my camouflage-wearing classmates has moseyed over and is already sniffing around the knife-tipped railroad spike jutting out from the side pocket of Maggie's cargo pants.
Besides, it's not like we didn't just spend all night going over how to barricade ourselves in our rooms and the proper thickness of salt lines for keeping out ghosts. Eva and I may not be hunters, but Maggie's always armed us with these sorts ofdetails.
Opening her arms like we're a pair of diapered toddlers, Maggie says, "I'm going to miss my girls."
Eva and I snuggle up, because Maggie's been our homiest home for years.
Her paisley shirt is like silk to my fingers. Her shoulders are soft, but layered by muscle. There's the ever-present scent of bug spray, Dawn soap, and engine oil. She's our Mama Bear, our Hagrid of Hogwarts. Parent without actually being a parent. Lifeline when our parents are being impossible.
To my embarrassment, Maggie's already blinking furiously when she lets us go. She fumbles for her eyeglasses perched atop her short brown curls before swiftly planting them on her nose. Maybe it's easier not to cry when she's "the scholar," Maggie Darrow.
Wiping her nose on the back of her rolled sleeve, she clears her throat. "Call me when you get there?" Eva places a bejeweled hand over the front ruffle of her shirt. "When the cat's away, the mice won't play."
Maggie furrows her brow. "I'll pretend that's how it goes. Frost, you'll look afterher?"
Yes, I very nearly say, almost wishing Maggie could chaperone. But who would look into those newlyweds who ate each other's faces off in Chicago?
Maggie rests a hand on my shoulder, still awaiting my answer, and guilt churns in my stomach like a hungry spider. I'd like to reassure her that everything will be okay, but no one can really know. Taking care of Eva is sort of like taking care of a bumblebee — she's a little precarious and flies wherever she wants to go.
So, I give Maggie the best answer I can. "I suppose."
Pacified, Maggie drops her hand as my heart slows. She doesn't mention the Almond Joy brownies she snuck into my satchel, or the peach cobbler she crammed inside Eva's duffel bag between her lip-gloss and headphones. No, instead Maggie holds up a stubby finger, and in her low, authoritative voice, says, "Don't forget to take notes."
Eva rolls her eyes. "Like Frost's capable of not being a nerd."
Maggie's already rosy cheeks darken with pleasure as she shifts in her hiking boots. Her collection of knives and pepper sprays makes her our Maggie. Our Jesse James, Carrie Nation, and Annie Oakley all balled up into one.
"Just promise me," she says, wiping the tears shining in her eyes, "that you'll carve those sigils into the doors. And don't forget to say your prayers."
She only said that because our parents must have reminded her to tell us before we go. Our family may not be hunters — we're a little higher on the totem pole — but we all know the necessity of arming ourselves.
Maggie doesn't have to state her "other" rules. The ones she's been drilling into us ever since we told her our Spanish class was going to the Alamo. She knows Eva and I have always been too curious for our own good.
No EMF readers.And no ghost tours.
When we broke it to her that we were actually staying at the Gunter — one of America's most famously haunted hotels, and where, incidentally, resides one of our hidden horrors — Maggie grabbed an Aleve before rolling out the white board.
No searching for ghosts of blonde girls, she wrote, because Albert Knox, a particularly horrible supernatural being, is a collector of those.
No taking baths, because that's where Knox put his victims after shooting them while they were in their underwear.
No shoes that make your feet look small.
No Sixties music.
And, absolutely, positively no meat grinders.
Like we're going to lug one of those to San Antonio.
Now, though, Maggie doesn't drag up any of her addendum rules, and I'm pretty darn glad, because I'm about done drawing undue attention to ourselves.
It isn't long before Eva and I are hunkered low in our shared vinyl seat, our fellow residents of Bloodcreek stringing together their most inspiring curse words. Twangy guitars and tambourines serenade us over the radio. Something splatters my cheek as someone tries to discard their tobacco out the window, and I wipe it off with the back of my sleeve.
A girl quips a clever joke about something anatomical, and in the back one of the boys moons the highway patrol.
Our driver jerks around a possum. One of the band geeks makes a fart noise, and we're just bouncing over a neat little collection of Missouri's potholes when Eva breathlessly turns to me.
"I packed a blonde wig."
I pull a purple plastic bottle from my satchel. "I brought bubble bath withchamomile."
CHAPTER 2
EVA
Find your Tejas Hombre, everyone," Mrs. Sanders shrills, waddling in her neon purple crocs toward the sloped roof of the Alamo.
I throw my arms like a giant windmill around Frost's bony shoulders. My ride-or-die sister from the same mister.
Reaching up, she pats my hand with her always cold one in solidarity, and we watch our twenty-something classmates scramble over the burning cobblestones to find their travel buddies. I force myself to not quirk an eyebrow at their bad teeth, Wranglers, and the hottest designers from ten years ago. I know it makes me a snob, but I can't help wishing Frost and I were part of a group with less hunter-flage and more style.
Double-decker tour buses, cars, trucks, and horse-drawn carriages crawl past us with the infamous Alamo standing behind them. It's kind of majestic, but sad at the same time, with its still visible cannonball dents.
We totally look the part of one of many high school tour groups, but the bad dye jobs and tobacco can-lined back pockets separate us from the prep school polos, pressed khakis, or otherwise washed and well-nourished groups. I have to remind myself there's more to people than looks, although after almost a year with these people, for most of them, I'm not sure how much more.
"Maybe we can find some guys here who actually shower," I mutter to Frost below a giant oak tree, hesitant to move into the beating sun.
She gives a small snort, and her movements have that jerky tendency she gets when big sis Frosty is stressed. Is she wondering if maybe we should have put on one of Maggie's temporary warding tattoos in case of an emergency? Quiz each other on the Latin Maggie taught us in case we have to exorcise a ghost?
"This is gonna be awesome." I nudge her lean, tan calf with my flip-flop. "Finally out of the house, ready for answers."
With a quick glance at her calf to make sure I didn't make it dirty, she flashes her perfect white teeth in a genuine smile. "Yes! Plus, we haven't had to pick up any rocks for like thirty-six hours now!"
"Ain't that the truth." But the mention of home reminds me how we left Maggie's contraband behind. She's gonna be pissed. "Did you remember to ditch the Reaper?" I murmur in Frost's ear.
Frost's head bobs. We'd found that in Frost's duffel beneath her nerd stash of history books and highlighters. Nice try, Maggie. We can probably get away with vials of holy water and salt, but no security guard is going to think kindly on Maggie's favorite blade. Fittingly nicknamed for its sick, silver curved blade. "Better for hackin' a banshee's head off," she likes to say. A small banshee, but a banshee just the same. Course, if the parentals caught any wind of us even dabbling in hunting, they'd crap agiraffe.
Not that we've ever used the blade, ourselves.
"Okay, are we ready, hombres?" Mrs. Sanders says, drawing out her best Spanglish accent. She claps her wrinkled hands, making her plastic bangles clatter. "Let's go over our plans for the rest of the dia!" She sings that last part and I stifle a laugh, not wanting to wet blanket her enthusiasm. She's probably frazzled, since all the other chaperones flaked. I'm just glad no one cared enough to make us cancel.
One of our classmates who has most likely never brushed his crooked teeth in his entire life pumps an arm, whooping, and Frost and I look at each other, her half-rolled eyes mirroring my own. Did I hear a snicker from the Khaki Yale Brigade?
The sickly sweet smell of bathroom cologne assaults my nose as one of our classmates, Wade, brushes my arm with his gangly one. He nudges me hard enough I feel his wiry arm-hairs. I desperately want to wipe off my arm.
"Hey." He winks his way-too-blond and too few lashes at me and jiggles his leg like he's struggling with a wedgie.
"Hey ..." It comes out like a question, and I'm taking shallow breaths to help me not gag. This. This is the difference between being country and being hick, hillbilly, or redneck. Country still has class. Country knows about hygiene.
"You oughta be my old lady." Wade reaches his heavy, damp arm around my suddenly very tense shoulders.
"Okay, buddy. Okay. Your mullet is looking extra curly today." I simultaneously want to laugh and vomit, but I don't actually know what he means, so I look at Frost, but she's already scribbling something in her notepad. So much help. I'd love to punch him in the stomach for touching me, try out some defensive moves in the real world, but I mind my manners.
"Let's talk later. I don't want to miss our plans for the dia with my Tejas hombre!" I duck out from under his arm — not enough cologne to mask that body odor — and drape my own over Frost's shoulders. "Time to gooooo." I steer Frost toward the Alamo's entrance. Thankfully, Mrs. Sander's speech was short this time, and the students are clambering through the mission's thick white-washed archway.
Wade runs one hand through his neck curls and reaches the other into his back pocket to feel for his snuff. "Aight! I'll catch you'ns later then! Bye, sexy lady!" he shouts after us just as we reach the gate.
"Dodged that mullet." I chuckle, extra pleased with my pun. I breathe in the cigarette and cumin flavored air. "See what we were missing out on riding to school with Dad all these years?" I've seen Wade float around girls before, but this is my first close encounter. He probably smelled fresh meat — a rarity in the redneck center of the world, where everyone has dated everyone and some chlorine could definitely be used in the gene pool. Mom and Dad transferred us this year away from the "big city influences" of Salem, Missouri — population whopping five thousand — after Dad found out one of his students had been on probation once.
"You sure know how to pick them." Frost pokes me where she knows I'll squirm, right between the ribs, so I pull back my arm.
"I know, I know. Wade Pinkman, my next flavor of the week." Shaking my head, I notice several pods have fallen from the tree into my dark hair. I set to picking them out. So dignified. When I'm satisfied I'm pod free, I turn to take in the mission more completely.
It's actually more peaceful than I would have expected from such a war-torn landmark. A string quartet plays "Deep in the Heart of Texas" in the big shady, tropical park while a group of kids play "soldier" with muskets near a babbling fountain.
Frost begins to listen to an audio tour through headphones, dutifully taking notes on her small blue notepad. I have no desire to be stuck in a notebook and instead enjoy the moment of freedom and just breathe. She can help jog my memory for my paper later. Does that make me selfish?
I lift one side of her headphones so she can hear me. "I'm glad you're a history buff, Frosty. Makes writing research papers way easier." I wait for a semi-annoyed look, but something must catch her eye, because she nearly drops her notepad to grab my arm.
"Camo bogie, eight o'clock!" she hisses into my ear. I'm shocked her fingers are still cold in this heat, but I'm turning around to spy the intruder when suddenly, someone takes a giant grab of my rear.
"What the — !" I leap and turn toward my assailant.
"Hey, ol' lady!" My long-locked admirer, Wade, has already returned. "How you likin' the Alama? I seen a spot o'er yonder I wanna show ya."
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "Hush, Now Forget"
by .
Copyright © 2017 Gray, Larsen.
Excerpted by permission of Monster Ivy Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1 - Frost,
Chapter 2 - Eva,
Chapter 3 - Frost,
Chapter 4 - Eva,
Chapter 5 - Frost,
Chapter 6 - Eva,
Chapter 7 - Frost,
Chapter 8 - Eva,
Chapter 9 - Frost,
Chapter 10 - Eva,
Chapter 11 - Frost,
Chapter 12 - Eva,
Chapter 13 - Frost,
Chapter 14 - Eva,
Chapter 15 - Frost,
Chapter 16 - Eva,
Chapter 17 - Frost,
Chapter 18 - Eva,
Chapter 19 - Frost,
Chapter 20 - Eva,
Chapter 21 - Frost,
Chapter 22 - Eva,
Chapter 23 - Frost,
Chapter 24 - Eva,
Chapter 25 - Frost,
Chapter 26 - Eva,
Chapter 27 - Frost,
Chapter 28 - Eva,
Chapter 29 - Frost,
Chapter 30 - Eva,
Chapter 31 - Frost,
Chapter 32 - Eva,
Chapter 33 - Frost,
Chapter 34 - Eva,
Chapter 35 - Frost,
Chapter 36 - Eva,
Chapter 37 - Frost,
Chapter 38 - Eva,
Chapter 39 - Frost,
Chapter 40 - Eva,
Chapter 41 - Frost,
Chapter 42 - Eva,
Chapter 43 - Frost,
Chapter 44 - Eva,
Chapter 45 - Frost,
Chapter 46 - Eva,
Chapter 47 - Frost,
Acknowledgments,
About the Authors,
Also by Mary Gray,