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Melissa looked at her watch. Time to go. The note was written which would explain everything. She tucked it into the bottom of the desk drawer, next to her insurance policy which named Matt as the beneficiary, put on her coat, and left. ***** Matt looked out the front window. The street was full of people carrying balloons. They started into the shop. One balloon caught on the ceiling fan and popped. The mob twittered. “No!” shouted Matt. “You can’t come in here. Get out!” He flapped his hands and even pushed a couple of them, but some of the crowd forced their way in. Dozens of mobbers filled the shop and the ones that didn’t fit pressed up against the window, all getting as close together as they could. “Hi Matt.” He whirled around. Melissa had come in the back way. She smiled. “What is going on?” he called to her, fighting his way to her side. He grabbed her arm. “Come into the office with me, Matt,” she said, putting her lips next to his ear. Puzzled, he followed her. The crowd grew eerily silent. Matt closed the door. Mel went behind his desk, drew the gun from the drawer and brought it slowly up in front of her. Matt froze. The mobbers checked their watches. Melissa checked hers. She pointed the gun at Matt with her gloved hand, just to see what he would do. “Mel,” he breathed, hyperventilating. “What are you doing?” “Saying goodbye, Matt.” She knew his were the only fingerprints on the gun. As five hundred balloons popped, Melissa pulled the trigger. Those nearest the office noticed the sound, in spite of the noise. Melissa had calculated correctly. The first ones into the room drew the conclusion she had planned. Matt was standing over her body. His prints were on the gun. Five different cell phones were used to call Nine One One and the response was instantaneous, since the police, suspicious of the mob, had converged outside. The note was found in a search of the house. It instructed the authorities to question Matt if anything happened to her. Matt was convicted within a year and sentenced to life in prison. Fin Chapter Twenty - Danielle Bourdon – Dréoteth Danielle Bourdon was born and raised in Corona, California. She started her first novel at age 11, on an airplane flight from CA to TX, but never finished it. Her love of books and writing led her to start several other novels later in life, all of which wound up in a drawer or lost in hard drive crashes. Dréoteth was written during an exhaustive but exciting National Novel Writing Month exercise, which she completed, and has now become a full-fledged book. It is her first published novel. Her next book, Bound by Blood, was released September 1, 2010. Danielle lives in Texas with her husband, two sons, and their black cat Sheba. Author website: http://www.daniellebourdon.com Amazon author page: http://tinyurl.com/2fgqunv Copyright © 2010 Danielle Bourdon Fall The Year of the Red Leaf: Dréoteth
“I am called Dréoteth.” I enunciated each syllable slowly, unable to abide the pleasure of his death with the wrong name on his lips. Dray-o-teth. It was the first time I have uttered it in—I do not know how long. Decades. Centuries. Mister Mathan, a prominent member of society, now knows exactly who and what has been picking off the citizens of Malmsbury. I worry not for my safety. The dead tell no tales. If the villagers knew what an atrocity walks among them, as one of them, they would look upon me with horror rather than intrigue and curiosity. But they do not. The people have no idea that the scribe in their midst is the one responsible for their nightmares, for the dark whispers in the corners of the inns and taverns. I have been here for six months and have chosen my prey wisely. I have not attacked them in groups even though I have been tempted. Sometimes I want to change right before their eyes and watch them flee en masse, terror thick on the air, their screams layered one over the other. In this subtle way, taking one victim at a time, I can stretch out the duration of my stay and study them. The townsfolk have concocted many stories about the unexpected disappearances; one rumor insists that one of their own has gone insane. Another is that a curse has been placed upon the village by a troupe of gypsies that passed through not long before I arrived here. A random stroke of luck, that, since it throws any suspicion off me. As a newer member of their small society, any ill news or bad omens and strange deaths might be blamed upon the man they know the least about. In an attempt to blend in better, I gave them a false name when I arrived. Here in the village of Malmsbury, they know me as Nehemiah Trimble. I amuse myself with these trivial little details. Centuries past, I never bothered to try and integrate or get to know them. There is danger in doing this, which I suppose is part of the lure. In a fit of brash honesty, I admit that humans have always been nothing more than food in my mind, not worthy of my time or commitment. They are prey, and I am a predator. I found their trials and tribulations tedious. Humans fret and worry over nonsensical things. However, the longer I spend amongst them, the more I find myself annoyingly intrigued. There are several men in this town with intellects almost as big as their egos and on more than one occasion we have engaged in interesting conversation. I find myself seeking their company out, shockingly, and could swear that they seek mine out also. I wish that did not fill me with a sense of satisfaction. They are only men, after all, vastly inferior and I know in time they will prove that their true worth is in how well they fill my belly. In another contradiction, I find myself loathe to target those with artistic skill; painters, architects, musicians. I am secretly fascinated by their abilities, as much as I wish I was not. A woman who serves here at the inn, Eugenia Bailey, bears watching. It is almost as if she can peel open the layers of a person and take a look inside. I know, because I caught her doing it to me and it was most unsettling. For a rare moment, I thought she knew my secret. I have not lived this long to be disabled by a glance, no matter how incisive, and dismissed the notion immediately. I will see her, in fact I will see them all again on the morrow. There is a great festival planned and while they revel, I will do my best not to be incited by their energy. For now the candle burns low and the hour grows late. Dréoteth. The distorted image that stared back at him in the looking glass resembled a gentleman. His coat, black wool with matching trim, fit loose from his shoulders to his thighs. Layered underneath, a black vest and white shirt added contrast but he cast a critical eye on the snug breeches that tapered down into knee high boots. They were gray, the color of ashes, and he considered changing them to match his coat. When Dréoteth realized that he was dawdling over his appearance like some normal human, he snorted. Humans and their wardrobes, in his grandiose opinion, were too bright, too frilly, too overdone. If he weren’t careful, he would next be shuffling through wigs and ruffles and lace kerchiefs that had absolutely no business anywhere in the vicinity of a man. The thought was laughable if he’d been the type given to fits of amused whimsy. He was not. Austere. Over-confident. Aggressive. Those were words that better suited him. Weak fingers of light, the last hurrah of a dying dusk, painted the spartan room more orange than ochre. It turned his olive skin a jaundiced hue and streaked his jet-black hair with bronze.
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Cloaked in the darkness of his car,
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“Hell, no. When a damsel’s in d
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Even when his mother's cries grew l
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Judd sounded miserable. "Me, too. B
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“Just to give you a heads up,”
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Abe and Bert Ladies and Gentlemen -
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Bert paused to assess Abe’s react
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with vine designs carved around the
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“Okay,” I said running out of h
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It was ridiculous, of course. Not j
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The women hissed again. The first o
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She opened her mouth, then closed i
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My journals from that time period s
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“Henry Blackheart Hanover.” Ecl
Page 34 and 35: “I didn’t mean you shouldn’t
Page 36 and 37: “I’m coming,” said a middle-a
Page 38 and 39: another night. The thin, hard mattr
Page 40 and 41: and midnight black detonated behind
Page 42 and 43: “Shut your mouth, Van.” Brody,
Page 44 and 45: Marla nodded her head. “Only a co
Page 46 and 47: The last of them were approaching,
Page 48 and 49: “Just tell her someone needs some
Page 50 and 51: “Thanks,” I jumped up and rushe
Page 52 and 53: As his eyes adjusted, he took in hi
Page 54 and 55: their squad had been assigned to de
Page 56 and 57: “Well how the hell was I supposed
Page 58 and 59: “You are the crème de la crème,
Page 60 and 61: actual happiness. Eleven years ago,
Page 62 and 63: He didn’t even look at her as he
Page 64 and 65: opening up the gate to Greg’s lif
Page 66 and 67: She lifted her glass for another si
Page 68 and 69: “Mr. Crowe, you were the last per
Page 70 and 71: The sound of a 15 passenger van pul
Page 72 and 73: “What is it?” McAffey directed
Page 74 and 75: And for no reason he could fathom,
Page 76 and 77: on Earth—or rather below the seas
Page 78 and 79: His wide shoulders, height, and goo
Page 80 and 81: Melissa breathed a barely perceptib
Page 82 and 83: Maybe this would be the last sessio
Page 86 and 87: He stalked to a small desk under th
Page 88 and 89: No one waited on either side. She s
Page 90 and 91: She was thin next to his roundness
Page 92 and 93: “I seem to recall that you could
Page 94 and 95: Just as she started to think she im
Page 96 and 97: his two apprentices pull the great
Page 98 and 99: Lower, between a cleft in the hills
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