(Okay, it already had words.)
Yes, SERVANT is coming soon. No, I don't know what day it will arrive at your favorite purveyor of books. The cover is finished, at least, and it's really, really cool. In fact, it's my favorite cover out of all my books. Bask in its beauty and awesomeness! BASK IN IT!!!
www.gobolddesigns.com
Now that your eyes have been sated, here's a sneak peek from this novel that took me so long to write. Watch out for flying pop cans.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just as his tired mind began to
wander off on some other tangent, something ticked against the window to the
left of his bed. A bug, probably, or something kicked up by the wind. Funny,
though. It kind of reminded him of that crazy sound he kept hearing earlier
when—
Tap. Tap-tap-tap.
Bobby’s
muscles froze. It was the same sound
he’d heard in the church office. And what had Randy said? That whatever caused
it was like a poltergeist. The sounds wouldn’t bother Bobby when Randy left his
job at the church because Randy was the one whom the unnamed thugs were after.
But now Bobby had associated with the man, and the beings—whatever they
were—had followed him.
Tap-tap.
Tap.
Of
course Bobby was being silly. Poltergeists did not exist, and he certainly
didn’t believe in ghosts. Randy had simply freaked him out with some kind of
sound-throwing trick back at the church. Maybe the tapping hadn’t been on the
window at all and was really something Randy himself was doing under the desk. Or
had it been a recording? It was even possible that Randy owned a secondary
vehicle and had followed Bobby home at a distance just to torment him further.
Bobby could see no motive for such actions, but crazy people didn’t follow the
same logic that others did.
Bobby
held his breath and continued listening for any indication that a solid,
flesh-and-blood human stood outside the window. Aside from the tapping, all he
heard was the soft sighing of wind in the trees.
He
waited five minutes before tiptoeing out of bed and peering through a gap in
the drapes. The moon lit up the night with a pale milky glow, though the wind
made patchy clouds scud across the sky at a fast clip that alternately dimmed
and brightened the cratered orb. The brief periods of brightness weren’t
enough. If someone lurked in the yard, he couldn’t see them.
Tap. The sound, louder this time,
originated from a more distant point. The creep had chosen another window and
upgraded to small boulders instead of pebbles.
“That’s
it.” Bobby jammed his bare feet into gym shoes and pulled on a sweatshirt. If
he didn’t stop the guy, he would break a window and then Bobby’s landlord would
jack up the rent to astronomic proportions if he didn’t throw Bobby out for
associating with the wrong crowd.
Bobby
owned no weapons. He did have a fireplace poker hanging in a stand by the
hearth out in the living room. He had no intention of using it, but it might
strike fear into the creep’s heart and make him run away.
He
crept out of his bedroom, slowly lifted the poker out of the stand so it
wouldn’t make a clanging noise that would rouse Caleb, and undid the deadbolt
on the back door.
The
porch light had burnt out some months before and neither of the house’s
occupants had bothered replacing it, much to Bobby’s current regret. The moon
disappeared behind a bank of fast-moving clouds again. He could have brought
out a flashlight, but stealth might be in his favor if he could catch the guy
by surprise.
He
made sure the door wouldn’t lock behind him and stepped onto the small cement
slab where they kept the tiny charcoal grill they’d used maybe twice all
summer. His eyes already adjusted to the darkness since he hadn’t turned on any
lights during his short flight from the bedroom to here. He took quick
inventory of the yard. Garbage cans. Stunted bushes. Chain-link fence. The creep
didn’t have many places to hide, though it was possible he’d heard Bobby and
dashed around to the side of the house to hunker down behind the giant pine tree
that took up a good portion of the side yard.
Anything
was possible.
Well,
almost anything.
He
was about to step off the slab when something whizzed by his head and bounced
off the lid of the grill before clattering to the ground.
He
wanted to whirl around and see what it had been, but if he turned his back, the
creep might sneak up behind him and conk him on the head. He squinted. What
direction had the thing come from? He didn’t see—
Clunk. Another something landed at his
feet. Keeping his gaze trained on the yard, Bobby stooped and found the object
with his hand. He picked it up and held it in front of his face.
The
moon emerged briefly from behind the mantle of clouds.
He
held a crushed can of Dr Pepper. Not nearly as crushed as it would have been
had it been in Caleb’s grip when that news bit about the murdered girl had been
on television, but crushed nonetheless.
Bobby
remembered part of his exchange with Randy earlier in the evening.
It sounds like someone’s throwing rocks at
the window.
Rocks, sticks, whatever else they
can find. I’m used to it.
The
Dr Pepper can had previously resided in one of the garbage cans along the back
fence ten yards away, or more specifically, the “recycle” can sitting next to
the one reserved for regular waste. Though Bobby didn’t see how a grown man
could remain concealed behind the bins while launching such an assault, that’s
where he had to be.
Bobby
squared his shoulders to make himself appear braver and marched across the damp
grass, wielding the poker like a baseball bat. He stopped five feet away from
the cans and cleared his throat. Maybe he could be diplomatic about this. “I
know you’re back there,” he said, “and if you don’t want me to bash a hole in
your head, you’ll come out with your hands up.” It sounded cheesy, but he
didn’t have time to think of a more elaborate threat.
He
waited. Nothing moved. Maybe the guy was holding his breath.
“Hello?”
He took another tentative step forward. The lid of one can rested on the ground
beside it. A few other crushed cans lay scattered in the grass.
“I’ve
got a fireplace poker,” he said.
Nothing.
“Do
you know what a person can do with a fireplace poker?”
He
hoped that none of his neighbors would hear him and think he had flipped his
lid.
He
continued anyway. “You don’t?” His voice shook. “Well, I’ll tell you. There’s
this guy back home, you see. Lived with a crazy mama. She tried to kill him,
but he killed her first with one of these things. He gives talks now. Stuff
about forgiveness and moving on and things like that.” Now he was just rambling
like a nutcase. “Do you want me to do that to you? Kill you with a poker like
you’re a crazy mama?”
He
thought he heard a faint snicker somewhere in the night, but it might have just
been the wind rustling through the grass and trees.
Somehow
the silence behind the garbage cans seemed far louder than all the nighttime
sounds surrounding him. Gripping the poker in one hand, he dragged the recycle
can aside with the other.
Nobody
was there.
