Archive for the 'query' Category
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***
Tarnished
Rap-tap-tapping at the chamber door is never a good thing. It usually means the failsafes have, well, failed.
The C door is made of wolfram, titanium, and silver the alloy most likely to repel and stand against any ass-hats attempting to enter the chamber without the codes. Its gleaming metallic surface was a stark contrast to the bare white walls and carpeted floors that enclosed her, completely cutting her off from the outside. The C door was a necessary evil according to the US military. How else could they control her? Study her? Imprison her?
The interior of the chamber looked benign. Like any other of a million hotel rooms across the globe, it sported a double bed in one corner butted up against a table with a light. A flat screen dominated one wall, with the entrance to the bathroom next to the bed. A bit austere but it did not appear hideous. Of course, appearances could be deceiving.
Silver backed away from …
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***
It had been two years, eight months and twenty-three days since Ella Lucas had last done the horizontal rumba. And even then it hadn’t been very good. With the powerful Harley throbbing between her legs, she was acutely aware of every minute. The vibrations pulsed against her taunting places that hadn’t seen action in a long time making her excruciatingly aware of her complete asexual existence. Was it possible to orgasm on the seat of a Harley? Alone?
She revved the engine. Lock up your husbands, Huntley, Rachel’s kid is back in town.
Her red lips twisted in a bitter smile. Nearly two decades since she’d been back in her hometown and it was still making her nuts. Seventeen years she’d spent in this speck on the map trying to do the right thing, trying to be her mother’s opposite. Playing the good girl. Until she’d cracked under the pressure and just walked away.
And still …
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***
‘Em? Emily, is that you?’
Emily Standish sat down hard on the little wooden chair with its faded floral needlepoint cushion. She barely registered the small cloud of dust it gave out in protest. Her heart was racing and her breath was short. It couldn’t be. It must be nearly fifteen years – and this really wasn’t the moment for that kind of complex mental arithmetic. If someone had asked her, Emily would have claimed she barely remembered him. She certainly wouldn’t have expected that she could recognise his voice on the end of a crackling phone line in just five words.
‘Hello? Can you hear me?’
She could hang up, of course. For all he knew, she was on a train heading through a tunnel at just the wrong moment. Right moment. Whichever.
Or perhaps she could pretend he’d got the wrong number. He wouldn’t be able to tell …
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***
Fate had painted a bull’s-eye on my back. The ironic thing, I didn’t believe in fate or karma before my brother left a message on my office’s answering machine that was the equivalent to Armageddon dropping a line just to say hey. Being the self- designated, birdie-flipper of fate I had to know if listening to the message would be like Darth Vader—Phoenix, I am your brother.
After six years of silence, only one reason would have made Samuel call me. Earlier this week the family had been going through the family bible, and would I mind if they whiteout my name?
But, no, instead of letting the call stay a mystery I helped fate change my course, and pushed that stupid button to listen to the message. At least to my credit, I braced myself to hear what my brother had to say.
“I really don’t want to leave this message, but I don’t think you would call me back.” He paused, and it felt like …
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***
Maddie flicked over the page of a dog-eared graphic spy thriller and burrowed deeper in her office chair, her red Converse hightops propped on an open drawer containing scientific articles, chunks of quartzite and the odd gemological tool. God, she would love to be kick-butt Modesty Blaise coming face to face with that big ape-man Delicata. Wham! Blam! Look out ma’am! She would look so hot in black leather.
At her elbow, twenty million dollars worth of pink diamond glowed in a tiny pool of light beneath the stereomicroscope.
Whirrr. Click. The cuckoo bobbed out of the clock with a mechanical chirp. One o’clock. Maddie closed her book and tossed it in the drawer. Scooting her chair up to the microscope she pushed her glasses up her nose and peered through the stereo eyepieces. Strands of wavy brown hair escaped her ponytail and fell past the shoulders of her Geology Rocks! T-shirt. Tomorrow the gem would go on display in her Aunt Grace’s jewelry shop. Until …
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***
“Shit.” Andy’s voice was in a pitch that would rival that of a dog whistle. She had rounded the corner at five knots and slammed into a scrawny chest and a huge red Slurpy.
Five minutes ago Andy had been sitting in the library, chewing on her lip, blinking back tears and mulling over what Molly had told her. The clock had been screaming at her that she was late and she almost didn’t notice. As fate would have it, she was very late and on the day of her Business Economics final. If she didn’t make it to the room in forty-seven seconds the door would close and she would receive an F on the final which would likely force her to retake the damn class. Of course that would mean that her entire scholarly plan would be flushed down the toilet.
“Wow, where’s the fire?”
“I am so sorry.” Andy only missed half a beat and was running down the hall again. “Really sorry. I …
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***
The phone rang.
Swan Shreve ignored it, and continued to flip through files in the black, metal file cabinet until she reached the right tab. The phone had been ringing like a malfunctioning car alarm all morning. It was as though every idiot in the world had signed a pact to call her today to ensure she wouldn’t get the filing done. In all, she’d gotten two sales calls for magazines, one man selling siding, three irate and rude customers, and a woman who called to complain about a bill and when Swan explained she’d called the wrong department said, “Why don’t you know? Can’t you just call it up on your computer?” Swan said she couldn’t look it up and she’d transfer the woman to accounts receivable. The woman brightly explained that they never pick up there. That’s why she’d called this office instead. The phone rang again as Swan slid a piece of …
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***
Staring at the bread knife she held in her hand, Angie wondered how long it would take her to die if she were to jam the pointed tip into her eye. The serrated edge ought to do maximum damage, but the very thought of touching anything to her eyeball made her shudder. Still, it was one way to end the miserable night she was having. It would be quick if she hit the brain. But with her luck, she thought with a wry twist to her pink lipsticked mouth, she would end up lobotomizing herself and drooling into a fruit cup for the rest of her shitty existence. She dropped the bread knife into a bucket of soapy water and wiped her hand on her apron. Mac, the short order cook and shift manager, looked up from the burgers flailing on the grill and gave her the stink eye before jerking his head toward the dining area.
Angie returned the cook’s glare and held up …
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***
Jonah was late.
Three minutes late, by the somber reckoning of the Trinity Church clock. Two, by his reliable old Waltham, which had kept him apace for twelve years while the rest of New York hurried to keep up. It was only on this morning, twisted into disorder by weeks of expectation and anxiety, that he had failed the Waltham and himself.
Braced for the wind, he jumped from the streetcar the instant it stopped, and navigated a path through the muddy slush to the sidewalk. There he stepped into the crowd and, with a tip of his bowler as he passed the churchyard, proceeded down Wall Street fueled by stomach-churning anticipation—twelve years’ worth.
He had been barely nineteen when Bennet Grandborough had first entrusted him with drafts for collection. It seemed a lifetime ago. From runner to clerk to teller, he had lived up to Mr. Grandborough’s faith in him. Even so, a promotion to ranking bank official had seemed as unattainable as the stars. …
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***
Warning: Graphic Content
***
The lamb’s blood was splattered against the wall. Its bleating shrieks of pain and surprise drowned out the crowd noise around them. The woman covered her ears to the animal’s pitiful cries. In a circle, the seven of them stood around the dying creature.
“Ladies first,” the black-haired man said, smiling at their guest. He held the lamb by the ears, pulling back its head to expose the cut throat.
She hesitated, then overcame her disgust and dove on the animal, drinking deeply of its warm blood, satiating her thirst. Only for a while. She could feel the lamb’s heartbeat fading as the blood pulsed out of its body. Not wanting to be an ungracious guest, she released her grip on the animal and stepped back.
“Thank you,” she said to the man who’d offered her a brief feast, blood dripping from the lower half of her face. He motioned to a nearby water pump.
The woman …
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***
OH MY GOD! MY GIRLFRIEND’S A BARBARIAN… (Or POLITICIAN? can’t decide)
A Sharp Edged Narrative of Characters Tangled Up In the Passion Realm
…AND SOME MEN ARE FROM GRAMMATIKA CHALLINGA
And the moral of this dream (Tet) is, don’t take lifestyle lessons from cultural newcomers…obviously.
Once, enclosed within a time cycle, a ten year one, there were six living entities bound by the laws of material nature moving as individuals inside a complete whole. Constantly engaged in profit-minded service this handful of living beings, it should be mentioned, have read the right books but in the wrong order. One of these transient, presently earthbound beings is Omni and his girlfriend/shrink was Neon Light. Neon, working late tying up some loose ends, planned to surprise Omni and Nivea with his favourite, a triple cheese-on-triple cheese (with extra grilled cheese and kidney beans) on a dingy-sized pizza, big enough for three of them to share. If she stayed over then from Blackfriars it’d be easy for …
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***
It started raining just as Cody Walker parked his Jeep Wrangler behind someone’s shiny new BMW. Thank God, he had put the top up before he’d left his apartment. It wasn’t raining hard, just an annoying drizzle that made the July night even muggier. The afternoon high today had reached the 99-degree mark. Gotta love this Houston weather. Fortunately, the walk to the front door was short. He tucked the birthday present he was carrying under one arm and reached out to ring the doorbell with his other.
“Cody! So glad you could make it!”
“Aw, you know I wouldn’t miss your birthday party, Karen,” replied Cody, handing her the package. “I hope you like it,” he added a little shyly, following her into the crowded living room.
“I’m sure it’s fabulous,” she said with a wink.
He shook his head, grinning. “Not all gay men use that word, you know.”
She laughed at that. “Especially not you, right, Mr. Cowboy?”
“My Mama would have a stroke if she …
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***
July 7, 1777, Hubbardton,Vermont
“Where do you think we are, Blackthorne?”
Stephen maintained his rigid posture, his eyes slanting to the right the only indication he’d heard the muttered question. He could just make out Granger’s profile—and one of Granger’s dark eyes staring sideways at him.
“Somewhere between Fort Ticonderoga and the mouth of hell,” Stephen said through stiff lips.
“We passed the mouth of hell a few miles back.”
Stephen nearly broke discipline and laughed. The idea comparison was an apt one. The scenes they’d passed on the road to this god-forsaken wilderness lacked only Lucifer to complete the picture. The carcasses of half-butchered cattle, the leavings of a retreating army with no time to do the job properly, festered along the way, bloated and fly-infested under a sweltering July sun. The stench of death, sticky and sweet, tainted the very air. The beasts had been part of some family’s livelihood once, but now they lay as a rotting sacrifice to the god of war.
The prostrating heat only …
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***
The misty grey corner of nowhere and no place, Bloomsbury, London—late Friday night at the pub. Another long, dreary week of suffering in the trenches had passed quietly into the oblivion of raucous laughter, dizzying clouds of smoke, and rounds of drinks for all.
Just the five of them. “Out on the piss,” they would all say, and as Laleana glanced around the table, she came to realise that it had always been this way, for as long as she cared to remember.
Lit cigarette dangling precariously from his lips, Julian presided over them, antagonizing everyone as he flung his glass of whiskey back and forth through the air, punctuating his sentences with cast off drops of drink.
“So,” he said as if already demanding an answer, “We all still headin’ out to the ole family plot for holiday? I have confirmed…we’ve got the run of the place. We can paint the walls chartreuse should we feel so inclined. Hell, we can douse the place with petrol …
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***
I held my breath and dove into the crawl space just before a flashlight beam swept across the wall.
A voice came over my ear piece, “Do you have it?”
I shook my head. Of course I had it, but if someone heard me talking, I’d get caught.
The echo of police boots trailed away. After a thirty count to make sure they’d left, I exhaled, and tried not to throw up.
At least I better have it, or we’re screwed. I checked my pocket once more for the gem. Still there. Good.
I wiggled out of the crack and glanced back at the glass case positioned in the middle of the room. Through my mask I could see the motion sensors surrounding the stand that held the Queen’s Ruby just moments before. No wonder I’d set them off. There were hundreds of laser streams pointing out in all directions. That’s what happened when I relied solely on my drawings though—I should have checked first before just walking right …
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***
Jackie Rutledge awoke to the abrasive grind of sand against her bare breast. She groaned and turned, feeling it abrade between her thighs, her shoulder, the cheeks of her butt. She was sleeping on sandpaper. Then the abrupt and shrill peel of her phone threatened to rupture the tenuous strands of sleep that still held her head in one piece. Oh, the joys of hangovers.
The phone blared again, announcing to her along with the blinding slice of light beaming between the curtains, that it was indeed morning. Or midday perhaps. Again the phone teetered dangerously close to making her head explode. A deft fling of the pillow that had been covering her head from the glare was rewarded with a soft thump and a meow. Bickerstaff, the captain of all things comfort, blinked at Jackie from the end of the bed, a decidedly distasteful look on his face.
“What?” He blinked but otherwise did nothing. “Don’t give me that look.” The phone beat …
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***
The blood coating my hands and face created one hell of a problem. “Well, shit,” I breathed, staring at the red winding over my knuckles. “That’s not good. Not at all.”
Anonymous people, their auras streaming like thick waters, surged past the mouth of the alley, oblivious on the Old City sidewalk. I staggered away from the wall and swiped my forearm across my eyes. Completely futile, though. Bloody images never cleaned away as easily as the real stuff.
That vision had hit me like a brick to the face. Wet warmth still trickled from my nose and I pinched it, tipping my head back. The slice of sky between the buildings was a riot of color, nuclear pinks and reds and oranges. Almost curfew.
“Shit,” I said again.
Then the rolling waves of nausea hit, magical whiplash exacting its price. I doubled over and retched, aching head clamped between my hands. As I rode out the queasiness, my gaze swept over the busted pavement, finally coming to …
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***
Jack Sutton heard a whisper of movement a split second before an arm wrapped around his neck and something sharp plunged into his gut. His brain registered that he’d been stabbed as a hard shove sent him crashing to the cold concrete floor.
“You should’ve slit his throat,” a croaky, unfamiliar voice complained.
“He’ll be dead in an hour,” a second voice assured the first. “Come on, help me get the cash register opened.”
Jack lay still as death, praying whoever these bastards were they’d hurry the hell up. If he could crawl to the phone and dial 9-1-1, he might have a chance.
Jesus, he was going to puke. Concentrate, Sutton, he thought, swallowing hard, choking down bile. He cracked an eye open and wished he hadn’t. The sight of his own blood brought on another wave of nausea; the noxious odor of gasoline made it worse.
He squeezed his eyes shut and listened as his attackers struggled to get the cash …
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***
“Casey Parker, if you’re not out here and ready in 5 minutes I will drag you out kicking and screaming!” Heather calls to me while pounding her hand on the bathroom door.
“Not if I lock myself in here, you won’t,” I holler back, while quickly checking the locked door handle in front of me.
Catching a glance at myself in the mirror I try to figure out how I let myself get into this mess. Whatever possessed me to let her use this temporary blue hair dye on me? At least she didn’t cover my entire head in it, just a few highlighted streaks. It doesn’t really look horrible with my straight black hair and it’ll wash out easily enough, but it’s just so, not me…
“In case you forgot, the apartment’s in my name… don’t make me call Uncle Dean to bust you outta there. We’re just going to the Java Lounge Case. Come on, it’ll be fun!”
Two months ago …
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***
The gutters on Gåsgränd were overflowing again. Ranulf stepped over the brimming cobblestone-rut with a silent blessing; February rain draped the alley in drizzling shadows. Late day might as well have been twilight, given four stories of medieval townhouses looming overhead, and Ranulf kept his pace slow. He wasn’t one for watching his feet in a literal sense, but neither had he ever been one for falling flat on his ass from an imbalanced step on a slick cobblestone. Besides, good coffee deserved to be sipped, not splattered on him and the street.
He came up short at his building’s doorway. A young man huddled in the narrow sheltered archway, dark hair slicked back. A thick tail of hair rested on his shoulder, bound or braided in some manner, the tail-end of a comma to punctuate the long pale face, high brow with a widow’s peak, straight nose, firm jaw. He brought to Ranulf’s mind the silent watching saints frozen in cathedral windows.
The resemblance stopped …
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This is the revised version. I failed to recall that the author had sent me a revision. Sorry guys!
***
Somewhere between ordering dinner and the arrival of the Italian salad, the conversation at Brizio’s veered into “Have you ever… ?” territory.
Two sets of eyes turned in Carla’s direction as she sipped from a glass of house red. Where do they find all this great stuff, she wondered, absently contemplating the shelves of imported cans, bags and boxes in the grocery store cum restaurant. And what the heck is it for?
‘Hey!” Mary’s finger tapped Carla’s glass, startling her back to attention. “Don’t leave us hanging. We’re collecting data.”
Data. Where was her concentration lately? “Sorry. Have I ever met someone and felt an immediate physical –”
‘Sexual.”
‘– attraction to that person and, yes, I have.”
A waitress began seating a party at the table to Carla’s left and the three women automatically moved in closer to each other.
‘And,” Gretchen prompted, passing the wine bottle to Mary, who waved it …
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***
“Nawlins ain’t nothing like what yer used to, McDunna. You may be a specialist where you come from, but here you ain’t shit.”
Dianna McDunna rubbed the center of her forehead, trying to chase away the voices of doubt which had nagged her since she’d left the police precinct. She’d been here a week and hadn’t managed to make much of an impression on her coworkers, at least not the kind of impression she wanted to make. Barry, at least, seemed willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and time, but Longstreet was a misogynistic dirtbag and already making arguments to get her assigned to a desk or busted back to patrol. She hadn’t worked patrol in almost eight years, the very thought was insulting.
The spires of the St Louis Cathedral rose closer and …
Welcome to First Page Saturday. Individual authors anonymously send a first page read and critiqued by the Dear Author community of authors, readers and industry others. Anyone is welcome to comment. You may comment anonymously.
If anyone has submitted a first page for critique and that book is now for sale, will you please let us know. I’ve had requests from readers who want to finish the story you started and are willing to pay for that privilege!
***
McLean, Virginia October 1985
Claire Campbell winced at approaching headlight beams. As the station wagon passed, she sighed and focused on the curve ahead. Deadman’s Curve, they unimaginatively dubbed it as teens, which, in Claire’s case, proved nearly prophetic. Her right knee ached. She gripped the wheel, ignoring the pain, as she navigated this curve yet again. The pain was not memory, though memory played its part; Hat Trick took the curve too fast, too high, and Claire went through the VW van’s windshield, landing on the crumpled hood of a Cadillac. Now, exhausted, hurting, and afraid, Claire made the curve and eased off the accelerator. The semi-circular driveway was up ahead on the …
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***
Lannie Bryan panicked and slammed on the brakes as her Mini began to slide down the hill outside the hospital.
Big mistake.
Nine years of living in temperate North Carolina combined with the fatigue of the past twenty-four hours had caused her brain to short-circuit and she’d forgotten the first rule of winter driving. Never, ever brake in a skid.
As the car slid sideways down the drive, her lessons from Drivers Ed kicked in and Lannie managed to gain some control. Instead of rear-ending the car in front of her, she sideswiped it, bouncing almost gently off the rear bumper, jumping the curb and coming to rest half-on and half-off the tree lawn
I can’t deal with this now, Lannie thought as she stared at the car she’d hit. It was a Mustang like Joe Santoro’s old …
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***
“If size really matters, I’m in trouble.”
Riley set in place the last of the new shipment of fairy figurines she’d been shelving and turned to the customer who had spoken behind her, a practiced smile of welcome readied for him.
The smile froze on lips gone stiff. And for one insane moment Riley thought sure the fairies at her back were not the dainty bits of ceramic they appeared to be but evil sprites come to life. How else could she account for whatever nasty spell had materialized the blast from the past standing three feet away and grinning at her like he figured she’d find him irresistible, and, really, why not?
Bren Reynolds, as she lived and breathed. Come back to mock her.
He dangled before him one of her better sellers — a T-shirt with a caricature of Bigfoot she’d drawn herself, a caption beneath it stating: Size Matters. “I don’t think I can compete,” he said, jiggling the shirt at …
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