Chasing Secrets
Praise for Alyssa Richards
THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR is a fascinating tale of tragedy, ghosts, and soulmates. Mystery fans will enjoy this heroine's efforts to track down clues -- both tangible and ghostly -- while trying to find the truth about a woman's death. Romance fans will adore this match-up of a strong heroine and an enigmatic yet endearingly charming and earnest hero. I look forward to reading the next book in this tantalizing ALCOTT MANOR series.” Fresh Fiction Review, THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR
“THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR is a great read…an escapist read, full of secrets and surprises that caught me out completely!” —Jeannie Zelos Book Reviews, THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR
“Having read Alyssa Richards other books, I knew I was in for a treat, even though this was a slightly different genre. And gothic suspense being one of my absolute favorites, I was extremely psyched to read this book. Fortunately, everything that I anticipated about how good this book would be, and how much I would enjoy it, came true.
At first glance, this might appear to be your average haunted house story. But in the hands of this very capable, and highly readable author, it becomes so much more. The haunting was unique and the story revolving around the haunting was very intriguing. I totally did not anticipate the way the story was going or how it was going to end up. This was a great first entry in a new genre that I hope the author will continue. This book, as well as everything else this author has written, comes highly recommended.” — DT Chantel, book reviewer, THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR
“Man oh man! Alyssa Richards has seriously outdone herself with this trilogy. It encompasses love, passion, deception, heartache, reality and alternate reality. Just stunning from start to finish. This trilogy is awesome. If you’re looking for a paranormal romance that’s focused around psychics and time travel, definitely grab this trilogy. It’s simply amazing!” —Nay’s Pink Bookshelf, THE FINE ART OF DECEPTION SERIES
5.0 out of 5 stars “Now this is what I’m talking about...absofreakingamazing!
“It’s authors like Ms. Richards that really opened up the portals to my world, and instilled/nurtured within me a love for reading. Hook, line and sinker you are pulled fast and hard into her storylines and are wrecked when you’ve reached the end...you just don’t want it to be over. The Haunting of Alcott Manor is no different and has a wonderful mix of gothic suspense/mystery with a titter of romance that will captivate you..and the end...omg I so didn’t see that coming. What a stunning conclusion!” —Amazon Reviewer, THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR
5.0 out of 5 stars That ending...!? Are you kidding me?!
“Like others, I'm sure, I’ve read hundred(s) of these types of books. This was a great read, great twists and turns. ...and the end...? WOW! What's really getting me right now though? Henry and Gemma at still with me....days after I've finished the book! I cried with them, I loved with them, and they touched me deeply! Great job! (This is the first time I have been inspired enough to write a review, too!)” Amazon Book Reviewer, THE HAUNTING OF ALCOTT MANOR
“A MURDER AT ALCOTT MANOR is very definitely a thrill-a-minute tale of evil trying to keep a stranglehold on the living. This is a perfect book for readers who enjoy non- stop action and suspense with a dash of sexy. …This story will appeal to readers who love suspense, the paranormal, and everyday people who become unexpected heroes. Hope to read more gothic tales of love and paranormal peril by Alyssa Richards in the future.” Fresh Fiction Review, A MURDER AT ALCOTT MANOR
Chasing Secrets
Alyssa Richards
Copyright © 2018 by Alyssa Richards
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. To obtain permission to excerpt portions of the text, please contact the author at alyssa@paranormalromancebooks.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Ebook ISBN-13: 978-0-9991555-6-1
Editing by Peter Senftleben
Proofreading by 221b Baker St.
copyright 2018 Alyssa Richards
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Also by Alyssa Richards
Acknowledgments
“It is the stars. The stars above us, govern our conditions.”
William Shakespeare
1
“You’re lying.” Barbara narrowed her eyes at her husband.
David raised his glass of champagne and broadcast his perfectly white, nearly electric smile that could have won an election. “Everything’s fine.”
She raised an eyebrow to scold him; he was evading. “I didn’t say things weren’t fine. I said you were lying.”
He cleared his throat and gestured with his glass. “To our second anniversary, to yet another clean health report, and to the baby we weren’t supposed to conceive.”
He placed his hand over his jacket pocket. It was an unconscious move. She knew that’s where he kept a photo of himself at the age of eight, his head resting across his mother’s chest, her head wrapped in a colorful scarf, her skin pale and drawn against the white sheets of the hospital bed.
Barbara survived the cancer, his mother hadn’t.
She ran her hand through her hair, grateful to have hair again. Grateful that it came in twice as thick as she once had, grateful that it didn’t come back gray as she had been told that it might.
The ring of their champagne toast sounded clear in the quiet outdoor restaurant. She took only a tiny sip. A few cars drove by slowly, their engines relatively soft. A man whizzed by, standing on an electric-powered scooter, which hummed like the motor of a sewing machine.
He kissed her hand.
She studied his assuring smile and his soft expression that was full of love and secrets. She never could read him clearly when his lips were on her skin or when he smiled at her in that way. In fact, she couldn’t read him well at all. Not in the way she read other people.
“I saw another stack of medical bills come in this week,” she said.
He looked at her hand and gave it a squeeze. “I’m making all the money we’ll ever need to overcome whatever life throws at us. Don’t you worry.”
“I don’t know how you do it.” She cast him her most scrutinizing stare, the one she planned to use when their child was a teenager.
“I can do anything, when it comes to you.” David tucked his napkin in his lap, his smile widening as if he were pleased with himself. “And as far as not being able to read me the way you want, you’re just going to have to trust me instead.”
“I’d rather be able to read you.” She arched her eyebrow again.
He leaned across the table and kissed her.
She’d never been able to figure out that little glitch with her gift. With anyone else, and on the simple mention of their first name, she could know quite a bit about that person. It was a skill she really appreciated b
ecause, oddly enough, she didn’t read people all that well otherwise.
When she realized she couldn't read David, her first instinct had been to stay away from him. But she fell in love with him. She couldn't help herself. He treated her like a queen, never gave her any reason not to trust him. Problem was, the more she overrode her instincts so that she could trust her husband, the less she trusted herself.
“One day soon I’ll tell you why,” he said.
“You know why I can’t read you?” she asked.
“I have a theory.” David sipped his champagne, kept his eyes on hers, as if he were prepared for her question. Knew what she was going to ask and when. Everything he did was deliberate and full of care.
“Then tell me, because this has been driving me nuts for years.”
“I will. Soon,” he said.
“Now. Please.”
“Soon enough.”
David was a planner. He always had a plan A and a plan B. Sometimes a plan C. Always thinking ahead.
She grunted in frustration. “Fine. Then you should know that I’ve been hiding something, too.”
“What? You’re not capable of keeping secrets from me.”
“Actually, I am.”
“Are you feeling okay? Is the baby alright?”
She pressed her hand to her still-flat stomach. “We’re fine. Perfectly fine.”
“Okay, good.” He gave a little exhale. “Then read a name for me first?”
“No, David, what I have to say is really important.” She heard a whine in her voice she hadn't expected. He had spoiled her over the years and now she whined. She would have to break herself of that.
“Just real quick. Then I want to hear your secret. Okay?”
She wasn’t supposed to know their baby’s gender, yet. But the nurse had slipped and told her during the last ultrasound. David would flip when he found out they were having a girl. She wanted his undivided attention when she told him. She cleared her throat to make sure the whine was gone. “Fine. Shoot.”
“Elias.”
“Elias…Elias…” Barb repeated the name in her mind and felt her awareness drawn in a specific direction. As if she had plugged exact coordinates into an energetic navigational system, her gift followed the energy of that person's name, and knew exactly where to take her. The details were fuzzy at first—a general feeling about the person, then the finer points would sharpen.
David used to question how she did this, how she could find someone's story by just tuning into the energy of their first name. “How can you tell one Steve from another? I mean, everyone's different.”
“A person's unique energetic narrative is attached to their given name. Because I can read energy, once I know that name, I can read them like a book. And you're right. No two names carry the same story, because no two people are alike."
He never really understood her gift, but he rolled with it because the information she found was so accurate. He even came to depend on her insight, because she could see things about people that he couldn't.
“Ah, okay, I’ve found him… He’s um, wow, all about money…on a search for something…he has a really dark vibe. What do you want to know?”
“He works with one of my customers. I think there’s something off about him.”
She clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and softened her focus. The images she saw now were not in front of her, but in her mind. They started to form and flow. “I see him wearing a black ski mask, picking a lock. He’s good at breaking into places. He’s searching for something. I would increase the security at the warehouse if I were you, make sure the cameras are working. I see him with a gun. He spends a lot of time at the shooting range; he’s a marksman.”
She saw him extending his arms, aiming the gun. She felt the gun kick as if his arms were her own. She watched someone fall in the distance and felt his sick satisfaction flow through her that he had ended a life, that he had played God. "My gosh, David. I think this man has killed someone before.”
David's complexion paled. “Okay. Enough of him. I’ll get rid of that customer.”
She exhaled hard to help clear her mind of the man’s energy, and focused on the cars that drove by as a distraction. “You need to stay away from him. Keep him away from your business. I mean it.”
He raised his glass of champagne. “I will. Another toast. Then I want to hear your secret. To your continued good health. And a wish on this, our second anniversary: May our next fifty years of marriage be as wonderful as our first two.”
“And a lot healthier.”
“They will be.” He pressed his hand against the breast pocket of his blazer again. “I’ll make sure of it.” Their glasses clinked in a toast. “Now that you’re healthy, I want to reopen the conversation about shutting the business down for a while so we can travel. We need to see the world while we can, just like we always wanted.”
“Oh, David.” They had talked about traveling the world together almost from their first date. But now that her mother had passed and her father had had his second heart attack, things had changed. “I can’t leave Pop alone for that long. You know he depends on me.”
“Then we’ll plan a long vacation, to celebrate your recovery. Just a few months. I’ll explain it all to you once we’re away, but it’s important.” His eyes were wide and intense. His hands were tucked into tight fists on the table, the skin stretched taut over his white knuckles.
“A few months, David, that’s—does this have something to do with that Elias person you just had me read?”
The brown sedan that drove toward them slowed down enough to catch her attention. The driver wore a trucker’s hat and aviator sunglasses, and he stared straight at them.
“David—” She pointed to the driver. At the last second, he raised his arm level and straight and pointed a gun at them.
David turned, then quickly stood to hover over her.
“I love you, Barb! Go to the—” David’s words were cut short by several loud pops. Blood spattered across her face and covered her glasses. Her husband’s body jerked violently, then collapsed on the ground.
Restaurant guests screamed, dishes crashed. Searing pain ripped through her shoulder and knocked her to the floor. Barbara crawled beneath the table, yanked her husband’s arm and tried to pull him to her. But he was dead weight, unmoving.
“NO!” she screamed.
Blood poured from the back of his head, his eyes wide open and unseeing.
2
Stars.
Everywhere.
Propped on the mantel, hung on the walls, patterned into the bath mats, painted on their dinnerware. One evening last year, after too many margaritas, she decided to count them. One hundred twelve was the final number at the time. But then David bought a few new ones, so she was no longer sure of the total.
Barbara Silver stretched out in her home that had once been overflowing with dreams coming true. Now haunted by living nightmares, she spent most nights in the recliner in the downstairs den, reading her cryptogram books, solving the endless puzzles. David used to buy her a fresh supply of these challenging puzzle books every month or so. He said he loved her nerdy addiction, that she was the perfect balance of beauty and brains.
When she had worked as many of the cryptograms as she could, she flipped through the travel-wish books she had assembled long before David died. She had put them together before they were married even. Before life took too many wrong turns to count.
Taped magazine pictures of Greece, Italy and the French Rivera looked up at her, reminding her of all the things she hadn’t yet accomplished, of all the dreams that were still hanging on the vine.
Earlier that evening she had promised herself that she was going to sleep in the bed again. Kris, her sister-in-law, had said that buying a new bed was what she needed in order to sleep again. But even after the new bed arrived, she hadn’t been able to sleep in it, or sleep anywhere at all.
In the eighteen months si
nce David’s death, the older condo’s settling had begun to unnerve her. The creaks were loud enough that they woke her. They made her think David was still alive and walking the floor at night, as he had often been prone to doing in the last few months of his life. When she remembered that he was gone and she was alone, she worried that someone was creeping through her home. She had taken to checking the security alarm controls several times a night, making sure the two red lights were on.
She stared at the floodlight-covered tree branches that bent and dipped with the wind. The star-laden wind chimes that David had hung were over-performing and she threatened to take them down. Even though she knew she wouldn’t. She wanted his beloved stars around her, those sparkling, heavenly reminders that she once had the promise of a truly bright future.
She had lost David and their child, along with her motivation to do most things. With the help of her father and sister-in-law, she had made it through the toughest part of the loss. But she couldn’t get going on the redecorating. Many of the stars needed to come down, there were too many. And the bedroom they had started to outfit as a nursery needed to be redone.
Before lying down on most nights, she would open the door to the nursery to see the fifty or so glow-in-the-dark stars David had affixed to the ceiling. It was one of the last things he had done before he was killed.
“I love these, but the sheer number of stars in our home may have crossed us over into tacky,” she’d said when she found him gluing them to the ceiling.