“He’s practically a kid,” Lisa said as she flipped the page on the clipboard she was holding.
“All you have to do is wait a decade and he’ll be your age,” Syndra pointed out.
Lisa snorted. “And then a decade later he would be older and then several decades later he would die and I would not. Been there, done that. I don’t do reruns.”
“Apparently you don’t do anyone,” Syndra muttered under her breath, but loud enough that her friend would hear.
Lisa dropped the clipboard on the counter with a loud clap and crossed her arms in front of her. “Did you come for a reason or were you just hoping I’d poison your tea and put Tamsin out of his misery?”
Syndra laughed. “Wow, you are prickly.” She walked casually around the storeroom ignoring Lisa’s scowl. “Why exactly are you prickly like a cactus these days? Oh and,” ―she tapped her lips with a finger as she turned back to face her― “why can’t you come to dinner tomorrow? Elora said that you canceled, again.”
“I’m busy,” Lisa huffed. “If you didn’t know, I sort of run a business when I’m not in your realm. I still have a life out here apart from the rest of you.”
“Hmm, hmm, I see. Okay, so that still doesn’t answer why you’re cancelling dinner? You have six other nights to, as you call it, run your business.”
Lisa stared at her eyes wide like a cornered rabbit. Syndra could have backed off, but she cared too much for her longtime friend to let it lie. “Or, perhaps, your business can’t change his plans to a different night?”
“Why are you so obsessed with me having a love life? First Tony, and now you think I have some mystery guy on the side. Maybe I just need a break, Syndra.”
Syndra shook her head. “I’m not buying it. You’ve never needed a break from me before.” Lisa didn’t respond and when she picked up her clipboard again, Syndra knew that she wouldn’t get any further with her.
“Okay, fine, new topic,” she said as she leaned against the wall. “Elora and Cassie told me that you are making them get their GEDs. I’ll have you know that anytime you do something that ticks them off I get an earful for days. It’s annoying.”
Lisa grinned and eyed her. “So it’s annoying for them to bug you repeatedly about something that you don’t want to talk about?”
“Touché,” Syndra conceded. “Fine, I’ll leave you to your business. But you better be at dinner next week or I shall be very put out.”
Lisa saluted her but didn’t look up from her clipboard. Syndra let out a sigh as she walked back over to the mirror. She glanced back one more time wondering, not for the first time, if she should ask Trik to put his spy experience to good use.
Lisa let out the breath she’d been holding as soon as Syndra disappeared through the mirror. She set down the clipboard and pen and rubbed her sweaty hands on her jeans. Syndra was like a bloodhound when she got a scent, and at the moment the scent she was chasing just happened to be Lisa and the secret she was keeping.
Truth be told, it really wasn’t much of a secret because there was nothing to tell, not yet. At the moment it was just half a dozen handwritten notes left in her mailbox at the store. When she’d gotten the first one, she didn’t even recognize the name. It wasn’t until the second note that she realized who had left it. And that was when she decided to keep the notes to herself. She’d be lying if she said she didn’t hurry to work each day just to see if there was another one waiting on her. A grin formed on her lips as she thought about the last one she’d gotten.
She walked over to her desk and opened the middle drawer and picked up the first piece of black folded paper in a stack. Her hands shook, just like the first time she’d opened it, as she unfolded it. And just like the first time she read it, her heart started galloping in her chest.
I remember you. You took my breath away then,
And a century later you still do.
Dinner, Wednesday, 7:00 p.m.
Yours,
R
From the author:
Thank you so very much for going on this journey with me and the characters from the Elfin Sereis. This is the last book in this series, though there will be a Novella about Lisa, Elora’s mother. So be looking for that! I hope that you enjoyed your journey with Cassie and Elora and if you are interested in other books like this you can check out my other series, as well as the following excerpts from several talented authors.
Excerpt From Into the Fae, Book of 1 of the Gypsy Healer Series By Quinn Loftis
A slow smile formed on his lips as he brushed a few wisps of hair from her face and then used that same finger to trace the swollen lips he had just tasted. “You look ravished.”
“Do I?” She asked innocently.
“Mm-hmm,” his chest rumbled as he continued to stare down at her with unabashed want.
“Well you look hungry,” she teased.
“Oh I am, beloved. I am famished.” He kissed her forehead and then her cheeks and then her chin. “Lucky for me I find that there is feast before me.”
Excerpt from The Forgotten Ones
Laura Howard
I caught a glimpse of my mother staring out the den window. She held her violin loosely under her chin and the bow dangled from her fingertips. Her jaw was slack, her eyes locked on something in the trees beyond me. I knew that haunted expression. I froze. I swallowed hard as her eyes shifted to me. The violin fell from her chin, and I could see her bottom lip trembling. I should have been used to that reaction from her when she saw me during an episode. It happened every time. But I wasn’t.
I flew into the house as fast as my feet would carry me. The screen door crashed behind me as I came to a halt outside the den. My mother clutched fistfuls of her blonde hair, garbled words spilling from her lips.
“I have to. I have to go out there,” she said. “He’s waiting for me.” She stood in the semi-darkness, mumbling, the only other sound the hum of the ceiling fan.
I clung to the doorjamb as I watched my grandmother approach carefully. She placed her hands on my mother’s shoulders, and on contact my mother’s body stopped quaking. Gram crooned, rocking her back and forth, as she pulled her into her arms and led her away from the window. My stomach tightened, and I backed away to leave them alone. If she saw me again, who knew what would happen. I cringed as the floor creaked beneath me, and she jerked her head in my direction. Her eyes widened when she saw me, and the shaking began again. Breaking away from my grandmother, she stumbled backward toward the window. She raked her fingers down her face and hair as she moaned.
“Liam…” Tears streamed down her cheeks, causing thick strands of hair to stick to her face.
I entered the room slowly, desperate not to step on another squeaky floorboard. Her green eyes burned into mine, and I locked my eyes on hers. No matter how many times she fought my attempts to soothe her, I had to keep trying. She was my mom. I reached for her shoulders. “Mom,” I whispered. “It’s just me.”
She flinched. I knew she recognized me. I’d never met my father, but under my mattress I hid the only scrap I could find with his image on it. The picture—a strip of them actually—was taken before I was born in a photo booth in Ireland. I looked just like him. Considering how she often spoke his name when she was like this, my gut told me that she saw my father in me. She writhed as I touched her and clawed at my hands. Gurgling sounds came from somewhere deep in her throat, but I knew she was still saying my father’s name. I placed my hands gently over hers, my gaze steady, as though approaching a wounded animal. I took deep, soothing breaths the way Gram had taught me.
I could feel the weight of Gram’s stare, watching as I got closer than ever to my mother actually letting me comfort her. I focused on my mom, ignoring the panic rising in my chest.
“Shh..you’re okay,” I said. “You’re okay.” I repeated it over and over, softly, until her breathing became even, more normal. It felt like hours, but the tension in her fingers loosened eventually as she stopped trying to re
sist me.
My grandmother walked out of the room as I continued to make shushing sounds, the panic in my
mother’s eyes fading. I couldn’t see it, but I knew Gram was probably smiling, at least a little. I exhaled and led my mother to the couch. The same woman who had just been in the throes of a schizophrenic episode was now completely unresponsive as she sat. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Gram standing just outside the doorway. I released my mother’s hands—she’d stay that way for a while, and there was nothing any of us could do—and got up to follow Gram down the hallway to the kitchen. The air wafted toward me as she moved, smelling like oranges and cloves—familiar and comforting.
I opened the refrigerator, snagged a bottle of water, and slouched down at the kitchen table. I tried to smile as I unscrewed the cap, but inside I was struggling with the gratification of being able to bring my mother down from her episode versus the pang of guilt for being the one who caused her condition in the first place. Before I was born, she’d been a bright, happy college student. Her spiral into schizophrenia didn’t start until I showed up. She had met my father during her last year of college. She had traveled to Ireland for her final semester to study music at Trinity College in Dublin. She’d been fine when she left, I’m told, but when she came back she was heartbroken and pregnant. She’d never been the same since.
“Have you eaten, honey?” Gram asked, nailing me in place with her eyes.
I flipped the bottle cap in my fingers. “No, but I’m fine.”
“Oh no, you don’t. We had a nice steak for supper, cooked just the way you like. You’ll have some, won’t you?”
I had to laugh. With Gram there was no choice, even if she asked. I sat down at the table while she whirled around the kitchen. In minutes I had a steak dinner in front of me, complete with steaming mashed potatoes and green beans.
“You spoil me, you know,” I said between bites. “I’m never going to be able to take care of myself if you keep this up.”
Gram smiled at me. “You’ll have plenty of time to take care of yourself. Let me spoil you while I still can.”
I swallowed down the guilt, knowing she didn’t see raising me—and Mom—for the past almost twenty-two years as the burden it felt like to me. As I ate, my mother walked into the kitchen. She sat down at the table quietly without looking at either of us.
“Hi, Mom…” I spoke as softly as I could, not wanting to alarm her.
“Hello.” Her voice was barely more than a whisper. She chewed on her fingernail and stared absently out the window. Even with the hair framing her face in knots, my mother looked lovely. Her eyes sage green, her skin flawless. She was forty-three but didn’t look a day over thirty.
“That was a beautiful tune you played earlier, Beth,” Gram said as she took my mother’s hands in her own. “I could practically smell the breeze blowing in off the Irish sea.”
“Mm hmm,” my mother answered, mostly detached, but a tiny smile lifted the corner of her mouth.
My cell phone buzzed in my pocket, and I pulled it out quickly before it startled my mom. I opened it to find a message from my cousin, Nicole: I need ice cream tonight
I gave a small laugh as I put my phone back into my pocket. I’d worked all afternoon at my grandfather’s hardware store, but it was Friday night—I should’ve known I wouldn’t be able to just relax with a good book. Nicole was twenty, only a year younger than me, and we were as close as sisters. But our ideas of a perfect Friday night couldn’t be more different. If only we didn’t live next door to each other maybe I could get out of this. I glanced out the window to Nicole’s driveway. When I’d gotten home, it had been filled with cars—her friends had been taking over the place. But now I was grateful to only see her little Jetta. Hanging out with Nicole I guess I could handle. Her friends were a different story. Especially when Ethan Magliaro was around.
About the Author:
USA Today Bestselling author Laura Howard lives in New Hampshire with her husband and four children. Her obsession with books began at the age of six when she got her first library card. Nancy Drew, Sweet Valley High and other girly novels were routinely devoured in single sittings. Books took a backseat to diapers when she had her first child. It wasn’t until the release of a little novel called Twilight, eight years later, that she rediscovered her love of fiction. Soon after, her own characters began to make themselves known.
If you enjoyed this glimpse of The Forgotten Ones, you can download it for free at all retailers!
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