“She’s not breathing,” he yelled as he carried her onto shore. He grasped both arms around her waist, and lifted her up, over and over, squeezing the water from her lungs. Once the water was clear, he laid her on the ground and started CPR. “Come on, Devra. Breathe,” he demanded in between breaths.
“The paramedics will be here in a few minutes,” the chief said, looking anxiously toward the road.
He kept pumping, praying, and breathing into her mouth. After a moment, Devra coughed and water spurted out of her lips.
Riley helped her clear the water and rolled her onto her side as she started to cough again. “Breathe for me, baby,” he pleaded. “Come on and breathe.”
Tears streamed from her eyes as she turned to look at him. “Riley?” Relief filled him at the sight of her vivid blue gaze.
“The paramedics are here,” the chief yelled as the truck pulled near.
“You’re going to be okay,” Riley said, pushing her hair back from her face.
“Mama?” She whispered as a shadow fell over her eyes, stealing their brightness and replacing it with a dull gleam.
A cold fist of fear grabbed hold of his heart, as her stare turned cold and distant. It was almost as if the Devra he knew, the Devra inside, just disappeared. “Devra? Come on, sweetie. Talk to me.”
“Excuse me, sir,” one of the paramedics said and bent over her. “We need to check her.”
Reluctantly, Riley moved out of the way as the team checked her vitals, put an oxygen mask over her face, then loaded her into the ambulance.
“Ride with them to the hospital,” the chief said, nudging Riley toward their van.
“What about you?”
“I’m not leaving until I find the man who killed my boy.”
“He was drifting downstream. He didn’t make it,” Riley said. Then he climbed into the back of the ambulance and took Devra’s hand.
“It’s going to be all right now. The nightmare is over,” he whispered, trying to assure her that everything was okay. But he didn’t like the dark cast to her gaze nor the way he couldn’t get her to focus on him. He had the feeling that everything wasn’t okay, and it might never be again.
Chapter 30
Icy darkness swirled around her. Devra waited patiently for the light, for her mama to come back to her. She was cold and alone, but she wasn’t scared. Somehow, it was comforting here. There was no fear, no running; she’d finally found someplace to hide where no one could hurt her.
She felt someone touching her face, her hair. Mama? Are you here? I’m so tired. The shadows drifted away and she fell back to sleep.
“Devra, can you hear me?”
She stirred.
Who was that? A voice reached for her. She retreated. She wasn’t ready. Not yet.
“What’s wrong with her? Why won’t she wake up?”
She heard the rattling of papers. A harsh bright light pricked her eyes. Panic tripped her heart. Stay away from me. She retreated into the darkness, looking for Mama, looking for a safe place.
Riley watched Devra grow paler and more withdrawn with each passing hour. She was leaving him. He could feel it. Despair racked his body. She’d needed him, depended on him, and he’d let her down.
“I’m so sorry.” He squeezed her hand and pushed her wild hair back from her head. “Don’t leave me, Devra. Please, come back to me.”
No sound, no movement. She lay motionless, like a lost princess from a fairy tale. Only he wasn’t her Prince Charming. Far from it, but he did love her with all his heart.
“I love you. Please don’t leave me.”
She didn’t respond. He rose and stared out the window. A storm had moved in and the rain was falling in sheets onto the hospital parking lot. He turned back to her. “Your mom and dad are here. They’ve been here all night, taking turns talking to you, holding your hand. They love you, baby, and so do I. We all love and need you.”
He stared at the monitor that measured her heartbeat. Steady rhythms, no change, no stress, no sign that would tell him she was fighting to find her way back to him.
“I’m sorry I doubted you,” he said, hoping that somehow she could hear him. “It was only for an instant, but it was enough to send you chasing after that monster alone. I’ll never forgive myself for letting you down.”
He sat and took her hand into both of his. “I should have trusted my instincts. I’ve made so many mistakes and I haven’t allowed myself to leave the past in the past. If I had, maybe I would have been able to trust your instincts, your decisions.”
He dropped his forehead onto her hand. “I didn’t believe in you. You never should have had to face that monster alone. Will you ever forgive me?”
Her hand moved.
He looked up. She looked the same as before; had he imagined it? “Devra? Can you hear me? Come on, sweetie. Come back to me.” He stared at her hand, willing it to move again.
“No,” she said, her voice a hoarse whisper.
His heart soared as she opened her eyes.
“Not your fault.” Tears filled her eyes.
“Shh. Save your strength.” Emotion filled him as he stared into her beautiful blue eyes. He knew he should call a doctor, but he couldn’t let her out of his sight. “Are you okay? How are you feeling?”
“My fault. I held on. I…I didn’t want to go with him.” She closed her eyes and turned away.
He didn’t understand. “No,” he said suddenly afraid she would leave him again. “I’m going to get a doctor.”
She turned back to him. “No, don’t leave me. Not yet.” She stared at him for a long minute, her liquid blue eyes melting with pain. “I’m not okay. I don’t think I’ll ever be okay. I’m damaged, much more than I thought.”
Fear clutched his heart. “What are you saying? You’re fine. There was no permanent damage.”
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “That’s not what I mean.”
Understanding dawned on him. “It wasn’t your fault. He was a monster, yes, but it had nothing to do with you.”
“It had everything to do with me. Everything he did was for me. Because of me.”
“I’m sorry you had to fight him alone.”
She let out a harsh laugh. “I didn’t fight him. I ran.”
“You didn’t have a choice.”
“Didn’t I?” She sighed. “We all have choices, Riley. All these years…” Something broke in her throat. “I was loved.”
“You still are,” he said softly.
She looked at him, a flicker of fear shining in her gaze.
“I love you, Devra.”
“You can’t,” she whispered.
“I do.”
“It’s not safe to love me. Bad things happen to people who love me.”
“Not anymore.” He stood, bent over the bed, took her face in his hands, and pressed his lips to hers. It was a frenzied kiss, desperate and unrelenting. He wouldn’t let her go. “All these years, I’ve been afraid to love, afraid to live. Afraid if I did, life would steal it away and I wouldn’t be able to live with that. But I wasn’t living, any more than you were.”
He sat back down and took her hand, then leaned close so she could see the sincerity in his eyes, so she could see how much she meant to him. “We were both running and hiding, not only from monsters but from love. Don’t run anymore, Devra. Let me love you the way you deserve to be loved.”
A tear slipped from the corner of her eye. She shook her head. “I don’t know how.”
“We’ll figure it out together. Let go of the shame and the guilt. I have, and you can, too. But most of all, let go of the fear.”
Uncertainty filled her eyes.
“Do you love me?” he asked and held his breath as he waited for her answer. She had his heart in her hands, and he prayed she would keep it.
She nodded, slowly at first, then a small smile trembled at the corners of her lips.
He took a deep breath and a giant leap of faith. “Will you marry m
e, Devra Morgan Miller? Will you stay by my side always and never let me give up fighting for you, for us, for our family?”
Tears pooled in her eyes and ran down her cheeks. “On one condition.”
He had her, he could tell by the color filling her cheeks. He flashed his famous MacIntyre grin, known to melt hearts all over the South. “And what would that be, sugar?”
“We don’t fight any more monsters alone. Real, imagined, or otherwise.”
He climbed onto the bed and pulled her into his arms. He would hold tight to her for the rest of his life.
“You’re on, baby. You’re on.”
The End
A Note From Cynthia
Thank you so much for reading – Shiver!
I love writing books featuring characters with psychic abilities, and Shiver was my first. I hope you enjoyed reading it. If so, please take a few minutes and leave an honest review. You can do so here!
My website at www.cynthiacooke.com has all my books listed and a signup for my newsletter so I can keep in touch. I try to send out newsletters every month or so. Your email address will never be shared.
Psychic romantic suspense is my favorite genre. I am hoping to write more, and are looking for ARC Readers for my newest novels. If you’d like to join my ARC team, please email me and [email protected] and put ARC team into the subject line. I look forward to hearing from you!
If you enjoy Psychic Romance, please turn the page for an excerpt from book 1 from my Deadly Secrets Series - Deadly Secrets Loving Lies.
The Deadly Secrets Series offers high-octane romantic suspense that keeps you guessing until the very end.
A few decades ago, the Counter Terrorist Agency (CTA) started a program that studied, mapped, and enhance the sixth senses. They pushed ethical boundaries by experimenting on pregnant women. One of those women was Amelia Marsters. Her daughters, triplets, now work to help others like them, born with special abilities, and targeted because of them.
Some secrets are too deadly to share…with anyone.
As a former counter-terrorism agent, Genie Marsters knows how to take care of herself. But when masked men invade her desert hideaway, she’s outnumbered. The last thing she expects is a rescue, especially from Kyle Montgomery. Her ex-partner. Her ex-lover. Her betrayer.
Kyle’s sure Genie betrayed him and their unit. While she still makes his blood burn—in all the right ways—the secrets she hides could be the most deadly weapon of all.
Excerpt From Deadly Secrets Loving Lies
Chapter One
Genie Marsters perched in the bulletproof glass-encased crow’s nest at the top of her desert home and watched the UPS truck barrel toward her down the long dirt road. A plume of dust kicked up behind it. This wasn’t good. Only one person knew where she lived, and he wouldn’t send her a delivery without warning her first.
The driver pulled to a stop amidst a cloud of sand and hopped out of the truck. He stared up at her circular retreat built high on stilts. No one could get in without her knowing it. Other than the trap door above her, the steep flight of stairs leading to her front door was the only way in or out of her sanctuary—her tree house without the tree.
She descended the ladder out of the crow’s nest and stepped into the loft that doubled for her bedroom, then continued down the stairs to the main floor. She rested one hand lightly on the front door, glanced through the peephole and waited for him to approach. She cleared her mind, opening herself to any impressions she could read from him once she opened the door. She’d spent most of her life trying to ignore the empathic abilities she’d been born with, to fit in with normal people. To be normal. Now, she knew better. The three Marsters girls would never be normal. Some advantages you just had to embrace.
The UPS guy—male, approximately thirty-years-old, six-foot, blue eyes, blond hair, lean and mean with massive, muscular thighs—climbed the stairs to her front door. Could be he liked to take care of himself. Could be he wasn’t a UPS driver.
Genie pulled her Glock out of a sconce on the wall next to the door. She slipped it into the waistband of her favorite black pants at the small of her back, fluffed her hair then opened the door. She faked a wide, flirtatious smile. “Good morning,” she greeted, a touch too loud, a touch too cheery, while her gaze dropped to the small box clutched in the man’s grasp.
Small. Printed address. Too much of his hand covered the type for her to be able to read who’d sent it.
The man smiled back showing a mouthful of perfectly straight obviously whitened teeth. “Morning ma’am. You have quite a place out here.” He shifted, trying to peek around her.
Genuine curiosity or something more? She reached with her thoughts, trying to read him, but couldn’t. His mind was shut tight. He gestured down the steep staircase that led to his truck below. “Don’t believe I’ve ever seen a house on stilts in the desert before.” He took a step forward into her personal space while once again trying to peer into the octagonal room behind her. Only this time he wasn’t so subtle about it.
She didn’t move an inch, letting him hover close enough that she could smell his cologne. Something cheap. “Cool, isn’t it?” She raised her voice an octave and tipped her head flirtatiously to the side. She flipped her hair over her shoulder. With her blond bombshell looks, she’d learned early on that if she threw in a touch of ditz, men tended to be easily distracted and to seriously underestimate her.
Most men that is. But not Kyle. He always saw right through her.
The UPS driver grinned, 100-watts of dazzling brightness, and suddenly he was more interested in her than in her house, which was exactly what she’d wanted.
“You all alone out here?” he asked, his light blue eyes twinkling. Eyes that almost looked like Kyle’s, but they weren’t quite as vibrant or as dark.
“Why? You offering to keep me company?” she asked, shaking off the image of deep blue that instantly filled her mind and soured her heart.
His eyelids lowered to half-mast, eyes darkening as his gaze dragged slowly down her body. Heat and desire rolled off him—she felt it like a ten-ton truck barreling down on her, moving through her and making her tingle. Everywhere.
For an insane moment she was sorely tempted. It had been a long time since she’d had large, strong hands on her skin. Not since before the explosion.
Not since Kyle.
She shook off the impression and closed her mind. She no longer wanted to absorb his feelings, or accept a psychic reading of his emotions. “Do you have something for me?” she asked coolly.
“Oh, yeah,” he said, hitching up his pants.
She looked pointedly at the box he held in his hands and raised her brows.
He followed her gaze. “Yeah. Right.” He handed her the small package and the electronic ‘DIAD’ clipboard.
She spied her father’s name and address printed on the shipping form. More than anyone else, her father would never send anyone to her house without warning her first. She frowned, scrawled her name across the device and handed it back to him, then quickly shut and locked the door.
She peered out the peephole, waiting impatiently until she heard his retreat down the stairs, then with two fingers pushed aside the blinds and peered out the front window. He eased his muscular self into his truck and drove down the road. She replaced the Glock in its sconce then picked up her satellite phone and hit the speed dial number for her father’s island estate in the Puget Sound.
It was a risk to call his home, but she took the chance anyway. If someone was monitoring his phone lines, they could pinpoint her location within minutes. She was crazy to be taking this chance after everything she’d done to ‘disappear.’ But something was not right.
The phone continued to ring on the other end. Three times. Four. Five. After the sixth ring, she stared down at the number in the display making sure she’d dialed correctly. Her father had a staff. Someone was always there to answer the phone. His housekeeper, Mary, or even the gardener. Dread ti
ghtened Genie’s grip on the receiver. She disconnected the line.
Something was wrong at the estate.
Something was wrong with her dad. Carefully, she placed the package on the table, and then hurried to the closet and took down a black plastic carrying case. She flipped the latches, opened the case, and hooked up the portable RTR-4 x-ray device it held, and scanned the package. No power source. No bomb.
She went to the nearest drawer, pulled out her Ka-Bar and gingerly sliced through the packaging tape and with the tip of her blade carefully opened the box. A large diamond-shaped crystal necklace sat nestled within burlap. Her eyes widened as she stared at the crystal. The last time she’d seen it, she’d been twelve. When she and her sisters, Cat and Becca, had been told their mother had died in a car accident. That she wasn’t coming home.
As they’d held one another and wept, their father had held up the necklace by its delicate gold chain and assured them that, like the crystal in their mother’s necklace, he would always be there to watch after and guide them. They could be certain of that, and certain of him and each other. She’d believed him. So had Becca and Cat. And yet, somehow they’d all gotten lost.
Genie held the crystal up to the light. Prisms of color bounced off the walls. For a second she let her finger graze the cold hard surface of the stone. An image of Becca immediately popped into her mind, laughing, her long blond hair flying in the breeze. Pressure pushed on the back of Genie’s eyes and she pinched the bridge of her nose to stop it. Her sister was dead. This was no time for sentimental reminiscing. She stuffed the necklace into her pocket and dug through the box. Nothing else was in it. No note or explanation for why her father would suddenly send it to her.
Shiver: Psychic Romantic Suspense Page 19