by Schulte, Liz
“What was that, Baker? My hearing ain’t so good in this ear,” Mickey the Knife asked.
I waved him off. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. The world had gone to Hell in a hand basket, and I was about ready to start over. I had enough of this life. The highs were taller than mountains, but the lows, well they went so deep they burned my feet.
Mickey wasn’t a bad guy, a bit of a palooka, if you catch my drift, but not a bad sort. More the simple sort. I was saddled with looking after him since most of the gang got themselves killed. Not that Mickey was ever in anything too deep. We all knew better than to involve him. He lost most of the hearing in his right ear when a touchy dancer jammed a potato peeler into his ear drum. He was big as an ox, but missing a few vital screws. To this day, I still don’t know why she stabbed him. Must have caught her in a cross mood—dames.
We let him hang around ‘cause the kid never had many chances at doing anything else in his life, but this was no business for someone like him to be in. This business wasn’t really fit for anyone to be in these days. A sigh weighed heavy in my chest. I had to get Mickey situated in some sort of gig, so his sister didn’t have to worry about him; then it was time for old Baker McGovern to disappear for good.
Whom would I be in the next life? That was the real question. Nothing too stuffy. Maybe someone who wasn’t a rag-a-muffin. A doctor maybe. Yeah, a doctor, I liked the sound of that. Now all I needed was a name.
My hand darted down and caught the little arm of a street rat trying to abscond with my wallet. I plucked it from his fingers as two even smaller ones ran as fast as they could for the alley.
“You think I’m a sap, kid? You’re going to get yourself pinched with those ham hands.”
“Hey, mister, let go.” He kicked me in the shin and twisted hard. He looked vaguely familiar. Huge brown eyes, dirty face, and scabby fingers were all I could see though. Who was looking after this kid? Someone needed to teach him the way of things before he got pinched.
“Who’s your father?”
The slippery little devil squirmed right out of my grip and darted away. He ran down the same alley his friends disappeared in. I moved to go after him, but Mickey stopped me.
“Let the kid go. He didn’t hurt nothing. It wasn’t anything we wouldn’t have done at that age.”
He had a point, but this was a matter of respect. And kids like that needed a good talking to, or they ended up wise guys like us, which for most people, meant dead before forty.
“It’s Christmas.” He tried to appeal to my holiday spirit—fat lot of good that would did.
FIRST AND FOREMOST I always want to thank my fans. You guys are awesome and the more of you I talk to and get to know the more excited I am to share these characters and worlds in my head with you.
I also need to thank the incredible team of people I work with. My editors, Ev Bishop and Michelle Kampmeier, my cover artist Karri Klawiter, my VA Cheryl Callighan, and my beta readers/people I can bounce ideas off of any time of day or night: Olivia Hardin, Amanda Latzel, Melissa Lummis, Mandie Stevens, Tawdra Kandle, C.G. Powell, Lola James, and Stephanie Nelson (otherwise known as the Romantic Edge).
Finally, I have to thank my family for always being there for me and for never trying to make me be anything other than completely insane. :)
MANY AUTHORS CLAIM to have known their calling from a young age. Liz Schulte, however, didn’t always want to be an author. In fact, she had no clue. Liz wanted to be a veterinarian, then she wanted to be a lawyer, then she wanted to be a criminal profiler. In a valiant effort to keep from becoming Walter Mitty, Liz put pen to paper and began writing her first novel. It was at that moment she realized this is what she was meant to do. As a scribe she could be all of those things and so much more.
When Liz isn’t writing or on social networks she is inflicting movie quotes and trivia on people, reading, traveling, and hanging out with friends and family. Liz is a Midwest girl through and through, though she would be perfectly happy never having to shovel her driveway again. She has a love for all things spooky, supernatural, and snarky. Her favorite authors range from Edgar Allen Poe to Joseph Heller to Jane Austen to Jim Butcher and everything in between.
Liz would love to hear from you
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Check out more books by Liz:
URBAN FANTASY/PARANORMAL ROMANCE
The Guardian Trilogy: Secrets
Choices
Consequences
Be Light (The Guardian Trilogy Christmas short story)
Easy Bake Coven
Hungry, Hungry Hoodoo
Pickup Styx
MYSTERY
Dark Corners
Dark Passing
The Ninth Floor
ANTHOLOGIES
Cupid Painted Blind (Femi Short Story)
Once Upon A Midnight Dreary (Stand alone mystery short story)
Eternal Summer (Ella Reynolds short story)
Naughty or Nice Christmas Anthology (Ella Reynolds Christmas short story)
Christmas Yet to Come (Baker Christmas short story)
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
A preview of Good Tidings, a Guardian short story
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
A preview of Good Tidings, a Guardian short story
Acknowledgments
About the Author