She swallowed. “Uh, no. I’m fourteen.”
The man looked as shocked as if she’d slapped him. “Holy crap. I didn’t think there were any honest kids left.” He pointed at a skull mounted to small podium. “Need your hand.”
Riley grasped the skull. The man rolled a rubber stamp over the back of her hand, tagging her a ‘minor’ in big, red letters.
Kieran offered a resigned chuckle and held out his arm. “Sixteen.”
The bouncer pulled a black curtain aside after stamping him. Kieran ducked through, pulling Riley along by the hand. Skeletons, skulls, and loose bones clung to every possible surface. Far to the right, a bar sat behind a cluster of tables. A stage dominated the central area, already containing Black Chakra’s equipment. Their mascot, a skeleton in lotus pose with green flames in its eyes, adorned the drum kit.
They wandered through the seats in the rear, past the standing area/mosh pit closest to the stage, to another section of tables on the left side where Camila, Lyle, and Luis sat. Riley tensed, expecting to relive the awkwardness of her last meeting with these people. Luis noticed her first, and smiled. He seemed much more sober than before. His still-dazed grin didn’t strike her as menacing at all anymore.
Camila’s hand bore no stamp, and humor lit her eyes when she noticed Riley’s. “Hey, kiddo.”
“Hey.” Riley sat in the chair Kieran pulled out for her.
“Yo.” Lyle looked her over. “Sorry to hear about your old man. Rough. Glad to see you’re okay.”
“Thanks,” mumbled Riley.
“Aww.” Camila drifted over to give her a hug. “Sorry if we were like… insensitive about him before. We didn’t know he was like, legit crazy.”
“Neither did I.” Riley felt her back muscles tensing, but relaxed when Kieran sat close enough to keep an arm around her. “I probably shoulda realized.”
“Yah.” Luis nodded in slow motion. “You guys wanna hang after the show?”
“I gotta go home right after.” Riley offered a weak smile. She almost wanted to stay and hang out, but pulling something like that the first time her foster parents trusted her seemed like a bad choice, and she’d had enough of bad choices for a while.
“Hey, it’s cool.” Luis nodded.
Jaime wandered out from a hidden curtain, a guitar on his back. He approached Luis, but looked at Riley. “Hey, kid. Glad you got away alive.”
Riley squinted. “I wasn’t kidnapped. Dad thought the world ended. We were hiding. He almost shot a cop.”
“Yo…” Luis snapped his head up as if startled. “How come your Dad never lost his shit before when they did an exercise before? He’s almost on top of the bomb range.”
Camila threw a handful of napkins at him. “Ass. Try to be a little more sensitive.”
“It’s okay.” Riley fidgeted with a plastic straw, spinning it on the table. “I dunno. I guess it was just ‘cause everything that was going on. He freaked when I told him about the convoy we saw. Maybe it put ‘nukes’ in his head or something. It kinda felt like we were scaring the shit out of each other and it kept getting stronger.”
“Yah.” Luis gestured at the stage. “Like a feedback loop.”
Wayne, drumsticks in hand, emerged from the same curtain. “Yo, we gotta half hour before we need to prep.”
“Aww, damn.” Jaime reached across the table, making a fist.
Riley looked confused for a second, then touched her knuckles to his.
Jaime pressed his fist into hers, smiled, and lowered his arm. “Not the greatest way to wind up here, but welcome to New Mexico. There’s reasons to everything that happens. The trick is learning what they are before it’s too late.”
The Chinese kid with the lip rings appeared on the stage. He waved at the table, pointed at Riley, and gave a thumbs-up before kneeling to fiddle with some of the sound gear.
“Don’t mind fortune cookie,” said Wayne. “He’s sucked up too much nag champa.”
“Such aggression.” Jaime brought his hands together like a meditating monk. “You must learn to release your anger.”
“Uh, okay.” Whatever that is. Riley draped herself over Kieran’s shoulder and smiled at her new friends.
When she looked up at his smile, he leaned in and their lips touched. Riley gave in to the kiss, holding on as if the two of them were the only people left alive. They gazed into each other’s eyes for a moment after. Lyle and Camila took their cue and embraced. A twinge of nerves rattled through Riley’s arms as she watched them wrestle with their tongues. Kissing Kieran on the lips had been awkward, scary, thrilling, and wonderful… but having his tongue inside her mouth? A wave of light-headedness swept over her. As gross as it sounded on the surface to think about, she found herself looking up at him and considering it.
Kieran caressed her cheek. “I love your smile. It’s nice to finally see it.” He kissed her again, but she chickened out on the tongue. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, I think so.” Riley smiled at him. “I survived the apocalypse, right?”
I’d like to thank Sam Hunt (author of the Outlaw King series) for providing an initial concept cover that gave me the inspiration for this book. I had asked him about what he would do for a cover for another one of my novels (Caller 107) and rather than give me an opinion, he sent me an image. While it was amazing, it didn’t work out as a cover for that book. I resolved to write something based on it. Many hours of staring at the image eventually produced the story you’ve just read.
Much gratitude to Lisa Gus for being a huge help editing this book.
Additional thanks to (in alphabetical order):
Tony Baker (author of Survivors of the Dead) for his assistance and advice about police related tactics and information.
Joseph Cautilli, Ph.D. LP, LPC, LBS, BCBA-D, BCIS for help with information regarding mental health issues.
Dr. Darin Kennedy (author of the Mussorgsky Riddle) for assistance with medical information.
Eugene Teplitsky for the beautiful cover.
Merethe Najjar for proofreading.
Ann Anderson Noser (author of How to Date Dead Guys) for invaluable critique feedback.
The Curiosity Quills team for making it possible.
Special thanks (beta reading, feedback, and support) go out to:
Mark Junk
Denise Kalicki
Amy Spitzley
Nerissa Spitzley
Wilbert Stanton
Leslie Whitaker
James Wymore
Born in a little town known as South Amboy NJ in 1973, Matthew has been creating science fiction and fantasy worlds for most of his reasoning life. Somewhere between fifteen to eighteen of them spent developing the world in which Division Zero, Virtual Immortality, and The Awakened Series take place. He has several other projects in the works as well as a collaborative science fiction endeavor with author Tony Healey.
Matthew is an avid gamer, a recovered WoW addict, Gamemaster for two custom systems (Chronicles of Eldrinaath [Fantasy] and Divergent Fates [Sci Fi], and a fan of anime, British humour (<- deliberate), and intellectual science fiction that questions the nature of reality, life, and what happens after it.
He is also fond of cats.
Now that you have completed this book, we hope you will leave a review so that other readers may benefit from your perspective. Authors like Matthew S. Cox live and die by your reviews, after all!
Please visit http://curiosityquills.com/reader-survey/ to share your reading experience with the author of this book!
Caller 107, by Matthew Cox
(http://bit.ly/1oSS2nf)
When thirteen-year-old Natalie Rausch said she would die to meet DJ Crazy Todd, she did not mean to be literal.
Whenever WROK 107 ran contests, she would dive for the phone, getting only busy signals. At least, with her best friend, even losing was fun―before her parents ruined that too.
Her last desperate attempt to get their attention goes as wrong as possible. With no one to blam
e for her mess of a life but herself, karma comes full circle and gives her just a few hours to make up for two years’ worth of mistakes–or be forever lost.
Paradise Earth: Day Zero, by Anthony Mathenia
(http://bit.ly/1K3MBiS)
When the ground quakes and blazing balls of fire fall from the sky, a religious sect interprets it as the fulfillment of long-held prophecies foretelling the end of the world. The members flee to their religious sanctuary, believing that this global cataclysm is the portent of a new paradise of eternal happiness. Inside, one cold and starving man struggles to hold onto his hope for the future and grapples with a lifetime of beliefs, and expectations.
If he survives to see the paradise earth, will it be worth it?
The Rearranged Life, by Annika Sharma
(http://bit.ly/1xfHIyw)
Nithya comes to terms with the idea of an arranged marriage, a tradition her conservative Indian family has held up for thousands of years. Enter James St. Clair, the smart, challenging and heartbreakingly handsome American. As Nithya and James fall in love, she questions the future she and her parents have always planned.
Now, Nithya has a choice to make. The decision she comes to takes her on a journey that transforms how she sees her future, her relationships with loved ones, and how she learns to put herself back together when even her best-laid plans fall apart.
Escape from Witchwood Hollow, by Jordan Elizabeth
(http://bit.ly/ZiZ6m5)
Everyone in Arnn―a small farming town with more legends than residents―knows the story of Witchwood Hollow: if you venture into the whispering forest, the witch will trap your soul among the trees. After losing her parents in a horrific terrorist attack on the Twin Towers, fifteen-year-old Honoria and her younger brother escape New York City to Arnn.
In the lure of that perpetual darkness, Honoria finds hope, when she should be afraid. Perhaps the witch can reunite her with her lost parents. Awakening the witch, however, brings more than salvation from mourning…
Appetizer:
Book Cover
Title Page
Main Course:
Chapter One: Nagging Doubt
Chapter Two: Unreal
Chapter Three: Sheltered
Chapter Four: Lonely Requiem
Chapter Five: Uprooted
Chapter Six: Squirrel
Chapter Seven: Forlorn
Chapter Eight: Homesick
Chapter Nine: A Whole Lot of Nothing
Chapter Ten: Small Town Doubts
Chapter Eleven: La Cerveza
Chapter Twelve: Boiling Over
Chapter Thirteen: Living Primitive
Chapter Fourteen: Outsiders
Chapter Fifteen: Growing Up
Chapter Sixteen: Protection
Chapter Seventeen: Keeping Secrets
Chapter Eighteen: Watching
Chapter Nineteen: Fire on the Mountains
Chapter Twenty: The World is Gone
Chapter Twenty-One: The Day After
Chapter Twenty-Two: Better Off
Chapter Twenty-Three: Six Days Under
Chapter Twenty-Four: Percussive Maintenance
Chapter Twenty-Five: Breaking the Seal
Chapter Twenty-Six: Deadly Force
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Is There Somebody Out There
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Unraveling
Chapter Twenty-Nine: Trust Unearthed
Chapter Thirty: Lucid
Chapter Thirty-One: Out of the Ashes
Chapter Thirty-Two: The Necropolis
Dessert:
Closing
About the Author
Copyright & Publisher
More from Curiosity Quills Press
The Summer the World Ended Page 30