Authors: Elicia Hyder
Tags: #Literature & Fiction, #Genre Fiction, #Horror, #Occult, #Mystery; Thriller & Suspense, #Thrillers & Suspense, #Crime, #Murder, #Spies & Politics, #Assassinations, #Supernatural, #Suspense, #Paranormal, #Psychics, #Thrillers, #Science Fiction & Fantasy, #Fantasy, #New Adult & College
The Siren
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THE SIREN
ELICIA HYDER
Book Two of
The Soul Summoner Series
Copyright © 2016 by Elicia Hyder
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved.
This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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This one’s for Taffy…
You’ve always believed in me.
My sister. My best friend.
Special Thanks to everyone who made this book possible:
As always, my biggest thanks must go to my loving husband who supports me sacrificially and without question or complaint.
He’s my in-house specialist in all things guns, police, and military related.
I love you.
Thanks to my best friend, Megan, who’s the best beta reader anyone could ask for.
Thanks to EVERYONE who read and loved The Soul Summoner.
This journey is going to keep getting better.
MY AWESOME LAUNCH TEAM
THE BOOK SUMMONERS
I would be nowhere without you! (Alphabetically):
Nikki Allen, Elsbeth Balas, Karla Barker, Tracie Bechard, Connor J. Bedell, Lilia Bingham, Betty Bowers, Cindy Brown, Gabriela Cabezut, Tiffany Cagle, Marsha Carmichael, Shweta Chopra, RK Close, Céleste Couture, Lisa Cowens, May Freighter, Sarah Gillaspie, Venice Gilmore, Rick Gottinger, Melody Hall, Lina Hanson, Bridget Hickey, Kira Hodge, Wendy Howell, Paula Hurdle, Misi Hurst, Susan Huttinger, Ashley Huttinger, Kristin Jacques, Ara James, Deborah Jay, Tango Jordan, John K. Park, Erani Kole, Debra L. Rutschman, Erica Laurie, Linda Levine, Rena Lott, Juliet Lyons, Lori Mahan, Chuck Mason, Sal Mason, Kellie Milon, Michel Moore, Susan Oates, Tammy Oja, Teresa Partridge, Wendy Pyatt, Jenny Quinn, Lucy Rhodes, Megan Robinson,, Marsha Sanderlin, Lisa Shaw, Vandi Shelton, Ana Simons, Sherry Skiles, Stephanie Smith, Rata Stevens-Robinette, Heather Grace Stewart, Ann Stewart-Akers, Debbie Stout, Leigh W. Stuart, Angela Tinkham, Nina van Vlierden, Ana Victoria Lopez, Ronnie Waldrop, Susie Waldrop, Lennie Warren, Shanna Whitten, Russ Williams, Stephanie Williams, K. Williams, Bridgett Wilson, Natalie Wolicki, Terrilynne Work, Ann Writes
1.
WHOMP WHOMP WHOMP WHOMP WHOMP. CLACK, CLACK. EEEENG! EEEENG! EEEENG!
“This is a test. This is only a test of the Emergency Broadcast System.” I was practicing my best radio announcer’s voice.
“Sloan, stop talking,” my father said through his microphone. “And please, lie still.”
Lying still was becoming increasingly more difficult with each second that passed. I had been trapped inside the deafening MRI machine for more than twenty minutes. My father had insisted on the test after my last hemiplegic migraine, but I knew its results would be as useless as the last two CT scans he had ordered. There was nothing wrong with my brain, and there was nothing wrong with me…except it seemed I had the power to read and control people’s souls. That, however, had nothing to do with my migraines that I was aware of.
The trigger for my latest headache was the same as the others: Warren Parish had left town. He and I seemed to be bound together by an electrifying force, and when we were apart, paralyzing migraines were the penalty.
The MRI was going to be inconclusive.
When the machine stopped whirring and knocking like the inside of a drag racer’s engine, I wiggled my feet from side to side. “Are we done yet?”
“All done,” Dad said. The MRI table slid slowly out of the electronic cave I had been confined to.
My father was fascinated and terribly worried by my new development of headaches, but I knew telling him the truth wouldn’t help. My adoptive parents were incredibly loving and supportive, but they were also medical professionals who believed everything had a scientific explanation. Being that my father was a geriatric physician who specialized in dementia, I knew what his diagnosis would be—mental instability.
Dad walked into the room as I sat up on the table and adjusted my twisted gown. Even in his fifties, he was still movie-star handsome with the brightest blue eyes I’d ever seen. He was looking down at a sheet of paper in his hand. “You can get dressed.”
I held the back of my gown closed while I stood up. “What did the test show? Is it all sawdust and rocks up there?”
Dad rolled his eyes. “Nothing stood out to me, but I’m going to have a friend of mine in neurology look over it to be sure.”
I put my hand on his arm and looked up at him. “Dad, I’m fine.”
He kissed my forehead. “I can’t be too careful with you. You’re the only Sloan I’ve got.” He started toward the door. “Do you want to grab lunch before you head to work? I have another hour or so before my first patient of the afternoon.”
I looked at the clock on the wall. I had told my boss that I would be in around noon, and it was already after eleven. “Will you be terribly heartbroken if I skip lunch this time? I want to pop in and check on Adrianne before I go to the office, if that’s OK.”
He smiled. “Of course. Give her my love, and tell her I’ll drop in to see her sometime this week,” he said. “I’ll see you at dinner tonight?”
I nodded. “I’ll be there.”
“Will Warren be joining us?” he called as I shuffled toward the door in my socks.
I looked back and shrugged. “I’m not sure. He’s flying in from D.C. sometime today, but I can’t remember when his flight lands. I’ll let Mom know if he gets here in time.”
“All right, sweetheart. We’ll see you later,” he said.
Adrianne Marx, my best friend, had been a patient at the hospital for almost three weeks since the guy she was dating decided to drive drunk and flip his Jeep into a highway guard rail. I had knocked out his front teeth in return and none of us had seen him since.
When I got to her room, she was reading a trashy tabloid magazine and munching on potato chips. Her hair was starting to regrow from where they had to shave it, and aside from the pink scars left by the stitches, her face looked almost back to normal.
I rapped my knuckles against the open door. “Knock, knock.”
She looked up and smiled. “Hey, weirdo.” She shifted against her mound of pillows as I crossed in front of her feet and plopped down in the chair by her bed. “What are you doing here?”
“I had an MRI upstairs. I thought I would swing by and say hello before I went to work.”
She sat up in her bed. “An MRI? I thought you just had a few broken bones and some stitches.”
Barely two weeks before, Warren and I had helped Detective Nathan McNamara take down a serial killer who had been murdering women across the state of North Carolina for over a decade. Billy Stewart had drugged me, beaten me, and then dragged me to his Bundy-style, secret body-stashing spot where he planned on raping and burying me in the woods. Thanks to Warren’s ability to track down dead bodies and Nathan’s protective instincts, I walked away with only a few broken ribs, nerve damage in my hands, and enough gashes on my arms and legs to potentially keep me in pants for the rest of my life.
I shook my head. “Dad wanted the MRI because he’s worried about my migraines. I had another really bad one on Sunday.”
Her head tilted to the side. “So Warren is gone?”
“Yeah. He had to go to Washington for a meeting at the Pentagon.”
She folded the open end of her bag of chips and laid it on the bedside table. “That sounds alarming. What do they want with him?”
I shrugged. “I’m sure they want to know how he tracked down those missing girls.”
Her eyes widened. “I wonder how he’s going to explain that.”
I laughed, though I was more worried than amused. “I don’t know, but I don’t think telling them he can
feel death
is going to cut it.”
“Probably not,” she agreed. “When he left, did you puke all over the detective again?”
Heat rose in my cheeks at either the embarrassing memory of my last migraine or at the simple thought of Nathan McNamara. I wasn’t sure which. My endocrine system had been thoroughly confused since Warren and Nathan came to town. “No. I was with my parents, and I didn’t puke on anyone this time.”
“How is Nathan?” she asked.
I leaned against the armrest. “I guess he’s doing OK. I haven’t seen him in a few days. This week he’s in Greensboro looking for Billy’s last victim on our list who hasn’t been found.”
“Which one is she?” she asked.
“Rachel Smith. She was reported missing by her co-workers in 2008. She didn’t have any known relatives, so her case went cold pretty fast. She was a social worker,” I said.
Adrianne shook her head. “That’s so sad.”
“Let’s talk about something else, please.” I was desperate to change the subject. Talking about the whole case still made me feel squeamish.
She nodded. “OK. How’s the boy drama?”
“Oh, it’s still drama.” I sighed. “Warren finished moving his stuff into my house this week. He put his furniture in storage over in West Asheville, but his clothes and his many weapons are at my house. My guest room looks like a freaking armory.”
She looked at me sideways. “Are you planning on living together, like long term?”
I laughed and shrugged my shoulders. “I haven’t planned anything with Warren up until this point, and life hasn’t exactly allowed for a lot of forethought and decision-making. I don’t know what we’re doing.”
She raised an eyebrow. “What does Nathan think about it?”
I sat back in my seat. “I have no idea. It’s not like we have heart-to-heart discussions on the subject. He still comes by the house and my office all the time, so I guess it hasn’t fazed him too much.”
“Is he still dating Shannon?” she asked.
The muscles tensed in my jaw at the mention of Nathan’s girlfriend because if I had a nemesis, Shannon Green would be it. But that bitterness was rooted a lot deeper than in just her relationship with Nathan. His presence only added fuel to embers that had been smoldering for over a decade.
I rolled my eyes. “I guess they’re still together, but you would never know it. He’s always around, and she’s never with him, and he doesn’t talk about her.”
Adrianne held out her hands. “Why is he with her?”
“I’ve been asking the same thing for a while now.”
“What does Warren say about Nathan showing up all the time?” she asked.
“He doesn’t say much. They actually spend more time together than Nathan and I do these days. Warren’s been helping recover the missing victims, and aside from their constant ping-ponging of insults back and forth, they’ve actually become pretty good friends. They love to hate each other.”
“I’ve noticed,” she said. “To be honest, I kind of feel bad for Nate. He’s crazy about you, and then Warren showed up and it was over with you guys before it even got started.”
I nodded. “I know. Warren came into town like a hurricane.” I chewed on my pinky nail. “Wanna hear a secret?”
She scooted forward in her bed. “Of course.”
I pointed a warning finger at her. “Do you promise to take it to the grave?”
She crossed her heart. “I swear.”
I lowered my voice. “I keep thinking about that night in the woods when Nathan dove in front of that bullet for me. He could have died trying to save me. That’s love on a whole different level.”
“Are you having second thoughts about you and Warren?” she asked.
I shook my head. “No. That’s what makes it so hard. I genuinely care about them both, but it’s too different with Warren for there to even be a competition. He’s like gravity or oxygen. I can’t
not
be with him.”
“You guys are really intense,” she said.
I tapped my finger against my forehead. “Intense enough for migraines.” I laughed. “Enough about my supernatural soap opera. How are you doing?”