The Haunting of Sky Hollow - SAMPLE

4.

A murky dusk had gathered to greet Nadia after she left the attorney's office, which occupied a sizable suite on the lower floor of a large Victorian house. The meticulously preserved and colorfully trimmed Queen Anne faced a park that sat on the edge of one of Rutland's busiest thoroughfares.

Tiny lights twinkled through the fog from evergreen swags in the park's sole structure, an old-fashioned gazebo. Used as a bandstand in the summer months, it now played host to a Christmas tree vendor. Business was booming too, despite the steep price tags on the frothy spruces and firs. But even if she'd wanted a Christmas tree this year, Nadia thought fifty dollars was too much to pay for something that was already dead.

She paused on the landing to zip her black puffer jacket out of habit, but in the end, left it open. The rain had stopped, and although a chill lingered in the air, the temperature still wasn't cold enough to turn her breath to ghostly puffs, or limn the standing water on the walkway with fragile rime. For the last couple of weeks, the weather had been like this. Rain, more often than not, and unseasonable warmth, with temperatures climbing into the forties and fifties during the day. So much for a white Christmas, she thought, although today's unexpected windfall was present enough.

Still dazed by the news, Nadia started down the steps like someone in a dream. To her, it still felt like she'd wandered into a dream. A fantastic bubble whose walls were so fragile; the slightest disturbance would cause them to burst. Only the folio and weight of the keys that clinked inside her tote provided evidence to the contrary. She'd entered Mr. Pratt's office in student loan debt up to her ears and left a co-heir to a sprawling estate, a luxury property that lay less than twenty miles south of the spot on which she was now standing!

Just beyond the steps, the walkway veered to the left, following the southern side of the house to a small parking lot. Nadia was midway down the stone path when a cloud of heady, clove-scented smoke burst her pleasant bubble of unreality.

"Djarums? Ugh, I thought you quit smoking. After your performance inside, I also thought you'd be halfway to Castleton by now."

Aidan flicked his cigarette over a nearby hedge. "I acted like an ass in there, Nad, sorry." He shoved his hands in his coat pockets and turned towards the street.

A colossal one. Though his apology was genuine, it wasn't enough. Part of Nadia was still bristling from his remark about their mother's tombstone. While she was dying to tell him their good news, stringing it out a little longer, making him squirm just the teensiest bit, seemed a good-enough punishment. "Well, you should've stuck around a little longer. If you hadn't stormed out of there like a three-year-old, you'd have heard something really amazing."

"What? Did the fat man give you today's winning lottery numbers?"

"Why do you have to be so mean? What did Mr. Pratt ever do to you?"

"He's a lawyer, isn't that reason enough? So, what's this amazing news of yours?"

Before she could answer, a woman in a long black coat and matching wide-brimmed hat emerged from the fog-shrouded street. Instead of walking across the drive, she slipped through a gap in the hedges to begin her trek up the narrow walkway.

"Oh, excuse me," Nadia said, stepping aside.

The woman said nothing but smiled and nodded to her. As she passed, a scent washed over Nadia. An odor, too strong to be called perfume, evoking images of dead vegetation in stagnant water. Things fallen and forgotten, rotting in silence. The stench rose from the woman like steam, wreathing her in a noxious cloud. Nadia turned away, covering her nose and mouth with one hand.

"Excuse you for what?"

"I was talking to her." Nadia gestured behind her.

Aidan peered over her shoulder. "Who?"

"The lady in the crushed velvet coat," she whispered, not wanting to appear rude. "You must have seen her, she walked right between us."

Concern clouded Aidan's features, canting his brows into a furious black vee. "Hate to tell you, Sis, but you're the only person on the path."

...

The Haunting of Sky Hollow is available exclusively on Amazon, and is enrolled in both Kindle Unlimited and Prime Reading.

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