I don’t know what to say! I won’t let her die! Something in the shadows flickered, and a surge of fear struck Bob like a hammer. “No …” he whispered.
Without thinking, he grabbed her and started to run across the square. He ducked into an alley just in time to hear Patience yelp in pain. A glance back showed a coil of blackness leaping from shadow to shadow.
“Bob, you’re hurting me!” she gasped. He looked back to see her rubbing her ankle. A shape began to form out of the shadow, but it faded, leaving Bob to wonder if it was all his imagination.
“What happened?” he asked quickly. He didn’t trust his senses, so he went with the worst possible scenario. Grimm was after the woman he loved.
“I rolled it when you tore me down this alley! Not the way to get a little extra attention, by the way, Mr. Less-than-Patient.”
Bob heard a strange clicking sound behind him. He turned around to see Richard Hertly pointing a gun at him. The sound Bob heard must have been the safety coming off. The former Surprise, Arizona, police officer looked as if he hadn’t slept in days. Nearly a day’s worth of beard covered his almost plump face, which had a vicious smile plastered on it from ear to ear. Bob thought the man laughed as he put his finger on the trigger of the gun.
“Oh there’s no way this is all happening at once!” Bob yelped as he pulled Patience back around the corner. He didn’t hear any gunfire and didn’t look behind him to see if they were being chased by a vengeance-crazed policeman or a real-life monster.
“That man has a gun!” Patience shouted. She couldn’t have said anything more helpful.
A woman in the square must have heard her and screamed. The entire area went mad. Children scurried to their parents, and men stood in front of their loved ones to protect them.
Bob weaved through the mass of people rushing around each other. He had an iron grip on Patience’s hand and tried to reassure her even as he yanked her out of the way of some kid that ran in front of him. Bob noticed a black hand reach out of the boy’s shadow.
Bob picked Patience up into his arms just as a giant black hand gripped the air that she had occupied the moment before. Bob made it to the street just in time to notice Drisc’s car screech to a stop on the side of the road. Bob shoved Patience into the car. She yelped at him again, but he didn’t really hear what she’d said.
“Go!” he shouted as he closed the door. Drisc floored the gas and they sped away. Bob held Patience as if his life depended on it.
Title: The Journals of Bob Drifter
Author: M.L.S. Weech
Genre: Paranormal Thriller / Urban Fantasy
Bob Drifter is a substitute teacher with a secret. He seems like no more than a polite young man who loves to read and mentor students in his free time. Yet, on the side, Bob takes part in some rather strange extracurricular activities that soon attract the attention of local police. For some reason, people have a way of dying around him.
It’s not his fault. Maybe he just hangs around people who are already dying. Maybe he has bad timing. But Bob knows better. He has a secret mission that must be completed before he ends up in prison or raises the ire of the most frightening individual in the supernatural world. No pressure.
A terrifying new force has set foot into Bob’s life, and a string of ghastly mutilations follows this figure wherever he goes. Now, Bob has to keep his own secrets, protect his students, and fulfill his mentor’s wishes. Welcome to the world of those who watch over the dead.
M.L. S. Weech was born in August 1979 in Rapid City, South Dakota. He fell in love with fantasy and science fiction at an early age. His love of writing quickly followed when he tried to write a sequel to his favorite movie. He didn’t know what copyright infringement was. He can’t remember a time he wasn’t working on some sort of project from that day on. He wrote for a junior high project. The only way his freshman english teacher could get him to settle down was to let him start writing a book. He completed what he calls his first manuscript when he was 17.
He got a ton of feedback that was honest, helpful, and not much fun to listen to, but instead of quit, he simply wrote another, and then another.
He fell in love with reading in high school when he was introduced to Timothy Zahn and the Star Wars novels. Then he was handed Anne McCaffrey, Robert Jordan, Dean Koontz, Brandon Sanderson and so many more. He went from reading to complete homework to reading more than three books a month.
He joined the U.S. Navy as a journalist in 2005. He served on aircraft carriers and destroyers. He served in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan. He finished his time in the Navy in 2015, and currently teaches future Navy Mass Communication Specialists at the Defense Information School.
When he wasn’t taking pictures or writing features or news stories, he was writing fiction. Photojournalism was a hobby he enjoyed getting paid for, but writing fiction has been and remains his true dream.
He’s completed six manuscripts and is already planning a seventh. He took his third project to Archway Publishing, who helped him turn his life-long dream into a reality.
Links
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