HAUNTED!

Out Now!

Haunted is my inaugural dive into self-publishing. I hope you like it!

Environmental consultant Georgie Del Ducco sees dead people. Well, one dead person—her best friend, journalist Min Goldfelder. Min’s latest visit comes as Georgie flees her own wedding in her cheating ex-fiancé’s car. As much as Georgie appreciates Min’s company, she can’t help but wonder why her friend keeps showing up and hasn’t “crossed over.”

While Georgie’s being held for car theft at an Oregon State Police station, Min sees an unknown man talking to handsome Trooper Chris Benton. Min’s not sure who the man is, but she knows he’s somehow connected to her fatal accident. Is her accident connected to a bear poaching story she was working on when she died?

Georgie and Min must solve the mystery of Min’s death so she can continue her journey to the other side.

Content Warnings: scenes of dealing with grief and loss of a close friend and an adult child; brief rough handling by a former romantic partner; recounting fatal automobile accident and images of injuries.

Pick it up at Amazon, Kobo, B&N, and Apple!

Only in ebook, but I’m working on the print version and will let you know.

EXCERPT :

Chapter One

 

“Damn it, Georgianna, what do you think you’re doing?”

My mother’s voice was all but snatched from the cell phone’s tiny speaker as I roared south down Interstate Five in my fiancé’s—okay, ex-fiancé’s—black cherry 1967 Mustang convertible. The “Just Married” sign had blown off about ten miles back, outside of Salem, along with the frou-frou white veil and headpiece of my bridal ensemble.

Needless to say, the wedding was off.

“Can’t hear you, Mom. I’ll call later.” I stabbed “End Call,” cutting off any further tirade.

I was no runaway bride. Well, technically I was, but I hadn’t changed my mind. Vincent changed it.

I tossed the phone onto the black leather back seat, gripped the wheel with two hands, pretending it was Vincent’s neck, and screamed at the top of my lungs until my throat burned. The primal sound carried north on the rush of air and exhaust fumes of the I-5 corridor.

That son-of-a-bitch. That bastard. That son-of-a-bitch!

So my capacity to curse someone out was horribly inept. A woman my age and intelligence should be well versed in her native language. A woman my age and intelligence should know better than to stay with an unfaithful bastard and agree to marry him when he promises he’ll change.

Sometimes women my age and intelligence are ninnies.

The early summer greens of the Willamette Valley blurred together as I passed other cars and numerous big rigs. It was a glorious May day in western Oregon that should have been more glorious because it was my wedding day. But when I caught Vincent fondling the florist’s assistant in the church vestibule it pretty much ruined the whole happy, surreal effect.

Geez. Couldn’t the guy wait to be a shit until after the honeymoon?

I smiled grimly, recalling that the tickets to Barbados were in Vincent’s carry-on bag in the trunk. Maybe I’d go without him. Maybe I could cash in his ticket and buy a lot of useless things just to remind myself how asinine I was. Or a lot of rum to forget how asinine I was.

Except the tickets were non-refundable.

Damn. I couldn’t even screw him over this once.

Pressure built and exploded from my chest in a heaving sob, and suddenly my vision was too blurred to see the road. Clearing the tears with the heel of my hand and smearing carefully applied mascara and eye shadow down my cheeks, I managed to pull off onto the emergency lane without killing myself or some innocent traveler.

I depressed the clutch and put the Mustang into first before cutting the throaty V8 engine. I didn’t want to roll into traffic, no matter how distraught I was. Vincent wasn’t worth it, even if I’d convinced myself he was once upon a time.

My head fell forward onto the faux wood grain steering wheel. The hard plastic felt warm against my forehead as I huddled there and cried. How pathetic. How cliché. My boyfriend was a total jerk and I’d believed his lies. Again.

Did I really think I’d changed him? His apology had seemed so sincere the last time his faithfulness stumbled. His promise that he’d never again do anything to hurt me, or us, was followed by two months of unflagging devotion. Then a marriage proposal. How could I refuse?

Now I asked myself, how could I have accepted?

I cried harder, angry at myself for being so gullible, so willing to take him back. This was one big, horrible soap opera, and I wanted to be written off the show.

“You know, the emergency lane is for emergencies only.”

I didn’t bother looking at the passenger seat where the familiar voice came from. I sniffed and cleared my throat. “I would consider this an emergency, wouldn’t you?”

“Nah,” she scoffed. “I told you months ago to drop the Vincemeister. But would you listen? Nooooo.”

I turned my head without raising it off the steering wheel. Sitting in the passenger seat, arms crossed over a snug brown sweater that contained an ample bosom, was my best friend Min-li Goldfelder. Her jet-black hair was cut close to her head on the sides with stylishly long bangs swooping across her forehead, her hazel eyes bright under thin, arched brows.

“Well, you didn’t, did you?” she asked again.

Min had never been one for pulling punches, especially when it involved my bad habit of choosing men who would only cause me grief.

“No,” I agreed, “but it’s a little hard to take advice from you just now.”

Her brows shot up in surprise. “Why?”

I closed my eyes as fresh tears fell. “Because you’re dead, Min.”

“I’m dead, not clueless,” she reminded me. “I know when someone’s being screwed, and not in a good way.”

I had to give her that one.

We both had jobs catering to our natural curiosity and desire to set things right. While I had studied biology and environmental sciences, Min had majored in journalism. I wanted to know about the world around us, and see that humans didn’t inflict excessive damage to it. Min always wanted to know “Why?” something happened, followed by more “Whys.” She was interested in what made people do what they did and loved to tell their stories.

Min knew more about the highs and lows of human existence than most cops, doctors, and drug dealers out there. They all had been willing to talk to her, though many men, and a surprising number of women, assumed that Min’s D-cups meant she had no brains. Too bad the reverse wasn’t true: You’re a Double A? You must be a genius. I’d have been in Mensa by default. But she used the unfounded stereotype to her advantage when necessary, turning the tables on them to show their own prejudices.

“I know you’re not,” I said, opening my eyes and wiping my runny nose across the sheer sleeve of my gown. I caught a nostril on the intricate beadwork and winced. “Clueless, I mean.”

 She gave me one of her Min smiles that made me want to fall against her and cry. Min looked solid enough, but when I moved to hug her when she first appeared in February, the month after she died, she stepped back saying we couldn’t. Was Min a ghost haunting me or a figment of my imagination? Either way, our conversations meant she was still with me, some of the time at least. Besides, I wasn’t sure which would have been worse.

“Thanks, Peach. And you’re not either. Which makes me wonder why you have such horrid taste in men.”

I’d wondered that myself.

My chest constricted. I started to cry again, and this time it had nothing to do with Vincent.

“God, I miss you,” I said in a tear-filled whisper. I missed doing things together, visiting friends and family together, being involved with each other’s lives. Seeing her was a gift, but something significant was gone.

Highway traffic rumbled by as we stared at each other. Min’s heart-shaped face contorted into a grimace as if she was trying not to cry.

“I miss you too,” she said just as quietly. “But—”

There was something in her voice that cut through my own misery. “But what?”

Min shook off the moment of emotion and clapped her hands together, the sound drowned out by the diesel engine of a passing eighteen-wheeler. “But enough self-pity. Let’s get this puppy going again and leave the world behind. Where were you headed?”

I scrubbed my hands over my face, the slickness of unfamiliar makeup reminding me I must look like hell.

“Anywhere.” I flipped the visor down and peered into the rectangular mirror.

Ugh. Worse than hell.

My once perfectly coifed blonde hair was a rat’s nest of tangles. Black and smoky plum streaks masked my blood-shot blue eyes all the way across my cheeks to my ears; so much for tear-proof. My nose was running and my skin blotchy. A Technicolor nightmare. And they say all brides are beautiful.

A flash of blue and red in the mirror caught my eye. An Oregon State Police cruiser pulled up behind me and burped out a little warning with its siren. Stay put, ma’am, we have you surrounded.

I realized I’d forgotten to activate the emergency flashers. Then I realized I was sitting in a stolen car.

Just when I thought the day couldn’t get any worse.