Bitter Moon (The Huntress/FBI Thrillers Book 4) Read online

  PRAISE FOR ALEXANDRA SOKOLOFF

  Huntress Moon

  A Thriller Award Nominee for Best E-Book Original Novel

  A Suspense Magazine Pick for Best Thriller

  An Amazon Top Ten Bestseller

  “This interstate manhunt has plenty of thrills . . . keeps the drama taut and the pages flying.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “The intensity of her main characters is equally matched by the strength of the multilayered plot . . . The next installment cannot release soon enough for me.”

  —Suspense Magazine

  “Who you know: Agatha Christie, Gillian Flynn, Mary Higgins Clark. Who you should read: Alexandra Sokoloff.”

  —Huffington Post Books

  The Price

  “Some of the most original and freshly unnerving work in the genre.”

  —The New York Times Book Review

  “A heartbreakingly eerie page turner.”

  —Library Journal

  “The Price is a gripping read full of questions about good, evil, and human nature . . . the devastating conclusion leaves the reader with an uncomfortable question to consider: ‘If everyone has a price, what’s yours?’”

  —Rue Morgue magazine

  The Unseen

  “A creepy haunted house, reports of a 40-year-old poltergeist investigation, and a young researcher trying to rebuild her life take the “publish or perish” initiative for college professors to a terrifying new level in this spine-tingling story that has every indication of becoming a horror classic. Based on the famous Rhine ESP experiments at the Duke University parapsychology department that collapsed in the 1960s, this is a chillingly dark look into the unknown.”

  —Romantic Times Book Reviews

  “Sokoloff keeps her story enticingly ambiguous, never clarifying until the climax whether the unfolding weirdness might be the result of the investigators’ psychic sensitivities or the mischievous handiwork of a human villain.”

  —Publisher’s Weekly

  “Alexandra Sokoloff takes the horror genre to new heights.”

  —Charlotte Examiner

  “Alexandra Sokoloff’s talent brings readers into the dark and encompassing world of the unknown so completely, that readers will find it difficult to go to bed until the last page has been turned. Her novels bring human frailty and the desperate desire to survive together in poignant stories of personal struggle and human triumph. But the truly fascinating element of Sokoloff’s writing is her deep dig into the human psyche and the horrors that lie just beneath the surface of our carefully constructed facades.”

  —Fiction Examiner

  Book of Shadows

  “Compelling, frightening, and exceptionally well-written, Book of Shadows is destined to become another hit for acclaimed horror and suspense novelist Sokoloff. The incredibly tense plot and mysterious characters will keep readers up late at night, jumping at every sound, and turning the pages until they’ve devoured the book.”

  —Romantic Times Book Reviews

  “Sokoloff successfully melds a classic murder-mystery whodunit with supernatural occult overtones.”

  —Library Journal

  The Harrowing

  Bram Stoker and Anthony Award Nominee for Best First Novel

  “Absolutely gripping . . . it is easy to imagine this as a film. Once started, you won’t want to stop reading.”

  —The London Times

  “Sokoloff’s debut novel is an eerie ghost story that captivates readers from page one. The author creates an element of suspense that builds until the chillingly believable conclusion.”

  —Romantic Times Book Reviews

  “Poltergeist meets The Breakfast Club as five college students tangle with an ancient evil presence. Plenty of sexual tension, quick pace and engaging plot.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  The Space Between

  “Filled with vivid images, mystery, and a strong sense of danger . . . Sokoloff interlaces psychological elements, quantum physics, and the idea of multiple dimensions and parallel universes into her story; this definitely adds something different and original from other teen novels on the market today.”

  —Seattle Post Intelligencer

  “Alexandra Sokoloff has created an intricate tapestry, a dark Young Adult novel with threads of horror and science fiction that make it a true original. Loaded with graphic, vivid images that place the reader in the midst of the mystery and danger, The Space Between takes psychological elements, quantum physics and multiple dimensions with parallel universes and creates a storyline that has no equal. A must-read.”

  —Suspense Magazine

  Also by Alexandra Sokoloff

  The Huntress/FBI Thrillers

  Huntress Moon: Book I

  Blood Moon: Book II

  Cold Moon: Book III

  The Haunted Thrillers

  The Harrowing

  The Price

  The Unseen

  Book of Shadows

  The Space Between

  Paranormal

  D-Girl on Doomsday (from Apocalypse: Year Zero)

  The Shifters (from The Keepers trilogy)

  Keeper of the Shadows (from The Keepers: L.A.)

  Nonfiction

  Stealing Hollywood: Screenwriting Tricks for Authors, III

  Writing Love: Screenwriting Tricks for Authors II

  Screenwriting Tricks for Authors

  Short Fiction

  The Edge of Seventeen (in Rage Against the Night)

  In Atlantis (in Love is Murder)

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2016 by Alexandra Sokoloff

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Thomas & Mercer are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781503940369

  ISBN-10: 1503940365

  Cover design by Ray Lundgren

  For Craig Robertson

  Contents

  CARA

  Chapter One

  TWO YEARS LATER

  Chapter Two

  ROARKE

  Chapter Three

  CARA

  Chapter Four

  ROARKE

  Chapter Five

  CARA

  Chapter Six

  ROARKE

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  CARA

  Chapter Ten

  ROARKE

  Chapter Eleven

  CARA

  Chapter Twelve

  ROARKE

  Chapter Thirteen

  CARA

  Chapter Fourteen

  ROARKE

  Chapter Fifteen

  CARA

  Chapter Sixteen

  ROARKE

  Chapter Seventeen

  CARA

  Chapter Eighteen

  ROARKE

  Chapter Nineteen

  CARA

  Chapter Twenty

  ROARKE

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  CARA

  Chapter Twe
nty-Six

  ROARKE

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  CARA

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  ROARKE

  Chapter Thirty

  CARA

  Chapter Thirty-One

  ROARKE

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  CARA

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  ROARKE

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  CARA

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  ROARKE

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  CARA

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  ROARKE

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  CARA

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  ROARKE

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  CARA

  Chapter Forty-Two

  ROARKE

  Chapter Forty-Three

  CARA

  Chapter Forty-Four

  ROARKE

  Chapter Forty-Five

  CARA

  Chapter Forty-Six

  ROARKE

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  CARA

  Chapter Fifty

  ROARKE

  Chapter Fifty-One

  CARA

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  ROARKE

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  CARA

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  ROARKE

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  CARA

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  ROARKE

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  CARA

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  ROARKE

  Chapter Sixty

  CARA

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  ROARKE

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  CARA

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  Author’s Note

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  CARA

  Chapter One

  It is the moon that wakes her.

  It is always the moon that tells her, somehow, that sends the rush of fight-or-flight chemicals into her blood, galvanizes her body with a warning of danger, a command to wake and act. The eerie light is bright through the window, shimmering in the room.

  Now the metallic scratching on the door announces Its presence.

  It is here again, the monster, coming for her. The thing that butchered her family. That left her scratched and bleeding and almost dead.

  But she has that few moments’ advantage because she knows. She knows the sound of It, Its smell, the hoarse and grating breath, the stench of sweat and malevolence. She knows what has come for her because she has been in a room with It before. She was small then, small and innocent and helpless. But she is bigger now, bigger and stronger and deadlier.

  And she has something else. This time she is angry. This thing has stolen her family, has left her alone and scorned and shunned. This time she will fight, and fight to kill.

  The creature slips stealthily into the tiny locked room, the counselor with the pitted skin and fat sausage fingers, and the fifteen-year-old bully he has brought for company or for camouflage or maybe for both.

  The man is muttering, his breath reeking with alcohol. “Hold her down. Little whore . . . you know you want it. Strutting around like you own this place. Grab her arms. Hold her down—”

  She launches upward, out of her bed. It is caught unawares, and she is a spitfire, punching and scratching and kicking. It happens in moments: the boy’s nose is broken, his eye bleeding; the man’s testicles crushed. And as the boy shrieks and the man lies moaning and clutching himself on the floor, she breathes through the fire in her chest and picks up the man’s foot in both hands and holds the leg straight and brings her foot down as hard as she can on the knee to snap the joint—

  The man screams once . . . and is silent. Passed out. She stands in the dark over the still bodies of the man and the boy, her whole body shaking, her heart slamming in her chest. The harsh breathing is still there, all around her, resonating in the room. Then It slowly recedes, foiled, but not vanquished.

  She breathes in, breathes out, calming the frantic racing of her heart.

  It will be back, she knows.

  For now, she sits and waits for Them to come to take her to jail.

  She is twelve years old.

  TWO YEARS LATER

  Chapter Two

  She sits in the back of the ugly dark official transport van and watches out the window as the van speeds on the freeway, and the foothills roll away from the road. The sun is blinding after two years of confinement, the sky a brilliant blue. Everything seems vast.

  The feeling of movement is alien. She has been transported only a few times during her captivity. She feels the drugs in her bloodstream, dulling her senses. Even so the speed of the van on the freeway is exhilarating, so fast it feels like flying.

  She has been two years in The Cage in Ventura, and she has to fight down the impulse to open the door beside her and jump from the moving vehicle.

  She does not know where They are taking her. Since she was five, she has never known where They will send her next, or what she will have to face when she gets there.

  This morning was the release from The Cage, the low brick prison of the California Youth Authority, maximum-security juvenile detention. The van had gone south first, the 101 to the 5, then came the long drive through all the counties bordering Los Angeles, the suburban sprawl, the sameness of the housing developments. Past the seemingly endless snarl of L.A., freeway turned into highway, and now the hills on either side of the road are barren, beige curves.

  The van is headed east, away from the ocean; she could tell that by the sun even if she couldn’t read the signs. But she has become very good at road signs. The numbers tell her everything she needs to know. When you know the numbers, you always know where you are.

  She can easily picture the map of the state in her head, the veins and arteries of the freeways and highways and interstates. During the two long years in The Cage, she had often journeyed these roads in her mind. They are etched in her soul. So she knows exactly where they are when the driver turns off the 15.

  It is Riverside County, the same county where her aunt lives. The county that she was arrested, convicted and sentenced in two years ago.

  Suddenly the land opens to desert, a wide sand-and-scrub corridor with foothills on either side of the highway. She stares out at pale dunes dotted with yellow black-eyed Susans and barrel cactus.

  And she allows herself the slightest, faintest hope. The desert is better than the city. There are far fewer people. And in the desert, you can see things coming. You can run.

  When the van turns off the highway, the off ramp is to the town of Las Piedras. She looks out the window at mountains with striking scattered rock formations which must have given the town its name.

  They pass vineyards and horse ranches on the right, at the base of the foothills. The horses stir a memory of life before The Night, before the monster came and took her family, left her scarred and alone—

  She slams shut a door in her mind to avoid looking back.

  There is a sign for an Indian reservation; she knows there are many in this area. And then there is a warren of houses, and the van turns, rolls up a long, curved drive toward a low, wide suburban box with two wings, a brown lawn, scruffy palm trees, and a dry fountain with a dusty angel.

  The group home. She has been in so many. They are all different. She has no idea what this one will be.

  She sits in the back seat, waiting for the driver to come around and let her out. When he doesn’t move, she remembers the door is not locked; she can open it for herself.

  She gets out of the van holding her cheap backpack, containing one change of clothes: jeans and a turtlenec
k, and socks and a sleep shirt. All the possessions she has in the world.

  Outside the overcooled vehicle, the sun blazes above. She feels the desert wind on her skin, smells the juniper and lavender and honey mesquite.

  She could run now, before she checks in, before anyone steps forward to process her. Before anyone can find out who she is.

  “Let’s go,” the driver says beside her. “I don’t got all day.”

  She fights down the feeling and forces herself to walk with him up the path to the door. As she moves up to the porch she is looking at the doors, the windows, the gates, checking escape routes, even as the game begins.

  The game of Normal.

  She must play it—play it and win.

  She will never go back to jail, ever.

  She is fourteen.

  Inside the entry hall she looks around quickly, memorizing the floor plan and exits. There is one wing for the bedrooms, one for the offices and kitchen, and the living room-slash-lounge and dining room are in the center. Across from the front door there is a large round clock on the wall, so big it seems to be screaming the time.

  The group home director’s office is immediately to the right.

  She steps in and gets the first look at her new jailer. Ms. Sharonda. The director sits behind a wide desk with neat stacks of papers and a thick open file in front of her. She has a dark, regal face and suspicious eyes. Her mouth is a hard line, a warning: Don’t mess with me. She is more than tough; there is an animal strength about her.

  There will be no slipping past this one.

  Ms. Sharonda nods to the chair on the other side of the desk, and she sits, holding herself still. It is very, very important to look Normal.

  Ms. Sharonda continues reading the file in front of her.

  She tries not to be distracted by the bracelets Ms. Sharonda is wearing: plain bronze circlets that clink softly when the director moves.

  She has not seen pretty things in two long years.

  Finally Ms. Sharonda looks up. “So. Cara. We’re on a level system here,” she says. “This home is a Level Five. Do you know what that means?”

  Cara nods. She knows. She is an expert on group homes, and group home staff. She has lived in them since she was nine years old. The homes are classified by levels that range from 1 to 14. She has been in every level.