Four years have passed and Cassie Belanger finds herself plagued with nightmares, ghostly voices from the past, and a compulsion to return to the sleepy fishing town of Oysterville, Washington.
There, she meets two strangers who have followed the same mysterious obsession to visit the Long Beach peninsula.
Cassie and her new friends must race against time to solve the mysteries of cryptic letters, bizarre and terrifying dreams, and a shadowy figure bent on finding a long forgotten treasure before they do, and more than willing to murder those who get in his way.
Danger, mystery, love, and fortune all await Cassie as she finds her way back to Oysterville once more.
Cassie Belanger woke in the darkness with a deep, shuddering gasp, rising through the foggy layers of her dream like a deepwater diver. She broke the surface into reality fighting for air, sheened in sweat as she struggled to place herself.
She was in the water, cold water…
No, she was in her own bed, in her own room. Her mind struggled to piece together the fragments of her dream. A ship, a storm, freezing water, and screams. But as quickly as the real world asserted itself, the dream faded from her mind like wisps of fog before the sun, until nothing remained except…
“Kil-a-ko-tah,” she whispered.
The word meant nothing to her, a vague collection of syllables, sung in a dialect that was already slipping away. It meant nothing now…but it had. Cassie was sure the word had meant something in her dream.
Kil-a-ko-tah…
Something brushed her bare leg and Cassie screamed, leaping from the bed as Spartacus gave a protesting yowl and bounded, in a yellow flash, off the bed and out of the room, his tail twitching in feline indignity.
Cassie sighed, brushing her long dark hair from a sweaty forehead and squinting at the tiny clock radio on the crate that served as her bedside table.
5:45.
She flipped on the bedside lamp, washing the room with soft yellow light.
With a groan, she probed beneath the bed with her bare toes until she found her slippers.
*
Cassie picked at her breakfast, allowing her cornflakes to congeal into an unappetizing gray lump as she struggled through her morning devotions. She read the same Bible verses repeatedly without seeing them, and left for class feeling sleepy and dissatisfied.
An hour later, she was convinced she was losing her mind.
*
Excerpt
“I saw a dream which made me afraid, and the thoughts on my bed and the visions of my head troubled me.”
Daniel 4:5
Professional Reviews
Wordsmith Shoppe Reviews
“…hands-down one of the best I've read. Perry Perkins writes with sensitivity, confidence, and authority, keeping the reader turning the pages.”
Peggy Phifer
Wordsmith Shoppe Reviews
Tyrone Banks
“Just when you think that you have this story figured out, Perkins will gently push you one step further and open your eyes to the possibilities that make up your destiny.”
Lighthouse Women’s Ministries
“I feel I must go to Oysterville with Cassie to find the hidden answers. I do not read many fiction books, but I have to continue the journey with Cassie.”
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