A horror story like you have never read before. It's what everyone who has ever been wronged wanted to do, but there's a catch.
Infected, Jules finds he can't control the Rage from releasing again and again. He criss-crosses the country running from authorities and looking for answers.
He is directed to Curtiss Manor on the Oregon coast, where a parapsychologist might be able to help him.
Shortly after his arrival, Jules is thrust deep into the past of the Manor, where he becomes a part of it.
Awarded 3rd place in the Mystery/Suspense/Thriller category by Premier Book Awards for 2009.
Excerpt
It's the off-season in Hawaii and the winds were favorable. It's been sixteen months since I've been here and the memories flooded in when the islands appeared on the horizon. I've been wrestling with the memories for three days now, somehow getting the supply shopping in between bouts of guilt, depression and drunken stupor.
The boat is fully stocked, fresh water and fuel tanks topped off, and I'm ready to leave, but I need to get this down and mailed before I do. Before it's too late. I've got this hunch I won't be seeing civilization again.
Excuse me, I need a cigarette.
I remember the day it all started:
It was a Sunday night and I was walking the streets of Los Angeles proper like I usually do, to get a pack of smokes and unwind. Except for the occasional booming car or someone homeless pushing their cart of worldly possessions, the streets were empty. When the rain began two hours later it caught me by surprise. I started home, taking shortcuts across parking lots and through alleys. I usually check the skies before leaving home, but another bad week at work had me in dark clouds of my own, thinking a lot about my career and if I should possibly make a change, at least employers, and had not noticed the weather.
The heavy rain came while I was on Fourth Avenue, still three miles from home. I ducked into an alley, dashing under the nearest overhang to wait out the cloudburst. I had chosen a metal staircase in my haste to escape the deluge. I stood beneath the landing, a thin piece of concrete keeping the rain off. Further down, as the stairs neared the ground, was a cardboard wall. The wall moved.
A thin man in rags crawled through the opening. His hair was long, mangled into dreadlocks by neglect and dirt, nearly dragging on the ground as he approached me on his hands and knees. His filthy white shirt had the seams ripped on both sides, the back fallen to one side exposing a large portion of skin. The skin was streaked and marred with what I thought were sores. As he neared, I could see that the streaks and discoloration were filth, not open sores. His grey, slacks dragged behind him, exposing only bare toes.
He stayed on his hands and knees until he reached me. Then he stood. He was an inch or two taller than me, but I outweighed him by twenty pounds. His untrimmed, scraggly beard was matted and twisted, his asymmetrical whiskers giving his head a distorted outline.
"Get wet, did ya'?" he asked. His voice was course, harsh, as if he'd smoked three packs of non-filtered cigarettes daily for decades.
I withdrew my pack from it's dry pocket. "A little." I picked out one for myself, then shook one part way out of the box and tilted it at him. I nodded at the pack. "Smoke?"
He looked at me, into my eyes, then down at the pack. He reached to it and plucked out two cigarettes. "And one for later." He put one in his mouth, one behind an ear, and the third in the breast pocket of the tattered rag of a shirt. There was enough of the pocket left to hold a cigarette, but just enough.
"Got a light?"
I handed him the pack of matches that came with the cigarettes. I had purchased the cigarettes half an hour earlier, the matches coming with it.
"Thanks." He lit the cigarette. "For the smokes, too." He inhaled, then
coughed.
I lit my cigarette with my lighter and shrugged.
"Got any change?"
"No." I lied.
He looked down the alley, into the rain. I inhaled on my cigarette, waiting impatiently for the rain to lighten up. I looked up, hoping to see a break in the clouds, but I couldn't see through the rain. I was either stuck here with him, or doomed to get soaked to the bone. It was February and the rain was cold. Home was still three miles away. I chose to stay, hoping the rain wouldn't last much longer, and that he wouldn't try to start a conversation.
"You sure you don't got any change?" He coughed again.
"What?" I asked incredulously.
"Fresh pack of smokes. Fresh pack of matches. I'd reckon you just bought that pack. You do it with exact change?" His tone was accusing.
I was at a loss momentarily. His deduction surprised me. Then, with a flair of arrogance I retorted, "As a matter-of-fact, I did. I often stop there for that exact purpose, with exact change."
He grunted at me, snorting a bit through his nose. The rain continued. Minutes passed before he spoke again. I knew the silence wouldn't last. I stamped out the butt.
"These are what put me here." He raised the rest of his cigarette out in front of him, exhaling on it.
"I'm sorry I offered them to you," I said coldly.
"Oh, no. Don't be. Like I said though, they're why I'm here. When they discovered cancer, they told me to stop smoking. I couldn't. The insurance refused to pay the bills. The doctors refused to see me. My job refused to employ me. Assholes. All of 'em, assholes." He flicked the remains of his cigarette into the rain.
"It's my own fault. I can't quit. I just can't. I did once." His voice was suddenly energetic. "For 'bout two weeks. 'Bout went mad, too. T'was then I got the Rage."
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Release Date: November 21, 2018
