Storm Watch
Unfinished Business, #3
By Carole Ann Moleti
Genre: Light Paranormal Romance
Mike and Liz thought they'd gotten control of the specters haunting the Barrett Inn. But things get very complicated when they're the ghosts from your past life. The Category Five Hurricane bearing down on Cape Cod appears to be headed directly for them--or has it been spawned from inside them? This may be their only chance to vanquish the specters--if they survive the storm.
EXCERPT
#1
The
engine whined and strained. The boat spun in the eddy, and Liz’s knuckles went
white trying to prevent the steering wheel from spinning. Sandra looked like
she was going to puke. Harley looked like he wanted to jump overboard.
“Liz,
move over to the next seat but keep your hands on the wheel until I get there.
Sandra, you and Harley get underneath the cabin into the berths, one on each
side, and keep your heads down. We’ve got to stay balanced. This is going to be
a rough ride.”
Mike
got his ass in the seat, turned catty corner into the waves, and gunned the
engine. The Whaler, made for stability in the surf, cut through it but crashed
and rocked wildly between the swells. An air horn rolled back and forth across
the deck, adding the effect of a ticking clock to an already nauseating ride.
The
cuddy cabin kept the worst of the spray off them, but Mike had to unzip his
roof panel and stand up to see over the salt encrusted windshield. A wave
lifted the entire boat out of the water.
“Hang
on!” He crouched and braced for impact. I hope everyone is where they’re
supposed to be or we’ll flip. His lungs were about to burst.
The
door thudded from side to side in knee-deep water. The motor bobbled and
threatened to stall as the propeller came out of the water. He’d been out in
weather this bad, but his two-way radio had been on and someone knew where he
was.
EXCERPT
#2
He
passed the living room where the flashback of an emaciated Mary, in a hospital
bed, being tended to by a hospice nurse, wiped all the good feelings away. He
pushed past it, into the kitchen.
Mary
stood at the stove, stirring and filling bowls with noodles and dumplings and
gravy. He smelled lily of the valley, her favorite perfume. Wine-tinged bile
rose into his throat. The light dimmed, and all the other voices in the room
went silent as she hummed some catchy 80’s tune. The glass fell from his hand
and shattered, but he didn’t hear the glass breaking or feel the blood-red wine
soaking his feet.
“Dad!
You okay?” Allison ran toward him.
The
room brightened. “Yeah, my hands were still wet.” He eased himself down to the
floor to pick up the glass shards.
“Careful,
don’t cut yourself.” Mary knelt beside him. Her hair smelled like lily of the
valley as it brushed his cheek.
Mike
reached for her, and tumbled into the void when she vanished. He landed on the
heel of his hand, miraculously avoiding the splintered glass, coughed, and
shook it off. “Get me a paper towel. Damn. Waste of good wine.”
Jay
stared. Dana brought a roll of paper towels.
Allison
mopped up the spill. Concern etched her face. “Dad, you’re exhausted!”
His
cheeks burned, and his hear raced. Mike tried to act nonchalant and hauled
himself up. “Yeah, I’m tired. And hungry. Let’s eat.”
Liz Levine is convinced her recently deceased husband is engineering the sequence of events that propels her into a new life. But it’s sea captain Edward Barrett, the husband that died over a century ago, who has returned to complete their unfinished business. Edward’s lingering presence complicates all her plans and jeopardizes a new relationship that reawakens her passion for life and love. What are Captain Barrett’s plans for his wife, and for the man who is the new object of her affections?
Mike and Liz Keeny are newlyweds, new parents, and the
proprietors of the Barrett Inn, an 1875 Victorian on Cape Cod, which just
happens to be haunted— by their own ghosts from past lives. The Barrett Inn had
become an annex of Purgatory, putting Liz and their infant son in danger.
Selling the historic seaside bed and breakfast was the only answer, one that
Liz and her own tortured specter refused to consider. Were Mike and Liz doomed
to follow the same path that led to disaster in their previous lives? Was
getting out, getting away, enough?
Carole Ann Moleti lives and works as a nurse-midwife in New York City, thus explaining her fascination with all things paranormal, urban fantasy, and space opera. Her nonfiction focuses on health care, politics, and women's issues. But her first love is writing science fiction and fantasy because walking through walls is less painful than running into them.
Books One and Two in the Unfinished Business series, Carole's Cape Cod paranormal romance novels, Breakwater Beach and The Widow's Walk, were published by Soulmate. Book Three, Storm Watch, is due out June 28,2017.
Urban fantasies set in the world of Carole's novels have been featured in Haunted: Ten Tales of Ghosts, Seers: Ten Tales of Clairvoyance, Beltane: Ten Tales of Witchcraft, and Bites: Ten Tales of Vampires.
Carole also writes nonfiction that ranges from sweet and sentimental in This Path and Thanksgiving to Christmas to edgy and irreverent in the Not Your Mother's Books: On Being a Mother and On Being a Parent.
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