Excerpt 1, Chapter 1, Book 3:
Lucinda, 1926“We did it,” I whispered to Everett, leaning into his side. Standing at the front door, we waved goodbye to Robert and Lillian Cooper as they strolled arm-in-arm down the path to their car.
My new husband closed the door with a smile that lit up his whole face.
“Our first successful dinner party as a married couple.” He leaned in and pressed a kiss to my temple. “The start of many more firsts to come, I hope.”
It was November of 1926, and Everett and I had been married for a little over four months. In that time, we had set up our own home with the wedding money from our parents. Thanks to Everett’s real estate knowledge and financial acumen, we’d purchased a two-story brownstone in the up-and-coming but immensely more affordable Queens borough.
At the back of our quaint property was a small cottage that had once been a carriage house. It was one of the main reasons we bought this property. Now my darling husband could rest easy, knowing his sister and nephew would be taken care of.
We set up the cottage for Nora and her son Grant to live, thus ending her constant worries over rent and how to put food on the table.
Everett worked as a financial adviser at the local bank between classes while he finished his degree. But he had plans to setup his own accounting firm once he graduated, despite his father’s wishes to work for the family business.
I was still working on my degree as well. After the successful protest last year, I was allowed to run for office in my junior year. Two months ago, I was the first female in history to be elected as Vice President of the NYU Law School.
And yet, at the back of my mind, I couldn’t help but wonder—could I really balance everything before Ricky Montrose enacted his own plans?
As the Seer, I needed to have children to continue the family bloodline. Despite our newly-wedded bliss, I was still nowhere near ready for that next step.
But the clock was ticking. Ricky Montrose and Rosie Stanton had opted for a longer engagement, probably because construction on Montrose Paranormal Academy was set to be completed by the end of the year.
Even so, Rosie and Ricky were scheduled to wed in the spring of 1927.
For the time being, he’d been focused on building his namesake school. But how long would that last?
I felt like there was a ticking time bomb always lurking somewhere over my shoulder.
When would my time expire? When would Ricky come after me to end the Seer’s bloodline forever?“You okay, Lucinda?” Everett asked, rubbing my shoulders.
I smiled up at him. “Yes. Just thinking about Ricky, unfortunately.”
He wrapped his arms around me. “Don’t worry, I won’t let him hurt you.”
I sank into the warmth of his embrace. In my heart, I believed my new husband would always do his best to protect me.
But could anyone stand up to Ricky Montrose and win? He had the power of time travel at his fingertips, and big plans to manipulate the Chosen One powers into his own hands and take over the world.
And I for one hated being a helpless puppet, waiting for him to pull the strings and set another horrible chain of events into motion.
But what else could we do?
“Let’s go to bed, Snickerdoodle.” Everett drew back, moving his hand to weave his fingers between mine as he tugged me up the stairs.
“You scoundrel.” I smacked his arm. “That was my first attempt at baking anything on my own.”
For tonight’s dinner, I decided to try my hand at making cookies. The cinnamon-sugar-coated snickerdoodles seemed like an easy choice. But they had proved more than challenging.
The edges were a little extra crispy, but our guests had eaten them anyway. Robert had nibbled out the middles and Lillian had dunked hers in her coffee.“You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?” I asked as we reached the second-floor landing.
“No, probably not, Snickerdoodle.” He tweaked my nose as he opened the bedroom door.
I pretended to ignore him as I dressed in my nightclothes and slid beneath the quilt.
“Goodnight, Snickerdoodle,” he said, stifling a laugh.
“Goodnight, Scoundrel,” I shot back, wrinkling my nose as I burrowed further under the covers.
Everett turned out the light, and we snuggled until he fell asleep.
As I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, the blackness behind my eyelids didn’t stay black for long.
This wasn’t right. This couldn’t be right. I could hear myself saying in some far-off corner of dreamland.
I tossed and turned as a strange scene screamed into focus like a talking horror picture—in full, living color.
Instead of being under construction, the picturesque campus of Montrose Paranormal Academy was now completed. The entire design was built out in a giant rectangle extending from the Guardian church, now situated at the backside of the grounds.
Half a dozen impressive brick buildings with formal white columns ringed the edges of a lush green lawn, complete with cobblestone paths artfully zigzagging across the landscape.
Every wrought-iron lamppost along each path now fluttered with bright green banners that read One School. One Society.
Green? That wasn’t one of the colors of the Three Societies. What was going on here?
My heart caught in my throat as the strange dream-scene unfolded around me.
This was it. This was Ricky’s endgame, right? He had to be behind this so-called “One Society.”
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