Chapter Two
A week later
Wind skittered over the parched ground, pushing dried leaves in front of it. Dust whipped up, swirling in an exotic dance before being dispersed by the cool breeze. A rabbit hopped across the clearing, stopped, lifted its pink nose and sniffed the air. A deer froze at the edge of the woods, sensing everything was not as it should be.
Evil.
On the wind and moving steadily closer. The rabbit bounded quickly into the woods. The deer bolted, racing deep into the forest, not looking back. The birds took flight, while the smaller woodland creatures burrowed into their dens and hidey-holes. Crows cawed raucously, flapping their wings as they soared above the clearing.
The sound of a truck interrupted their chatter. Another quickly followed it. Voices rang out as a convoy of vehicles flanked either side of the large clearing. Metal clanked as equipment was unloaded. Canvas flapped in the wind as tents were raised.
Shade’s Carnival has come to Salvation, North Carolina.
Aimee sighed as she climbed out of the low-slung, vintage red Mustang. This was the last place she wanted to be tonight, but her friend had insisted.
“It’ll be fun,” she muttered, mocking what her friend, Sandra Travers, had said. Aimee would rather have a root canal.
“I heard that.” Sandra closed the car door with a thunk and leaned her arms on top of the roof, peering over it. “I know that you prefer to be a hermit, but honestly, Aimee, even you’ve never been quite this bad before.”
“I know. I’ve just been preoccupied lately. With work,” she added before Sandra could ask.
Aimee knew there was no defense against her friend’s accusations. There was no denying she didn’t like being out in public, much preferred being at home in her art studio. Even as a child, she’d spent all her time with her colored pencils, sketch books and oil paints. In school, she’d constantly doodled when she should have been concentrating on her social studies or math assignments.
Her teachers had predicted she’d never graduate high school or get a job if she didn’t stop scribbling pictures on every available sheet of paper. She’d proved them wrong on both counts. She’d not only graduated from high school, but had managed a year of art school before returning to Salvation. Her doodles, as many had deemed them, not only provided her with a comfortable living, but also allowed her to do something she loved on a daily basis.
Aimee considered herself luckier than most folks she knew, even though her life hadn’t been an easy one. Both her parents had been killed in a car accident when she was seventeen. She’d been in the car with them when the drunk driver of a delivery truck had slammed into them, and she hadn’t escaped unharmed.
Shattered glass had left her face with several scars that had faded to thin white lines over time. Her left arm and both her legs had been broken, but her left leg had been the worst. It had taken several surgeries and months of rehabilitation for Aimee to be able to walk again. She still limped when she was tired, and her left leg would never be as strong as it once was. But she was alive. Her parents hadn’t been as lucky.
By the time she’d been released from the hospital, her eighteenth birthday had come and gone and she was an adult. She’d moved back into her family home on the outskirts of town and adjusted to her new life. Art school had beckoned and she’d gone, but only for a year. Aimee found she missed the mountains and her childhood home, needed the connection with her past to keep her grounded. So she’d moved back to Salvation, lucked into her current job and never looked back.
Even after a decade, the townspeople still called her “that poor Horner girl” in whispers whenever they saw her, recounting her tragic story. It was frustrating, but Aimee had long ago learned to ignore it and to live with the stares that followed her whenever she went into town.
“Aimee.” Sandra’s voice broke through her memories, bringing her back to the present.
She offered her friend a smile. It wasn’t much of one, but it was the best she could do. Sandra Travers couldn’t understand what it was like to be the object of pity and sometimes ridicule. Her friend was tall and slender, with thick blonde hair that fell halfway down her back and framed sultry blue eyes. She had the body of a centerfold model, and men stopped in their tracks whenever they saw her.
The blonde bombshell had unwittingly caused several car accidents just by walking down the sidewalk. Flirting came natural to her and was simply a part of who she was. Sandra was outgoing and vivacious, chatting to everyone. She loved to be out and about among people and drew them to her like flies to honey.
In spite of the protective walls Aimee had built around herself, Sandra had knocked them down one by one when she’d moved to Salvation less than a year ago, and the two of them had become unlikely friends.