A Murderous Mind Book 1: Hunter

John is haunted by more than his memory

Hunter – 

John held the gun with the barrel facing the ground. He knew he was dreaming. Knowing didn’t make it any better.

He hated the dream, yet he knew it as well as he knew his wife, an old lover, or the…someone who he had shared the most important moments of his life with. When John got to the point, what other moments were more important than the ones in his dreams?

He couldn’t change what came next. He knew what was coming because he was reliving something he’d done many years ago. It didn’t matter how many times he dreamed this moment, it always ended the same way.

Perhaps that was why everything had gone so wrong. His inability to change anything.

John watched the seventeen-year-old dream version of himself raise the gun. The barrel shook from the excitement and fear coursing through his body. He’d never done this before, despite every other line he’d already crossed in his seventeen years of life. Somehow, he’d held himself back.

Until now.

He stood on the black asphalt, the trees surrounding him hiding the moonlight above. Who was the pretty young woman kneeling in front of him? He didn’t remember her name, not anymore.

Is that true, John? Or do you just refuse to name her after all this time?

Perhaps the dream version of himself knew, but he walked the roads of his past the way a ghost might walk through the world. He wanted to reach out and tell himself to stop, to put the gun down—or at least part of him did. Another part, a stronger part, wanted to watch it happen.

Hot, fat tears ran down her face, swelling on her chin before falling and disappearing into the dream’s darkness. John’s lips quivered as he looked at her. Her body shook with fear instead of the winter night’s bitter chill. Her eyes sparkled in the moonlight, pleading with him in the hope that this was a sick joke, that it would all work out. But she knew deep down that it wouldn’t.

Hope and knowledge rested in the eyes of the seventeen-year-old version of John, too. Hope that this would be as good as he had envisioned, and a quiet knowledge that it could never match the fantasy.

Still, his hand didn’t stop its ascent, shaking the same as the girl on her knees.

“Please,” she said.

It was the last word she ever spoke.

John pulled the trigger, blinking at the unexpected roar of the gun. He only closed them for a second. Everything inside of him wanted—no, needed—to see what happened next.

Time slowed to a crawl as the bullet entered her forehead. John watched the back of her head balloon outward as the bullet tore through her skull. He shivered when blood spurted from the exit wound as the bullet smashed through the back, splattering her brain matter and bone shards on the car behind her.

Reality crashed in as soon as it had departed. Her eyes remained open, but the life that had animated them was gone. Blood dripped from the hole in her forehead, covering her eyelids and turning the white of her eyes red.

She remained in place for a second or so, as if in shock, unable to believe that her head was no longer intact. Then she fell backward and her head hit the car door as she crumpled to the ground. Her hair trailed around her head, soaking up the already cooling blood.

It was over.

John grieved for the younger version of himself standing alone in the cold night with the gun’s report still echoing in his ears.

* * *

John opened his eyes, expecting to see nothing in the dark room but the chest of drawers against the opposite wall. Sweat ran in rivulets across his skin, causing a chill that made his body shiver despite the blanket draped over him.

He blinked twice, unable to move an inch. He saw someone he hadn’t seen in a long time, someone he’d hoped to never see again blocking his view of the chest of drawers.

Harry had his hands in his pockets, his swollen gaze pointed directly at John.

Maybe he’ll leave. Maybe this is just the dream’s hangover.

“Hey, John,” Harry said, putting an end to John’s fragile hope.

Harry had aged at the same rate John had, which never made sense to John because Harry hadn’t aged a day beyond thirteen. Still, he stood there looking heavier and older than the last time John had seen him.

John glanced at Diane, who was lying beside him, still asleep.

“You know she won’t wake,” Harry said. “She can’t hear me, John.”

John almost groaned aloud at the derision in his voice. He closed his eyes and turned his head away from Harry.

God, please. Make this a dream. Please. Please. Please.

“Still doing the praying thing, I see,” Harry said. “When did that start? It was definitely after I left the last time, but I hoped it would pass. Just doesn’t make any sense… Ya know, given everything.”

John didn’t open his eyes but he couldn’t shut out Harry’s voice. Harry who shouldn’t be here. Harry who had been dead for almost twenty years. Harry who was standing across the room all the same.

The dream. He should have known what the return of the dreams meant. That Harry was coming, or he was near. However, he’d ignored the signs and Harry had been waiting when he woke up.

“Go away.” John knew Diane wouldn’t hear him talking to Harry any more than she would hear Harry speak. He put every bit of his despair into his words. “I don’t want you here anymore.”

“Come on, John. We both know that’s not entirely true. If you didn’t want me here, then I wouldn’t be here, would I? I’m not the one running the show. You are.”

“Please go, Harry. Please. I need more time. I need… I can’t do that again.”

Harry’s voice wandered as if he was taking a stroll around the room. “Need is a funny word, I think. I’m not sure that what you think you need is part of the equation between the two of us. I’m not sure it’s out of the equation, either.”

John listened to Harry prattling, only caring that he wasn’t leaving. That Harry was still here, standing in his room.

“Look, go back to sleep,” Harry said. “We can discuss this in the morning. We’re not going to get all of our work done tonight, that’s for sure. There’s a lot to do, John. A whole lot.”

John opened his eyes and the chest of drawers was visible in the moonlight from the window. The sliver of light sliced through the room and showed John that Harry was gone.

It was a dream. Just a part of the dream. He wasn’t here. You’re okay …

John didn’t know if he believed what he told himself. When Harry arrived, he arrived. For Harry, despite what John wanted, there was plenty of work to be done.

* * *

Alicia hated the weeks leading up to this time of year and the weeks after. She couldn’t get away from it. Her hatred of the time of year had nothing to do with the climate. If she wanted to avoid the cold, she could pack up and go on a vacation.

She could escape much in this world, but she couldn’t escape her mother’s death. The anniversary would come regardless of where she lived or however she tried to avoid it.

Alicia walked out of her house and into the chilly morning air. She’d kissed her husband goodbye before leaving, but her heart hadn’t been in it. She wasn’t able to stop thinking about speaking with John, or about their mom. He’d handled her death worse than anyone else, and this month was always tough on him. On top of that, she’d been derelict in her duty to him. Despite thinking of him almost constantly as the date grew near, she hadn’t called him in days.

She opened the door of her Toyota and placed her purse on the passenger seat after climbing in. The clock on the dash read six when she started the car. He would be on his way to work, too. Alicia didn’t always leave this early, but when she wanted to talk to John she knew she could get hold of him at this time of day.

Alicia grabbed her phone from her purse and dialed her brother’s number. She let the phone ring through her car’s stereo system as she pulled out of the driveway.

John sounded like he didn’t know who was calling when he answered. “Hello?”

“Hey, it’s me. What ya up to?”

“Just driving to work.”

The silence that came over the line felt like a cold breeze running across Alicia’s skin. They didn’t have awkward silences like this, not on the phone and not in person.

“Have you talked to Dad?” Alicia asked, wanting to fill the space with something.

“About what?”

“About Mom.”

“Oh,” John said. “No, I haven’t. Have you?”

“What do you mean, oh?” Alicia was confused by John sounding so surprised, as if he’d forgotten that the anniversary of their mom’s death was next week.

“I just… I haven’t thought about it, I guess.”

Alicia didn’t know what to say. Almost speechless, she stared out at the mostly empty road the car was rolling down. She had never heard her brother speak as if their mom’s death was a side issue and not a central piece of both their lives.

“Have you talked to him?” John asked.

“I called him last night.”

“I’ll probably give him a call today,” he said.

A few seconds passed before Alicia broke the silence again. “Are you okay, John? You sound out of it.”

His answer didn’t come immediately. She was about to ask again when he spoke, his voice sounding like he was a million miles away.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I just didn’t sleep well last night. A lot of bad dreams. I’ll call him today.”

“You’re sure nothing’s wrong?”

“Yeah, positive. I’m fine, just tired.”

There wasn’t much she could do if he was choosing to hold back on whatever was bothering him. She sighed. “Okay. Call me later?”

“Sure,” John said.

“‘OK. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

He ended the call and Alicia drove in silence. She knew John as well as she knew anyone besides perhaps her husband, and she had been with her brother at this time of year for the past decade. He never, ever forgot their mother’s death. He never went this long without calling their father around the time of the anniversary.

What are you getting at, Alicia? He’s tired so he hasn’t been thinking about Mom, and you’re imagining…what, exactly?

She didn’t know, and it worried her. She wanted him to sound like he usually did. There wasn’t anything wrong with that, was there?

Who is Harry, who was the woman in John’s vision? This snippet brings up more questions than answers. Head over to Amazon and download today if your anything like us and can’t wait to find out what happens next.