Title: Secret Voices
Series: The Spirit of Destiny Series, Book 3 (Standalone)
Author: Lynn Donovan
Published: March 31st, 2015
Publisher: AltWit Press
Genre: Paranormal Mystery
Recommended Age: 13+
The voices in Keisha’s head know where her fiancé has been left for dead, but who will believe her?
Keisha Moore has a secret which has been kept hidden her entire life. But when her fiancé, Clifford Valdez, disappears and the authorities dismiss it as lovers’ remorse, she has to tell somebody. Can she make anybody understand the four voices in her head are real, and they know where Clifford has been taken? How can she save the man she loves without revealing her deepest secret?
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Clifford and Keisha Announce Engagement
Clifford and Keisha spilled through the front door, giggling. Her mother pressed her brows together, puzzled by their sudden entrance and vivacity.
“Has the game started?” Clifford yelled to whoever was in the den.
Zeke yelled back. “Not yet. You’re just in time.”
Clifford helped Keisha slip out of her coat. She intentionally left her gloves on. He unwrapped her scarf from her neck and wound it on the coat hanger along with her coat. She turned to do the same for him, except he pulled his gloves off and slid them into his coat pockets. She skipped into the den, giggling like a little girl. Clifford, too, chuckled as he followed close behind her. Zeke and Rose stared with an expectant smile.
Daniel looked up from coloring at the coffee table and laughed. Their effervescent joy was contagious.
Phyllis’s eyes crinkled as she watched Keisha move between everybody seated and the T.V. “Well, for heaven’s sake, come sit down. Why are you still wearing your gloves?”
“Oh,” Keisha coyly pulled at her right glove. “I thought I’d keep them on…” She handed the right glove to Clifford whose grin widened as he took it from her. His eyebrows rose as she teasingly pulled at her left glove. “…until I could show you…” She yanked the glove off and held her hand up with the ring facing out. “…this!”
“OH!” Phyllis cried and leaped to her feet.
Daniel looked around, a puzzled look on his face, as the adults ran up to hug Clifford and Keisha. He ran up, too. The National Anthem played on the T.V., but it was ignored. The Moores hugged their future son-in-law. Rose and Zeke clasped hands. Daniel was hoisted on Zeke’s hip for a five-person group hug. Congratulations were repeated over and over. Even Inez clasped her hands with joy.
“When?” Bob finally asked.
Keisha glanced at Clifford. He shrugged.
“I have no idea.” Keisha looked at her mom. A dampened sense of sadness blanketed her joy for a moment. If Mom did have some form of dementia, how long would her memory last? “We haven’t discussed it.”
Clifford squeezed her close to his side. Had he read her mind, noticed her concerns for Mom? “Soon, I think.”
She looked at him sternly. “Yeah?”
Clifford nodded.
“You heard my fiancé.” She nodded. “Soon.”
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No Word from Clifford
At six o’clock Keisha pulled left-over muffins from the display case and sacked them up for the freezer. Clifford hadn’t called or texted all day. A gnawing sensation burned in her stomach. Where was he? She scanned the street through the bakery’s plate-glass windows. Every call to his cell phone had gone to his voice mail. Another call to the office itself reached the new receptionist, Gloria, who had seen him come in after his morning classes, but hadn’t seen him since. But of course, according to Clifford, she was so overwhelmed learning his old job, Santa Claus could have come in and she probably wouldn’t have noticed. Keisha had asked for his voice mail and left a message.
An empty feeling stayed with her as she locked the front door and exited out the back.
Deidre’s voice sounded muffled and sing-song. An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. Tit for tat and all of that.
What? Are you drunk, Deidre? Keisha drove home without the radio on. She wanted to be able to hear her phone chime when Clifford called.
How could I be drunk?
Don’t know. How can you talk to me in the first place?
Point taken.
Somebody needs to shut up! Abbie jeered in a sing-song imitation.
She’ll figure it out eventually, Deidre replied back but still in the sing-song tone.
It’s not your place! Abbie sang.
“What?” Keisha turned onto her street.
Silence.
“What will I figure out eventually?”
Silence.
“You guys make me so mad, sometimes.” Keisha shoved the front door open and stomped into her house. This was another gift from Rose after she married Zeke, the deed to Rose’s parent’s house. Keisha let her purse drop onto the bench in the mud room, the entry area of the house, and hung up her coat. Glancing at her phone again, with no text reply or missed calls, she decided to call Pastor V.
Lynn Donovan spends her days chasing after her muses, trying to get them to settle down and behave long enough to write down their words and actions. The results have produced short stories published in anthologies: The Clockwork Dragon, Different Dragons II, and Supernatural Colorado. Lynn’s full-length novels include The Wishing Well Curse, Thorns of Betrayal, and Secret Voices. She has also published Rocking Horse Shadows, and Christmas Grace, Signing Seeds. Other stories are hovering out there somewhere, so keep a look out for Fertility Pirates, Echoes from the Loft, and White Blossom Cottage.
Lynn enjoys reading and writing Christian, Paranormal, and Speculative Fiction. But you never know what her muses will come up with for a story, you could see a novel under any given genre. All that can be said is keep your eyes open, cause these muses are not sitting still for long! Oops, there they go again…
Tens List
Top 10 things the voice(s) in your head say (as answered by Lynn Donovon).
That’s funny, considering Secret Voices is about four distinctly different voices in my character’s head…but putting that aside:
I have a running dialog in my head all the time. Let’s see if I can put it into ten things.
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I’m hungry.
It’s not time to eat.
But, I want a snack.
NO!
Pleeeeeeease!
Oh, all right.
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What are the bees doing? (we have bees and they fascinate me! I go out and check on them all the time, like a new mother checks to see if her newborn is breathing. <giggle>
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There’s chocolate in the kitchen…
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What do we need from the grocery store?
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I want to watch TV.
You need to go write.
Okay…
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Ooo, look at that bird!
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Hey, I know you’re writing that story, but I have this idea…
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What day is it?
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What time is it?
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What’s for dinner?
Links
The book: Amazon Barnes and Noble Good Reads
The author: Amazon Author Page Facebook Twitter Good Reads Blog
