The door flung open before Marshal Roland Chadwick could finish pouring his morning coffee. The frontier town’s lawman, Sheriff Tiller, was away on his honeymoon, so Chadwick had offered to substitute. He sat at the sheriff’s desk, reading a worn copy of Emerson.
“Well?” the intruder asked, striding toward Chadwick with her dress swaying
“We’re risking our lives for a princess no one has ever seen,” I grumble, tossing my knife and catching it again. Ruddy light from the fireplace dances down its long, wicked blade.
Most people think it’s odd for a girl to be so fond of weapons.
But if I cared what most people
The house sits in darkness except for the faintest orange glow seeping between the downstairs window blinds. Probably the boys watching TV, bundled in blankets, hoping their dad won’t come home tonight.
You have no right to those kids. By human law, they belong to Earth. So says the human government.
Tamrin’s prized pumpkin was missing.
Well, her second prized pumpkin. Her best one had vanished two weeks ago on the evening of Prince Charlin’s first ball. Then her second best one vanished the night of Charlin’s second dance. Months of hard work, love, and care down the drain.
It wouldn’t happen again. Tonight
The waves were hungry.
Adira’s stomach flipped against her swan-bill corset as she leaned over the balcony of the luxury steamship, imagining how it might feel to sink into those roiling depths. Behind her, an investigator from Maravel’s official detective agency interviewed a witness.
“Let’s walk through this again,” Mr. Bright enunciated
The red-brick houses behind Mick Scholmberg huddled together like prisoners awaiting a firing squad, hoping for a reprieve but at the same time sullenly resolved. Their only chance now was with their homeowners.
If Mick could prove that the mastermind behind the new development plan was a criminal, he could save
The clock ticked as Doctor K made a few perfunctory marks on her clipboard, then studied the hollow-eyed patient. “The man in the purple waistcoat… have you seen him again since the accident?”
The patient’s face spasmed at the mention. He shook his head with the short, sharp ferocity of a dog shaking
Halfway down 22nd Avenue, a linebacker wannabe nearly knocked me over. I twisted around him, threaded between a mother and daughter, and sidestepped a yapping fur ball. All the while, my focus never left the woman.
She stood with her back against a storefront wall, staring at me with purple eyes. Yep. Purple.
You okay? Eli’s voice tickled Iris’s mind.
She rubbed the itchy spot behind her ear where the purple telepachip had been inserted. Just nervous. About the dive, about this new telepathic technology…
He chuckled. Aren’t you a pilot?
She glanced out the plane window at the clear lilac-blue sky. Somewhere, thousands of feet
There are two rooms we don’t talk about.
One’s the scullery. No need to talk about it—we live there.
The other’s Miss Mary’s room.
Master Falwell keeps the door locked. Wears the key ’round his neck. Never speaks about the daughter he loved and lost, the wispy girl on the brink of womanhood
The groom’s lips twisted in a final death cry.
Someone in the wedding party called for a doctor, but US Marshal Roland Chadwick suspected the worst. As the wedding’s officiator, he’d heard both bride and groom swear till death do us part, but not even he could have predicted such a swift separation.
I’ve always considered brevity to be blue. A concise plan, a neat introduction, and a minimalist finish—all speak of a calmness I adore.
Brevity is my greatest ally and my greatest foe. I speak in short sentences. I punctuate my speech with thoughts about the environment—the clues reside in the latter,
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