Book excerpt: Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore

Here’s an excerpt from chapter 7 of Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore:

I take Brandon to the living room to watch Cartoon Network, and then I go to the kitchen to wash the dishes. Somewhere in the middle of putting the rinsed dishes in the dishwasher, I start to feel hot and anxious for no reason. The feeling of my skin splitting comes back, and I break out in a sweat. My teeth grind audibly, and I feel the need to curl my hands into fists.

When the puzzle pieces snap together, I sling my head around, finding the calendar pinned to the wall. My vision is so sharp, I don’t need to cross the room to see the little black circle beside the date. It’s a full moon tonight, and my wolf is calling me. It’s why I was extra irritable, and why I snapped under the same stress that I’d been handling for months without blowing up.

Four years, I’d been warned this was coming. Four years, I’ve dreaded it and prayed I would be alone when it hit. But no, here’s my first bout with lunar madness, and I’ve got a kid I barely know, no parents to watch over us, and no way to get away.

I grit my teeth harder, and a growl rumbles in my throat. I’m so hot I have to pant, and my skin feels like I’m soaking up sunlight in the middle of summer.

Spinning away from the dishwasher, I grab the door leading to the side yard and fling it open too hard. I can’t think straight, and I need to cool down. Off comes my sweatshirt followed by my T-shirt, and I’m down to my bra, thinking to lose it too. I’m dripping sweat, and my breath comes in shaking gasps. The wind is blowing, but it doesn’t feel cold to me. It’s a hot wind on my burning body, doing nothing to quench my parched throat.

“Alice?”

I spin on my heel and glare at Brandon, who gasps and steps behind the doorframe like he’s trying to hide. He stinks of fear and it makes my mouth water.

I swallow thick spit and struggle to find my voice. “Go back to the living room. I’m…going for a walk. Don’t follow me.”

There. Simple, easy directions. Go me.

Brandon shuts the door and locks it. Were I in a better mood, I might find that funny. You can’t lock out the monster when she has a key to the house you’re hiding in.

Hopping the fence I take off walking, knowing where I will head. Not far from our neighborhood is a wide copse of trees, and these woods are the place Peter claimed as his territory. After his mother cursed me, it became our woods. But when Peter left, I stopped visiting. It holds too many memories that I’m supposed to think of as unhealthy.

But tonight, I’m guided more by instinct than common sense. Tonight, I need to get out of these restrictive clothes and run until I pass out.

Once I’m inside my woods, I reach down to unbutton my jeans. I pop the first button before I smell a rabbit, and my thoughts unravel into a single word chorus: kill, kill, kill.

Hunching over, I creep at a waddling pace while I sniff out the trail of my prey. I don’t have to move very far into the woods before I find the grey rabbit. I’m close enough that I should hear it, but my ears are muffled by the roar of my blood pumping too fast. My body is thrumming like I’ve been running for an hour, and despite the cold air against my skin I’m dripping sweat.

My slow crawl brings me within ten yards of my prey before the rabbit hears me and turns to run, but it’s pivoting on its back legs when I leap to close the distance between us. It shrieks when I snatch the struggling animal by the scruff of its neck and snap a bite over its throat. The rabbit’s throat collapses as the skin yields with a pop, ending its terrified scream.

I growl and swallow a mouthful of hot blood. So sweet, so perfect. I jerk my head back to open the wound. The rabbit spasms while I dig my fingers under the fur, peeling wet flesh off the ribs. My thumbs find the sternum, and I push them under the lowest ribs to crack open the chest and pry out the heart. It rips loose with a wet tear and spurts blood over my cheeks and nose. I pop the heart into my mouth and hum in pleasure. Then I pry away the skin around the back leg and sink my teeth into the hot, raw meat. There’s no rational thought to my actions, only the greedy need to fill myself.

As I feast, some of my bloodlust fades, and when the whooshing rush of my blood stops singing in my ears, other sounds alert me to the fact that I am not alone. Somewhere behind me is a rapid heartbeat and shaking breath. I drop my kill and growl, twisting at the waist to seek out the intruder. Brandon hides behind a tree, but when our eyes meet, he takes a step back.

This is his mistake, moving out from behind cover. Acting on the instinct to hunt, I pivot and plant my hands on the ground to launch myself at him. My shoulder connects with his side, and the impact dazes him, making his limbs go limp. He flops to the ground and I crawl on top of him, pinning his arms under my knees.

Brandon squeals in pain when I set my weight down, his breath louder in my ears. “No, please,” he begs. “I won’t tell anyone.”

Maybe it’s my full stomach that saves him, but I freeze and I really see him. He’s so pale his freckles look like flecks of blood stuck to his cheeks, and his green eyes are filled with terror. This isn’t food. He’s a little boy who just an hour ago was professing his love for me because I made him tuna casserole.

I smell urine. He’s just peed himself.

Despite my feelings of guilt, I can’t stop glaring at him. “I said, stay inside.”

“Okay,” Brandon whines like a little girl. “Please, don’t hurt me.”

I ease up off of him and sink into a low crouch. He’s seen too much, and the cold logical monster in me says I should kill him. But the same logical voice recognizes how that would be my undoing. His mom knows I was watching him. My mom does too, and she knows what I am. If Brandon should disappear on the night of a full moon, it wouldn’t be hard to figure out what happened.

Brandon gets up and stares at me with undisguised horror. The scent of his fear is so strong, my full stomach growls with the need for his blood.

I spit a red glob on the ground and wipe my mouth. “You didn’t see anything.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Say it!” I snap, the gravel growl in my voice getting stronger.

“I didn’t see anything.”

I get up and walk around him, and he follows after me, his rattling heartbeat thumping in my ears.

___

Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore is available on Amazon, Kobo, and Gumroad for $2.99. You can download a free sample from Amazon, and if you are a member of Goodreads, you can add it to your bookshelves. If you’re a fan of werewolves or dark fantasy, you may enjoy this tale of a young skinwalker coming to terms with her past and her curse.