Geneticist Nicole Bordais has one goal—to find a cure for her supernatural powers so she can walk the streets of California without the spirits if the dead constantly harassing her. At least, until her scumbag of a boyfriend steals a precious family heirloom and skips town. Now, along with her best friend Lulu, she’s on a mission to get it back.
Part-time bounty hunter Beckett Sinclair doesn’t want to hunt down escaped felon Corey Hastings. No, he’d rather stick with his regular job as a nightclub bouncer and his hobby researching the paranormal. But family obligations send him west, where he finds more than he bargained for in San Francisco…
Possessed is the third book in the Electi series but can be read as a standalone – no cliffhanger!
Read now:
Retailers
Libraries
Subscription Services
Apps
Radish coming soon!
Add to your Bookshelf
The Beginning…
I didn’t even have to open my eyes to know something was wrong. The bed was too cool, the room too quiet. Carlton’s limbs always flopped over to my side, and he had a habit of snoring quietly in the early hours. So where was he? The bathroom? I listened carefully for the sound of running water through the paper-thin walls, but the whole house was silent apart from the quiet snuffling of George and Templeton, my pet rats.
I had to do it. I had to lo ok, which was easier said than done when it felt as if my eyelids had rusted shut. That was what happened when I stayed up until after midnight writing a research proposal that had to pass muster with Professor Fairchild. And Carlton had definitely been home last night. He’d arrived back from work just after two, made mugs of cocoa for me and Lulu, our housemate, who’d stayed awake to give me moral support and check for spelling errors, then he’d helped me upstairs to bed.
But now the room was empty in the grey morning light. What time was it? I rolled to check on my phone, but it wasn't in its usual place on the nightstand.
“Where’s Carlton, boys? And where’s my phone?”
No answer, but the rats did twitch their whiskers at me.
Had I left the phone downstairs? Since Lulu was a neat freak, our three-bedroom house in the Mission District of San Francisco was scrupulously tidy, and when I stumbled into the kitchen, my textbooks were stacked neatly on the fold-up dining table in the kitchen. But my phone wasn’t with them.
A house in San Francisco, you ask? How could we afford that on our definitely below-average incomes? Well, firstly because I was almost certain our landlord used his lettings business as a front for money laundering and we didn't ask awkward questions, and secondly, due to the fact it was one step away from being demolished. The back wall moved if you leaned on it hard, wind whistled in around the ill-fitting window frames, and Lulu scrubbed mould off the ceilings every other day. And did I mention how tiny it was? I slept on a futon-slash-sofa—one barely wide enough to be called a double—that folded up to give me room to dress in the mornings.
But there was still no sign of Carlton. Not even a note. He worked the late shift at Jive, a bar three streets away, so he never got up early.
Perhaps I’d put the phone in my purse? Yes, that was a possibility. Except when I went looking, I couldn’t find the purse either. And didn’t we have a TV yesterday? My addled brain had just begun to realise there was something very, very wrong when I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror over the sofa and gasped. No, not because my brown hair was sticking out in a thousand different directions or because the dark circles under my eyes could have been drawn on with a Sharpie, but because of what was missing.
My necklace.
Meet Beckett…
Then I saw him. A silent guy, standing a good four inches taller than anyone else in the crowd. But it wasn’t just his height that got my attention—he was big all over. A muscular physique, just like Donna’s friend had said, and he had dirty blond hair too, although there was no sign of stubble tonight. Could this be the man who’d been looking for Carlton? How many other big guys frequented Jive? Not many, according to Lulu, who constantly complained that all the hot fitness models hung out on Instagram rather than anywhere near the Mission District. And this man was certainly magazine-spread-worthy.
Yes, I know I spent most of my time locked up in a lab, but I wasn’t blind. And trust me, the guy had good genes. His personality? Perhaps left a little to be desired. He looked me up and down, not just undressing me with his eyes but peeling a layer of skin off too. That gaze was intense.
I nudged Lulu, who was looking decidedly green around the edges.
“What do you think of that guy over there?”
She slowly turned her head. “A ten.”
“I meant, do you think he could be the person Donna said was looking for Carlton?”
“Oh. I guess he might be.” The older cop shone his flashlight over Macy, and Lulu gagged again, but this time only bile came up. “How do they do it?”
“Who? What?”
“The cops. How do they sleep at night after they see dead people every day? I couldn’t live with myself.”
Yes, it was difficult. But with no cure for my affliction in sight, I just had to close my eyes and block out all the spirits. Maybe one day, I’d be able to rest a little easier, but that would take a miracle.
If you’d like to hear about my upcoming book news, why not subscribe to my newsletter?
I send out a message every couple of weeks, and I promise never to pass your email address on.
Or if you’d just like to chat, you can find me in the Team Blackwood Facebook group