Grave Robber for Hire Read Free Page A

a cold frisson shot into my chest, icing a path to my stomach. It hit the boiling evil that had crawled inside me from touching the grave and sprang back, mimicking a bungee rope throwing its adrenaline junkie victim back toward the cliff he’d leapt off.
    The evil exploded splintering into marble sized coals. My stomach knotted into a contraction worthy of expelling an elephant. My back arched until my feet and shoulders ground into the soil.
    Sweat streamed down Vig’s tense face. The scar on his cheek whitened from strain, but he kept generating whatever came out of his hands.
    Helpless and terrified, I tried to speak and gurgled.
    Fear clasped my heart in a triumphant squeeze, pulsing my blood into a tidal wave. Blood pressure at a thundering high, my head throbbed, and I retched.
    “Ferk,” Vig’s eyes nearly popped. He snatched his hand away and stared at his palm. His scowl appeared to be a whole pile of, what-the-hey? A low guttural sub-human growl vibrated from deep in his chest.
    I fell flat and lay in a pain and evil riddled stupor.
    Vig raised his palms above his head, tipped his face skyward and started a melodious chant. The descant’s rhythm built. My body acting as a tuning fork hummed with infinitesimal vibrations. Inside my head began to fizz as if carbonated. Body whirring, the balls in my gut began to spin.
    I clawed at my stomach. Moaning like Frankenstein, I tried to disassociate myself from my body’s pain and failed.
    Vig’s singing stopped.
    My body twitched. As a way to die, this blew.
    Viggo knocked my hands away from my stomach and slapped both of his palms on my chest, pressing the metal studs of my vest into my flesh. Cold, multiple degrees icier than before, sprinted down Vig’s earlier path to the evil lurking within.
    The cold spread into my gut, flicked out icy tendrils, ensnaring the hot orbs in a fire on ice agonizing dance. I choked back a scream.
    Cold chunks burbled up from my stomach and raced up my throat. I turned my head and vomited. Black balls of ice shot out of my mouth. Like tiny decapitated heads they rolled until they hit clumps of grass, and melted.
    My stomach stopped spinning and cramping, but my heart still pushed my blood pressure towards explosion.
    It was out. Way to rescue a girl Vig.
    My heart stuttered. Then stopped. Just stopped.
    The chill silence hung hollowly in my ears. Shadows etched around my vision, stealing my sight.
    Noooo , Vig saved me, I can’t die .
    A cannon ball crashed onto my chest. Any spare molecules of air I held burst out in a rattling hiss. My heart pitched and followed up with a reassuring ka-thud, ka-thud .
    I refocused and saw Vig’s massive fist poised and ready for another reboot. Not dead—unless Vig shattered my ribs with another less than gentle cardiac massage. I’d swear at him, except I couldn’t speak—or breathe.
    To indicate I lived I gave him a weak ass thumbs up, rolled to my side, sucked air, and cursed the fact that air doesn’t come laced with pain meds.
    Chest heaving and laboring for breath, Viggo stood. His limbs went rigid, his joints bent at funny angles, and he started to jerk as if his muscles didn’t work. He resembled a 1960’s B-grade movie Zombie.
    My lungs deflated as if they’d collapsed under the squeezing coils of a python.
    What did he do to himself by blasting that evi l out of me?
    Vig crashed to his knees and arched backwards until I thought I’d hear his spine snap. His red and blue tunic rode down, bunching under his arms, exposing the painful tautness of his convulsing muscles. Pale skin glowed in the sun, his bright near white hair thrashed in the ground’s filth.
    My WTF meter already peaking on holy-shit red, hit explosive purple. I couldn’t bear his agony, the tortured wrenching of his body—the knowledge he suffered because of me.
    I rolled to my knees. The world spun and whirled. I pitched forward and collapsed.
    Stupid-traitorous-weak-ass-body.
    A shaft of light blazed