the end of Everything (New Adult Erotic Romance) Read Free Page A

My voice sounded quavery
and uncertain, strange to my ears. “Mr. Grayson?” I tried again.
“Hello?” But the only sound I could clearly hear above the pinging
was the thumping of my heart. My fingers turned cold with fright
but I gave myself a stern talking to. What was there to be
frightened of on the covered bridge? Not an old, empty car, for
sure. I suddenly remembered the flashlight I held in my hand and
switched it on. I played the light all over the car. As far as I
could tell, it was empty. I made myself keep walking. It felt like
the longest walk of my life to reach that car but, finally, I did.
There was nobody inside.
    I closed the door to stop the annoying
pinging and that was when I noticed the dark stain on the wooden
planks right where the driver’s feet might have rested when he got
out of the car. I trained the flashlight on it and bent over,
sniffing. The strong metallic scent of blood threaded through with
a faint putrid smell which I recognized. The smell of decay. Had
the car struck an animal that had died on the bridge? I played the
light around on the ground and saw a few, much smaller stains
leading to the far side of the bridge where they disappeared. This
didn’t make sense. If Mr. Grayson had struck an animal there should
be more traces of it under his car but there weren’t. And, where
was Mr. Grayson, himself? The blood couldn’t be his. The dead rats
that sometimes turned up around the barn smelled like that but only
after a few days.
    I stood beside his car, debating what to do.
If something bad had happened to Mr. Grayson and he’d gone to get
help or something he’d be mad if he came back and his car was
missing. But if he’d been taken to heaven in the Rapture then he
didn’t need his car anymore. I could back the car out, do a u-turn
on the road outside, and reach Acadia in less than half-an-hour if
I really floored it.
    Driving into town was a much better plan than
continuing to walk. But, suppose I was wrong on all counts and Mr.
Grayson had just stopped the car to take a leak? It didn’t seem
likely he’d go very far but, just to be safe, I crossed back over
to the other side of the bridge where the blood stains had led and
shouted his name a couple times.
    I played the flashlight on the nearby trees,
hoping that, if he was around but couldn’t hear me, at least he’d
see the light. I shouted his name some more, too. Mr. Grayson moved
to our area a few years ago. He’d bought the Campbell’s old house a
few miles down the road from us but he didn’t socialize with area
folks much. He didn’t even go to church, just kept to himself but
he always smiled and had a good word for people when he was in
Acadia so people liked him well enough.
    There was no answer of any kind to all my
hollering so I returned to the car. Half of me was worried about
what might have happened to Mr. Grayson, but the other half was
elated at the idea of driving the rest of the way to town.
    I was just about to open the car door and get
behind the wheel when I heard a strange dragging sound. I swung
around. At first, I couldn’t see anything and I thought maybe it
was just a log or something in the water below but then my
flashlight picked out the sight of Mr. Grayson lurching awkwardly
toward me. Except…except it wasn’t Mr. Grayson, not really. It had
Mr. Grayson’s features and general shape but this…this thing had
grey, unnatural-looking skin and its sunken, unfocused eyes were
bloodshot and red-rimmed. He was bare-footed and I could see that
his lower left pants leg was ripped and darker than his right. It
took me a minute to realize it was soaked in blood. The dragging
sound I’d heard was that of his mangled left foot which, dear God,
looked as if it had been gnawed to the bone by some wild
animal.
    “Mr. Grayson!” My concern overcame my fear.
“Oh, my God. What happened?”
    I’d already started to run to him when it hit
me. Mr. Grayson was one of the Risen Dead. That’s why