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    In Dark Woods
    In Dark Woods
    In Dark Woods
    Ebook92 pages1 hour

    In Dark Woods

    By Susan Fanetti

    4.5/5

    ()

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    About this ebook

    AUTHOR’S NOTE: This novella develops a plot point in Alone on Earth, Book Four of the Signal Bend Series, that could not be adequately explored in the POVs of that book. The description below therefore is a spoiler for that event.

    Ride or die.

    An act of treachery has weakened Isaac Lunden, President of the Night Horde MC. His life, and his family’s, is changed fundamentally. Lilli, his old lady, is at his side, exhorting him to fight. But he isn’t sure that what’s left to him is enough to fight for. This is the story of Isaac and Lilli’s journey through those dark woods.

    Note: Explicit scenes. (108 words)

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSusan Fanetti
    Release dateJul 30, 2014
    ISBN9781310046933
    In Dark Woods
    Author

    Susan Fanetti

    Susan Fanetti was born and raised in the Midwest--Missouri, to be precise. A few years ago, she was transplanted into the dusty soil of Northern California and has apparently taken root there. An inveterate geek and gamer, she is a fan of many things considered pop culture and maybe even lowbrow. The Signal Bend Series is complete at Smashwords, with eight books released: Move the Sun, Behold the Stars, Into the Storm, Alone on Earth, In Dark Woods (a novella), All the Sky, Show the Fire, and Leave a Trail. The Night Horde SoCal series, a spinoff to the Signal Bend Series, is complete, with eight books released: Strength & Courage, Shadow & Soul, Today & Tomorrow (a "Side Trip" in the series), Fire & Dark, Dream & Dare (another "Side Trip), Knife & Flesh, Rest & Trust, and Calm & Storm. Nolan: Return to Signal Bend is a semi-standalone novel that follows the Signal Bend and Night Horde SoCal series and completes the Night Horde saga. The Pagano Family Series is complete, with six books released: Footsteps, Touch, Rooted, Deep, Prayer, and Miracle. Find updates and musing from Susan and her muse here: http://susanfanetti.com/ Susan's Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/authorsusanfanetti The Freak Circle Press is an independent collective of friends and fellow writers. Find more information at their blog: tfcpress.wordpress.com and on Facebook: www.facebook.com/freakcirclepress

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    • 5/5
      This novella explores the very nature of the relationship between Lili and Isaac. A beautiful piece of writing, and one that should not be missed.

    Book preview

    In Dark Woods - Susan Fanetti

    IN

    DARK

    WOODS

    A Signal Bend Byway

    (Book 4.5)

    By

    Susan Fanetti

    Published by Susan Fanetti at Smashwords

    Copyright 2014 Susan Fanetti

    THE FREAK CIRCLE PRESS

    In Dark Woods © Susan Fanetti 2014

    All rights reserved

    Susan Fanetti has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this book under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.

    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales are entirely coincidental.

    This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

    To all who struggle and persevere.

    Midway on our life’s journey, I found myself

    In dark woods, the right road lost. To tell

    About those woods is hard—so tangled and rough

    And savage that thinking of it now, I feel

    The old fear stirring: death is hardly more bitter.

    Dante, Inferno, Canto I

    ONE

    Fa la ninna, fa la nanna

    Nella braccia della mamma

    Fa la ninna bel bambin,

    Fa la nanna bambin bel,

    Fa la ninna, fa la nanna

    Nella braccia della mamma

    Rocking in the chair Isaac had made for them, Lilli looked down at Gia in her arms. Her daughter was wide awake and did not seem to be in any rush not to be, but she was still and, except for singing along with the sounds that she knew, she was quiet. And that was something. Like her mother—and, for that matter, her father—‘still’ was not something that Gia did well.

    Mo’. Mo’.

    "Okay, cara. I’ll sing more if you close your eyes for me. It’s naptime, little love. Come on, close your eyes."

    Gia squinched her eyes tightly shut, and Lilli laughed. Good girl.

    Fa la ninna, fa la nanna

    Nella braccia della mamma

    Fa la ninna bel bambin,

    Fa la nanna bambin bel,

    Fa la ninna, fa la nanna

    Nella braccia della mamma

    It was a song that Lilli’s sad, doomed mother had sung to her when she was a child. She hadn’t even known she had any memory of it at all, much less had remembered the words—until she’d sat in this rocking chair with her infant daughter in her arms and begun to rock. The words and melody came unbidden to her lips. She remembered every word, every note.

    Being a mother had given Lilli her own mother back. She had lost so much of her in the years since her suicide, when her father, feeling furious and betrayed and lost, had made it a mission to remove her whole from their lives. Her father was a great love in her life, a wonderful father, steady and loving, and she did not fault him for taking her memories of her mother. She understood. He’d come home one night to find his beloved Mena dead in their bathtub, floating in water scummed with her blood, and their ten-year-old daughter hiding behind the toilet. She understood why he could not forgive his wife enough to allow their daughter to remember her.

    But the memories that had been left to Lilli had been of her mother as broken, hurting and hurtful. Neglectful. Reckless. Lost. And so incredibly sad. A woman buried so deeply in her own nightmares that it had not occurred to her that it would be her young daughter who would find her bloody corpse, and that she would be alone with it for hours.

    Mothering her own daughter, though, had released in Lilli a trove of repressed memories, like this lullaby, of the deep love her mother had had for her. They came slowly and unexpectedly, little jolts of melancholy joy coming sporadically over the fifteen months since Gia had been born. She could remember good days, days spent on her mother’s lap reading Italian fairy tales. Evenings spent curled against her breast as she sang her to sleep. Trips to the zoo or the bookshop or to museums—adventures that hadn’t gone wrong. There had been plenty that had; Lilli was moved nearly to tears every time a memory of one that hadn’t was returned to her.

    As Lilli sang, Gia’s squinched-up eyes relaxed, but her lips were yet moving to the sounds she could make from the song—fa fa fa ba, fa fa fa ma—Lilli slowed down the tempo and quieted to a whisper, and Gia’s eyes opened, a frown creasing her brow. Smiling down at her stubborn little love, she sang a bit louder as Gia’s eyes—brilliantly green, so like Isaac’s—drooped to a close. When her little girl was at last asleep, Lilli sang two more rounds for good measure, then eased out of the chair and carried her to her crib.

    After checking to make sure the monitors were on, she tiptoed out of the room, stepping carefully over the squeaky boards, and closed the door.

    Lilli had needed that respite, a quiet moment to feel nothing but the love she had for her family. Because she had a chill wind dancing up her spine—things were wrong again. When Isaac had called her hours before dawn and told her that the Scorpions were in town, arriving early and unannounced, and asked her to help get all of the actors out, her heart dropped deep into her gut. She wasn’t sure she could withstand another dark time.

    She had been a fierce warrior once, but then Lawrence Ellis had happened. He had not broken her, but she wasn’t sure he had left her intact, either. As much as she despised the

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