Fallen by Chrys Fey

Synopsis: Even lack of faith and beliefs doesn’t change the fact that all good men have an angel looking over them.

About the Author: Chrys Fey is an avid writer. Every day she can be seen with a pen in her hand or pounding away at the computer. Strange suspense stories are her specialty. At this very moment, she is working her fingers black and blue, and sacrificing her brain to numbness, by writing the fourth and final book of her supernatural-thriller series. Visit her how-to blog about writing a novel at: writewithfey.blogspot.com

In this haunting tale, a man runs away from his fate and is helped to face it with pranormal assistance.

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Fallen
by Chrys Fey

Deep in the frozen woods of Northern Michigan, a small cabin is nestled among towering trees that sway in the bitter breeze. A stooped old witch, with a warty nose and a taste for sweet-toothed little children, does not live here. A man with dark hair and sharp brown eyes named
Jared Myers does.

Jared was a cop, but when he was shot in the chest during an undercover sting six months
ago, he was forced to retire. He had been tracking down a cop killer, a cold and ruthless man known as Thorn Blackstone. Somehow his cover was blown and Thorn came after him with blazing guns, and the bullet that sliced through Jared’s bulletproof vest came within inches of his beating heart. The scar it left behind is a constant reminder that a man who murdered hundreds of police officers had unsuccessfully tried to take his life, which is why Jared is living in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, just in case Thorn ever decides to finish what he started.

Behind a computer, positioned in front of a window where he can stare out into the screaming darkness, Jared spends his days and nights writing horror novels. After twenty years of being on the force, he knows what sort of sickness humans are capable of. He has seen it with his own eyes.

Jared was finishing the end of a very gory chapter when an explosive bang shot through the night, rattling the doors and windows of the small cabin. His head snapped up and he stared out the window. Off in the distance, a blinding light exploded outward like a nuclear blast and rushed at him. He shielded his eyes as the flood of light washed over the cabin, swallowing it whole, licking it with its bright tongue. White light seared Jared’s eyelids. He groped at his face with his hands, fighting to block the deadly glare.

The wave drew back into the distant woods like a tidal wave retreating back into the ocean. The light faded. Jared uncovered his eyes, blinking rapidly against the assault. He looked out the window. There was the gentle sparkle of a billion stars in the black and purple sky. Far away, in the thick blackness of the forest, he saw the light wink out like a dying flashlight.

Jared jumped out of his chair, which fell backwards and hit the ground with a thud. Still a cop to the marrow of his bones, Jared shoved his feet into heavy boots, tugged on a thick jacket, and grabbed his loaded rifle off the fireplace mantel. He rushed out the front door toward the origin of the blast.

He ran through bushes that clawed at him with their thorny fingers, and jumped over far roots that tried to trip him. When he got closer to the location, he slowed. He didn’t know what he’d find. A military testing site, a plane crash, a UFO.

The sound of something moving beyond the brush ahead of him caught his attention. He crept closer, his gun raised. Whatever is there, he’s not taking any chances. Any animals that were in this area would’ve been scared away for miles from the explosion of light, but something is there.

Jared’s heart was pounding a strong dose of adrenaline through his veins. He slipped through a shield of bushes and pointed his gun at the dark movement. His finger, which started to squeeze the trigger, instantly lifted.

A woman was walking barefoot in the fresh fallen snow. She wore a sweeping black cloak with a hood over her face. Jared stepped cautiously closer and lowered his weapon.

“Excuse me,” he called out. The woman came to a stop. “Are you okay?” She turned around and Jared felt the full force of her punch in his gut. Her eyes were a pale and eerie gray.

She pushed back the hood and a shock of glittering white hair fell down her back. Her skin was as white as the snow around her, her lips were full and raspberry red.

Jared hastily put his weapon at his side. “Are you okay,” he repeated, speaking softly, not wanting to alarm her. He put his hands out as if he were approaching a frightened animal that could easily be rabid.

“I crashed,” she replied, then her eyes rolled back and her body went limp.

Jared caught her and hoisted her into his arms. Cursing, he carried her all the way back to his cabin and laid her down on his couch. He looked at her for a long time. Who is she? Where did she come from? She looks like she was carved from moonstone. Her white hair shimmered with flexes of silver, and those eyes….

Jared couldn’t help himself from starring at the pale eyelids that were hiding those remarkable eyes.

He raked his fingers through his windblown hair. “Jesus, what are you doing,” he asked himself. She could be a psychopath. She could be a murderer. She could be an extraterrestrial. “And you brought her home. Idiot!” He shook his head in disbelief. All of his cop instincts were ringing, but every time he looked at her, they became silent.

He watched her for a long time, until the roaring fire in the fireplace died down to a few sputtering flames. When the cold started to seep through the cracks of the cabins walls, he got up to stoke the fire and bring it back to life. He crouched in front of the fireplace, poked the charred logs and tossed on a new one.

“I don’t feel the cold.” Jared whirled around to see the woman sitting up, perfectly erect, those smoky eyes on his. “Or the heat.”

“Who are you,” Jared asked her.

She stood up with the grace of a ballerina. She unclasped the silver at the nape of her neck and let the cloak slip from her shoulders. Jared’s breath escaped him. Underneath, she wore a white silk dress that flowed smooth and cool down her body. She was a pristine vision. She can’t possibly be real.

“You can call me Nevaeh,” she said, her voice creamy, and she held out her hand.

Reluctantly, Jared took her slender hand with his and felt warmth leap off her palm and shoot straight through him. He snatched his hand back. She smiled at him. “And I already know who you are. Jared Myers.”

“How do you know my name?” She didn’t answer. “You said you crashed. Were you in a car accident? Maybe you bumped your head.” Or maybe she crash landed her mother-ship.

Nevaeh only smiled.

“You could have a concussion,” he continued. “Coffee might help.” It was pathetic, but it was the only excuse and the only remedy he could concoct.

“I don’t drink coffee,” she answered.

“Then what do you drink? Milk? Water? Blood?”

Nevaeh laughed, a rich sound. “Do you think I’m a vampire?” She tilted her head, her hair sparkled in the light. She slanted those pale gray eyes at him as if in mockery. “I don’t suck blood and I don’t have a concussion. I was weak before, from the impact of the crash. And no, I wasn’t in a car accident. I fell from the sky.” She smiled that mysterious smile at him. “I’m your angel, Jared. I was sent here because someone is going to try and kill you.”

Jared stared at her, unable to look away and for the strangest reason he found himself believing her, at least the part about someone coming to kill him. He’d been expecting it.

“When,” he wanted to know.

Speechlessly, Jared watched as her face went utterly blank and the gray of her eyes turned white. He swallowed hard. She’s a crazy psychic. She’s a witch. She’s a freak. His mind was telling him to turn and run, but his feet were cemented in place. He kept his eyes glued to her. She appeared to be just a statue of white, but he could see her chest rising with each slow breath she took.

“Trust me,” she whispered as she framed his face with her hands and laid her lips on his.
Jared jolted from the searing touch of her mouth, but all of that was soon lost.

The whole world seemed to whirl around them. As if possessed, Jared’s arms came around the mysterious, hypnotic woman and pulled her to him. Her body molded against his as fluid as molten glass. The shock Jared felt the moment their bodies melded, had him deepening the kiss. She tasted like sweet fire. It was intoxicating, addicting.

As he kissed her, his whole life didn’t just flash before his eyes, it spun around him. He saw everything from being born to the moment Thorn Blackstone shot him in the chest. He felt the bullet penetrate him, felt it rip through him, felt the burning pain.

Jared pulled back quickly and gazed into Nevaeh’s eyes. She is definitely not like any other woman he has ever met, ever kissed, ever laid eyes on before in his entire life. She is strange and magnificent, but he still doesn’t know who she is or where she came from.

Nevaeh glanced at the front door, then at Jared with wide eyes. “It’s time,” she said. The window behind her shot out, spraying shards of glass in all directions. Sparks flew from the computer and the lamp shattered.

Jared shoved Nevaeh to the ground and covered her with his body. Bullets shredded apart the couch and speckled the wall. Jared crawled along the ground, grabbed his rifle, and then dragged Nevaeh to the back of the cabin.

“Officer Myers,” a male voice shouted over the gunfire. It dripped with hate and anger.

Jared recognized Thorn Blackstone’s voice immediately, but he didn’t stop. He continued to pull Nevaeh to the back, to safety. The front door burst open at the same time as he opened the back door and pulled Nevaeh out.

With his hand in hers, they ran through the woods and snaked in and out of trees. Thorn chased after them, shooting off rounds. Bullets hit the trees around them, spraying bark at them like shrapnel.

The black night enveloped them, but it didn’t swallow them. Gunfire still followed as they ran deeper and deeper into the woods. They tripped over sneaky roots and thick, fallen branches. Nevaeh’s bare feet sank into the soft snow and Jared kept yanking her free, pulling her forward. He can’t let them slow down. He can’t let them get caught.

He tugged Nevaeh behind a wide tree and nudged her behind him. He raised his rifle. If he doesn’t take Thorn out now then they will both end up dead. He waited for Thorn to come into view, aimed, fired.

Thorn staggered back. Blood ran down his arm from the hole in his shoulder. Jared cursed. He had meant to give him a fatal wound. “Come on, Nevaeh. We have to get out of here.” He turned and Nevaeh wasn’t there. His stomach dropped to the soles of his feet. “Nevaeh?!” He ran through the woods desperately searching for her. Trees whizzed past him and his eyes darted from left to right, but he couldn’t find her anywhere.

He stopped running, his heart a jackhammer in his chest as he scanned the pitch blackness for her. He stalked forward, his ears straining.

Where did she go? He could only hope she was hiding somewhere.

A twig snapped to his right. He swung the rifle and came face to face with Thorn and the
semi-automatic that was pointed at his chest.

“You didn’t think I’d let you live did you?” Thorn sneered at him, a tall menacing man with cold blue eyes. His inky black hair was in a ponytail. “I’m going to kill you just like all your other pig friends.”

Jared glared at him down the length of his barrel. “You’ll have to kill me before I kill you.” He shot his rifle. The long, lethal bullet sailed through the air toward Thorn who shot his own gun a second too late.

The bullet from Jared’s rifle dived into Thorn’s chest, right into his pumping heart, killing him instantly. Then all of a sudden, Nevaeh materialized in front of Jared, catching the bullet from Thorn’s gun. Jared blinked in astonished confusion; Nevaeh had appeared out of thin air.

She turned slowly and smiled at him. He watched in horror as blood spread across her stomach, and leaked down the white silk. Her mouth peeled open and she pitched forward.

Jared dropped his rifle, caught her, and brought her gently to the ground. He cradled her in his arms and stared helplessly at the blood that was pouring out of her.

He looked into her mystifying eyes. “Why’d you do that?”

A smile spread on her lips and she lifted her hand to his cheek. It was icy cold. “I told you,” she whispered. “I am your angel.” Jared shook his head, tears biting his eyes.

Nevaeh’s hand slipped from his cheek. With the expel of her very last breath, she faded away into a sparkling dust that rose up and swirled into the night sky toward the full moon.

From the forest floor, his arms empty, Jared watched the glorious remains of his angel float back up to heaven.

**** THE END ****

Copyright Chrys Fey 2012

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