Free Haunting Warrior by Erin Quinn

snapped up from the box. “He was fifteen when he died.”
    “But that’s what she meant, when she said we were lucky to have him those extra years. That he wasn’t intended for this world. Maybe she knew of another past where he didn’t live so long. I don’t understand it any more than you do, but somewhere in there is a kind of sense. I think the point is, what has happened in the past is not set in stone. It can be changed by the Book of Fennore. But you’ve no way of knowing what the change will bring. It may only postpone the inevitable. Do you see what I’m saying?”
    He didn’t answer, but inside him something dark and insidious slithered through his thoughts. A sibilant whisper hissed from the deep caverns of his mind, urging him to come closer, look deeper.
    Was Trevor what Nana had been talking about when she said he’d changed destiny? Possibly, but he wasn’t sure.
    “The Book of Fennore, it’s not to be trusted, Rory. You may think you want to find it to destroy it, but the truth is, if you’re thinking of the Book, it’s because the Book is thinking of you. Don’t ever forget that.”
    “I remember . . .” He started and then paused, not sure if he should, if he could, share this piece of memory. “I remember touching it that night.”
    She gave a jerky nod, letting him know she remembered, too.
    “I was scared. Ready to piss my pants I was so scared. But . . . but as soon as I touched it, all that went away. I felt, I don’t know, at peace. I could see life ahead of me, and it looked like something out of a movie, you know? Grassy fields swaying in the breeze, laughter. Sunshine. It all came at me in this rush. And I wanted it.”
    He looked at his sister and shook his head, feeling foolish but unable to stop the words. “We’d been living on the wire for so long, what with Mom and Dad dancing around each other like boxers. We knew something was coming and it was going to be bad. And so that peace I felt—it was like a warm sun on my frozen face. It felt like heaven, and I never wanted to leave. I don’t know what the me who was holding that Book was doing, but up here—” He tapped his head. “Up here, I was happy. I had no worries, no troubled past, no dismal future. I had everything I wanted.”
    “It was messing with you, Rory.”
    “I hear you, Danni. But it doesn’t change a damn thing. This Book has fucked with my life long enough. First it was Dad, then . . .” He stopped before he finished the sentence. Then it was himself, feeling like he didn’t belong. Filled with a fear he hated but could never quite escape. “Dad took it with him, wherever he went. Maybe if I find the Book, I’ll find Dad, too.” He gave his sister a quick glance, not confessing the other reason why he was determined to locate the Book. Not mentioning the dream-woman and Colleen’s assurance that the Book would lead him to her. The need to find her had been building until now; he felt it like a weight on his shoulders. He didn’t just want to know if she was real, he needed to know. Thoughts of her had begun to consume him.
    “You haven’t seen the Book lying around anywhere, have you?” he said in a poor attempt at humor that neither one of them found funny.
    Danni looked at him for a long, drawn moment. Then she lowered her eyes and shook her head. “Finding it won’t be the problem, Rory. It’s looking for you, too.”

Chapter Eight
    T HE two kids awoke as the Volvo rounded the last corner. His niece did it quietly with a yawn and a stretch and a shy “Hullo.” She was cute, with eyes like Danni’s and rosy cheeks. His nephew chose to wake with an earsplitting howl and instantaneous tears.
    “What’s up with that?” Rory asked, looking back at the sobbing kid. The toddler’s plump face was an alarming shade of red, his uvula waggling with distress.
    “I think Raegan has nightmares,” Danni said, reaching back to touch a flailing foot. “Dig around in my bag there and hand