Free Gypsy of Spirits: Prequel to So Fell the Sparrow by Katie Jennings

 
     

     
     
    ON THE DAY she was born, the world knew her as Mary Jacqueline Hart. When she ran away from home, she simply became Jackie.
    She belonged to no one and everyone at the same time. Her favorite song was about a girl who talked to angels; her preferred vice a rich glass of elderberry wine. She craved the moonlight over the sun and carried a weathered copy of the Book of Psalms in her pocket.
    Home was a place she never truly found, though she gave up searching long ago. Instead, she made each new destination her temporary home. And as she traveled, the only constant that remained was her gift. Her sight. Her ability to talk to the dead.
    The fire red Jeep she drove took her into the Ozarks, winding aimlessly through the endless rolling hills. With the top down, the cool night air swirled around her. It brushed her dusted-gold skin like a sweet caress and sent her long, ebony curls flying across her gypsy face. Her dark eyes filled with a peace that only the open road could give. She smelled the trees of the forest, the rusty cedar and the licorice aroma of sassafras. It blended with the cool, mineral scent of a nearby creek running fast with mountain water.
    The clear sky rioted with stars; millions of them dotting the expanse of sapphire. There was no one for miles around. Not a single car, home, or any sign of life at all.
    She didn’t have a destination. None that she knew, anyway. She simply drove on, content that fate would take her where she needed to be.
    Reaching behind her into the backseat, she scratched the fur of her dog, Gatsby. He licked her hand, then yawned and went back to sleep. He had the soft tan and white coloring typical of a corgi and the sweet personality to accompany it. She’d rescued him from the streets of San Francisco as a puppy five years earlier, and since then he’d been her best friend.
    Though she considered herself wealthy in friendship, she never let anyone get close enough to truly know her. Long ago, she’d learned a valuable lesson about trust. It ended with her understanding that she needed nothing and no one but herself to be content. To be free.
    She came around a swooping bend, the towering trees leaning over the road on both sides like a canopy. Her headlights caught the leaves and branches and cascaded over the aged, tired asphalt. As she pulled out of the curve, she spotted a young woman in jeans and a white T-shirt walking on the side of the road.
    Before she had a chance to slow down, she’d passed the woman. One glance in her rearview mirror, and she was gone.
    Behind her, Gatsby let out a low growl.
    Jackie depressed the brake slowly then looked to her right. Sitting in the passenger seat was the young woman, her shoulder length blonde hair tangled and in disarray. Her hands were clasped together tightly in her lap, the jeans she wore tattered and stained with blood. A vivid bruise bloomed over the pale white skin on her neck. Haunted blue eyes stared at Jackie in shock.
    “Can you see me?” the young woman whispered in a soft southern lilt. She blinked back tears.
    Jackie nodded, absorbing the waves of confusion and misery that clung to the girl like an overpowering perfume. She might have been sixteen, maybe seventeen, practically still a child.
    “Am I dead?” The girl’s question ended on a sob, as if she knew the horrible truth.
    Jackie let out a long, measured breath. She turned her eyes back to the road and continued to drive. “Yes, darling.”
    “I…I don’t remember dying.”
    “People often don’t,” Jackie told her, sympathy in her voice.
    The girl shook her head. “I’ve been wandering down this road for a long time. You’re the first person to see me.”
    Jackie attempted a smile. “You are not my first.”
    “There are others?”
    “They are all around us.” Jackie glanced over at her with bright eyes. “You are not alone, Rachel.”
    The girl trembled with a visible shudder. “How do you know my name?”
    “I read about