To celebrate Stacey Wallace Benefiel’s 3rd Indieversary, FOUND (Penny Black #1) is only 99cents April 20-27!
From Stacey Wallace Benefiel, the author of the Zellie Wells trilogy, comes a new NA trilogy set in the Society world.
Description:
*The Penny Black trilogy is a companion to the Zellie Wells trilogy and not a continuation of the series. (PBT is set 18 years in the future with a new cast of characters.)
*Due to language and sexuality, FOUND is recommended for older teens (Most of the characters are out of high school and preparing for college.)
Also available at: Kobo / Smashwords / Apple
Haven't read the Zellie Wells trilogy yet? Pick up all three novels together for $6.99 at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Smashwords, and iTunes. Or get the first novel, Glimpse, for FREE at all e-book retailers.
I get a hold on the worn straps of my pack and stand, slinging it on. Before I turn to walk out the door and go meet my supposed uncle, I reach back and feel for my knife in one of the side compartments. It’s there.
A man with dark hair who’s wearing a fitted black t-shirt and moss green trousers gets up from one of the chairs in the waiting area. He comes at me, his hand extended, his brown eyes trained on mine.
I should think he’s creepy. But I don’t. His palm hits my palm and then we’re shaking hands.
“The resemblance to her mother is remarkable,” he says to the caseworker, who nods back at him with stars in her eyes. “Well…” He hooks his left index finger under my chin and turns my face from side to side. “Her mother didn’t have all of these piercings or model her hairstyle after Emo Brite, but it’s there. In the eyes.”
This statement isn’t true. At all. I look more like my olive skinned, brown-eyed dad than my fair skinned, blue-eyed mother. The caseworker would’ve known that if she’d bothered to check my file and seen the two crime scene photos that have followed me no matter how hard I’ve tried to get away from them. Still, I don’t care. “Ready to go, Uncle…?”
“Christopher.” He places his hand on the back of my left arm and guides me toward the parking lot. “Thanks for all of your help,” he says over his shoulder to the caseworker.
“Anytime,” she practically purrs.
Uncy Christopher’s fingers tighten around my arm as we exit the juvie center. He’s not hurting me, but he’s definitely got a good grip. Panic flares in my chest. I twist away from him and swing my backpack off, going for my knife.
“Hold on,” he says in a soothing voice. “You can trust me, Penny, I promise. I’m like you.”
Like me how? I leave the knife in the side pocket. “You’re a seventeen-year-old girl?” I give him an exaggerated once over. “That sure is one hell of a believable ‘middle-aged-man-aging-gracefully’ get-up you’ve got going on there.”
“My car’s over here.” He takes my arm again and walks me to a silver two-door Toyota with Arkansas plates. Arkansas being the state I was living in prior to Virginia. The dreams plagued me something awful there.
“You’ve been looking for me,” I say. He lets go of me as the passenger side door slides open.
“Not just me, Penny. The New Society has been searching for you since you disappeared off our radar seven years ago.”
I toss my pack into the back seat and get into the car. I…don’t know why. I’m just not threatened by him or suspicious of him and that doesn’t ever happen. I’m a damn bueno judge of character. Eerily bueno. “I don’t have the first clue what you’re talking about, man. I think you’re going to have to spell it out for me. The New Society? Does that mean there’s an Old Society?” I joke.
My door slides shut and Christopher goes around the front of the car, climbing into the driver’s seat. He pushes the ignition button. “Actually, there is an old Society, but most of its members have made their home in Europe for the past eighteen years. We’re not affiliated with the other branches any longer.”
“Naturally.”
Christopher programs in our destination (the Sheraton by Dulles International) and puts the car in autodrive mode, presumably so he can focus less on driving and more on telling me WHAT THE FUCK IS UP. I’m not getting any bizarro vibes from him, but this whole scene, this whole New, Old, whatever-the-hell, Society deal is out there.
The car backs up, exits the parking lot, and enters the flow of traffic gracefully. We’re on our way. “I know you have a lot of questions. Perhaps a visual aid?” Christopher takes his Ret-Tech off of his head and hands it to me. “I assume you don’t have one of these?”
I give him a “duh” look and then strap the Ret-tech on. This is only the third time I’ve ever used one, and it takes me a second to remember how it all works.
“Be careful with your blinking, the New Society won’t spring for the latest model until the end of next month, so the commands are a little touchy.”
I close my left eye in order to steady the gaze of my right. “What am I looking for exactly?”
“Blink on the video icon.”
A clip appears on the microscreen, the text at the bottom reading Camera 58, Hwy. 66 with a scrolling digital timestamp next to it. 3:21, 3:22, 3:23.
Cars whizz by, semi-trucks, bio-buses, all headed into Washington DC. The traffic is light. Well, as light as traffic in a metro area can be. The highway is ten lanes wide and a clunky station wagon swerves from lane six into lane seven. This is familiar to me. I fist my right hand and push it against my stomach to keep from throwing up.
“My dream,” I whisper to Christopher.
“Keep watching,” he says, taking my left hand. His touch is comforting. “You did more than dream this, Penny.”
Author Links:
Giveaway: (1) signed Zellie Wells trilogy e-card (Zellie Wells is companion to the
Penny Black series and this card allows a download for the
complete Zellie Wells trilogy).
Open internationally!
