Good Intentions (The Road to Hell Series, Book 1) Read online

  GOOD INTENTIONS

  Brenda K. Davies

  Copyright © 2016 Brenda K. Davies

  All rights reserved.

  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 ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Books By The Author

  The Road to Hell Series

  Good Intentions (Book 1)

  Carved (Book 2) Coming October 2016

  The Vampire Awakenings Series

  Awakened (Book 1)

  Destined (Book 2)

  Untamed (Book 3)

  Enraptured (Book 4)

  Undone (Book 5)

  Historical Romance

  A Stolen Heart

  Books written under the penname Erica Stevens

  The Captive Series

  Captured (Book 1)

  Renegade (Book 2)

  Refugee (Book 3)

  Salvation (Book 4)

  Redemption (Book 5)

  Broken (The Captive Series prequel)

  Vengeance (Book 6)

  Unbound (Book 7) Coming Fall 2016

  The Fire & Ice Series

  Frost Burn (Book 1)

  Arctic Fire (Book 2)

  The Kindred Series

  Kindred (Book 1)

  Ashes (Book 2)

  Kindled (Book 3)

  Inferno (Book 4)

  Phoenix Rising (Book 5)

  The Ravening Series

  Ravenous (Book 1)

  Taken Over (Book 2)

  Reclamation (Book 3)

  The Survivor Chronicles

  Book 1: The Upheaval

  Book 2: The Divide

  Book 3: The Forsaken

  Book 4: The Risen

  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to all those who love to lose themselves in stories and dream, you make the world a far more interesting place to be.

  GLOSSARY OF TERMS:

  Adhene demon - Mischievous elf-like demon.

  Craetons - Lucifer’s followers.

  Madagan - A beast from Hell. Resembles a boar with a giant tusk in the center of forehead. Mottled red and black skin, plumes of smoke from a blowhole in top of head. Extended, round skulls, cloven hooves.

  Palitons - Kobal’s followers.

  Revenirs - Mummy-like skeletons. Debilitating cry. Suck life from victims with “kiss”.

  The Wall - Blocks off all of Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. Blocks parts of Nevada, New York, Pennsylvania, and Arkansas. Similar wall blocks off parts of Europe.

  Varcolac demon - Born from the fires of Hell. Only one can exist at a time. When that one dies another rises from the Fires of Creation. Fastest and most brutal of all the demons. They are the only kind that can create and open natural gateways within Hell as well as close them. They control the hellhounds.

  DEMON WORDS:

  Mah Kush-la ˈmɑː - My Heart.

  Mjéod - Mead or a demon drink.

  GLOSSARY OF SYMBOLS: -

  humans took some of them and turned them into what became known as the Elder Futhark, also known as runes.

  Eiaz - (Tilted Z) - Speed, heightened senses, and protection.

  Risaz - (Straight line with a triangle attached to the middle) - Force of destruction.

  Sowa - (Backwards E with sword piercing the center) - Blade of fire.

  Zenak - (Three wavy lines) - Eternal fire and life.

  Ziwa - (Two V’s with a line connecting the top, like fangs) - Guardian of the hellhounds. Mark is considered gift of strength, endurance, and virility. Considered a blessing and a curse as well as marks bearer as having a piece of the hellhound’s soul within them.

  Table of Contents

  Other books by the Author

  Dedication

  Glossary of terms, demon words and symbols

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Excerpt from Book 2, Carved

  Where to Find the Author

  PROLOGUE

  River

  I was nine when the first of the fighter planes flew over thirteen years ago. I remember tilting my head back to stare at them as they moved over us in a V formation. Excitement buzzed through me, but I felt no fear. They had been a more common sight before the military base closed last year; despite that status, they still occasionally flew over our town.

  When the planes vanished from view, I turned my attention back to the game of hopscotch I was playing with my friend, Lisa. I was about to beat her, and I wanted to finish before Mother woke from her nap and called me away. Lisa stared at the sky for a minute more before turning her attention back to me. She bent to pick up the rock on the ground as four more planes flew over us in a tight formation. They left white streaks in the sky as their engines roared over us.

  The rock Lisa had picked up slid from her fingers and clattered onto the asphalt. Together, we watched as the second wave of them disappeared from view. I don’t know why the initial wave hadn’t bothered me, but the second wave caused a cold sweat to trickle down my neck.

  Following the noise of the planes, the world around us took on an unusual hush for a Saturday afternoon in July. Normally there were shouts from kids playing up and down the street. The rumble of cars driving down the highway, heading toward the beach, was a near constant background noise now that tourist season was in full swing.

  Turning my attention back to Lisa, I waited for her to pick her rock up again and continue, but she remained staring at the sky. The planes had unnerved me, but what did I really know? At that point in my young life, my biggest problem was napping in the house a hundred feet away from me. I hoped their noise hadn’t woken Mother; grouchy was a permanent state for her, but when she was woken from a nap, she could be a real bear.

  I glanced over at my one-year-old brother, Gage. My heart melted at the sight of his disheveled blond hair stickin
g up in spikes and his warm brown eyes staring at the sky. He lifted a fist and waved at the planes fading from view. His coloring was completely different from my raven hair and violet eyes, due to our different fathers. Mine had taken off before I was born; Gage’s father had at least stuck around to see his birth before leaving our mother in the dust.

  Turning his attention away from the sky, Gage held his arms toward me before shoving a hand into his mouth. Unable to resist him, I walked over and lifted him off the ground. I cradled his warm body in my arms. I always brought him with me during Mother’s naps so he wouldn’t wake her, and because I couldn’t stand him being alone in the house while she slept. I’d been alone so many times before he’d come along that I refused to let him be too.

  Gage wrapped his chubby arms around my neck, pressing his sweaty body against mine. Lisa wiped the sweat from her brow and brushed aside the strands of brown hair sticking to her face. Waves of heat wafted from the cooking asphalt, but I barely felt it. I’d always preferred summer to winter and tolerated the heat better than most others.

  Six more planes swept overhead, leaving a loud, reverberating boom in their wake as they sped by. Car alarms up and down the street blared loudly. Horns honking in quick succession, and headlights flashing had all the dogs in the neighborhood barking. The relatively peaceful day had become chaotic in the blink of an eye.

  Along the road, doors opened and beeps sounded as people turned off their alarms. Shouts for the dogs to be quiet could be heard over the noise of the vehicles. Some people ran out of their homes and toward the squealing cars to try and turn off the alarms that wouldn’t be silenced.

  Gage’s arm tightened around my neck to the point of near choking. I didn’t try to pull him away; instead I held him closer when he began to shake. Then just as rapidly as the rush of noise had erupted on the street, everything went completely still. Even the dogs, sensing something was off, became almost simultaneously silent. The few birds that had been chirping stopped their song; they seemed to be holding their breath with the rest of the world.

  I remember Lisa stepping closer to me. Years later, I can still feel her warm arm against mine in a moment of much needed solidarity. “What’s going on, River?” she asked me.

  “I don’t know.”

  Then, from inside some of the nearby homes, screams and cries erupted, breaking the near silence. Exchanging a look with Lisa, we turned as one and ran toward her house. We clambered up the steps, jostling against each other in our rush to see what was going on. We’d scarcely entered the cool shadows of her screened-in porch when I heard the sobs of her mother.

  We both froze, uncertain of what to do. Tears streaked Gage’s cheeks and wet my shirt when he buried his face in my neck. He may have only been a baby, but he still sensed something was completely wrong.

  Instinctively knowing we would be shut out of whatever was going on if we alerted them to our presence, it had to be grown-up stuff after all, we’d edged carefully over to the windows, looking in on the living room. Peering in the windows, I spotted Lisa’s mom on the couch, her head in her hands as she wept openly. Lisa’s father stood before the TV, the remote dangling from his fingertips as he gaped at the screen.

  My eyes were drawn to the TV; my brow creased in curious wonder at the mushroom cloud I saw rising from the earth. A black cloud of rolling fire and smoke covered the entire horizon on the screen.

  Beneath the cloud, words ran across the bottom of the screen. The U.S. is under attack. Nuclear bomb dropped on Kansas. Possible terrorist attack. Possible attack from China or Russia. Numerous areas of reported violence erupting.

  “It’s World War III,” Lisa’s father said as the remote fell from his hand and her mother sobbed harder.

  My heart raced in my chest, and my throat went dry as I struggled to grasp what was going on. I knew something awful had happened, but I still couldn’t understand what. How could I? I was a child. My time on this earth had been spent trying to avoid my mother as much as possible. It had also been filled with taking care of my brother, friends, TV, books, school, and the endless days of summer, that until then, I’d been so looking forward to.

  I hugged Gage as I vowed to do anything I could to keep him safe from whatever was about to unfold.

  Standing there with Lisa, I may not have completely understood what was happening, but I knew nothing would ever be the same again. The only world I’d ever known was now entirely different.

  The cries and shouts in the neighborhood increased in intensity when more planes flew overhead with a loud whoosh that rattled the glass in the windows before us and set off some of the alarms again. Turning, I glanced back at the street to find some people running back and forth, hugging each other before running toward another house. Some got in their cars and drove away with a squeal of tires. Much like a chicken with its head cut off, they were unsure of where to go or what to do.

  What could anyone possibly do? Were we next for the bombs? The hair on my nape rose.

  I turned back to the TV and watched as the cloud continued to rise. More words flashed by on the bottom of the screen, but I barely saw them. I became so focused on the TV, I never heard my mother enter the porch until one of her hands fell on my shoulder.

  Tilting my head back to look at her, I realized it must be worse than I ever could have imagined if she was touching me. It was the first time she’d touched me in a comforting way in years. It would be the last, that wasn’t by accident or in anger, for all the years following.

  “What is happening?” Lisa inquired in a tremulous whisper.

  “The end,” Mother replied.

  I wouldn’t know how right she was until years later.

  CHAPTER 1

  River

  Gathering the bundle of fish I’d caught, I lifted them off the ground and grabbed my pole. I’d eaten so much fish over the years, I kept expecting to sprout gills one day. Gills were a better option than starvation though. Despite the vast quantities of fish I’d caught over the years, I still hated the vacant stare of death in their eyes and the fact I’d been the one to cause it. I avoided looking into their eyes as I swung them over my back and gathered the rest of my equipment.

  Turning back to the ocean flowing through the canal, I stared across the deep blue water swirling with rapid currents. On the other side was a rocky shoreline and pathway that practically mirrored the shore where I stood. More fishermen and women stood on the rocks or waded down into the water. I couldn’t make out any of their features, but it didn’t matter anyway; I’d probably never meet any of them. Below me and across the way, there were more people walking the rocks, plucking crabs from between them, and tossing the clawing creatures into baskets.

  The crisp, briny smell of the ocean tickled my nostrils as I inhaled the familiar, well-loved scent. I brushed away the strands of black hair the breeze tugged from my ponytail and blew across my eyes. The power of the sea, the life flowing through it called to me, making me feel strangely more alive and yet all alone as I watched the sun dancing across its surface. Above me, seagulls and herrings cawed and circled before plunging into the water.

  An older man with gray hair and a kind smile waved to me before gesturing at the stripers hanging heavily against my back. “Nice catch today, River,” he commented.

  “Thanks, Mr. Wix,” I replied and shifted the weight of the three fish I’d caught. Now that it was mid-May, the bigger stripers were finally starting to come through the canal again. The most we were allowed to pull from the ocean was three a week, so as not to deplete the fish population now that they’d once again become Cape Cod’s main food supply. Mostly, I only caught one at a time so they wouldn’t go bad but today was a special day and I had plans for these three. “Good luck to you.”

  He wiped the sweat from his forehead. “I think I’m going to need it,” he muttered.

  I knew how he felt. It had taken me years to become as good at fishing as I was, and I most certainly hadn’t done it alone. After the
bombs, it had fallen on my shoulders to keep my family fed. Gage was still breast-feeding, thankfully, but my mother and I were on our own.

  One day, with my stomach grumbling and my head spinning from lack of food, I had decided to take my small, freshwater pole here. On my first cast, I managed to hook myself in my right eyebrow. After cutting the line, I placed a new hook on the line and successfully cast the hook into the water. I’d barely had time to breathe before the pole was snatched from my hands by the strong current, which had probably been for the best because if I had miraculously managed to catch something, it would have snapped my pole like a toothpick.

  I had returned to my neighborhood, desolate and starving as I shuffled down the street at sunset. My eyebrow throbbed from the hook still stuck in it; I’d had no success in getting it out on my own. One of my neighbors, Mr. Anderson, had spotted me walking down the street, sniffling as I tried not to cry. He’d taken me into his garage, pulled the hook from my eyebrow with a set of pliers, and placed a piece of ice over it.

  I’d sat on a stool, with the ice over my eye, and stared at all of the poles and lures hanging from the hooks and pegs on his back wall. Many on the Cape enjoyed fishing, but he had reveled in making his own hooks, lures, and poles. To him, it had been better than actually fishing; to me it had been a stark reminder of my recent failure.

  “Seems we’ve got some things to teach you, young miss,” he’d said after I’d told him my story and how my mother and I hadn’t eaten in two days. He’d sent me home with a smallmouth bass to eat, and instructions to return early in the morning so I could start learning how to fish. He told me if I was late, he wouldn’t offer again.

  I showed up a half hour early and ready to go. He taught me how to catch fresh water fish for a few years before determining I was old enough and strong enough to handle saltwater fishing. He’d also patiently taught me how to bend the hooks and create lures, with a vise and a pair of pliers, in his garage. When I was ready for them, he’d given me a couple of his poles and taught me how to care for them.