Keeper of Crows (The Keeper of Crows Duology Book 1) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 33 ½

  GLOSSARY

  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

  The Keeper of Crows Playlist

  About the Author

  Other books by Casey L. Bond:

  Acknowledgments

  Keeper of Crows

  Book One of the Keeper of Crows Duology

  Casey L. Bond

  Contents

  GLOSSARY

  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 33 ½

  The Keeper of Crows Playlist

  About the Author

  Other books by Casey L. Bond:

  Acknowledgments

  Copyright © 2017 by Casey L. Bond. All rights reserved.

  First Edition.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any way by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise without the prior express permission of the author except as provided by USA Copyright Law. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of a copyrighted work is illegal. Copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by fines and federal imprisonment.

  This book is a work of fiction and does not represent any individual, living or dead. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Book cover designed by Regina Wamba of MaeIDesign & Photography.

  Map drawn by Sydney Provencher.

  Professionally Edited by The Girl with the Red Pen/ Stacy Sanford. Content Editing by Angela Marshall Smith.

  Published in the United States of America.

  ISBN-13: 978-1544296692

  ISBN-10: 154429669X

  Created with Vellum

  GLOSSARY

  A reference to the world of Keeper of Crows...

  Crosser – One of the original souls to escape Purgatory and walk the Earth after Christ’s crucifixion when the veil was torn in two. Once a soul escapes Purgatory, it can freely cross the barrier between the two realms.

  Fissure – A tear in the veil that opens for a short time.

  Floaters – Souls smuggled into Purgatory by Merchants. Only those souls undergoing a near-death experience can be pulled across the barrier.

  Keeper of Crows – Guardian of Purgatory, who leads a murder of crows. The crows carry souls to Purgatory (that are meant to be there) and follow the instructions of the Keeper.

  Lesson – Soul brought to Purgatory by a demon to be taught a lesson before entering Hell. Either their eyes, ears, or mouth are blocked, depending on the lesson they need to learn. See no evil. Hear no evil. Speak no evil.

  Manna – Food that rains down from the sky to feed the souls in Purgatory.

  Marum – Secret, bottom-level of Heaven itself, where punishment is decided and meted out by one of the seven angels banished there. It is a desolate and frightening place.

  Meat Market – Where souls are sold into slavery; sexual or simple servitude.

  Merchants – Granted power by crossers to kidnap souls. They have no power of their own and have to be granted power each time they are told to cross the barrier.

  Reddies – Female souls smuggled into Purgatory and sold in the Meat Market for sexual purposes.

  Soul – A human who has crossed the barrier. They develop a body in Purgatory that reflects the state of their human body back on Earth.

  The Cleansing – Daily rain shower in which souls can bathe.

  The Killing Fields – Grassy area between two solid stone walls and their gates.

  Triple – A Lesson whose eyes, ears, and mouth are bound.

  Veil – A thin fabric that stretches between the earthen realm and Purgatory. It was torn in two when Christ was crucified, and was weakened when mended.

  1

  My father was the antichrist for sending me to this place. Rehab, it turned out, smelled like lemon-scented disinfectant, and apparently, ‘rock bottom’ was comfortably padded with heaping piles of Benjamins. Father spent enough on this place to justify the brocade upholstered couch beneath me a thousand times over, but no amount was too large to show how much Warren Kennedy loved his only child. Just pick up a tabloid; my face would be plastered there, along with bold-printed words like rebellious, addict, and promiscuous. The sad part? The tabloids were right for once.

  Sunny Bridge was just as perky as the name implied, from its glistening, polished tile to the overflowing motivational posters that dripped from its walls. Even the staff seemed happy as they went about their daily tasks. The most annoying of the smiling faces here belonged to my shrink, Doctor Coleman. When he greeted me, and the orderly who escorted me to him, in the hallway with a broad smile and pink cheeks and asked me to go in to his office and have a seat, I decided to call him Doc.

  “I’ll join you in just a few minutes,” he said, returning his attention to a small stack of papers at the nurse’s station that he thumbed through and scrawled his signature on at precise intervals.

  He reminded me of a professionally-dressed version of one of Snow White’s dwarves. As I waited for him to finish his paperwork in the hallway, I looked around his basic-looking office. File cabinets lined the longest wall, overflowing with files stuffed with paper and unfortunate circumstances. Ink blot pictures were Doc’s preferred décor. How they used them was beyond me, and I hoped Doc wouldn’t ask me to find the hidden meanings and shapes in the paintings hanging all around his office. If he ever tested me, he might recommend I be transferred to a mental institution. The blending colors and shapes looked like Kindergarten art, globs of paint on a page that had been folded. The fact that I couldn’t tell a pelvis from a bat was disturbing.

  Doc strolled into the room and assumed his position behind the large mahogany desk situated between us, shuffling more papers and shifting stacks of files until he had a clean space. Doc wasn’t the most organized person. I looked
around at more ink blot pictures, trying my hardest to decipher them. He started asking questions. I didn’t feel like answering them, so I ignored him. He folded his hands over his stomach and stared at me.

  I let him. It didn’t bother me if he stared.

  He sat across from me with a resolute expression, tapping the end of his pen against the clipboard of paper he thought summed up my life. The court told him all he needed to know, so I didn’t know why he wanted to delve deeper. I was a junkie, a rich girl, a girl with a chip on her shoulder. A nineteen-year old getting ready to start her senior year of high school. He would assume I’d failed a grade, but I didn’t. I’d gotten sick as a child and couldn’t start school when I was supposed to, so my parents kept me home an extra year.

  Doc wouldn’t care about any of that. He just cared about my apparent drug problem. The facts were all there, what he wanted to see, what he thought I wanted to hide, but Doctor Coleman wanted more for some reason. He needed me to believe he wanted to help me come to grips with my drug use and how it impacted my loved ones.

  But did he really care?

  My opinion? He was paid hourly by this lovely, expensive place to ask questions. Time was important to Doc. I could tell by the way his eyes kept shifting to the clock hanging on the wall just above my head. Only one hour. In one hour a day, three to five days per week, he was supposed to fix what was broken inside me, or fill sixty minutes appearing to do so. Then, he could move on to the next person, and so on until his day was over, his week was finished, and he could pick up his paycheck. I wondered what he did on the weekends to fill his time.

  “You can lie back if you want,” Doc said, his eyes flicking to the minute hand.

  I smirked at him, crossing and uncrossing my legs and leaning forward. Hospital scrubs weren’t sexy, but I did have a V-neck working for me. My ample cleavage caught his eye. “Would you like me to lie down?” I asked seductively.

  Doc swallowed, staring down at the clipboard again. The tapping of the tip of his pen quickened.

  “You can do whatever makes you comfortable, Miss Kennedy.”

  “Carmen,” I corrected, hating the family name and the sound of it coming out of his pudgy lips.

  “Alright. You can do whatever makes you comfortable, Carmen. It makes no difference to me whether you sit or lay. What does matter to me is making progress, so I’d like to start with you. Describe yourself in a few sentences or words.”

  The truth? I wasn’t sure Doc really wanted the truth. Maybe he just wanted me to vomit the same crap that was on the documents he read. He wanted me to tell him I was a spoiled rich girl and an addict who wanted to do more with her life, but that would be a lie. I was spoiled. My father was rich. My mother was dead. I had no siblings. Did I enjoy blow? Absolutely. I wished I had some now. But could I stop using it? It would suck and life would be boring, but yes. I could. But back to Doc… He wanted three words, all about little ole’ me.

  “Sexual, sarcastic, and intelligent.” Those three were accurate.

  Doc raked a free hand through his gray hair. He was in desperate need of a haircut. Thick tufts of it hung over his ears and thick strands crawled up the back of his neck. I bet he was hairy all over.

  “Those are interesting terms, especially in that order. If you open up a little, I can better judge their accuracy.” He tried to smile and then glanced over my head at the clock again.

  “If you really want me to open up…” I trailed my fingers over my thighs and spread my legs wider.

  He quickly removed his eyes from my skin and stared at the documents in front of him. Clearing his throat, he remained professional. “I’m not going down this road with you, Carmen, so let’s discuss something else so our time is not wasted.”

  Would I really spread my legs for an old man? No, but seeing Doc squirm a little was priceless.

  “Tell me about your relationship with your father.”

  “Why do you want to know?”

  “He’s an influential man, powerful. I’m sure his choice to run for office made your life different; more difficult, maybe.” Doc cleared his throat. “When he brought you here, he mentioned an incident with the paparazzi right before your accident.”

  Well, wasn’t Father just the proponent of airing dirty laundry—as long as it wasn’t his. “There isn’t much to tell, really.”

  “Try.” He began tapping his pen. My teeth raked together.

  Hell, why not? Maybe if I talk a little, he’ll let me out of here early.

  “I was never beaten or abused. Father worked long hours when he was CEO of Lyta Pharmaceuticals, and now he’s running for President. He thinks his connections and money can buy him a one-way ticket into the White House, and according to the latest poll numbers, he might be right.”

  “What about your mother? How did you feel about her?”

  “Do,” I corrected.

  “Pardon?” he asked, sitting up straight.

  “How do I feel about my mother, is the question you should have asked. She might be dead, but she’s still a part of me. I love her. She had problems, but who doesn’t? She dealt with a lot of bullshit from my father, and in the end, she was too weak to endure it all. End of story.”

  Doc shifted in his seat, glancing at his papers again. Maybe he had copies of Psychiatry for Dummies under there. A checklist for crazies.

  “Tell me about their marriage.”

  “It wasn’t bad in the beginning. At least, she said it wasn’t. But over time, Father changed. She wasn’t enough for him, apparently, because he began sleeping with other women. She always managed to forgive him for all the bad things he did, even though he never apologized for hurting her. He didn’t care. Father only cares about one person in this world. It wasn’t my mother, and it sure as hell isn’t me.”

  “He brought you here to help you. That sounds like he does care.”

  “Oh,” I smiled, “he cares—about his public image.”

  He dug his heels in. “Tell me about your mother’s addiction and how it affected you,” he said sternly. “Addiction can be hereditary. There are studies to suggest it.”

  Doc stared at me intently. I wondered how badly he wanted to glance up at the wall to see if the session time was up. Why he didn’t ask more questions about my father blew my mind. Everyone always wanted to know about the private life of the great Warren Kennedy; his habits, secrets, and scandals, but Mother and I were usually just background noise to all of his indiscretions. But, since he asked about her, I’d answer. She deserved that much.

  “First of all, I make my own decisions and Mom made hers. I can empathize with her, though. Mom loved to look at the bottom of liquor bottles. It was her repeated goal in life to find them. She stared at them like she was looking through a kaleidoscope, but she never found any pretty rainbows at the end. She would chuck the empty bottle into the trash and start searching again.”

  “How’d she die?” He already knew, but he wanted me to use my words.

  “She took too many sleeping pills with her vodka.”

  My mother liked to drown her sorrows. I liked to snort mine. The difference between me and my mom? She knew what she was doing when she ended it. She knew what to take and how quickly it would kill her. She died with a suicide note addressed to me curled in her cold, stiff fingers.

  “Were you the one to find her?”

  “No,” I answered simply.

  Thank God. I couldn’t have handled seeing her like that. My father was busy fucking his girlfriend across town, and I was out partying when she died. The staff didn’t find her until the next morning. When they called him to come home, he told them, ‘Why bother? She’s already dead, and I need to eat breakfast.’ At least, that was what our maid told me. I believed her.

  “Were you home the night she passed away?”

  “No.” I shifted in my seat.

  “Where were you?”

  “With a friend.”

  “Who told you what had happened to her?” he ask
ed, brows raised in expectation. This was probably better than reality TV for him.

  “My father told me when I got home.” My cell phone had died sometime during the night. I’d found a guy at the bar to go home with, so when I finally rolled in the next afternoon, Father told me very bluntly, ‘Your mother is dead. She killed herself and left you this. I suggest you take her advice unless you want to end up just like her.’

  He’d read my fucking note. He didn’t ask whether I wanted to be in her shoes. I’d trade places with her in a heartbeat. But guilt ate at me all the same. Mom was dead, I was alone, and it could have been prevented. If I cared enough to stay home, if I stopped partying and sleeping my way through the worthless guys in Beverly Hills, I’d have been there and might have been able to save her. I could have called 9-1-1.

  What killed me the most was that all she needed was a reason to live, and I didn’t give her one. I wasn’t enough for her to want to stay.

  “It says she left a suicide note behind. What did it say?” Doc sat, poised with his pen, ready to scribble psychobabble. Fuck that.

  “I’m not gonna tell you that. The note was for me.” Only me. It didn’t say much, not nearly enough to justify taking her own life. It just said she was sorry, she felt like a failure, she would miss me, and that I should stop partying and go to school, to do something with my life.

  Quite a lecture from a woman who felt life wasn’t worth living.

  “You need to open up to me, Carmen. It’s the only way I can help you.”

  I snorted. “Maybe I don’t want your help, Doc.”

  He sighed and sat back in his desk chair, testing the weight limit with his ample stomach.

  “Will you tell me about the incident with the paparazzi?”

  I smiled. “Since you asked so nicely… That jerk deserved what he got. I want to state that first. When my father was actually around, he always lectured me about being proper. He would say that cameras were everywhere, and they could capture us at our weakest moments. We couldn’t afford to be seen as weak. He needed the White House. ‘Imagine another Kennedy in the Oval office,’ he would boast.”