Whitewater (Rachel Hatch #6)(67)

I will not feel the lash of the devil's whip, for my spirit will wander above it all. I will be with you in the wind that passes through your hair. I look on as you live the rest of your existence in peace and tranquility. In those moments of doubt, when you need a father's hand, you will hear my wisdom in the rustle of leaves.

For you were more than a servant girl who became my daughter. You were the girl who planted the seed of love that blossomed into a flower, replacing darkness for light.

In you, I see a different path than I have traveled. And on it, I hope you continue to spread your seed wherever the wind takes you.



Maria stepped out of the busy café onto the street and walked over to the man in the blue ambulance carrying her heavy satchel. He turned to face her. "Are you the one they call Azul?"

"I am."

Maria then fished out a metal box the size and shape of a brick. A turquoise bracelet dangled loosely at her wrist with beads that rattled noisily. Azul accepted the box containing twenty-five thousand dollars. Maria hoped it would do well for the man she'd read about in the newspaper.

The article had struck a chord with Maria when she'd first read it. The three hundred thousand dollars Machado had left her was more than she'd ever know what to do with in two lifetimes.

She set aside enough to carry her through the rest of her life. And then looking at the pile left over, Maria contemplated how to best use her newfound wealth. The answer came with a breeze pushing its way through the clustered branches of a nearby tree. Maria was instantly found by a hissed whisper and set forth to do its biding.

Standing beside Azul and looking upon his blue ambulance, Maria was suddenly inspired to do something else.

Maria pulled a paintbrush and palate from her oversized satchel. She then took a step back. Holding the bristled end of the paintbrush in front of her, she angled it and turned it and angled it, squinting her eye while taking in the blurred image of the blue backdrop. And thought of the flower she planned to paint.

The whisper she'd heard had told her what to do with the money. In the leaves jostling, she heard Machado's slithered tongue tell her what to do. She heard it as plain as if the man, who she had loved as a father, said four words to her.

Make light the dark.

And Maria planned to, using the money gifted her to help those in need. Maria looked at her canvas and it came to her. The flower would be a rose. It seemed a fitting flower for the van, since Maria planned on meeting with the reporter who'd written the article at a restaurant called Rosa's Café.

Maria squirted a deep red into the recessed bowl and, looking at her canvas, she wondered if the reporter, Miguel Ayala, would like to see one of her flower drawings.

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The Rachel Hatch Series





Drift

Downburst

Fever Burn

Smoke Signal

Firewalk

Whitewater

Aftershock (pre-order now)



RACHEL HATCH SHORT STORIES

Fractured

Proving Ground

The Gauntlet





Aftershock





Rachel Hatch Book Seven





by L.T. Ryan & Brian Shea





Copyright ? 2021 by L.T. Ryan, Liquid Mind Media, LLC, & Brian Christopher Shea. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be copied, reproduced in any format, by any means, electronic or otherwise, without prior consent from the copyright owner and publisher of this book. This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, places and events are the product of the author's imagination or used fictitiously.





Aftershock Chapter 1





The moon hid under a thin veil of wispy gray clouds but still managed to cast its glow over the freshly fallen snow.

Chris Macintosh’s hot breath melted the flakes falling in front of him and covering his face in a glimmering sheen. He snapped an icicle from his nose with the rough edge of his sleeve. The leaking pipes that were his nostrils worked to replace the stalactite of snot. The cold air pinched his throat and stung his lungs. He'd forgotten how much he hated the cold. Breakneck, Alaska, was a lifetime away from his Austin, Texas, childhood. The company he currently kept worsened his tolerance for the cold, wet embrace of Mother Nature.

Lank cursed under his breath as he turned his face from the wind. The man assisting Lank’s right side complained in hushed curses, most of which were washed out by the high winds that blew in their faces every few minutes or so. "How much did you say this guy weighs?"

Lank's pitchy voice irritated Macintosh to no end. He’d been listening to Lank moan for the past ten minutes since they'd pulled the body out of the trunk of the Bronco a half mile back. Todd Lankowski, better known as Lank, was by all accounts an idiot. And his question about the weight was the third time he’d asked, thus making this Macintosh’s third attempt to explain. “Because he’s dead weight.”

Lank spit. The wind blew it back into his face, instigating another round of expletives. His use of the f-bomb would give a sailor pause. Lankowksi peppered that word into just about every sentence the wire-thin man uttered. Macintosh tolerated Lank out of necessity. In other circumstances, Macintosh would’ve probably already punched him in the face.