Rise

RiseHinton Thriller Book ThreeLee DawnaLeeDawna Books, Inc. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Copyright © 2023 Lee DawnaAll rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner except for the use of quotations in a book review.First editionCover design by Premade Ebook Cover Shopwww.premadeebookcovershop.comISBN 978-1-949192-23-0 (paperback)ISBN 978-1-949192-22-3 (ebook)Published by LeeDawna Books, Inc.https://[email protected]. Box 205, MacArthur WV 25873 Contents Dedication 1. ~1~ 2. ~2~ 3. ~3~ 4. ~4~ 5. ~5~ 6. ~6~ 7. ~7~ 8. ~8~ 9. ~9~ 10. ~10~ 11. ~11~ 12. ~12~ 13. ~13~ 14. ~14~ 15. ~15~ 16. ~16~ 17. ~17~ 18. ~18~ 19. ~19~ 20. ~20~ 21. ~21~ 22. ~22~ 23. ~23~ 24. ~24~ 25. ~25~ 26. ~26~ 27. ~27~ 28. ~28~ 29. ~29~ 30. ~30~ 31. ~31~ 32. ~32~ 33. ~33~ Acknowledgments About the Author Also By Lee Dawna ~ This book is dedicated to my editor. Anita, thank you for keeping me off the cliff! ~ ~1~TessaDeath is a strange notion. We all ignore it, doing our best to fight for life, the here and now, the joys we insist are all worth it. None of that pretending stops the inevitable, though. We can put dying out of our minds and pretend our days are important, but death comes for us all in the end. We just don’t know when that end will come. Some of us make it to old age and others are gone before they ever have a chance to play at this charade we call life. Then there are those like me, the dead among the living, desolate people who have nothing inside of them but the air their lungs insist upon holding.I pull my knees tighter into my chest, wrapping my arms around my wet jeans and keeping my eyes trained on the deceiving caress of the river I used to love to wake up beside. Many nights, I’d curl up with Warren and we’d sleep right on this very bank, resting as if we didn’t have a care in the world even though we both had many. Now I’m all grown up and my charade is over. There’s no place left for me on this earth. No life to pretend at and no love to hold onto. I can’t even feel the cool touch of this river anymore. But I don’t need to. Long after I’m gone, this water will still be here, flowing from one end of town to the other. It’ll wash the pain of loss from Hinton and carry it far away from the memories of the people who call this valley home.Now that I know where I’m heading and how fast I’m going there, I accept what my fate is. I’m even finding it within myself to be calm. The screams are gone, fading from my lips as dawn peeked over the still burning mountain. I stayed in the park with Gary until the light of this new day cast a sickening pallor over a face that no longer holds a trace of the strength his living body held. He’s gone from me. They’re all gone. And the only reason I climbed from the depths of this river earlier is because Beth is still alive. If she were dead, I wouldn’t have bothered to let the current wash Gary off my skin and clothes, I would have sunk under the surface, watching the fire reflect off the water above me, and never come back up again.I shiver, not caring to register the shake in my limbs or the threads of pain lacing through my bruised body. After what I saw in the park, every complaint I have is meaningless. Worthless. The brutality of what was done to Gary eclipses everything. It’s unfathomable, and it removes all doubt from my mind. Beth is Hinton’s killer. No one else would have gotten close enough to kill both Gary and Granger, and no one else would have cause to gut Gary like that. It was Beth, taking out her anger on Gary because of what was done to her dad. She unleashed her fury and strung Gary up, littering the park with his insides in order to repay me for Chopper spreading her dad across the highway. Something I didn’t ask Chopper to do and wish he never had. But Beth doesn’t care about truth or reason. She never has. She only cares about the reality she tries to convince the rest of us we’re living in.Considering what she’s put Hinton through this summer, I’m certain she’s proud of herself. I’m as certain of her joy as I am of my guilt. Not a single time since the early days of childhood, when she lied just as easily as she breathed, have I ever called her out for lying. I’ve never held her accountable for her actions. Instead, I pitied her. Felt sorry for the downturn of her lips even though my own frown was just as deeply etched on my soul. We were born to a bad lot and somehow I focused on her suffering more than my own. Maybe because I had Warren. He was all I ever needed so I didn’t much try to make other friends. People were around but it was only Warren who I was close to. Beth tried to be close to everyone and most didn’t want her around. I felt bad for her on account of that. I talked her up whenever anyone would listen and I defended her when they tried to do their own talking, so I’m as guilty of the murders as she is because Beth used the care I had for her to manipulate everyone. It was because of me taking up for her that no one ever challenged her. She’d lie