Twisted: Book One Of The Carmody Chronicles

By Kathryn Deans

Somebody is killing the coolest kids in Carmody...

Nobody believes Shauna McLeod when she says she’s witnessed a murder in the park one foggy afternoon. Even her friends think it was some kind of sick practical joke... until a girl drowns in a deserted swimming pool a few days later. Accident or murder? Shauna, her best friend Luisa and Luisa’s screwball brother Ruben are betting on murder.

Despite their suspicions, it hardly seems possible. How could there be a killer in sleepy little Carmody?

When Davina Sheffield and Charlie Bannister plummet off the school’s old bell tower at morning assembly two days later even the police begin to take an interest. It looks like a joint suicide attempt but there are too many questions... and not enough answers. Ruben, Shauna and Luisa begin asking questions, intent on tracking down a killer who always seems to be just one step ahead.

It’s a game that quickly turns into one of survival - who can they trust when it seems likely that the killer is somebody they already know – a friend, a teacher or even Shauna’s old boyfriend Daniel who has arrived out of nowhere, determined to re-ignite their romance?

It’s not until fog once again grips little Carmody that the climax of the killer’s game is revealed. The stage is set and the final scene enacted in the old summer pavilion in the park. There Shauna and Luisa come face to face with a nightmare and realize even your best guess can be a wrong one.

Then their struggle for survival really begins...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kate Harper
• Release date: Jul 26, 2011
• ISBN: 9781465820389

Kathryn Deans

It feels like I've been writing since parchment was invented. I'll be adding more to this when I can think of something truly brilliant to say. At the moment, the mental well has run dry!

Book preview

The Carmody Chronicles

TWISTED

Kathryn Deans

Copyright Kathryn Deans 2011

www.kathryndeans.com

Smashwords Edition

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Chapter One

Shauna stood staring indecisively at the flagged stone path that cut through the centre of Trevellyn Park, willing herself to move. A dragon crouched on either side of her, fanciful wrought iron figures that made up the gates to the park. In the thick, shifting mist that swirled like a damp shroud they looked malevolent, waiting to spring on anybody unwise enough to pass them by.

On a nice day, the park looked inviting, benches swathed in dappled sunlight, dogs and kids running around the place. But now? Even though it was only five in the afternoon, the tall, Victorian style lamps that illuminated the place at night were lit, each one crowned with a fuzzy halo of gold. Instead of reassuring her, the effect merely looked like something of a B grade horror movie.

Damn it! Shauna muttered. She hated fog, always had ever since she was a kid. There was even a name for it, impressively long winded; homichlophobia. It sounded impressive but it didn’t help one little bit. Fog scared the crap out of her. Still, she’d lost track of the time and if she didn’t move it, she’d miss her mom’s call and they hadn’t spoken for a week.

"Move it Shauna!" Cutting through the path would take fifteen minutes off the walk home so fog or no fog, the park it would have to be.

Despite the fact that summer was only a couple of weeks gone, the weather was worthy of a much colder season. The Tasmanian town of Carmody was famous for its dank, foggy days. Or maybe that should read infamous. The residents blamed the Tasman Sea, only five miles away. Shauna was more inclined to think that the place was atmospherically cursed because the heavy fog that regularly blanketed the place had to be unnatural.

This was witch weather, ghostly and insubstantial.

Getting a grip, Shauna hurried through the gates. A short way in and suddenly walking that extra distance didn’t look so bad but her stubbornness kept her moving forward. "Don't be such a wimp! This is Carmody, for heavens sake. Nothing ever happens in Carmody." Or so her friend Luisa said and she’d been living here for almost ten months now. All things considered it had to be a whole lot safer than the inner city suburb in Melbourne which Shauna had called home for seventeen years.

A few steps in and the park closed around her, another world where familiar landmarks were suddenly unfamiliar. Trees and fog and a little too much imagination were not a good mix. Everyday objects twisted into surreal parodies, taking on darker forms. This was the backside of reality and Shauna looked around her uneasily. The indefinable sense of menace she’d sensed since leaving the library ten minutes earlier had grown and the shivers that were sliding down her back had little to do with the crowding dampness. Wrapping her arms around herself, she hurried on, leaving a shifting, agitated trail in her wake.

When a figure loomed out of the mist Shauna stopped dead, heartbeat thundering as she clamped a hand over her mouth. The statue of the park's founder, Astor Trevellyn stood in a paved circle at the centre of the avenue. She must have passed it a dozen times in the weeks she had been in Carmody but its sudden appearance still gave her a nasty shock. "Geez, Shauna..."

Her heart seemed to stop all together when a scream tore the unnatural silence apart.

Shauna looked around her wildly, trying to work out where the sound had come from. When a second cry came, it was weaker, more of a ragged, strangled sob and Shauna’s skin goose pimpled, real terror settling in the pit of her stomach. Leaving the path, she ran beneath the tall line of chestnut trees on her left, bending low to avoid the wet slap of leaves as she strained her ears, listening for something other than the sigh of the wind and the ever-present drip, drip, dripping. The harsh sound of a gurgling breath brought Shauna to an abrupt stop and she peered uncertainly ahead. She could make out a dark shape, crouching close to the ground and took a tentative step forward. Hello? Her voice cracked, Is everything alright? I thought I heard...

The figure on the ground rose abruptly. Tall and dressed in black, it turned slowly to face her. Shauna took one more step forward, trying to see and realized with a sickening jolt that the figure before her had no face. It took her a moment to understand that the person before her was wearing a balaclava. She was close enough now to see the sheen of eyes through the holes as they stared her but whoever was behind the mask remained unnervingly silent. Her own moved down to the body that was lying still on the ground. Shauna caught the pale spill of long blonde hair but the figure was face down, legs and arms splayed with casual abandon that seemed altogether unnatural.

The menace that had been tainting the afternoon took form and became terrifyingly real. Shauna caught the glitter of metal in the hand of the dark figure before her; it took a moment before she made the connection but all at once her thoughts, which seemed to be moving like cold molasses, stuttered into life again and with a sickening twist of the stomach she finally understood the scene before her. The metal was the blurred silhouette of a knife, faded twilight gleaming along the length of the blade until the sheen was cut off at the tip which was dripping dark, viscous fluid...

When the killer started to move, Shauna was already turning to run, desperate to escape the horror she had stumbled across. Fear pumped adrenaline through her veins and she plunged blindly forward. Almost immediately she was disoriented with no idea of which direction the path lay and she half fell into a thick bank of shrubs. Her boots slipped on the slick grass as she struggled to stay upright, fighting free of the obstruction while her mind wheeled in panic, terrified that she’d feel a hand on her at any moment, dragging her back. Run, a little voice inside her head screamed and she obeyed, moving again, searching for the path.

It took several long minutes of panic stricken flight before common sense gained enough ground for rational thought to kick in. Shauna forced herself to stop running. Instead she stood still and made herself take a few deep breaths.

Calm, she thought, forcing down her hysteria. She had to be calm. The last thing she wanted to do was run into whoever had been holding that knife…

When she moved again, it was with caution, making as little noise as possible as she tried to recall where the exit was. She crouched behind a bushy rhododendron, giving herself a moment to control her ragged breathing while she strained her ears to listen. She could hear nothing but the dripping trees and the distant sound of passing traffic somewhere to her right. The sound of cars gave her hope. It meant the road wasn’t too far away. Shauna bit her lip and tried to think. If she couldn’t see what was around her it stood to reason that he couldn't either. She hesitated, wondering why she was so sure it had been a man. The height, the footballer width of those shoulders... they could only belong to a man.

Even though he must be having as much trouble seeing as she was, she couldn’t stop herself from wondering if he were creeping around right now, checking behind bushes, searching through the shrubbery. What if he was heading towards the very stand she was sheltering behind right now, an insubstantial shape sliding through the mist, moving closer with every moment she remained there…

Don’t panic!

Slipping out from behind her precarious cover, Shauna hurried from one clump of greenery to the next, staying low. Every instinct urged her to run but she knew panic might land her right into the killer’s hands and then... and then... Oh God, she'd be as dead like that poor, crumpled creature back there on the ground! The unnatural silence half convinced her she was alone, that he’d left the park. The problem was, she couldn't be sure. Several times she thought she caught a soft, dull footfall and she had frozen on the spot, waiting for the danger to pass. Instinct told her that something was out there, searching through the mist for her. The question was; could she find a way out of the park without running into him.

She’d never realized Trevellyn Park was so big. Or maybe she was just going around in circles, confused by the smothering blanket of the mist. She gave a strangled sob of relief when the railings of the fence suddenly appeared, blurred outlines sharpening into solid reality. She lunged towards them, icy fingers closing in gratitude around the narrow metal bars. On the other side of them was normality; freedom. Safety!

Placing her foot on the first intersecting rung she hauled herself upwards. It was an effort to sling her leg over the topmost bar but she managed it, balancing precariously at the top for a moment before pivoting around for the jump down. A sudden, flurried rustling in the bushes behind her made her gasp and she hurriedly dropped the six feet to the ground as a tall, masked figure flung himself at the fence, hands reaching for her through the railings.

Shauna screamed, backing away from the fingers that had come so close, close enough to graze the fleece of her jacket. She looked into the eyes staring at her through the black woolen sockets of a balaclava. Crazed eyes, insane eyes, eyes that glittered with a kind of frenzied madness.

For a long moment their gazes locked. Then he spoke in a hoarse, guttural whisper.

"Come here..."

She took another step backwards, distancing herself from that cold malevolence.

As if!

He shook his head. "I think you'll discover it was a bad afternoon to take a walk!"

Shauna’s heart was pounding, fear turning her legs to water. "I already did!