Doubting Thomas

By Kristine Kathryn Rusch

Six-year-old Tommy Ulrick saw Santas enter the Sutter house on Christmas Eve, the night the house got robbed. Tommy said Santa stole.

No one believed him, thinking robbers dressed as Santa emptied that house. But Tommy believed.

And when Tommy turns thirty—after losing family and friends—he decides to prove once and for all that the Jolly Old Elf is one evil s.o.b.

Tommy just doesn't expect the J.O. Elf to threaten him—or have the capability to make good on the threat.

Turns out Santa takes that naughty or nice list very seriously. Very, very seriously.

"Rusch is a great storyteller."

—RT Book Reviews

• Language: English
• Publisher: WMG Publishing
• Release date: Nov 26, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393066910

Kristine Kathryn Rusch

USA Today bestselling author Kristine Kathryn Rusch writes in almost every genre. Generally, she uses her real name (Rusch) for most of her writing. Under that name, she publishes bestselling science fiction and fantasy, award-winning mysteries, acclaimed mainstream fiction, controversial nonfiction, and the occasional romance. Her novels have made bestseller lists around the world and her short fiction has appeared in eighteen best of the year collections. She has won more than twenty-five awards for her fiction, including the Hugo, Le Prix Imaginales, the Asimov’s Readers Choice award, and the Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine Readers Choice Award. Publications from The Chicago Tribune to Booklist have included her Kris Nelscott mystery novels in their top-ten-best mystery novels of the year. The Nelscott books have received nominations for almost every award in the mystery field, including the best novel Edgar Award, and the Shamus Award. She writes goofy romance novels as award-winner Kristine Grayson, romantic suspense as Kristine Dexter, and futuristic sf as Kris DeLake.  She also edits. Beginning with work at the innovative publishing company, Pulphouse, followed by her award-winning tenure at The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, she took fifteen years off before returning to editing with the original anthology series Fiction River, published by WMG Publishing. She acts as series editor with her husband, writer Dean Wesley Smith, and edits at least two anthologies in the series per year on her own. To keep up with everything she does, go to kriswrites.com and sign up for her newsletter. To track her many pen names and series, see their individual websites (krisnelscott.com, kristinegrayson.com, krisdelake.com, retrievalartist.com, divingintothewreck.com). She lives and occasionally sleeps in Oregon.

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Doubting Thomas

Doubting Thomas

Kristine Kathryn Rusch

WMG Publishing, Inc.

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Doubting Thomas

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About the Author

Doubting Thomas

Tommy Ulrick discovered the scam when he was six. He remembered everything about the night clearly: the winter dampness in the air, the smell of wood smoke mixed with ocean, waking on his flannel sheets with an urgency that seemed only to happen in childhood. He slipped out of bed and hurried to the bathroom—one of those herky-jerky emergencies where he jiggled all the way, holding himself, and praying he’d arrive on time.

Which he did, just barely. He remembered the relief, and as the relief grew, so did his chill. Someone had left the large bathroom window open, letting the December cold inside, allowing people on the street below to see his most private moment.

He glanced out—still too compromised to pull the window closed—to see if anyone was watching. The neighborhood Christmas lights were off, the houselights were off, even the few porch lights that stayed on late were off. Only the streetlight broke the darkness, casting pools of pale light through the thin fog.

He was safe. No one could see him. He shook himself off, tucked himself back inside his flannel pajamas, reached to close the window— and froze.

There was movement on the roof of the house across the street.

Well, not a house, actually. It was too big to be a house. It was the Sutter place, which his mother used to call, the only bona fide mansion on the Central Oregon Coast. Later when he learned the history of it, when he was