AWAKENING: A YOUNG ADULT PARANORMAL ROMANCE (THE EQUINOX PACT Book 1) Read online

  AWAKENING

  THE EQUINOX PACT BOOK 1 - A YOUNG ADULT PARANORMAL ROMANCE

  LEIGH WALKER

  AWAKENING

  A YOUNG ADULT PARANORMAL ROMANCE

  THE EQUINOX PACT BOOK 1

  Copyright © 2020 by Leigh Walker.

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author's rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  All characters in this book are fiction and are figments of the author’s imagination. v.5.22.2020.

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  Contents

  1. DAYLIGHT

  2. SURFACE

  3. THE ISLAND

  4. STANDING APOLOGY

  5. WAITING

  6. HIM

  7. TAKE MY WORD FOR IT

  8. SHIFT

  9. YOU’RE WELCOME

  10. ONCE UPON A SEAL

  11. EDGAR

  12. STICKS AND STONES

  13. A CHANCE

  14. SOLSTICE

  15. RING A DING DING

  16. INTRODUCTIONS

  17. A DIFFERENT LIGHT

  18. GLIMPSES

  19. RUN FOR IT

  20. AS IF

  21. SHOCK AND AWE

  22. WAKE ME UP

  23. YOU

  24. THE MESSAGE

  25. WILD WORLD

  26. EXTRA

  27. COLD WATER

  28. SOFTENING

  29. SHAKY

  30. STARTING SOMETHING

  31. RISE

  32. WHO COULD STAY

  33. GLIMMER

  34. BRIEFED

  35. IF I KNEW IT ALL THEN

  36. REAR WINDOW

  37. TOO FACED

  38. PROTECTIVE

  39. THE ALTAR

  40. COUNTDOWN

  41. TOXIC

  42. THE VISITOR

  43. HIGHER LOVE

  44. LIKE A PRAYER

  45. THE GALA

  46. DOWN DOWN DOWN

  Epilogue

  Dear Reader

  Also by Leigh Walker

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  1

  DAYLIGHT

  Last night I dreamt I was on the island again. I’m down near west beach, at the Tower. It’s been a while, but it looks the same. It can’t be—I know this. But in the dream, I choose to ignore the facts.

  I stand in the field at the end of the drive. The crickets chirp in the high grass as it sways, swept by the ocean breeze. Toward the water the enormous mansion looms, white and empty, its tower outlined against the darkening sky. The waves crash against the rocks. The ocean rumbles, buzzing in my ears.

  I want to go inside the house more than anything. I want to see who else is here. But as I start up the steps, something, some dim awareness, tugs at me: Go back. Leave. I should never have returned. But in the way of dreams, my limbs are heavy, and I’m slow to follow instructions. The only thing that’s fast are my thoughts. They whizz, chasing the truth, reaching for the edge of the memory of what happened to this place. It eludes me, slipping around the corner, just out of reach…

  I jerk awake, first stunned by the sunlight streaming through the unfamiliar windows, then grateful for it. In the sun, it’s safe to think about the big white mansion on the island.

  I turn and stare at the empty space next to me, and my sense of well-being evaporates.

  Some things are never safe to think about.

  2

  SURFACE

  Even though it was a five-hour drive to Bar Harbor, I wasn’t ready when the bus pulled into the station. I peered through the window but didn’t see my dad waiting for me. Instead there was my stepmother, Becky, scowling at her phone and furiously texting.

  Becky Hale was blonde, tall and slender, her white jeans faux-casually cuffed above her tanned ankles. She arranged her enormous designer bag over her shoulder and pushed her aviator sunglasses up on her nose, while still managing to rapid-fire off a text with one thumb. She didn’t look up as the trickle of seasonal workers and tourists spilled out from the bus. Such people were beneath her concern. I grabbed my duffel bag and took a deep breath, preparing myself.

  Becky sort of really sucked.

  “Hey.” She put her phone away and smiled at me coolly, and I was briefly entranced by the sight of her pretty face. She had that effect on people, and I often wondered what her life would be like if she didn’t have her looks to mask her personality. “Your father couldn’t leave the island—one of the lobster boats just came in.” My father ran the co-op on Dawnhaven, and one of his jobs was getting the lobsters weighed and accounted for when the fishermen came in.

  “Okay. Thanks for coming.” I peered around her. “Where’s Amelia?” Amelia, my half-sister, was fourteen and almost as petrifying as her mother.

  “She’s at sailing lessons.”

  “Ah.” My heart sank. I’d been praying they’d changed their minds at the last minute and sent her to summer camp.

  “Is that all you have?” Becky eyed my cheap duffel with disdain.

  “Yes.” In fact, the contents of my bag were all I had left in the world, but I was not exactly into sharing with Becky.

  “Then let’s go.” She turned on her heel and disappeared into the parking lot.

  There was no How are you doing? Have you eaten? or How were the last couple of weeks with Aunt Jackie? kind of talk from Becky Hale. She did not give a shit, and she wasn’t afraid to show it.

  I hustled after her. If I wasn’t careful, she’d leave me behind and then blame me for it.

  Mount Desert Island or MDI, as it’s commonly known, is the largest island in Maine. The fact that it’s an island used to confuse me when I was little because you could drive there, right across the Trenton Bridge.

  Home to Acadia National Park, MDI is comprised of approximately eighteen towns, most notably the famous tourist destination, Bar Harbor. It boasts mountains, forests, quaint towns with New England charm, and the coldest, cleanest, bluest part of the Atlantic Ocean. It’s also a playground for America’s rich and famous. The Rockefellers once lived on the island, and lots of television executives and celebrities have homes there: the producer of Law and Order, Martha Stewart, John Travolta, Susan Sarandon. A famous young actress was spotted on MDI last summer at a wedding. People gossiped that she’d been out shopping in the afternoon before the ceremony, wearing a white tank top with no bra.

  Becky drove us to Pine Harbor. From there we’d take a water taxi to the small island of Dawnhaven, where Becky, Amelia and my dad lived. It had a year-round population of about a hundred, mostly commercial lobstermen and their families. In the summer, tourists and locals alike flocked to Dawnhaven to have dinner at the restaurant and explore the art galleries, gravel paths, rose bushes and rocky beaches.

  The ferry parking lot was packed, and the dock was crowded with tourists when we pulled in. They waited for public transportation, the mail boat, which delivered the mail and other goods to Dawnhaven several times a day. The Hales never took the mail boat. If my father couldn’t pick her up, Becky hired a private water taxi. My stepmother didn’t suffer much. She’d never rub shoulders with tourists and their faux-leather fanny packs and cheap “Maine-Vacationland” T-shirts.

  Becky parked her enormous Mercedes SUV in one of the reserved spots and we climbed out. I imme
diately felt eyes on us. I know what it looks like. Some of the tourists stared, probably wondering if Becky was famous or just really rich. With the rap-star-grade SUV, along with the huge designer bag, perfect looks and air of detached superiority, strangers often did a double-take when they saw her.

  I was wearing capri leggings, an oversized Worcester Polytechnic Institute T-shirt, and five-dollar flip flops from Old Navy. Maybe people thought I was her assistant.

  “Grab your bag,” she said. “Bud doesn’t wait for anyone.” She didn’t look at me as she spoke. I took my duffel from the trunk, then nodded toward the case of wine and groceries from Main Street Market. “I’ll come back for that.”

  “The crew will get it.” She frowned. “Let’s go. We have a couple of things to discuss.” I followed her down the steep ramp to the dock. There were dozens of boats parked nearby, running the gamut from yachts, to mid-sized sailboats to dinghies. The blue-green water shone in the early afternoon sunlight. Even with all the boats, the water was clean. Freezing, to be sure, but pristine.

  Becky swung a long leg over the side of the water taxi, the Breathless, and easily climbed on board. Once she’d settled in, she pulled her aviators down on her nose, all the better to narrow her eyes at me. “First of all, you have to get a job. Today. You can’t just be hanging around, texting your friends all summer.”

  “O-Okay.” But finding a position could be tricky. Dawnhaven was tiny, with one run-down store and one restaurant. The local kids usually lined up their jobs a year in advance. “I’ll see if they still need anyone at the Portside.”

  “They’ll hire you if they want my business this summer,” she sniffed. “Next thing: you have a curfew. I expect you in our house by ten every night, no exceptions unless you’re working.”

  “Don’t worry about it—I don’t know anyone on the island. I’ll probably be home all the time.”

  The tiniest crease permitted by Becky’s strict Botox schedule appeared between her eyes. “Hopefully you’ll stay busy. And I expect you to be on your best behavior in front of Amelia. That goes without saying.” Even though she felt the need to say it.

  “Of course,” I mumbled. Becky always seemed to assume, because of my mother’s issues, that I was somehow tainted. Little did she know that I’d never drank a beer or vaped, let alone kissed a boy. I was shunned by the popular group back home; on the weekends, I spent my free time working at a sub shop. I’d been deemed “basic” since eighth grade and perhaps “emo” after my mom died—Lena Harris had caught me crying in the bathroom one day. Whatever. I had one more year left before college, one year with Becky and Amelia, one year of suck.

  I just have to make it through.

  Bud, the captain of the Breathless, nodded to us as he reached the dock. “We’ll be going in a minute.”

  “Thanks, Bud.” Becky smiled at him, the faker. Of course, he smiled right back. The tourists watched as Bud and his crew loaded the groceries and wine into the boat. They were probably trying to figure out if they’d seen Becky in the tabloids.

  “Your father will be happy to see you,” she said.

  I nodded. “Me too.”

  “He wanted to come and get you.” I could tell this was the truth because she didn’t seem to want to say it.

  “That’s nice.”

  She pushed the sunglasses up on her head and forced me to confront those light-blue eyes, so cold, in direct contradiction to the smattering of freckles across her nose. In the beginning, the freckles had given me hope that Becky might have a friendly bone in her body; they lied. “This is going to be really tough for me, you know.”

  “I know.” I could only imagine the fight.

  “I’ve worked really hard to make sure Amelia has good character. Please don’t be a bad influence.”

  Years of dealing with Becky had taught me that trying to defend myself was a waste of perfectly decent oxygen. “Don’t worry. I won’t.”

  “She thinks your mother died from cancer.”

  The young crewman untied the boat from the dock and hopped aboard. “Here we go,” Bud said. He put the boat into drive without preamble.

  Becky watched me carefully. “I don’t want any mention of what happened. The past is in the past.”

  I nodded, even though her words cut me. The past, as in my mother, had only been dead for three months. Her death was below Becky’s consideration, as was my grief, but I was literally out of options. “Of course. Your house, your rules.” She’d been drilling it into me since I was four.

  As the Breathless navigated out of the harbor, the tourists watched us, their expressions open and eager. Becky’s golden aviators were back in place, secured against the ocean breeze. Her white-blond hair blew back from her face as she watched the bay open up, mansions lining each side of the craggy coastline. I know what it looks like. But it was so far from the truth that had I been capable, I would’ve laughed and laughed.

  3

  THE ISLAND

  I would never admit it to Becky, but I loved the island. The way the ocean smelled as we crossed from Pine Harbor to Dawnhaven was my favorite scent in all the world. The land was unspoiled, and the earth smelled the way God had probably intended it: pure, luscious, clean.

  We passed two of the neighboring islands, Crescent and Spruce Island, covered with trees and fronted by rocky beaches. I checked on the enormous Osprey nest as we rode by. Easily six feet across, it was situated on top of a tall, man-made tower and had been there for years.

  Dawnhaven came into view. First the uninhabited portion, the rocky coastline bordered by the forest, followed by the restaurant, the dock and the bustling co-op, where my father worked, and the lobstermen brought in their daily hauls.

  I’d fallen for the island because of my dad. When I was younger, he used to tell me stories about it. “The settlers named it Dawnhaven because of what the Indians told them. It’s the easternmost island in the state, so you see the sun come up first. The tribe that lived here, the Wabanaki, used to have to first watch. They protected the others and let them know if they saw danger coming from the ocean.”

  After he and my mother divorced, he moved to the island on a whim. It had been good to him. As the manager of the fisherman’s co-op, he knew all the residents. Tall, ruggedly handsome, and always good-natured, the local women loved him. He started dating Becky, they got pregnant with Amelia, and they got married soon after.

  The sun was halfway over the horizon now; I basked in the warmth on my face as we neared the island dock. Part of me couldn’t wait to see my father, but I’d learned over the years to be conscious of showing too much affection for him. Becky didn’t want us to be close. Still, my heart leapt when I saw him waving from the dock. People called him “Big Kyle” for a reason. My father was six-foot-five and had the shoulders of a linebacker. A grin split his face as the boat got closer. I’d pay for it later, but I couldn’t help but grin back. “Dad!”

  “Hi, pumpkin!” He pulled me off the boat and wrapped me in a hug, engulfing me in his arms. It was like hugging a giant, friendly meat-locker. “Glad you made it safe and sound. Was the bus all right?” I could hear the undercurrent of guilt in his voice, always bubbling below the surface.

  “It was fine.”

  “You girls get some lunch?” he asked.

  Becky made a big show of getting off the boat by herself. She whipped her sunglasses off and gave him a look. “No, we did not. I had to make it back to pick up Amelia from her lesson. I can’t just leave her there.”

  “Amelia is fourteen, and she has a bike,” Kyle reminded her gently. He turned back to me. “Would my beautiful daughter like to get some lunch?”

  I couldn’t see Becky, but I felt certain she was scowling. I didn’t want to start the summer off on the wrong foot. “I’m fine.”

  Dad’s face softened. “C’mon. Let’s go get some chowder and a burger. Becky can drive Her Highness home.”

  Becky stepped forward. “Kyle—”

  He gave her
a warning look, something he usually reserved for the big fights they had about me. “I’m taking Taylor to lunch. You and Amelia are welcome to join us, if you like.”

  “Fine.” She shrugged as if she didn’t care. “You can just load the groceries into the truck, Bud. I’m going to get Amelia.”

  “All right, Mrs. Hale.” The captain tipped his hat.

  “I’ll see you down there, Kyle. Order me an iced tea, please.” Becky put her sunglasses back on and hustled toward the small dock where Amelia took sailing lessons. Of course they were coming to lunch. She wouldn’t want us alone for too long, lest the focus be taken off of her and Amelia for a nanosecond.

  My dad threw his arm around me as we walked up the ramp, then crossed the field to get to the Portside. The island looked just as I remembered. The fields stretched out around us. The dock bustled with activity, kids played wiffle ball down by the beach, the trim white church sat at the top of the road, and the dark-green firs rose majestically into the sky.

  “How are you holding up?” Dad asked.

  “I’m fine.”

  “It was nice that you could stay with Aunt Jackie to finish up school.” He shot me a look. “Was it okay over there?”