Autumn Ritual (Falling into Darkness #2)

Chapter 1 – Sara

Oh, look, a random bale of hay in the middle of a cornfield.

That wasn’t at all suspicious. I began to count down from three in my head. The sound of our shoes crunched over the dirt path. Corn rustled beside us. A blast of wind shot through the opening, swirling the crisp scent of earth and decay past us.

Right on cue, ghouls cawed.

To the left, Maria and a few of my other friends shrieked.

I rolled my eyes.

Of all the scenes, this one was particularly bad.

It was like they weren’t even trying this year.

Most of the props were recycled and had been old a decade ago, when I was still a freaking teen.

But if you calculated the number of visitors to the attraction tonight, increasing the curve on a bell chart as autumn progressed, factoring in nights for bad weather, the profit would still be solid.

I had to remind myself that the goal of the haunted corn maze wasn’t to make the town rich.

Like every festival or event San Pietro Cove put on, the haunted corn maze laundered money for the mob.

Still, the B-rated effort made me cringe.

At the next opening in the maze, zombies crawled on the ground, reaching for our legs with partially detached limbs.

I crossed my arms over my chest and kept walking with the large friend group that dragged me out tonight.

I’d only come back to town this morning, and already the townies roped me into their shenanigans.

I’d tried to stay at home. I hadn’t been faking the exhaustion.

I would rather be plotting my next book or watching reality TV with my mother.

But no…I’d been forced to come out and socialize.

To make matters worse, I’d been told costumes were mandatory.

So here I was, wandering through clacking stalks of corn, dressed as Wednesday Adams. Since I already had glasses, it was as simple as wearing one of my black dresses and pulling my hair into two braids.

At least I wasn’t freezing my tits off like Barbie or the topless Malibu Ken.

Maria was going to catch frostbite in that pink mini dress, while Carlo’s spray tan was two shades too orange.

But my friends ate this event up! I wasn’t sure which was worse: the locals who were loyal or the people in charge who thought this was actually good.

The Ravello Family sponsored this farce.

Surely, they could spare a few bucks to update the theatrics?

Their committee in charge of public festivals could use a plan to make this event better.

I should join the committee.

Or at least give them a scathing review.

“No, Sara, you’re going to ignore your surroundings, and by the time we leave this accursed maze, you’ll have a solid plan to finish your novel,” I ordered myself.

“What did you say?” Camilla turned her head and asked.

I gave her a flat smile. “I’m terrified. Oooh, ahh!”

She rolled her eyes. “The day something scares you will be apocalyptic.”

Giosuè laughed.

Before my friends could tease me again, wraiths floated through the corn stalks. Their wispy black outfits caught on cobs and stalks, putting fresh holes in the material. I rushed away with the group, tuning out the cheesy horror tunes and thinking of tomorrow.

When I could begin a new chapter in my life in the safety of my hometown.

No one was going to hurt me here. The big city drama was behind me. The drive from the Big Apple closed the bad chapters of my life. Returning to the Cove was a delicious beginning, full of possibilities. Here, I could focus on my writing without needing to look over my shoulder.

Having a deranged ex-boyfriend, who wanted to marry me so that he could have his inheritance was bad enough.

Add to that the fact that he’d been cheating on me, then harassed me to the point where I would have gotten a restraining order made it impossible to stay.

And because the judges were corrupt and his family was powerful, even if I’d gotten a restraining order, it wouldn’t have kept him away.

But the people of the Cove would protect me. No one messed with the Ravello Famiglia.

So now, I could write in peace.

Except…you’ll have an audience.

A sigh whispered from my lips. While crashing at my parents’ place was nice, I really needed my own space.

Preferably a spot where my mother wouldn’t be knocking on the door every couple of hours and then chatting with me with no concept of time.

I needed to minimize interruptions. If I wrote five thousand words per day, taking two days off per week, I would hit my word count in a month.

But that was just draft one of the stories swimming in my head.

“No Wi-Fi,” I muttered.

I couldn’t afford distractions. While an indie author needed to market their own books, I couldn’t promote something on social media if I hadn’t actually written it.

Other authors did, but my scattered thoughts made things change too often in a story to get a solid grasp, especially in the early drafts.

Going off the grid and unplugging was the best course of action.

The lake house….

I stopped short, rubbing my arms. That could work. My parents wouldn’t hesitate to let me spend the next few months there. I would be close enough to have the occasional dinner with them, while still being able to disappear into my work.

A real smile tipped my lips. Acres of land would provide solitude. The view while writing would inspire the setting of my romantasy. Fresh fall air, walks along the shivering shore, a glass of wine on the deck with a fire—I could do that!

By the time we left the haunted maze, I was practically jumping up and down with excitement. Leaving the city was the best choice. Coming back to my roots wasn’t career suicide. I took life’s lemons and made the best damn cocktail ever.

“Let’s grab some food!” Carlo suggested.

I looked around our group. There was one person I needed to say goodbye to, and then I would slip away.

Socializing wasn’t my favorite thing. Granted, I’d grown up with these people, but their brains were built differently.

They had jobs that required human interaction.

They thrived off their social calendars. I was content to be alone.

“Where’s Ivry?” I asked.

Maria tossed her faux blonde pigtails. “I don’t know. Did we lose her?”

“She’s not here.”

“She’s a big girl,” Giosuè laughed. “She can handle herself.”

I was about to yell at him that leaving someone behind in the corn maze was wrong, when Maria began to vibrate with energy.

“The don is here,” Maria stage whispered.

Carlo pulled himself up straight. As did every other guy in our group. Their change in posture was a silent salute to their fearsome leader.

Camilla snorted. “Yeah? So?”

“So, we should go say hi,” Maria insisted, looking across the event area like a huntress who’d spotted her prey.

I pulled out my phone and dialed my friend as the girls in our group broke away to talk to Lucian Ravello while the boys went to scope out the food trucks.

There was a wrestling match in the corn pit, and someone was playing king of the hill on the haybale castle.

Dozens of visitors were selecting pumpkins from the benches and antique chairs to purchase.

The line to enter the maze was still long.

Good for the town and their event committee.

An icy breeze slithered across my skin.

“Sara?” Ivry answered in a breathless rush, her voice crackling in my ear.

“Hey! Are you still in the maze? Do you need us to come back to find you?” I clapped a hand over my other ear to hear her response.

“Oh! No,” Ivry laughed. “Sorry, I should have texted. But I already left.”

Relief rushed through me, followed by a spike of annoyance.

Ivry was older than the rest of us and had been like my big sister growing up.

She even stayed home alone with me sometimes when she was a teen, and I was the gangly kid in braces.

And when I was sick, she was my biggest cheerleader.

Her unshakeable faith helped ground me through the cancer treatments. We’d always been close.

But she could have told me she’d left. “Okay, good, I’m about to leave too.”

“Sorry if I worried you.” Ivry sounded contrite.

“No problem, talk to you tomorrow?” I asked absently as Maria intercepted the mafia boss with her flock of friends.

The hairs on my arms lifted as another chilling blast of the supernatural fluttered through the event. I looked around but didn’t see anything.

“Sure thing!” Ivry chirped, and the call disconnected.

I shook myself.

It was hard to be upset with Ivry for ditching us.

I hadn’t been interactive with the group while we’d traipsed through the corn maze.

My own thoughts consumed me enough that I hadn’t even noticed her absence.

Ivry was just the one friend I more than tolerated, so wondering if she was lost had worried me.

I need to be a better friend.

Just another reason why the lake house held appeal. I wouldn’t be interrupted with obligations unless I came into town. There would be a legitimate excuse to be a hermit.

“Okay, I’m going to head out,” I told Camilla.

She glanced at me, momentarily tearing herself away from Pink Barbie Maria, who was flirting hard with an uninterested Lucian. “Oh, okay. Bye!”

I gave her a wave, but before I stepped away, Maria’s hyena giggle made me cringe.

The writer in me wanted to tell her it was never going to work.

My brain started to do that thing where I analyzed my surroundings and cataloged them like a book.

Lucian hadn’t been interested in any of the local girls and never would be.

Maria’s big tits weren’t enough. He wanted something real.

I watched for a moment, calculating how his story would happen.

I could see it play out. A mystery woman, blown into town, who didn’t look at him as the don, but saw the man under the title.

He would fall hard, trying to catch her attention.

There was a soft noise, eerie under the chaos of the people.

I jumped.

The shadows to the left shifted, and a man stepped into view. The pulse in my throat made it impossible to breathe. I was frozen, rooted to the ground as the feeling of facing a real monster spread through me. This wasn’t an actor or a ghoul.

He was a living, breathing devil.

He entered the event area from the pumpkin patch, unfolding from the dark as though he’d been part of the night. I blinked and pushed my glasses up my nose, trying to hide the physical response to flee.

Oh! It’s just…him.

Camillo Ravello, cousin to the don, and his enforcer.

But it wasn’t the killer’s title that made my heartbeat speed up.

It was the specter, ageless and still as hot as when we were younger and he’d lived next door.

What had it been? A couple of years? Crap, no…

. More like five. Maybe six since we’d last spoken.

It would have been before I left the Cove.

I rarely saw Cam when I came home for the holidays.

And the last two years, my parents had come to visit me.

The wind picked up, and a shudder rattled my bones.

He looked good. Tall, and fiercely independent.

He could take on any Made Man here and win.

It wouldn’t even be a fair fight. He was built differently.

The Ravello Famiglia dealt in mercenaries.

They were hitmen, the best assassins in the world.

But in a town of men who walked on the wrong side of the law, men who were hired to kill, Cam was the monster who kept them in line.

He was the don’s enforcer. The man who hunted down and ended killers.

His light brown eyes took in the scene as he walked toward Lucian.

Up close, they had a golden quality, the brown of a setting sun.

A small ache formed in my chest, and I took a step forward before I stopped myself.

His wild hair was buzzed short. A scar cut through an eyebrow.

Maybe the last few years had changed him more than I’d realized.

“The harvest ball is this weekend,” Maria gushed, her falsetto tone snapping me back into reality. “Are you coming?”

Lucian looked like the collar of his dress shirt was going to cut off his air. “Cam and I will be there.”

The enforcer stopped beside his cousin, shooting daggers from his gaze.

I couldn’t help it. A laugh bubbled up my throat, but I clapped a hand over my mouth before it could escape. Cam looked downright venomous!

The enforcer must have heard the sound, because his gaze cut to me. It was as though the carnival fell silent around us. A breath dragged into my lungs. For the first time since we’d come to the haunted corn maze, I was warm. I gave Cam a small wave—

And then realized people were looking.

To remedy the awkward moment, I gave everyone a wave, turned on my heels, and began to walk away.

If anyone in our friend group noticed I tripped over a stone, they didn’t say.

But someone saw. I felt his gaze long after I left the autumn attraction.

It burrowed in my spine like a solid presence.

And I wasn’t in a hurry to get rid of it.