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The Dark of Night: A Dark Night Thriller, #3
The Dark of Night: A Dark Night Thriller, #3
The Dark of Night: A Dark Night Thriller, #3
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The Dark of Night: A Dark Night Thriller, #3

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Emma Gilbert never imagined she'd have to battle an ancient evil, one whose powers and rage have been building for centuries.

Rabid Reader says, "Once again Jason LaVelle has written an intricate, creepy and yet thought provoking story that keeps you on the edge of your seat... The storyline captures your imagination and sends shivers down your spine...."

More than twenty years have passed since Karen Gilbert was stalked by a demon child intent on her death. Still, she can't escape from dark forces in this world. As her life draws near its end, her body ravaged by the same cancer that took her mother and grandmother before her, she's restricted to a hospital bed. With time running out, she must warn her daughter of the dark forces in the world, those she could never talk about before.

Emma Gilbert is as beautiful and headstrong as her mother, and she's just learned that she's about to be called into battle against an unimaginable evil that has stalked the earth for a millennium. She flounders under the weight of her newfound knowledge, and what it might mean for her life, but she cannot ignore her destiny. Forced into a supernatural confrontation, she discovers the daunting stakes should she fail—much more than her own life.

Jane Straugh says, "The minute I started reading this I was hooked and could not stop reading it. There was excitement from start to finish, lots of twists and turns...."

Evolved Publishing presents the third book in the "A Dark Night Thriller" series. This supernatural thriller/horror novel will keep you at the edge of your seat in suspense. [DRM-Free]

 

LanguageEnglish
Release dateNov 1, 2018
ISBN9781622534579
The Dark of Night: A Dark Night Thriller, #3
Author

Jason LaVelle

Jason LaVelle is an author and photographer from West Michigan. When he’s not spending time with his beautiful wife and four children, LaVelle works at a veterinary clinic, helping animals of all kinds. With his two pugs, Dragon and Mr. Sparkles, his Chihuahua, Mari, and his annoying dachshund, Lady, he pretty much lives in a zoo. After he’s done playing with the pugs and tucking the kids into bed, he ventures down into the basement, where his umbrella cockatoo, Bella, whispers in his ear like a demonic muse, forcing him to explore the paranormal world inside his mind.

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    Book preview

    The Dark of Night - Jason LaVelle

    Copyright

    Evolved_Evolution_Logo_Color-small

    www.EvolvedPub.com

    ~~~

    THE DARK OF NIGHT

    A Dark Night Thriller – Book 3

    Copyright © 2018 Jason LaVelle

    Cover Art Copyright © 2018 D. Robert Pease

    ~~~

    ISBN (EPUB Version): 1622534573

    ISBN-13 (EPUB Version): 978-1-62253-457-9

    ~~~

    Editor: Jessica West

    Interior Designer: Lane Diamond

    ~~~

    eBook License Notes:

    You may not use, reproduce or transmit in any manner, any part of this book without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations used in critical articles and reviews, or in accordance with federal Fair Use laws. All rights are reserved.

    This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only; it may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, please return to your eBook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

    ~~~

    Disclaimer:

    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or the author has used them fictitiously.

    Books by Jason LaVelle

    A DARK NIGHT THRILLER

    Book 1: Whispers in the Shadows

    Book 2: The Cold Room

    Book 3: The Dark of Night

    ~~~

    DYING WORLD CHRONICLES

    Book 1: Pathosis

    Book 2: Ecocide

    ~~~

    www.jnlavelle.com

    ~~~

    What Others Are Saying about Jason LaVelle’s Books:

    ~~~

    Whispers in the Shadows:

    If you love biopic type stories that drag you into the life of a character and becomes a highly addictive ride you can’t put down, this story is perfect. Dealing with sensitive issues in the timeline from love, murder, persecution for sexual preferences, and the role of woman in society during world war events. This is one story that will suck you in and keep you wondering what is going to happen next. ~ Voracious Reviews

    ~~~

    Whispers in the Shadows:

    This is a story that says many things, not only is it a great supernatural thriller but it also shows what psychological damage abuse, desperation and war can cause to a person. It speaks to us of the beauty of love, of having the courage to follow your heart and of being true to yourself despite what others may think. It is tastefully written and the fact that the characters, Delia and Alice, were based on real people makes this book all the more interesting, even if the actual story is fiction. ~ Rabid Reader

    ~~~

    The Cold Room:

    This book was CRAZY! I got whiplash from reading it. Things went from so nice and happy to insanely dark. And then back. And forth. I LOVED the characters, especially the dialogue between the two main characters. I really enjoy a story that has real, fleshed out characters and a moving plot line. This book had it all. I kept guessing the whole time I was reading and was always wrong. Even the last sentence had me in shock. If you like dark, creepy ghost stories with a hint of realistic romance, you will definitely want to read this. And I hope this author has more books coming out, because I really want to know the story behind some of his minor characters. ~ A. Jaeger

    ~~~

    The Cold Room:

    I was pretty blown away by this story. It was full of twists and turns that I never saw coming. Plus, it had a steamy, romantic side infused into the pages which made me cheer the main couple on. ... Once it took off like a freight train with no brakes, I could not put it down. It was fast -paced, awesome, very detailed and the storytelling was immaculate. When the back story comes into play, full of lore and legend, it gripped onto me and never let go. Gave me the creeps! ~ Voracious Reviews

    BONUS CONTENT

    We’re pleased to offer you not one, but two Special Sneak Previews at the end of this book.

    ~~~

    In the first preview, you’ll enjoy the First 2 Chapters of WHISPERS OF THE DEAD, the first book in the award-winning Zoë Delante Thrillers series by C.L. Roberts-Huth.

    ~~~

    ~~~

    IndieHeart says, "There’s a little mystery, a little romance, and a lot of suspense and magick. Recommended if you like an action-packed paranormal tale."

    ~~~

    OR GRAB THE FULL EBOOK TODAY!

    YOU’LL FIND LINKS TO YOUR FAVORITE RETAILER HERE:

    ZOË DELANTE THRILLER Series at Evolved Publishing

    In the second preview, you’ll enjoy the First 3 Chapters of the award-winning DEVIL’S DEN, the first book in multiple award-winning author Jeff Altabef’s A Nephilim Thriller series.

    ~~~

    ~~~

    D. Donovan, Senior Reviewer, Midwest Book Review, says, "Readers who enjoy an injection of the supernatural rather than a story based entirely on otherworldly forces will appreciate just the right blend of paranormal tension and intrigue that bring this thriller to life.... [A] vivid, winning tale of a former couple’s confrontation with themselves, each other, and a wider-ranging threat that grabs the reader from the beginning and proves nearly impossible to put down. Thriller audiences will find Devil’s Den more than a notch above others in the genre." [Pick of the Month - September 2018]

    ~~~

    OR GRAB THE FULL EBOOK TODAY!

    YOU’LL FIND LINKS TO YOUR FAVORITE RETAILER HERE:

    A NEPHILIM THRILLER Series at Evolved Publishing

    Dedication

    As always, for my family.

    Table of Contents

    Title Page

    Copyright

    Books by Jason LaVelle

    BONUS CONTENT

    Dedication

    Prologue

    Chapter 1

    Chapter 2

    Chapter 3

    Chapter 4

    Chapter 5

    Chapter 6

    Chapter 7

    Chapter 8

    Chapter 9

    Chapter 10

    Chapter 11

    Chapter 12

    Chapter 13

    Chapter 14

    Chapter 15

    Chapter 16

    Chapter 17

    Chapter 18

    Chapter 19

    Chapter 20

    Chapter 21

    Chapter 22

    Chapter 23

    Chapter 24

    Chapter 25

    Chapter 26

    Chapter 27

    Chapter 28

    Chapter 29

    Chapter 30

    Chapter 31

    Acknowledgements

    About the Author

    What’s Next?

    More from Jason LaVelle

    More from Evolved Publishing

    Special Sneak Preview: WHISPERS OF THE DEAD by C.L. Roberts-Huth

    Special Sneak Preview: DEVIL’S DEN by Jeff Altabef

    Prologue

    Karen lay in bed on Saturday afternoon, somewhere between sleep and wake, but with a terrible feeling in her gut. She’d worked at the event center last night until midnight, then returned home to find that the babysitter hadn’t cleaned up. The kitchen was trashed, with bits of sticky, dehydrating mac and cheese stuck to the stove and the kitchen island. There was a hotdog wedged between the refrigerator and the counter and about fifty plastic cups, each in various states of filled or empty, were left to ferment in different spots around the kitchen and dining area.

    So she did what any mom would do, she paid the babysitter, because she couldn’t very well find another one right now, then started cleaning. It was almost two in the morning by the time she lay down in bed. Her heart was thumping so hard with exhaustion that she almost couldn’t fall asleep. Then four hours later, like clockwork, Emma woke up.

    Karen slogged through breakfast, trying and failing to make two good-tasting fruit parfaits, and eventually settled on oatmeal with a couple of blueberries on top. Then it was time to ready Emma for karate class and Karen felt even worse.

    Emma was in fine spirits, but she was only five, and in truth, the girl was always happy.

    Karen braided her daughter’s hair down her back, dragging the long brown locks away from her forehead while Emma sang You Are My Sunshine.

    After an hour at the dojo, trying hard not to nod off, they headed back home for a lunch of peanut butter and jelly. Then, finally, quiet time. Formerly nap time—before Emma reached the mature age of five and professed that she no longer needed a nap—quiet time was a ninety-minute siesta in which Emma could play quietly in her room, read books, or sleep. That was also the time when Karen could finally lie down herself.

    She flopped over onto her bed still wearing jeans and a sweatshirt. She’d at least remembered to kick her worn house shoes off. She nuzzled her face against the pillow, lying on her side like she always did, letting her bad hip stay in the air.

    Ever since Joel had attacked her almost six years ago, she had chronic pain in her hip where the ischio-femoral tendon had been torn.

    Sleep overtook her—a deep, black sleep with no dreams. Her body fell hard into it without hesitation and soon, she was snoring and time passed effortlessly. Quiet time went from one hour to two and Karen still slept, her over-taxed mind shut down completely. A sound finally woke her. Her groggy eyes peeled themselves open, trailing stringy mascara. She lay in bed, looking up at her ceiling for a moment, then heard the sound once more. An odd, scraping sound, followed by a bang, then more scraping. She looked over to her alarm clock. Two in the afternoon. She’d been out for two hours. Scrape, bang, scrape.

    What was she doing in there, what could she be dragging across her floor? Emma’s room had wood floors just like her own, which amplified sound throughout the upstairs. Karen rose slowly from bed, wincing as a twinge of pain darted through her hip. Toys hit the floor with a clatter, then the gritty scraping came again. The window. Someone was opening Emma’s window!

    Karen shot out of her bedroom, swaying momentarily as her body adjusted to the change in position. She ran out into the hallway and pulled Emma’s door open. Karen took in her daughter’s room. The bed was messy as always, with three books scattered on top of the peeled back blankets. Her toy box was shoved underneath the window. That must have been the banging and scraping Karen heard: Emma moving the heavy trunk from the other side of her room. But no Emma in the room. Not in the room because she was outside the window, standing on the narrow ledge overlooking the sidewalk twenty-five feet below. She flapped her arms up and down in an exaggerated bird motion while staring up at the sky.

    Karen screamed for Emma as she sprinted through the room, dodging Lalaloopsy dolls and Legos. Emma heard her scream and startled, trying to look behind her into the room. One of her daughter’s little feet slipped forward. She started to fall.

    No! Karen screamed and dove at the window, both arms outstretched before her. Her chest slammed into the window frame, but her hands found purchase on her daughter’s body. She clamped one hand on Emma’s arm. The other caught her bright turquoise shirt, and she braced herself. Emma flopped against the outside of the house, crying out as her head smacked into the wooden lap-siding.

    Still not breathing, Karen hauled the girl’s small body back in through the window frame until she fell backward and Emma landed on top of her. Furious heat burned in her face. She wanted to scream at Emma, maybe even spank her, but all she could do was cry.

    Momma, it’s okay. They told me I don’t belong here anymore. They told me I could just fly away.

    That very day, Karen resigned from her job as event planner and coordinator at the Lakeside Banquet Hall. She had enough loyal clients that she could go into business for herself and not have to be away from home so much. Consumed with guilt about what almost happened to Emma, Karen felt she had no other choice. If she hadn’t been so exhausted, she would have never slept so long or so hard. Jesus, she almost lost her baby, and Emma was the only thing that Karen really cared about in the world.

    She made the decision right then that she would live every day for her and her daughter. She would find the money they needed wherever she could, but the most important thing was Emma. It was time for them to start living, to start living together.

    And the voices her daughter heard, her imaginary friends? Karen tried to tell herself that it was a silly phase of childhood, but she was scared, and not only because her daughter’s ‘friends’ had almost convinced her to commit suicide. They were creepy, and even though they weren’t real, Karen had some experience with things that weren’t supposed to be real, and for that reason, they frightened her more than they might have any other mom.

    Emma was just a little girl, and Karen wanted to protect her, had to protect her, especially after the evil she herself had lived through. Because sometimes the evil things aren’t just in your head. Sometimes, the creepy imaginary friends were actually monsters.

    She didn’t know where to turn for help, she didn’t know who would believe her, but one thing was for certain: she would always have to keep a close eye on Emma.

    Chapter 1

    It should have been over, she should have been dead, but she wasn’t. The small thing that lived in Joel’s body—the demon, the curse—had lived for many years, and when he died, she should have died too. She had hoped she would die. An eternity was too long to be on the Earth, even when one had as many special qualities as she had. But perhaps that was part of her own curse, because even after the fire and the death—pain, so much pain—she was once again reborn into the useless, squalling body of a human child.

    There was no telling how much consciousness was really passed from one life to the next. There was no way of knowing just how much an infant’s mind could comprehend, even with the burden of consciousness inside. After all, a baby was just a baby, wasn’t it? Sometimes, yes, but definitely not this baby. One thing was for certain; the child Amala learned quickly, much faster than her predecessors had.

    From the very first time she opened her eyes, when she looked at the face of her earthly father, she could feel her own power. It tugged around the corners of her mind and reached out, drawing in all life around her. She could see the very fabric of her father’s being within him; she could feel it like a barely tangible skein of energy, humming with life just at the surface. Her power reached out and touched the thin veil, caressed it, drew it to her. And in those brilliant infant’s eyes, she could see him dying. But she stopped.

    Her instinct for survival took over; it knew, it remembered. In a milky haze of memory, the infant’s brain decoded messages from the past, when Amala’s powers had lashed out and killed those around her too soon. She couldn’t kill her parents, not now. She needed him, she needed them, at least for now. This body was immature and weak, easily damaged. So she inhaled the rich power within herself, drawing it against its will back into her, and she watched the color of life return to her father’s face. Patience must be exercised until she was strong.

    She endured for many long years, learning to walk, learning to speak. She endured the embarrassment of pissing and shitting in her diapers, the humiliation of her ‘parents’ wiping her ass, feeding her helpless body, passing her from family member to family member for them to stick their chubby fingers in her face and make ridiculous infantile noises at her. She hated them, she hated all of it. She still didn’t remember everything, but she knew she had been in the world for far too long. She was bitter and exhausted.

    At twelve years old, she lost control and lashed out at a boy at school. He was an idiot, a little douche bag, but she should have known better.

    Beaner! he called out in the playground. He was a towheaded sixth grader, standing with two of his little friends.

    Amala, who was named Destiny by her mother and father, was sitting by herself on a swing, slowly rocking back and forth. She didn’t look like a beaner, with her white skin and green eyes, but her hair was black and her mother and father both spoke with a Hispanic accent. She didn’t know what exactly sparked the rage—it could have been the jibe at her family’s cultural heritage but, in truth, she didn’t care that much about such things. Originally, she was Egyptian, born a millennia ago; though that was something she hadn’t yet come to know. Maybe it was simply that he had the gall to speak to her in the first place.

    Why me? And why be a dickhead? She was a beautiful girl, thin, already developing breasts, with clear skin and a melodious voice. Her eyes were a molten green, a color so rich that it seemed to move. They had a hypnotic quality, and she found that when people looked into them, it was easy to press her will onto them. And yet here she was, a target. Of course she was; he was a man—a baby man, yes, but a man just the same. It may have been thousands of years but they didn’t change, they just found new ways to humiliate women.

    You filthy wetback! Are you gonna say something or can’t you understand? He laughed. They all laughed.

    Suddenly, she was overflowing with feeling, with emotion, with anger. She rose from the swing, arms shaking. She felt little tremors rippling in her legs as she stalked toward him. It was out of control, the heat building within her, somewhere between pubescent hormones and ancient rage. Whatever the source, she reached the little dickhead much faster than he expected, and he stumbled back a little, but she caught him, her arm snapping out lightning quick and grasping his collar, then pulling him to her. She felt an animal need to—to do something, to hurt him, to consume him. So what she did next came as a complete shock to his friends.

    She smashed her mouth on top of his in a large, open mouth kiss, then sucked—hard. Something broke free in the boy, she felt it pop in her mouth, then a wonderful thing happened. Something started to flow from his body into hers, a delicious, sweet energy. It was alive, writhing in her mouth and she gulped it down, drank him down. It was incredible, and as close to orgasmic as her little body had ever felt. She didn’t want to stop; she never wanted to stop. The boy became heavier, then fell out of her arms, thumping onto the ground. She stood there, looking down at him, feeling better than she’d ever felt in her life.

    That’s what scared the recess monitor the most when she came running as fast as her sixty-year-old legs would carry her. The boy was on the ground. His skin was white. His eyes were gray. The black-haired girl standing over him was smiling. His friends had backed away, terrified. And the girl was smiling.

    The boy was dead. He had been stupid, an asshole, but just a boy. Now a dead boy. And she was a twelve-year-old murderess.

    Of course there was no real forensic or medical evidence that suggested she could have actually hurt the boy. There was no bruising of any kind, no trauma. His heart just stopped. Still, there were suspicions. There was worry, confusion, pain, and heartache. There were fingers pointed—a witch hunt, if you will—and Destiny’s family moved away from the school district.

    They moved to a small Catholic school on the south side of Holland. The memories of the boy she killed were pushed away. Not forgotten, but locked up tight. She knew she had done wrong, and she knew the pleasure she took when she killed him had been reprehensible. What disturbed her most was the way her parents seemed to shut down after that. They didn’t yell at her, they didn’t discipline her, and in fact, both her mother and father seemed to avoid her. It appeared to Destiny that they were ashamed of her, and she grew smaller in her mind.

    Then she realized they were afraid of her, their own daughter. So as she began her courses at St. Patrick’s, the small angry part of her grew much larger. Smaller classes and teachers who hovered over the students marked the private school’s dedication to educational excellence. Everyone looked the same in their uniforms, but Destiny was still...different. She did her best to stay out of trouble, to just get by, but it was difficult. She had needs that built up within her, lusts that would not be quieted, and a powerful desire to harm those around her.

    Chapter 2

    So did you get past that Civics lesson, or are you still stuck on it? Karen asked, pausing and leaning on the carved wood walking stick. Emma was a half dozen paces in front of her, and turned to look over her shoulder at her mother. Her dark hair was pulled back tight in a ponytail, giving her face a more severe look. She reminded Karen of herself at a younger age: strong and confident.

    You know, Emma began,

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