Kiss Of Darkness. Heather Graham

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      Jessica couldn’t sleep. She lay on her bed, strangely aware of time passing.

      In the middle of the night, she walked outside to her balcony, which faced the street. She loved her house, and it was sheer luck that she’d been able to buy it. Amazingly, the winds and flooding from hurricane Katrina that had devastated so much of the parish had done very little damage to the Quarter or her house. The house was quite large, and she was able to keep it because, with Stacey’s help, she ran it as a very selective bed-and-breakfast. Her practice, which she ran out of the house, was a good one; in psychology, she had found the perfect vocation. And, on the side, she designed one-of-a-kind costumes for various Mardi Gras krewes.

      From a distance, she could very faintly hear the sounds of music and laughter, carried on the breeze from the French Quarter.

      She looked at the sky again. Absurdly, it appeared as if there was a hint of red in the night air. A hint of red that seemed to grow stronger as she watched and the darkness seemed to take almost physical form around her.

      “Ridiculous,” she told herself.

      She imagined herself with a shrink. “I don’t actually see the dark…I feel it.”

      For a moment, a chill seized her as the darkness seemed to loom, like a hint, a warning. A deep red darkness…

      It made her feel as if she was being hunted. Stalked.

      She stepped back into her room, locking the balcony doors, trying to fight the feeling.

      But she was oddly afraid. As she hadn’t been in ages.

      She stayed awake, staring at the sky, certain the darkness was turning a still deeper red as she watched.

      Her friends had felt it, too, she thought. That was why they’ve been so nervous about her trip.

      This was ridiculous, she told herself. When the conference had been announced, it had immediately intrigued her. And now she was committed to speak. She had to go, and that was that, even though her initial excitement was gone.

      What the hell had changed? she wondered. Or was it all in her mind?

      Suddenly, she felt dizzy. The world before her seemed to shift and change. She was no longer in her bedroom but outside, staring up at a high ridge, and atop the ridge stood a man. He was exceptionally tall, a cape billowing around him in the breeze.

      And he was the epitome of evil.

      Evil that was stalking her. An ancient evil that lurked somewhere in a strange and distant memory that couldn’t be.

      The Master.

      The name flashed unbidden to her mind. She banished it immediately.

      The vision faded. She was home again, in her own room, the peace and beauty barely disturbed by distant sounds from the street, the scent of magnolia blossoms heavy on the air.

      She was losing her mind, she told herself impatiently. She needed some sleep.