Inherent
Lies
Blood Secrets, #2
by Alicia Anthony
Publication Date: March 17th 2020
Publisher: Drury Lane Books
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, & Suspense, Romantic Suspense
A woman with a haunted past…
An agent with a dangerous secret…
A madman with a twisted sense of revenge…
BLURB
While honing her gifts as a cold-case consultant with the Dublin Garda, Liv Sullivan uncovers a personal connection to the spirits who seek her help. Faced with a chance to bring peace to the living, rather than the dead, Liv can’t resist. Even if it means working alongside the man who broke her heart.
Special Agent Ridge McCaffrey chose duty over desire, a mistake that nearly ended Liv Sullivan’s life. So, when a missing person’s investigation exposes a link to Liv, Ridge vows to bring her home, hoping for a second chance with the Bureau’s most valuable asset.
As they rekindle their relationship, an enemy from Ridge’s past looms dangerously close. And when Ridge’s sister is abducted, Liv makes the ultimate sacrifice, placing herself in the crosshairs between a corrupt psychic intelligence operation and an ex-agent with a score to settle.
Can Liv stop a killer before death becomes her only escape?
Inherent Lies is the compelling second book in the Blood Secrets psychological suspense series. If you like flawed heroines and complex plots laced with a hint of romance, then you’ll love this second installment of Alicia Anthony’s award-winning thriller.
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EXCERPT
INHERENT LIES
A Blood Secrets Novel - © 2020 Alicia Anthony
I should have been three
thousand miles away that night, not standing in the drizzle watching recovery
units unearth the remains of a twelve-year-old girl. I shivered as the piercing
caw of a crow sounded from the church steeple behind me.
“Tis an omen, it is.”
Michael Donaghey's white hair lay plastered to his head, darkened by an
afternoon spent in Irish mist. Although he now lived in Dublin, he'd grown up
in County Cork and his accent was heavy even to native Irish. To an American
like me, he sounded like what I'd always thought an Irish man should sound
like, a mix between Darby O'Gill and a post-pubescent Lucky Charms leprechaun.
Michael had been with
the Dublin Garda “since God was a young man,” as he liked to say, and had taken
me under his wing since the afternoon I'd mustered the courage to call the
number on the scrap of paper I'd found in my grandmother's old cottage. That
was almost six months ago. And despite my sister’s urging, I'd never intended
to stay this long.
The trip was planned.
Head to Ireland, tie up some loose ends with my grandmother’s estate, go home.
I’d even factored in a little time with the sister I’d never known. All that,
and it’d be time to go back to Cascade Hills. Time to pick up the pieces of my
jigsaw puzzle of a life. But it was easier to stay. Easier to claim that life
had gotten in the way. When the truth was, death had other ideas.
Michael's arm
blanketed my shoulder in warmth as he joined me at the rock wall. Below us, the
countryside opened, revealing lush hills and valleys just outside Dublin City.
Behind us, across a narrow road, was Johnnie Fox's Pub, whose claim to fame was
being the “highest” pub in all of Ireland.
I'd been there with
Ashlyn my first night in Ireland. Beyond the quaint nooks and crannies of the
pub, there'd been another draw. A sensation, greater than the cozy warmth of
Guinness filtering through my veins. It was a sense of belonging.
Whispers of, “Welcome
home,” wafted on the breeze. Maybe it was because I was with the sister I'd
just recently learned existed, or the fact that I was in a country that held a
special place in my grandmother's heart. Regardless, I felt safe and welcomed
in the land of my ancestors, people who afforded magic and the unexplainable an
air of importance I'd never before experienced.
Trust me, I know how
cheesy that sounds. And now, as jacketed professionals sifted through a blanket
of overgrown vegetation to haul the decomposing remains of an innocent little
girl to the morgue, safe was the most remote emotion.
I pushed the memory of
that first night at the pub away and leaned into Michael's side, the rainproof
fabric of our navy blue Garda jackets sliding noisily against each other.
“It's unfair,” I heard
myself say, realizing too late that I was more distraught over the role I was
forced to play versus the death of someone's daughter. I took a breath and
tried to cover, scuffing my tennis shoe over a loose rock at the base of the wall.
“She didn't do anything to deserve this.”
“Oh, Liv, thirty years
I've been watching these things happen, and thirty years later I still don't
understand the evils of man.” Michael paused, his voice getting quiet. “You,
though, just like your ma, you see it.”
“What if I don't want
to see it anymore?” For the first time I lent a voice to the frustration that
nagged at me.
Michael sighed, his
broad shoulders rose and fell as he gave my shoulder a squeeze. “We aren’t
always afforded the opportunity to choose our destiny.”
Michael had become one
of the few people I could confide in. Before the trip, I anticipated Ashlyn
would have filled that role. I owed her a debt of gratitude for giving me
reason enough to leave the heartache of Cascade Hills in my rear-view mirror.
But since I'd been working with Michael, my relationship with my sister had
changed.
We still got together
for dinner and drinks at least once a week, but there was an air of
inexplicable friction between us. The way my body buzzed with pent up energy
when we were together proved she felt the rift as powerfully as I did. Even so,
she never let on.
She was busy with her
own caseload for the Garda so our talks usually circled around the everyday
minutiae of our jobs. Rarely did our conversations border on our personal
relationship. I was thankful for that. I had a feeling I wouldn't like what she
had to say.
“Perhaps it's time to
take a break, my love.” Michael had started calling me that the first day I met
him, and the nickname stuck.
I glanced over at him,
grateful for a reason to stop watching as techs zipped what was left of the
girl’s blackened body into an oversized bag and lifted her onto a gurney.
Michael’s blue eyes
twinkled down at me, the skin crinkled at the corners above round rosy cheeks.
His easy smile was what had first drawn me to him. Many officers in the Garda
were so serious in their work. Michael tempered his professionalism with a good
dose of Irish wit. It was obvious why my birthmother had chosen him as her
partner some twenty years before.
No matter what case he
was working, what horrific crime he was forced to solve, he never allowed the
horrible parts of his job to cloud his psyche.
“The devil knocks on
our door every day, lads. The key is, not to let him in.” I'd heard that turn
of phrase from Michael countless times. The younger generation of officers had
taken to ignoring him. It was hard not to notice the sideways glances between
them, the condescension of an old man teetering on the edge of senility,
spouting nonsense. But from the beginning, I knew he was different.
“Donaghey, Sullivan!
Over here!” One of the crime scene investigators motioned for us from the
bottom of the hill. I followed Michael over the low rock wall. Picking my way
down the embankment with care, I worked to keep a firm grip on the wet foliage
beneath the rubber soles of my tennis shoes. Michael, by contrast, trotted
easily down the incline, ignoring any threat the rain-glazed vegetation posed
to a man of his age. I hurried to join him just as one of the investigators
began to speak.
“Could be the murder
weapon.” The older of the two men pointed into the knee-high grass.
Michael glanced back
at me, waiting for my input. I peered down into the weeds. A knife, about eight
inches long with a curved blade glinted up at me. It was caked with mud, the
ivory handle blackened by time and grime. I blew a silent stream of air through
my lips as relief flooded me. The knife had nothing to do with the girl’s
death, sparing me from the impromptu vision that too often accompanied crime
scene finds.
“It's not the murder
weapon. She was strangled.”
Two sets of eyes bored
into me.
“Quite a coincidence,
then, isn’t it? How can you be sure?” The younger of the two crime scene
investigators gave me a doubtful look, one eyebrow raised, voice ripe with
skepticism.
“Has she been wrong
before?” Michael shot back. “Give us a ring when the forensics come in. Sure,
they’ll be looking for ligatures.”
And so it had been for
the last several months, Michael cocooning me from skeptics while I re-opened
cases long cold with ever intensifying visions. There was an obvious divide
within the Garda. A good majority believed that psychic dreams held merit. Most
still had grandmothers that swore by the call of the banshee. But not everyone
was willing to admit those beliefs, at least not out loud.
Others asserted
psychic mediums were nothing more than a spoof, a hoax meant to draw attention
or money. I had a file full of newly closed cases to prove otherwise, so it
didn't bother me, except when we were in the field and one of the investigators
called me out.
Sometimes I think they
just wanted me to go there, to tell them the gory details of the images that
haunted me, rubbernecking their way into my own personal freak show. But there
was only one person I wanted in the room when I was relaying a vision, and that
was Michael.
I glanced up the hill
toward Johnnie Fox's as we walked away from the scene. The setting sun peeked
slowly from behind receding clouds, shooting rays of sunshine down onto the sheep
field beyond the pub. In a moment, the weeping skies would clear and there
would be a rainbow, a meteorological phenomenon marking the predictable shift
of the Irish sky that never ceased to amaze me.
A crow called again
from the church as Michael and I approached the car. The steeple drew my
attention once more as the bird took flight, vacating the bell tower with a few
strong flaps of blue-black wings. The girl had been found exactly where I'd
said she would. Our job here was done.
The rain-streaked passenger
window of the car brightened as the clouds drifted away. An arc of vibrant
colors slid down behind Johnnie Fox’s. Michael pulled the car away from the
side of the road, winding down the hill toward the city while the fear-widened
eyes of a twelve-year-old girl shadowed my thoughts.
Tour Wide Giveaway
To celebrate the release of INHERENT LIES by Alicia Anthony, we're giving away a paperback copy of Inherent Truth, book one in the Blood Secrets series, to one lucky winner!
GIVEAWAY TERMS & CONDITIONS: Open to US shipping addresses only. One winner will receive a paperback copy of Inherent Truth by Alicia Anthony. This giveaway is administered by Pure Textuality PR on behalf of Alicia Anthony. Giveaway ends 4/30/2020 @ 11:59pm EST.
Author Info
ALICIA ANTHONY‘s first novels were illegible scribbles on the back of her truck driver father’s logbook trip tickets. Having graduated from scribbles to laptop, she now pens novels of psychological suspense in the quiet of the wee morning hours. A full-time elementary school Literacy Specialist, Alicia hopes to pass on her passion for books and writing to the students she teaches.
A two time Golden Heart® finalist and Silver Quill Award winner, Alicia finds her inspiration in exploring the dark, dusty corners of the human experience. Alicia is a graduate of Spalding University’s School of Creative & Professional Writing (MFA), Ashland University (M.Ed.) and THE Ohio State University (BA). Go Bucks! She lives in rural south-central Ohio with her amazingly patient and supportive husband, incredibly understanding teenage daughter, two dogs, three horses, a plethora of both visiting and resident barn cats, and some feral raccoons who have worn out their welcome.
When she’s not writing or teaching, Alicia loves to travel and experience new places. Connect with her online at http://www.AliciaAnthonyBooks.com. She’d love to hear from you!
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