We've all had some sleepless nights here and there, but for Crystal...Excerpt:
Crystal Bawle yawned
for the billionth time. Her fist barely supported her chin while she leaned
against the front desk of Breezes Resort in Horseshoe Bay, Bermuda. If she had
another sleepless night, another night packed with nightmares, she would rent a
boat, sail directly to the center of the Bermuda Triangle, and let the
mysterious zone swallow her. She swore she’d do it this time.
“You look like shit,
Crys,” Rionne D’Agestine, Breezes Resort’s Perkiest Employee announced. Funny
thing was Crystal had been out with Rionne a few times. Perky was so not the word to describe her. Pessimistic, perturbed,
pissed. Yep, all those fit. Perky? No. The only thing perky about Rionne were her boobs, their
overinflated glory bound and boosted to add some allure to her otherwise bitchy
demeanor. Day after day, male customers changed lines to
be serviced by Rionne at the front desk instead of Crystal, whose own boobs
were less than perky. Less than plump, less than protruding, less than perfect.
“Did you hear me?” Rionne
tapped her pen on Crystal’s forearm. “You look like death.”
“What happened to
looking like shit?” Crystal took a step away from the front desk, but could
hardly manage to move her gaze to Rionne’s face. Her eyes felt as if someone
had removed them, used them as beach balls for the afternoon, then put them
back full of sand. A lovely side effect of not sleeping a damn wink.
Ever.
“I had to downgrade for
the sickly gray bags under your eyes. I mean, you always look somewhat
zombie-esque, but it’s really bad today. Totally not attractive.” Rionne
flipped her straight blond hair off her sun-tanned shoulder, her full, pink
lips turned down in disapproval.
Crystal opened her
mouth to reply, but another yawn overtook her.
“You’ve got to ease off
on the partying, mon amie.” Rionne perched herself on one of the stools behind
the front desk and crossed her impossibly long legs. Allowing her sandal, one
with complicated straps and a cork heel, to dangle from her toes, she said,
“Tell me it’s wild sex keeping you up at night. Your appearance would be worth
it if the sex was mind blowing.”
Sex?
Ha! I barely have enough energy to bathe myself, never mind have sex. Besides,
who the hell would be my partner? Rionne reels in all the cute ones.
Crystal shook her head
and immediately regretted it. With no sleep came whopping headaches. She was
used to no sleep. Hadn’t been dozing productively since she was a teenager, but
her teenage body hadn’t cared. It could still keep up. She’d fudged her way
through her twenties with lots of energy drinks. Now that she’d turned thirty,
however, and all she had to show for her life was a stupid Breezes Resort name
tag, her body just couldn’t manage on so little sleep anymore. She didn’t even
dream of a full eight hours either. She’d give her right arm for just twenty
minutes of peaceful slumber. Twenty minutes. Was that too much to ask?
“Do I really look that
bad?” Crystal squinted at her reflection in the black granite covering the
front desk. While she couldn’t see the color of the bags Rionne had so
graciously pointed out, she could definitely see their size. And a trio of
nasty pimples on her chin. And a few wild strands of long, wavy brown hair that
had escaped from her ponytail. Actually escaped
wasn’t the right word. That would mean she’d attempted to get those strands
into the ponytail in the first place, which she hadn’t. Why bother?
Rionne’s face came into
view in the granite. She looked so…alive. So I-slept-like-a-baby-and-always-do.
Oh how Crystal longed
to punch that well-rested face.
Instead, she let out a groan and rested her forehead on the cool granite. “You want to dig a hole
tonight, drop me into it, and bury me?” She pressed her cheek into the desk and closed her dry,
scratchy eyes. Maybe she would find some sleep six feet under the ground. It’d be worth suffocating
just to try.
ABOUT ALL FOUR TALES in DIVE - A QUARTET OF MERFOLK TALES
DEEPER
by Christine
DePetrillo
Crystal Bawle wants to
sleep, but every time she closes her eyes, the drowning nightmare seizes her.
Water is everywhere, and she is swallowed. That deep blue ocean wants her, and
she’s getting too tired to fight.
Doctor Ray Taimen has
spent too much time on land, but he can’t let his people down. His messages of
marine health need to be spread to protect his kin and home. There’s no time
for distractions, especially from an exhausted human.
When Ray falls ill, can Crystal reach deep enough to
save him?
****
MERMAIDS
ARE NOT NICE by
Heather Rigney
Just so you
know, all those stories about mermaids being perky and adorable like nautical
cheerleaders are crap.Just ask Evelyn "Evie” (rhymes with heavy) McFagan, alcohol-fueled funeral director, and all-around lousy mother. In a coastal New England playground, some crazy new chick, named Nomia just spoke to Evie telepathically…or did Evie put a little “something-something” in her coffee again?
Or maybe this time, despite her husband’s insistence that she seek rehab, Evie’s onto something—something fishy.
Snooty playground mom, Marla, has gone missing and Nomia was the last to see her.
Coincidence? Or does the village have a killer trolling around?
Evie is determined to get to the bottom of things…or the bottom of a nice bottle of bourbon; whichever comes first.
Maybe she should stick with the bourbon, because as Evie dives deeper into the mystery, she starts to discover that mermaids are not nice…
****
UNFATHOMABLE
by Rachel E.
Moniz
Just another sunny, summer day on the
coast of Rhode Island...
...until the boat crashed.
Scared, alone and filled with regrets,
Theresa Gordon waits for rescue, her guiltythoughts her only company. As the last remnants of her sanity slip away during the dark night, rescue comes in a most unexpected form.
Troy Williams has
searched for the one woman who can save him and thinks Theresa might be
the one...if only she believes his unfathomable story...
****
BLOODY
DEPTHS
by Joseph Mazzenga
Maren’s home was the
ocean that she loved. An oceanographer, she lived her dream of being one with
the sea until the day an ill fog rolled in to change her life forever.
She lost everything she
knew - her family, her friends and her humanity.
All that remains is her love of the sea, and a fading hope that the humanity within her can be saved by
the caretakers of the ocean that no one knew existed.
Download DIVE - A QUARTET OF MERFOLK TALES today at AMAZON.
Gurgle and glug,
Chris
www.christinedepetrillo.weebly.com
3 comments:
Wow! Aside from an eye catching cover, the excerpts were so very entertaining. I'm off to download this one!
I've felt that way a few times after a sleepless night. I'd punch her co-worker, too! Great excerpt!
Neat excerpt - boy, can I ever empathise with Crystal! And haven't we all had co-workers from hell?
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