Read Online Dead Lucky by M.R. Forbes - Free Book Online Page A

looked more like the inside of a church. Sixteen rows of carved wooden pews lined the room from the back, splitting the center aisle, where a thick white carpet led to the front. The columns on either side were masterfully carved as giant white snakes circling the supports, and the ceiling was painted in a menagerie of symbols and icons that I could only assume were related to voodoo.
    At the front of the whole thing, resting on a recliner between two wicks of burning incense, was Marie's mother. She was just as dark as Marie, and just as bald, the same tattoo ringing her head. She was visibly older, her flesh wrinkled and sagging, her belly protruding from her midsection, unlike her daughter with the solid abs. She was wearing a simple white frock, and she had a glass of iced tea in her hand. A third person, a man, stood behind the chair in a well-tailored three piece suit.
    "Mother," Marie said. "I brought-"
    Her mother raised her hand, and she silenced immediately.
    "Do you have them?" the older woman asked.  
    "The dice?" I patted my pocket. "Yes."
    She smiled. "I knew I could count on you, boy. The bones never be wrong."
    I wasn't sure what she meant.  
    "You have the money?" It was all I cared about at this point. I was going to die without it.
    I saw the guy move behind her, lifting a small form in his hand. I felt the fields shifting as he angled the limbs straight out. I looked over at Danelle, and saw that she had been frozen again.
    "What the fuck is this?" I shouted. My hand started going for my gun, until I remembered that Marie would never let me hit anything with it.
    "Please, calm down," Marie said. She was still standing near me. "It is insurance, nothing more."
    "Insurance?"
    "The bones say you be dangerous," Marie's mother said. "And that she be even more dangerous than you."
    The bones were right about that.  
    "She'll be freed when the exchange has been made. My brother Lucian is going to get the money."
    "Please, come and talk with me, boy. It be many years since I lost Rene. Since I felt his power."
    I looked at Marie, and then up to the front of the room. Why not?
    I gave Danelle one more glance before letting Marie escort me to the front of the room. The incense was thick and heavy, leaving a haze around us. It threatened to make me hack to death right there in front of them.  
    "It be an honor to be a necromancer," Mother said. "A blessing. And a curse."
    My initial thought was that it had only been a curse. Except, I would never have met Dannie if I had never gotten sick. I wouldn't call that a blessing though. More of a silver lining.
    "I'd rather not be dying."
    She laughed. "Dying be part of living, boy. When you be called... you go. It's as simple as that. It isn't wise to cheat death." She shrugged. "Why not get a little benefit from it first? Why not learn some of the secrets? You be hearing it, I know. The power, the magic. Its different for you, not quite voodoo. Similar."
    "I haven't learned many secrets."
    "You be learning that the soul goes on. You know it to be true. That be a very special secret."
    And a frightening one. To know that when you died, you went... somewhere. Somewhere that some asshole with a terminal illness could drag you back from, if you happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or rather, if your body did.  
    "That's one secret I wish I didn't know."
    She laughed harder. "Perhaps for you. It is one I be grateful for. I know my Rene is out there, waiting for me. It be a comfort."
    There was no one waiting for me. Not anymore. Dannie was all I had.
    "I be happy to have the dice back. They been in my family... for as long as anyone can remember."
    I stuck my hand in my pocket and wrapped it around them. Were they getting warmer?
    "What's keeping Lucian?" Marie asked her mother, looking over to the side door he had left from.  
    She shook her head. "Maybe you should go and-"
    The door opened, and Lucian walked in. He had a briefcase in his hand, and a sour