The Finder of the Lucky Devil, page 1
Table of Contents
Acknowledgment
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
Book Club Questions
Author Bio
The Finder of the Lucky Devil
The Lucky Devil Series Book 1
Copyright © 2023 Megan Mackie. All rights reserved.
4 Horsemen Publications, Inc.
1497 Main St. Suite 169
Dunedin, FL 34698
4horsemenpublications.com
info@4horsemenpublications.com
Cover by J. Caleb Clark
Typesetting by S. Wilder
Editor Jenna Stanton, Jamie Garner, and Jen Paquette
All rights to the work within are reserved to the author and publisher. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 International Copyright Act, without prior written permission except in brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Please contact either the Publisher or Author to gain permission.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022947615
Paperback ISBN-13: 979-8-8232-0100-1
Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-64450-726-1
Audiobook ISBN-13: 979-8-8232-0098-1
Ebook ISBN-13: 979-8-8232-0099-8
To my grandmother, the librarian
Acknowledgment
Thank you first and foremost to my mother, Connie, for my entire life in general and for proofreading my book three times specifically.
Thank you to Jenna, my editor, for guiding me through this process.
Thank you, Andrew, for always dropping everything to come over and help me figure out what was wrong with my book.
Thank you to Frank for being my life-affirming snowman.
Thank you to Caleb for working with me tirelessly on getting my cover art exactly right.
Thank you to my husband and friend, Paul, for supporting me unwaveringly. I love you with all my heart. Thank you to Byron and Alaina for leaving mommy alone for five minutes so she could finish her book.
“For whatsoeuer from one place doth fall,
Is with the tide vnto an other brought:
For there is nothing lost, that may be found, if sought.”
The Faerie Queen excerpt, 1590
Edmund Spenser
Prologue
The door shut heavily behind the prisoner, slamming in a way that had become too familiar over the past six months… or was it a lifetime? It was hard to tell anymore. The room never changed. The bare white walls, the gray round table, the two rounded chairs. The same horrible woman sitting on the far side, smiling like she ate the cat that ate the canary. She sat upright, her hands folded before her. She wore another perfect business suit; this one a dark green that complemented her blonde hair and matched the green-rimmed glasses sitting smartly on her nose.
The prisoner wore the same bright-yellow jumpsuit she had worn every day she had been in this hell, her own brown hair unstylishly short, hacked and kept that way since she first arrived. Her tormentor did it herself whenever she took a fancy to, like a child playing hairdresser with her least favorite doll, cooing how it was for her own good. Short hair was so much easier to manage. Wouldn’t want the guards thinking she was too beautiful to resist. What would Justin think of her now?
“Her doll” dreaded this place, dreaded it with every step away from the cell. It had been two weeks. She counted them on her cell wall. Two weeks since she last entered this awful room. Since she faced this awful woman with her cruel, smiling face. Heard her fake words, always said pleasantly but containing three different meanings. It had been too much to hope that her tormentor had forgotten her; that the torture and interrogations were over.
“Oh, you don’t look happy to see me. I’m hurt,” the well-dressed woman said, feigning a pout. The prisoner’s face remained dispassionate as she took the open seat, like the well-trained dog she was. Her tormentor looked at her expectantly, but the prisoner just laid her hands one on top of the other on the cold table’s surface and waited. Any move she made ended in her suffering, so she had learned to just stay still and wait. They each waited for a response from the other.
“I’d think you would miss me a little bit, seeing as I am your only friend in the world,” the well-dressed woman pushed.
The prisoner swallowed a dry lump in her throat. God, she hated this woman. “How are you, ma’am?” she asked, her voice dry and creaky.
“Oh, dear, you sound parched. Here, have some of this,” she said and fetched a plastic bottle of liquid from the leather satchel next to her chair. The prisoner noticed how she avoided identifying what “this” was. Just as likely, it wasn’t water at all, but some medicinal concoction or tasteless poison designed to make her suffer or be more compliant. If she didn’t take the bottle, she would suffer either way, and at that moment, thirst overwhelmed her.
She took the bottle, cracked the seal, and downed the whole thing. It was room temperature, mineral-rich, and delicious. While she guzzled her “probably water,” her interrogator busied herself setting out papers in a neat little stack in front of her prisoner, followed by two pens that she aligned perfectly with the top of the papers. Her prisoner eyed the symmetry warily.
“No need to look like that. This won’t be too strenuous today. Just a little paperwork, and then it’s all over.” She uncapped one of the pens; it was the flowy quill type.
“You mean this is it?” the prisoner asked, not really believing what the well-dressed woman was saying.
“Well, I can bring back the car battery if you like, but I think you’d rather just sign my papers. Am I right?” the well-dressed woman said as if she was trying to make a joke.
The well-dressed woman was right, and the prisoner knew it.
Bitch.
Yet, the prisoner knew she would sign anything the well-dressed woman ordered. The momentary resistance sparking within quieted.
Then the well-dressed woman slammed something into the surface of the table, causing her prisoner to flinch and recoil. It was the pair of dull scissors, the point not dull enough to prevent it from sticking out of the table’s surface. She stared at it in horror, before lowering her head forward, to offer her hair to be cut. The move was so automatic, her hands resting on the table, her fingers pointing to the ceiling like a supplicant.
“Tell me again, why are you here?” the well-dressed woman asked, pulling the scissors out of the table and setting them aside. This, too, was part of the ritual, a sign that her prisoner responded correctly.
“Because my husband, Justin Masterson…” A catch in her throat forced the prisoner to pause. No matter how many times she repeated these words, it hurt as freshly as the day they were arrested. The sight of Justin’s eyes as he stared at her across the floor, his hands pinned behind his back by men in body armor. They were doing the same to her, and her heart broke as she looked into those perfect, beautiful eyes. But her suffering and continued longing for him wasn’t what the well-dressed woman wanted to hear. “He embezzled money and betrayed his loyalty to the company,” the prisoner recited. “I did not report my suspicions to the company, thereby enabling and abetting him in this crime.”
“And you admit this freely?” the well-dressed woman asked.
That made the prisoner pause. The question was a deviation from the usual ritual.
“Am… am I supposed to?” she asked softly.
The well-dressed woman huffed out a harsh breath before sliding the first piece of paper before her prisoner. “This document is your confession to your crimes, listed below. Take some time to go over them. Make sure I didn’t miss anything. Then sign it that you agree.”
The prisoner double blinked at the page. Sign it? With her name?
She didn’t know why any of this was necessary but had stopped asking why a long time ago. It was what her tormentor wanted. There was no getting out of it. Nobody was coming for her, nor was anyone looking for her. She was going to die very soon, and no one would know what had happened to her—or to Justin, whatever they had done with him.
The prisoner closed her eyes and tried to picture him again, his dark hair and wicked smile. The way his blue eyes twinkled and the way his hands felt on her waist when
“Will you hurry up?” her interrogator ordered, snapping her back to the present moment. She slid a single page across the table to the prisoner. “Sign this next, attesting that you are alive and in reasonable health.”
The prisoner picked up a pen and uncapped it. The quill mesmerized her. It was so pointy. So sharp. She could easily visualize it piercing flesh. Never before had they given her anything that came even close to a weapon. How easy would it be to just stab her tormentor with it? She didn’t believe she could escape, but maybe for just a moment, she could strike out at this person. Get a little of her own back. Make this bitch bleed like she had bled. Show her that she wasn’t broken. Didn’t she have a reason to want revenge? The best reason?
“Hurry up. I don’t have all day,” the well-dressed woman snapped.
Quickly, the prisoner complied, signing on the line at the bottom. Her hand seemed to know what it was doing, though she barely remembered her own name anymore; it had been something pretty, something she had loved once.
Once the paper was marked, her interrogator took it, stamped it, and then signed it herself. They repeated this sequence five more times. The prisoner didn’t bother to listen to what her interrogator said about each page and what it was for. She just signed and signed. Finally, they reached the last little stack of pages that were stapled together.
“Last but not least,” the well-dressed woman declared and slapped the papers in front of the prisoner, who blinked at the words scrawled across the top.
“Dissolution of marriage?” The prisoner read the top aloud, and only then did the words make sense. The prisoner looked at her interrogator, feeling lost and numb. “I don’t understand.”
The well-dressed woman did something surprising. She reached across the table and squeezed the prisoner’s hand. “I’m sorry, dear.” Somehow, her kindness hurt worse, as if the small bit of sympathy made what she was saying more real. The gentle touch was more painful than a slap. The prisoner wanted to shake her hand off, itched to do it, but she didn’t dare. Instead, she picked the pages up and looked at them closer.
There in the first space of every set of two was his name, his signature, in crisp, ugly, thin letters: Justin Masterson. Justin Masterson. Justin Masterson.
“He already signed them?”
The prisoner shoved the pages away like they were acid. “No!” Her throat closed, and her hands shook. “This is a trick,” she argued as panic rose to fill her up.
“No, you stupid little bitch, this is very real,” the well-dressed woman said, her voice now the cold familiar one the prisoner knew too well.
“But I don’t understand. Why is he doing this?”
Suddenly, her interrogator slapped her hand on the table, and the prisoner jumped reflexively. “You’re whining again. I don’t like it when you whine.”
The prisoner flinched. Cowered. “I’m sorry!” Her hands shook even worse now. Her interrogator pulled the pages back toward herself and tidied them up in an exaggerated show of irritation.
“I would think it would be obvious why this is happening. Your husband accepted our offer; you did not. Now he will be rid of you once you sign those papers.” The well-dressed woman’s eyes gleamed, the corners of her mouth upturning into the threat of a smile.
“I… I want to see him,” the prisoner requested, knowing it would be denied. She had asked every day to see her husband, her Justin. She had called for him. Cried his name in pain and fear. Clung on to any tiny shred of hope that he was somewhere in this place, like her, and that maybe they would both survive it. The lie that they were in this together kept her going like nothing else had. “I need to talk to him.”
“That’s not going to happen, you pathetic idiot child. Sign the papers.” It was an order, not a request.
“But I… I don’t want to divorce.” She did sound like a child, even to her own ears.
“It’s not a divorce. It’s a dissolution of marriage. There is a difference. Sign the papers,” the interrogator repeated, her voice growing even colder, even quieter.
The prisoner looked down at the documents, and her eyes filled with tears. Her hands came together, the right one fiddling with the wedding band on her left ring finger. She never understood why they let her keep it. Her last link to Justin. It was a plain band, no jewels or anything, just gold with white-gold running through the middle. She had twisted it a million times until it had left a red dent in the flesh of her finger. She could barely see it now through her tears. She let them trickle down her face, not bothering to wipe them away. Her grief flowed freely as she realized he had abandoned her as she feared he would. She signed one line after another until the dissolution decree was completed.
“Truthfully, I’m not sure what he saw in you to begin with,” her interrogator said as soon as the prisoner started signing. “It must be a relief, I’m sure, to be rid of a worthless piece of garbage like you.” She said it so matter-of-fact. No malice, or hate, really, just as if it were a simple, undeniable fact. The moment the prisoner’s last signature was in place, the well-dressed woman snatched the page out from under her pen and stowed it with the rest. Then she stood, plucked the prisoner’s pen from her weak hands, placed it in the satchel, and slung the whole thing over her shoulder.
“Goodbye,” she said, the mask of pleasantness reasserting itself over the well-dressed woman’s face, contrasting her words. “I never did find out what secret you’re still keeping, but oh, well. I will never see you again,” she declared with happy relief, as if she were the one who endured months of torture. Then she walked out the door just as two burly men entered.
The hairs on the back of the prisoner’s arms rose as she realized the implications of the things her tormentor, her former tormentor, had said. It was over.
These men weren’t her escort. They were her executioners.
The minute the first meaty hand wrapped itself around her wrist, something snapped inside her. She screamed her rage at the top of her lungs. She kicked and clawed and bucked, not caring that she might also hurt herself in her struggle to get away.
It took both the burly men to secure her. One tried to bear-hug her. The other wrangled her legs. Together, they got her out the door. Once in the hall, they managed to carry her a short distance. Her struggles freed one foot. She kicked off the ground, partially breaking the hold on her upper body.
“Goddamn bitch!” one of the men yelled. He swung back to slap her across the face. The blow didn’t connect. She scrambled up, out of his range, and tried to run, but one of them caught her feet again. The other caught her by the hair, and that was how they dragged her down the hall, through clinical double doors.
The moment they passed those doors, she gave up. She couldn’t see where they were going anymore.
“Unhand her!” snapped a voice filled with eerie power. Or rather, there was a snap. Something crackled through the air. The burly men dropped her, each of them arching their backs as they writhed in pain. Softly, the young woman floated like a feather to the ground while they both fell hard. Some force seemed to fling the men back through the doors they had just entered.
She laid on the cold tiled floor, collapsed onto her knees, breathing hard, her face covered in sweat. She stayed that way for an eternity, but no one touched her.
No one was touching her. That was strange. Why wasn’t she being hauled to her feet and strapped into some horror device out of a dark nightmare?
“Anna?”
She looked up, startled at the sound of the gentle voice. The gentle, familiar voice.
Anna? She was Anna, and she lay on the floor of what looked like a visitor’s room. So disturbingly ordinary. Comfortable, even, with its sofa, a side table, and two armchairs. On the wall hung a painting of a gentle landscape. In the middle of the room, looking down at her, stood a small, old woman. Her features were soft. In fact, everything about her was soft, from her pink sweater to the curl of her snowy white hair, to the hand reaching out to Anna, palm open in invitation. Anna remembered those eyes, blue and clear as the sky. She remembered that wrinkled face. The one that smiled even when the lips did not. Anna knew her. She knew her!
