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DEMONIC OBSESSION
An Ellora’s Cave publication, November 2003
Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.
PO Box 787
Hudson, OH 44236-0787
ISBN MS Reader (LIT) ISBN # 1-84360-667-4
Other available formats (no ISBNs are assigned):
Adobe (PDF), Rocketbook (RB), Mobipocket (PRC) & HTML
DEMONIC OBSESSION © 2003 ELISA ADAMS
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part without
permission.
This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons living or dead, or places,
events or locales is purely coincidental. They are productions of the authors’
imaginations and used fictitiously.
Edited by MARTHA PUNCHES.
Cover art by DARRELL KING.
DEMONIC OBSESSION
By Elisa Adams
Elisa Adams
Chapter 1
Ellie sat on an old wooden bench, her sketchpad resting on her lap. The sunset just
visible over the tops of the trees washed the sky in brilliant hues of orange and pink. The
rustling of the summer wind through the leaves and the faint breaking of waves against
the nearby shore calmed her nerves like nothing else could—on most nights.
Just not tonight.
She tucked a few stray strands of hair behind her ears and took a sip from her water
bottle, making an attempt to ignore the strange sensations that prickled the hair on the
back of her neck. The air crackled with an electrical tension, sending a shiver through
her despite the warm temperature.
Something was different.
Something had disturbed the peaceful, sleepy quiet of Stone Harbor. Something she
couldn’t define—maybe didn’t want to. A knot of anxiety formed in the pit of her
stomach and her gaze landed on a man leaning against a tree a few dozen feet away. Did
he have something to do with the disturbance?
“Yeah, right,” she muttered to herself, turning her attention back to her sketchpad.
He looked about average height, with an average build and average dark hair—nothing
spectacular about him, at least from this distance. He wore khaki pants and an off-white
polo shirt—nothing impressive there. He looked more like the married-with-three-
children type than the bad-to-the-bone and out-to-cause-trouble type.
So why couldn’t she shake the feeling that his presence signaled danger?
She blew out a breath, frustrated with her paranoia. So her ex-husband had turned
out to be a first-class jerk disguised as a successful businessman. That didn’t mean that
every other man who dressed nicely meant her emotional harm. If she didn’t get over
what happened with Todd, she’d never get the chance to meet a nice guy and settle
down. Three years had passed since her divorce—plenty of time to get over her silly
insecurities.
She had to stop pasting Todd’s face on every man who walked into her life. They
weren’t
all
like him—she wasn’t naïve enough to believe that—but her luck with men
seemed to really suck lately. This poor guy hadn’t done anything to her, he probably
hadn’t even noticed she was alive, and she’d already pegged him as some kind of
deranged mass murderer.
His head was turned toward the small pond in the center of the park, but every so
often, he looked in her direction. From the distance, she couldn’t be sure if he was
looking at
her,
but the fact that he might be married unsettled her. Her fingers smoothed
over the totem that hung from a silver chain around her neck—a small panther carved in
black onyx—in a reaction that was more automatic than calculated. She closed her eyes
briefly, calling to the animal the totem represented for guidance. She tried to focus on
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Demonic Obsession
the sleek grace of the creature, the control and strength it exuded, but her powers of
concentration were severely lacking tonight. It was all
his
fault.
She tried to keep her eyes off him, but she couldn’t help stealing little glances every
so often. Something about him compelled her, even when she knew it was impolite and
possibly dangerous. The man was a complete stranger in a town where she recognized
most people on sight, and that fact alone made her wary. She knew she shouldn’t stare,
yet she couldn’t pull her gaze away.
That frightened her the most. An odd fixation on a complete stranger was
something she thought she’d outgrown years ago, once she’d hit puberty. What made
him so special that she couldn’t draw her gaze away, even with exercised concentration?
As far as she could tell—nothing.
But there had to be
something,
or else she wouldn’t be spending her evening
observing him when she’d come here to sketch the sunset in preparation for her next
painting.
His head swung in her direction and she didn’t have time to look away. This time
she had no doubts—he was looking right at her. She drew in a deep, shaky breath, her
palms suddenly growing damp. A smile spread across his face and he nodded slightly—
just enough to let her know he’d caught her staring. The thought unnerved her, but not
enough to make her drag her gaze from his. A dog barking in the distance finally broke
the spell. She looked quickly back at her sketchpad, not wanting to encourage him in
any way, but afraid it might already be too late.
She tried to make a rough sketch of the flowers lining the banks of the pond, but her
traitorous hands instead drew the shadowy form of a lean, dark-haired man. After three
attempts, she slammed her pencil down on the pad and sighed in disgust. It figured.
She’d never felt a pull this strong—not even when she’d been with Todd. She prided
herself on being independent, level-headed to a fault, and suddenly she felt like the
world had tilted on its axis.
She was being such an idiot! Ellie was the calm one. Her sister, Charlotte, was the
dramatic one. Always had been. But now it seemed like Ellie had switched places with
her younger sister. The whole situation made her feel off balance, like she couldn’t quite
get her footing right. This had to be some kind of a sign that she needed to make some
changes in her life. Either that, or she needed some kind of psychological counseling.
She blew out a breath and muttered to herself, “Normal, healthy women don’t obsess
about complete strangers.”
And all the while, the stranger in question was probably leaning against that tree,
laughing to himself about the skinny girl who kept staring at him. He’d probably go
home later to his house with a white picket fence and a couple of Volvos in the driveway
and have a good laugh with his equally yuppy wife.
Yeah, she was definitely nuts. Time to get back to work. That was, after all, her
purpose for being in the park.
She picked her pencil back up and tried her best to focus on her sketching, but it
was no use. Her mind was on that man, not on her work. She slammed her pencil down
on the pad yet again, this time with a lot more force. If she wasn’t going to get anything
done tonight, she might as well just pack up and go home. No sense wasting time sitting
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