HIDDEN DANGER

HIDDEN DANGER
Friday, November 1, 2024 by GAIL PALLOTTA

Categories: Friday's Fiction / GUEST AUTHORS

PLEASE WELCOME

GAIL PALLOTTA

FICTION FRIDAY

THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY

The story behind Hidden Danger started with my love of mysteries and suspense, which began many years ago when I discovered Nancy Drew. Becoming a detective appealed to me as a future career. That didn’t happen, but I turned my hero and heroine in Hidden Danger into amateur sleuths.

The granddaughter of a minister who planted churches in the far reaches of the North Carolina Mountains, I grew up at the foothills of them. As a child I heard stories from my father about the rugged way of life in those hills of granite and visited places where he had lived, many of them still sparsely populated then. The area with wild growing underbrush and caves offered opportunities for suspenseful scenes.

Even though the heroine, Emily, is on vacation at Sky High Campground, I made her a newspaper reporter since I have experience as an editor and copywriter. My husband was in the military. After all these years of marriage, I’m familiar with that type of personality, so the hero, Nick, became an ex-military guy turned security guard.

Emily went to the campground to find peace and comfort after she was left standing at the altar by the groom on her wedding day. To say she has a chip on her shoulder over men is an understatement. The only true love Nick ever had died while he was overseas. Guilt because he couldn’t be by her side, plagues him, and he’ll never love another.

Emily meets Nick because her first night at the campground, she sees a man carrying a dead body. Nick knows the area as well as I do. He understands how remote it is. During the winter there’s hardly anyone there. He’s tired. After leaving the military, he entered college and he’s exhausted from his studies. He doesn’t want to be bothered. But Emily’s frightened and is determined to get him to do something about the man with the body. He dismisses her claim as a man carrying a deer.

That set me on a course to write a faith-filled journey with Nick, Emily and a mysterious man.

Excerpt

Chapter One

Emily Hanover jumped and sat straight up in the bed.

She hadn’t been dreaming. There it was again, a scraping noise and banging outside the cabin. With a shaky hand she reached for her cell phone and the after-hours number for Larry, the security guard who checked her in at Sky High Campground. She stopped in mid-air. Thinking only of getting her life back together, she’d forgotten to charge her phone.

The clanging grew louder, more intense. You are our only visitor. Larry had told her. “Few people come to the North Carolina Mountains in January and February, so the managers take off. Another guard, Nick Lancaster who’s on break from college, will be in the office tomorrow.”

With a tremor running through her fingers, Emily plugged the phone into the charger. She flinched each time someone hit stone. With what? A shovel. Yes. It banged into a boulder and resounded in the wind howling around the corner of the house.

Quivering, she slid her feet to the floor. Another round of metal met granite. She raised a blind in the bedroom window, stared at the blackness outside, and let the blind drop. She could see no one. Yet, the shovel vibrations echoed. Whoever hit the rock was really angry. She chewed her knuckle. She’d make herself small and hide. She scooted under the covers and shook.

She had traveled here to renew her spirit in these awe-inspiring mountains. After Donnie West dumped her at the altar, she had yearned to rest and regroup at Sky High. A clank rang out, but this time it reverberated inside her. She would no longer lay here and let a trespasser ruin her vacation. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and forced her body up.

She started to turn on the lights. No. She pulled back her hand. Whoever was outside would see her. She snatched pepper spray and a flashlight from the nightstand and started to the country kitchen, nearly dropping the items as she crept down the hall.

Lord, please help me. First, Donnie. Now this. Please help.

As she peered out the small kitchen window over the sink, the shovel blasted into the silence again. She cringed. Only a person up to no good would invade someone else’s yard in the middle of the night.

She tiptoed past the dining area and the rock fireplace. Her stomach churned as she crossed the room. Finally, she reached the large sliding glass door in the living area. Careful not to touch the drapes, she peeked out the small crack between two panels. No one was there. Had the person outside left? Hope rippled over her. She waited to make sure though. A man with long hair passed outside on her porch. She yanked the drapes shut as tight as she could.

He carried a body.

Kindle copies of Hidden Danger are FREE through November 1 (Pacific Time) on Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DDYC11RM

Hidden Danger was presented a Top Author Certificate. Their review is available at https://www.gailpallotta.com/this-and-that.html

ABOUT GAIL PALLOTTA

Award-winning author Gail Pallotta’s a wife, Mom, swimmer and bargain shopper who loves God, beach sunsets and getting together with friends and family. A 2013 Grace Awards finalist, she’s a Reader’s Favorite 2017 Book Award winner, a TopShelf 2020 Book Awards Finalist and a Top Author pick. She’s published seven books, poems, short stories and several hundred articles. Some of her articles appear in anthologies while two are in museums. She enjoys connecting with readers. Sign up for her newsletter at https://www.gailpallotta.com/mainphp.html and visit her website at gailpallotta.com

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