Tiny Glitches: A Magical Contemporary Romance (52 page)

“Do you see the imps?”

I swiveled back to Kyle and blinked against his brightness. Unobtrusively, I leaned against the table while the world spun back into color.

“They’re the smallest of the evil creatures, little blobs of pure evil. Hardly enough brain matter to function. Just enough to recognize food and attack it.”

Not good. This is
so
not good.
I wished I were back at home with my cat, Mr. Bond, and a good book or a TV show. Something ordinary. I did not want to be talking with the only other known person with soul-sight who kept insisting there were evil creatures visible to only us. I felt like a character in a horror movie right before they turn slowly around and come face-to-face with a monster. Seeing evil on people’s souls was bad enough. I didn’t want to see—let alone come into contact with—something purely evil.

And yet, how could I
not
look?

I blinked, carefully focusing away from Kyle first.

I scanned the room again. Baristas. Customers. Books and CDs. Coffee bags. “What am I looking for?” Kyle didn’t answer me. Movement under the nearest table caught my attention. An inky black chinchilla-like blob sat on the table’s base, its glowing eyes watching me.

“What the hell is that?” Anything with life was always a version of white. Even the sullied souls of the sadistic still glowed with light undertones. Nothing living was all black—it was life that made everything glow. Furthermore, animals were never tainted by ambiguous moral choices like humans; animals were
always
white. The tiny fluff ball of blackness was darker than the inanimate objects around it. It was black—solid black. Impossibly black. Either there were varying degrees of life I’d never encountered, and this was the zombie equivalent of life, or this creature—this pile of dust with bright eyes—was pure evil.

“Madison, meet your first imps,” Kyle said.

The imp cocked its head at me, clearly curious. Curious meant it could think. Curious meant it was trying to puzzle me out. A thinking
evil
creature was interested in me. Abandoning my job hunt and moving back in with my parents suddenly seemed like a great idea.

The imp hopped toward me.

I lurched to my feet, sending my chair careening into the people behind me. Scrambling around the table, I put distance between myself and the creature. Its eyes tracked me. It hopped out from under the table until it was less than two feet away from me. I tensed to flee.

Kyle waved his radiant hand in front of the imp the way a matador waves a cape for a bull. Like a bull, the imp charged. I squealed. The imp disappeared.

He’d said
imps
, right? With an
s
?
I spun around, looking for more.

I spied three behind Kyle’s chair. Like the first one, the dark creatures were fixated on him. In a group they lunged. I jumped back, tripping over a chair. Windmilling my arms, I fought for balance while trying to keep the evil creatures in my sight, but gravity won. In a cacophony of wood and metal and flesh, I crashed to the floor. When I looked back at Kyle, the imps were gone.

“Miss? Are you okay?”

Reality popped like my ears had just unplugged. I blinked. The world swam. I rolled to my side. From my position on the gritty floor, I could see a circle of black-clad feet, and more approaching. Baristas. Everyone in the coffee shop had gone deafeningly quiet, making the cheerful jazz sound like it was blaring. I realized three things simultaneously:
everyone
—from the patrons to the dishwasher—was staring at me; I must look like I had gone absolutely, raving insane; and my skirt was hiked up to my hips.
Shit. Can you die from embarrassment? Please?

I untangled myself from the rungs of the chair I’d tripped over, stood faster than I should have, assisted by the adrenaline of embarrassment, and yanked my skirt down so that it covered me to my knees. I patted at my hair, pulling a bit of muffin out of a clump and wiping my hand on a napkin. And I assured everyone that I was fine, convincing no one.

How could I be fine? I’d just learned that I wasn’t the only person with soul-sight—or the ability to see in Primordium. Worse, there were evil creatures who lived alongside us, visible only in Primordium. Creatures who gazed upon me and Kyle with the same loving look I reserved for triple chocolate fudge cake. Somehow Kyle had made them disappear, but for all I could tell, it was magic, because how did you use a sight to make something vanish? I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t just seen it. It was the equivalent of a person using their normal sight to move and object; it just didn’t happen.

Only it had.

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Acknowledgments

In 2009, I wrote 80,000 words of the first draft of this novel, read it, deemed it pure rubbish, and buried it in my “Old Stories” folder. In 2012, Eva was still pestering me to have her story told, so I took the three pieces of the original draft that I liked—Eva, Hudson, and Kyoko—and wrote an all-new 100,000-word novel. In 2013, I revised the new book, rewriting the ending as well as a 20,000-word chunk in the middle.

Then I abandoned it to focus on
A Fistful of Evil
and
Magic of the Gargoyles
, but when I started writing
A Fistful of Fire
, I was once again hearing Eva in my head. So finally in 2015, I gave this book a new chance,
another
new ending, and multiple rounds of edits, polishing it into publishing shape.

Along the way, I accrued a lengthy list of people to whom I owe a great deal of gratitude.

First, thank
you
! Thank you for taking a chance on me, and thank you for buying my novel. I hope you enjoyed it!

Second, I have the absolute best fans! I wouldn’t have been able to publish this novel without your support of my previous works. Thank you for trying another of my books, especially one that is about neither Madison Fox nor gargoyles.

Kate and Jennieke, thank you for your critiques of the beginning years ago, which helped me strengthen the first chapter. The goal was always to get Kyoko into Eva’s hands, but how to do so gracefully (or even believably) eluded me for far too long.

Thank you, Shaida, for pinpointing the flaws of logic in Eva’s magical power. The rewrites from your feedback were extensive and painstaking, but I love the novel so much more because of it.

Ilona Andrews, your critique of my novel’s cover copy was invaluable. Based on your comments, I solidified Eva’s motivation, which required yet another rewrite but made the entire novel twice as strong. Thank you! (And if I find out you’ve read this, I’m going to have a major fan-girl freak-out.)

To my stellar beta readers: Karl, Kerri, Shandy, and Dad, you were all so helpful, and your insights changed this novel in subtle but important ways. Thank you for volunteering your time and your opinions; I’m incredibly flattered and grateful. (Dad, I’m going to continue to delude myself into believing you did
not
read the sex scenes.)

Sara and Mom, do you remember reading one of those earlier versions years ago? Thank you both for your gentle feedback then, and for reading the novel in its latest (and last!) permutation. I hope you both like the new ending!

For the real-life details about a police response to a break-in (which I greatly exaggerated to torture Eva), thank you again, Sara. I’m sorry you had to go through the experience, but I found it helpful. Does that mitigate the loss of your brand-new television?

Cari, thank you for scouting Clover Park for me years ago and sending me video. From the sound of the plane engines to the mesh kid’s control tower, having those authentic details made Sofie’s rescue scene come to life. And I couldn’t resist adding in the dog in a sweater that you saw, too.

For your patience in listening to me talk about this story idea for six years, I should throw a parade in your honor, Cody. Did you know your short fiction inspired some of my favorite support characters, including Atlas, Edmond, and Dempsey? I wanted to create characters that would make you laugh. Okay, I wanted to make every reader laugh, but you were the person sitting in my head as I wrote each scene, and you’re the person I’m always trying to impress. Thanks for always encouraging me to be better—and for loving me just as I am.

REBECCA CHASTAIN
has found seven four-leaf clovers to date, won a purebred Arabian horse in a drawing, and once tamed a blackbird for a day. She has been employed as a VHS rental clerk, bookshelf straightener, government pseudo-employee, professional finder of lost sporting goods, and strategy guide wrangler in the video game industry—and now she makes a living as an internationally bestselling author. Dreaming up the absurd and writing stories designed to amuse and entertain has been her passion since she was eleven years old. She lives in Roseville, California, with her wonderful husband and two bossy cats.

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