Lay Them To Rest

The day I was awarded the highest service medal, I got a call that my grandfather had died. My superiors approved emergency leave, and I rushed straight back to the family estate without stopping. The moment I reached the hillside cemetery behind the house, what I saw snapped something inside me. Our family burial ground had been completely leveled. My parents' graves had been dug open. Their urns had been turned into flower pot bases, with dark-red roses planted right on top of them. My grandfather's coffin had been split apart. His body was left exposed in the dirt, already starting to rot. And my younger brother, Jerry Horton, who was on the autism spectrum, was being ordered around like a laborer by my husband's assistant, Digby Wolfe, hauling construction materials back and forth. I lost it. I grabbed Digby and slammed him into the ground with a hard shoulder throw. "You touched my family's graves and made my brother do manual labor. Are you trying to get buried here with them?" Digby coughed up blood as he struggled to his feet, sneering at me. "This was Mr. Gray's decision. He said your family plot is in a good location, with plenty of space. It's perfect for building a golf course for the future Mrs. Gray. In Joule, Mr. Gray is the law." His tone was icy. "And who do you think you are?" I swallowed my rage and called Marshall Gray. "I hear you run Joule," I said. "Well, I'm about to change that."

There are monsters in this world. And they used to be us. Now it's time to euthanize to survive in a hospice where Emily, a woman haunted by her past, only wants to do her job and be the best mother possible. Post-infection Chicago. Christmas. Inside The Hospice, Emily and her fellow nurses do their rounds. Here, men and women live out their final days in comfort, segregated from society, and are then humanely terminated before fate turns them into marrow-craving monsters known as ‘Smilers.’ Outside these imposing walls, rabid protesters swarm with signs, caught up in the heat of their hatred. Emily, a woman haunted by her past, only wants to do her job and be the best mother possible. But in a world where mortality means nothing, where guns are drawn in fear and nobody seems safe anymore – at what cost will this pursuit come? And through it all, the soon to be dead remain silent, ever smiling. Such is their curse. It won't be long before that snow-speckled ground will be salted by blood. ©️ Crystal Lake Publishing

After my husband, Trevor Penn, abuses me for the 98th time just to stand up for Callista Whitcombe, I've completely given up on him. That's when I accept his best friend, Maddox Harlow's confession. After spending the night with Maddox, he agrees to help me fake my death. That way, I'll be able to use a brand new identity to marry him overseas. I've taken the fake-death drug Maddox has given to me, only to wake up in a coffin earlier than expected. I can't move a single muscle in my body. But that's when I overhear Maddox's conversation with another person outside the coffin. "Mr. Harlow, you convinced Trevor to abuse Judith before pretending to save her from her abusive life. Now that you've obtained her full-fledged trust, why did you still arrange for her to be buried after faking her death?" "Only by doing this will the Whitcombes trust that Judith is truly dead. That way, Callie's position as the heiress will be unshakable. No one will ever bring up the fact that she's an illegitimate child ever again." The other person sounds hesitant. "Won't it be too long if we only dig the coffin out one week from now, after you've held the wedding with Callista?" "The fake-death drug's effects can last for five days. I've already had someone put enough water, food, and oxygen tanks in the coffin. There's no way Judith will die."

To honor the last wish of my late husband, Daniel Bennett, I spent twenty thousand dollars on the most lavish Christmas funeral Evergreen Memorial Funeral Home offered. As I watched Daniel's urn being lowered into the ground, I thought he had finally found peace. Then, the following March, local police called to tell me Daniel's body had not been cremated until January. I marched into Evergreen Memorial's reception office with the police record and slapped it on the table. Evergreen Memorial's manager, Martin Hayes, glanced at the record, shut the door at once, pulled a stack of cash from a drawer, and pushed it toward me. "Ma'am, the cremation schedule was fully booked over Christmas. We held the funeral first and used temporary fill for the burial. It's an industry workaround for scheduling delays. Take the money, we'll finish the paperwork, and we can all pretend this never happened." "If you insist on making a scene, we'll sue you for defamation, and you won't even get this compensation." I studied the smug look on his face, so certain he had me cornered, then pulled out my phone and tapped the button to save the recording.

What would you do if you saw a woman who really looks like you in your dream murder someone? What would you do if you know that it is not you but when you woke up the dead body is already under your bed but there is no evidence or even a single sign of murder? What would you do if you heard voices and saw scenes that made you insane? And what would you do if you’re the only one who came back from the dead after the bus accident? Find out the life of Irish Stephen who came back from the dead after the bus that she was riding together with her friends, colleagues and boyfriend fell off a cliff that made it totally wreck. People call her “Lazarus” and “Lucky” for returning back from the dead but for her it is a curse because after an accident she knows that there is something wrong with her. She starts seeing things, seeing people that she doesn't know, and hearing voices that she thought is just an effect of the accident. Only her friend Devon understands her and helps her by consulting his friend named, Luna, who knows about spiritual awakenings who told Irish to empty her heart from hatred because of what happened to her in the past of losing someone she loved and her life. When she starts discovering what is happening to her; it is more than what she expected because it is all connected to her dreams and to her visions. The voices that she hears and the things that she sees are all connected to her. Find out how it happened and how Irish became a living dead. Here in MORTEM from one of the best story-teller; I.B.LOYOLA

The Luther Pack believed that the mate bond between twin sisters and twin Alphas was the greatest blessing from the Moon Goddess. Up until I was seven months pregnant, I never doubted that belief. Everything changed when I was kidnapped by the Cassa Pack, the Luther Pack’s sworn enemy. Meanwhile, my mate was busy performing a blessing ritual for the pup of his puphood sweetheart. He ignored my eighth attempt at mindlinking him and severed the connection entirely by the ninth. Kaden’s actions enraged the Cassa Pack’s Alpha, who fired rounds of silver-coated bullets into my belly. My wolf howled in agony while my unborn pup was killed instantly. The silver poison destroyed my ability to heal, and the loss of my pup drained me of all will to live. At the brink of death, my sister, Lucia, found me. In a desperate bid to save me, she crashed into my abductors and perished with them in the resulting explosion. I had no time to grieve, nor did I reach out to our mates. Silently, I erased all traces of our existence within the pack and built a grave for Lucia and me in the Dark Forest. I was dying. Once I completed this final task, I could join my sister. Even after my death, our mates assumed we were merely acting out of jealousy. They had no idea that their mates and pup were already six feet underground.