MirrorWorld

MirrorWorld by Jeremy Robinson




PROLOGUE

LAS CROABAS, PUERTO RICO

Perfect.

That’s how Bob Alford, vacationing widower-retiree, described his day by the pool, watching the scantily clad women, drinking mai tais, and admiring the sun’s lazy track through the sky. Perfect. Right up until the moment a man of equal age and better physical shape slapped against the concrete beside Alford’s lounge chair. The sharp, wet snap of a body hitting the solid ground opened Alford’s eyes, hidden behind a pair of boxy fit-over sunglasses. Annoyed by the interruption, he glanced at the man, whose wetness suggested he’d just come from the pool.

He closed his eyes again, but the image began to resolve like a photo in a darkroom displayed on the inside of his eyelids. The man wasn’t dressed for the pool. He was dressed for dinner. And the wetness on the pavement … was red. Dark red.

His eyes snapped open just as the first screams rang out. He turned toward the man again, this time noting that he looked flatter than he should, and broken. A pool of blood had formed around him. Definitely dead.

Knowing the man had not simply tripped, Alford turned his eyes up. He didn’t expect to see anything other than empty balconies. Maybe a few people looking down.

But there was something there. Something moving.

Oh my God—something falling. Someone! A woman plummeted from high above, her dinner dress fluttering like a flag caught by a stiff wind. As Alford’s horrified cry joined the chorus, the body sailed past, plunging into the pool. There was a moment of collective stunned silence as the poolside vacationers seemed to be waiting for the woman to surface. Even the lifeguard’s mind had shut down. Alford was the first to snap free from the strange trance. He ran to the edge, feeling momentary hope that the chlorine-scented pool could have saved the woman from the same fate as the man, but the water was already turning red.

While the pool emptied of screaming youth, Alford dove straight in. The water tore his sunglasses away, and the sudden crisp coolness stung his recently burnt skin like lit fireworks, but he didn’t give his discomfort a second thought as his body arced down through the water to the unconscious, maybe dead woman. He wrapped an arm around her chest, shoved off the bottom, and rose up to find a lifeguard reaching down. While Alford fought against creaking joints to lift himself over the pool’s edge, the lifeguard hoisted the woman onto the concrete and went to work, performing rapid CPR.

Exhausted by fear and effort, Alford gasped for breath while he stood over the lifeguard. People all around began snapping photos and tapping out messages on their phones. Then, hope blossomed. The woman breathed, deeply. Just once. With her final exhalation, she said, “The darkness came for us,” and then departed the world, lying in a puddle of water, ten feet away from the man lying in his own blood.


LONDON, ENGLAND

“What do you think?” Kelly Allenby said, striking a pose while wearing a gaudy, feathery cap. It barely held her wild salt-and-pepper hair down, and in the small shop’s elegant surroundings, it looked as ridiculous as she hoped it would. “Am I posh?”

“Fit for a royal wedding, you are,” her husband, Hugh, replied, failing miserably at matching his wife’s natural British accent.

She swatted his arm. “Bollocks, they won’t let me within a block of the palace. And, please, no more accent.”

“Is it really that bad?”

She placed the hat back on the mannequin’s head. “I just like your natural accent better.”

“That’s right,” Hugh said, reverting back to his natural Hebrew accent, exaggerating the rough h sound. “Hhhow do you like my Hhhebrew?” Hugh was born and raised by Jewish parents who immigrated to the United States. His Hebrew accent emerged when surrounded by family, but otherwise he had a bland American accent, which to an American meant he had no telltale accent at all.

“Hhhilarious,” she replied, patting his face. She glanced at the shopkeeper and saw he was far from enthused by their antics. When they’d entered the shop, he’d greeted them kindly, no doubt sensing a sale. But it quickly became clear they were simply amused by his wares. “Time to go.”

She took Hugh by the arm and dragged him to the door.

“But I still need to try on the hat,” he said.

“You need to buy me lunch.”

The bell above the door chimed as Hugh opened it and poured on his horrible British accent. “What’ll it be then, love? Jellied eels, cockles in vinegar, or some soggy tripe?”

Allenby laughed hard, but the sound of her voice was cut short. At once, the pair fell to their knees. A fear unlike anything Allenby had ever felt suddenly twisted inside her gut. Something was behind her!

Hugh took her hand. “Kel, what—”

His eyes suddenly went wide. She watched the hairs on his neck stand straight like the most disciplined beefeater. He felt it, too.