Pariah preview

#amwriting Pariah, book five in the Starblood series. This is the first draft. I only started writing the novel this morning, and chances are the final version will vary considerably from the first draft. However here is a sneaky peek at the first paragraph (in its current form) and a brief introduction to a new character/narrator – Louisa. Enjoy!

Louisa watches through a narrow gap in the door to her husband’s study. He is holding court. His head minions sit in chairs, backs straight, faces towards David Garlow. Her husband wears a self-satisfied smile that has become far too familiar to her. He is still the same man who wooed her while she served pints in her father’s pub at nineteen. He remains the hero who rescued her from the insults of her father, the drunkard. When he brushes her lightened hair back from her face, pushes the twins on the swing, or feeds his ten month old son with a patience borne of absolute devotion she feels like the luckiest of women. He made her queen of his castle almost a decade ago and four children later he still smiles widely when he catches her eye in a way that makes her breath hitch and her stomach flutter. She loves him, but she is afraid of what he is becoming, not only for her own sake, but also for his. She has glimpsed cruelty and a thirst for power in his tight mouth and glittery eyes in moments when he doesn’t realise she is watching. She sees it now as he addresses his skinhead generals.