Cover of Beyond Blood by Sharon A. Crawford, published by Blue Denim Press

Ideally, I like to integrate the human issues into the suspense story itself.

• Jeffery Deaver

As the book launch for my prequel mystery novel Beyond Blood is gearing up for October 19, 2014, Dana Bowman and her fraternal twin Bast Overture are back here on my blog post. So are some of the other characters carried over from their four linked short stories in Beyond the Tripping Point. The time is August 1998 and the scenarios coming up now and the next few weeks are supplements to Beyond Blood.

In this session, Dana and Bast are mulling over the opening of their Attic Investigative Agency upstairs in their house, when… well, you’ll have to read on here to see what happens.

Dana enters the Attic Investigative office where Bast is hunched over his computer.

Dana: Still sending out invitations for our open house reception? Or, do we already have some business?

Bast: No just emailing for some more publicity.

Dana (frowning): That’s what I’m concerned about.

Bast: Publicity? Thurston may be a large town but not everyone knows what everyone else is doing. Have to get the word out to get business.

Dana: Yes, I know and that’s what I mean. I really want to do this but I’m still having concerns about our location.

Bast: Dana, we’ve been over this before many times. We are centrally located, a few blocks in from Main St. in downtown Thurston. And having the business in our home keeps us close to David.

Dana: That’s it – close to David. He is a six-year old and I’m still not sure if the top floor of the house he lives in is safe for him. We will be dealing with criminal cases, probably interviewing some shady characters, and…

Bast (swings around to face his sister): Whoa! Hold on there Dana. The office is separate upstairs with a closed door. David will be downstairs or outside with one of us or Debbie when she comes over to babysit. Sometimes she’ll take him to her apartment, as she does now. And David will be in school full days starting next month.

Dana: I suppose. But I keep getting this funny feeling in my gut.

Bast: You’re just hungry. You need to eat more. You’re

Dana and Bast: too skinny.

Dana: Let’s leave my weight out of it.

Bast: You are under 100 pounds.

Dana: I’m also under 5 feet short. No, food won’t remove that gut feeling.

Bast: We have an alarm for the office.

Dana: Yeah, but you haven’t tested it yet have you?

Bast: No. All right. I’ll do it now.

Bast goes over to the alarm, sets it, leaves the office, and returns.

The sounds of silence fills the office air.

Dana: See what I mean.

Bast: All right. All right. I’ll call the alarm company.

He has just done so when loud footsteps are heard on the stairs and two figures rush into the office.

The sound of the alarm vibrates inside the office. Both Dana and Bast jump up.

Dana: What are you two doing here?

Stay tuned for next Thursday’s blog post to find out just who did rush into the room and why.

Meantime check out my books. The book at the top of this blog post links to Amazon. Click on Sharon A Crawford for my profile.

For those of us with Kobo’s, here is that link for the e-pub version. http://store.kobobooks.com/en-CA/ebook/beyond-blood-1 And check out my updated web page at www.samcraw.com and click on Beyond Blood. Still more updates on my reading gigs to be added as I get them.