Murder
is the new mascot at Ellington High...
A murdered coach and a missing counselor has thrown the school into a foreign
curriculum of anger, fear, and suspicion. English teacher Emily Taylor is
determined to prove that her missing friend is not a murderer. But if she's
not, then who is? And where could her friend be? Against the advice of fellow
math teacher and former crush Tad, Emily and her best friend Gabby dig into the
dead coach's past. But someone doesn't want Emily unearthing their secrets and
is determined to see that she gets a failing grade in the sleuthing department.
Soon, Emily finds herself scrambling for a new lesson plan to solve the
murder...before the killer sets his own deadline!
Excerpt:
The clack of Emily Taylor's high
heels echoed hollowly in the deserted high school hallway. Normally, she loved
the sound her heels made on the tile floor. Her obsession with high heels began
when her height topped off at a gargantuan five foot one inch, and their
authoritative tapping sound typically made her feel confident and in charge.
But not this morning. The click-clack reverberating off the rows of metal
lockers seemed ominous, a warning of some kind.
Letting herself into her classroom,
she decided that the school seemed somewhat sinister because she was unused to
being there that early. Her great love affair with her snooze button meant that
getting to school before it was filled with a mass of hormone-fueled teenagers was
a rarity for her, but she had needed to get in early today in order to prep for
a special before-school meeting with a student's mother. Stevie Davis was new
to Ellington High and was really struggling in Emily's junior-level English
class.
Something about Stevie tugged at
Emily. He usually hid his eyes behind his fringe of bangs, causing Emily to
fight the urge to grab her scissors and hack away at his curtain of hair so
that she could see what was going on behind it. The few times he had tossed his
hair back with the irritated shrug that was his typical answer to any question,
his eyes had seemed sad, lost, or…something. Emily wasn't sure what that
something was, but she was hoping that this meeting with his mother would shed
some light on his issues.
Her cantankerous old computer whined
to life as Emily flipped on her desk light. Dark, swollen clouds crowded the
sky, swallowing her early morning classroom in shadows. Emily felt jumpy and
spooked, as if those dark clouds were pressing down on her, enshrouding her in
their gloom. Must be an allergy medicine-induced hangover making her feel
strange this morning. Nothing like fall to get her sinuses going. As soon as
she got her notes together for her meeting, she'd grab a cold shot of caffeine
from the stash of sodas she kept in the teachers' lounge fridge. That would
help clear her head. Or at least it would if Tad, the conference-hour-sharing,
next-door math teacher and fellow soda junkie, hadn't depleted her supply.
As she pulled out samples of
Stevie's writing and wrestled her computer into spitting out a copy of his
grade report, the lights flickered. Glancing out the back wall of windows,
Emily watched the increasing wind whip the trees into a frenzy. Multicolored
fall leaves rained down like confetti. She usually loved the electric feel in
the air before a good thunderstorm, but a loss of power would ruin her day's
plans. Figuring she better make her copies before the ancient, temperamental
copy machine went on the fritz, she began sorting through the piles on her desk
for the paper she needed. They were organized piles, of course. Oh, who was she
kidding? Trying to find the one thing she needed on her messy desk was like
trying to isolate a single snowflake during a blizzard. Shuffling papers and
files, Emily jumped at the first boom of thunder. The accompanying flash of
lightning happened to spotlight the copy of the quiz for which she was
searching. Hoping to entice Stevie into becoming more involved in class
discussions, she was starting a unit on mythology since he had shown some
interest in legends. Today's quiz was over the gods and goddesses of Mount
Olympus, or it would be if she got her copies made in time.
Tucking all of her information for
the meeting with Stevie's mother into a stray file folder, Emily grabbed up a
fresh legal pad and pen and headed out the door. Halfway there, she turned on
her heel to go back for the quiz she needed to copy. Yep, she definitely needed
that soda. A glance at her vintage Strawberry Shortcake watch showed she was,
as usual, cutting it close on time. But first things first.
Popping the top on the last soda in the fridge,
Emily silently thanked whoever was the God of caffeine for their nectar as she
took her first icy sip of the sugar-laden soda. No diet drinks for her, no sir,
as the extra ten pounds on her hips could attest. Tad had tried to hide the
last can behind a pitcher of green tea, knowing Emily would never touch that,
even if it might benefit her hips. She, however, was on to his nefarious ways.
Practicing her evil victory laugh, she click-clacked her way to the copy room
to get her copies started before the meeting. Another crashing boom of thunder
rattled the windows as Emily threw the door wide, propping it open with those
cursed hips while she flipped the light switch. Nothing. Scanning the hallway
confirmed her suspicions. The power was out. She took a step backward, thinking
she would head downstairs to consult with Principal Matthews. Rain began to
lash the windows over the stairwell, making the darkness of the hall seem even
more complete. She fumbled her way a few feet down the hallway until the lights
flickered back on again. Not wanting to waste a second in case the power
decided to blink off again, Emily dashed back to the partially open copy room
door. Hitting the light switch again with one hand, she rushed toward the
hulking machine on the far wall. That was when papers went flying and sticky,
syrupy soda sprayed everything in its path. Emily went airborne. Throwing her
hands out in front of her to break her fall, Emily winced as they skidded
through sticky wetness. The picture of grace she was not, so finding herself
flat on her face was actually not uncommon for Emily. She could trip on a
completely flat surface. The lights flickered again as she clambered to her
feet, worrying about getting the sticky mess cleaned up before someone else
slipped. Glancing down at her hands, she was busy cursing her lost lifeline,
her last caffeine hit, when she realized that the sticky substance covering her
hands was not soda. It was something thicker, and redder. Finally looking back
to see what she had tripped over, Emily saw what appeared to be a head
protruding from behind an office chair. Taking a cautious step closer, she
could see that the head was surrounded by what looked like a puddle of
congealing blood and was, thankfully, attached to a body. Unfortunately, it
appeared to be a dead body. And
that's when Emily began to scream and scream.
About the Author:
Murder is our Mascot is available now at
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There I
was, flat on my back, 20,000 miles above the galactic plane, when it struck
me! No, not the fact that traditional
publishing is price gouging its customers—it was the caffeine in my
coffee. I blinked my eyes and focused on
the road I was driving, raggedly dragging my mind along with that focus.
