The Devil's Hand Read online

  By the time I'm back in the car with John, I've managed to regather my composure. Half an hour later, by the time we reach the church where the service is to take place, I've received a message from the retirement home on my mobile telephone, to tell me that Mr. Percy Winterbottom died of a massive heart attack just a few minutes after I left his room. I imagine the sight of all those ghosts was more than enough to take him off to wherever men like him go when they die.

  The service in the church is pleasant enough. I'm not really religious, but it's nice to come and hear the silly old priests give their sermons, and to sing those jolly carols that I remember from my youth, and most importantly to see my daughter Alice and her family all together for the holidays. While those moments are wonderful, however, they're not the real reason I come to church every Christmas. There's something else, something that always makes me weep tears of joy. As we all stand and start singing, I listen to the lovely voices singing around me and I wait for one in particular to come through them all. No-one else notices her, of course, and she's certainly nowhere to be seen, but tears start to roll down my cheeks as soon as I hear her, and a moment later I feel a small hand resting on my shoulder.

  Even in death, Sissy's singing is utterly out of tune, but she does sound as if she's enjoying herself.

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE FARM

  No-one ever remembers what happens to them when they go into the barn at Bondalen farm. Some never come out again, and the rest... Something about them is different.

  In 1979, the farm is home to three young girls. As winter fades to spring, Elizabeth, Kari and Sara each come to face the secrets of the barn, and they each emerge with their own injuries. But someone else is lurking nearby, a man who claims to be Death incarnate, and for these three girls the spring of 1979 is set to end in tragedy.

  In the modern day, meanwhile, Bondalen farm has finally been sold to a new family. Dragged from London by her widowed father, Paula Ridley hates the idea of rural life. Soon, however, she starts to realize that her new home retains hints of its horrific past, while the darkness of the barn still awaits anyone who dares venture inside.

  Set over the course of several decades, The Farm is a horror novel about people who live with no idea of the terror in their midst, and about a girl who finally has a chance to confront a source of great evil that has been feeding on the farm for generations.

  Also by Amy Cross

  ANNIE'S ROOM

  1945 and 2015. Seventy years apart, two girls named Annie move into the same room of the same remote house. Their stories are very different, but tragedy is about to bring them crashing together.

  Annie Riley has just broken both her legs. Unable to leave bed, she's holed up in her new room and completely reliant upon her family for company. She's also the first to notice a series of strange noises in the house, but her parents and brother think she's just letting her imagination run overtime. And then, one night, dark forces start to make their presence more keenly felt, leading to a horrific discovery...

  Seventy years ago, Annie Garrett lived in the same house with her parents. This Annie, however, was very different. Bitter and vindictive and hopelessly devoted to her father, she developed a passionate hatred for her mother. History records that Annie eventually disappeared while her parents were executed for her murder, but what really happened to Annie Garrett, and is her ghost still haunting the house to this day?

  Annie's Room is the story of two girls whose lives just happened to be thrown together by an unlikely set of circumstances, and of a potent evil that blossomed in one soul and then threatened to consume another.

  Also by Amy Cross

  ELI'S TOWN

  “Someone really should go check on Eli...”

  Every year, someone from the Denton family travels to the town of Tulepa, to check on weird old uncle Eli. This time around it's Holly's turn to make the journey, but when she arrives she discovers that not only is Eli missing, but the locals appear to be hiding something.

  Meanwhile, a strange curse seems to have struck the town. Every day, at exactly noon, one resident drops dead. Is the string of sudden fatalities just a coincidence? If it's something more sinister, why does no-one seem to be trying to uncover the truth? And what do these deaths have to do with the disappearance of Eli Denton, a strange old man who has barely even left his house in more than a decade?

  Eli's Town is a horror novel about an eccentric but seemingly harmless man who discovers a new way to live, and about his niece's desperate attempt to uncover the truth before she too succumbs to the town's mysteries.

  Also by Amy Cross

  THE ISLAND

  (STEADFALL BOOK 1)

  “The revolution never came. We all waited, but it didn't happen. Eventually we just had to accept that the world was never going to change.”

  In the near future, it's not hard to end up on the wrong side of the law. Every lie counts, every minor mistake. Build up enough points, and you'll be hauled off to work for the government. The only possible escape is the island, a remote wilderness with no rules and no laws. But if you choose to go to the island, you can never come back.

  Everyone knows that only crazy people go to the island.

  Arrested for a crime she didn't commit, Iris soon discovers that she already has a long criminal record she never knew about. When her world comes crashing down, she makes the ultimate choice and invokes her right to be sent to the island. There, she quickly discovers the horrors of a land where anyone can do anything they want, free of all rules and laws. She also meets Asher, a mysterious girl with a dark past and a crazy plan to establish her own town in the midst of the island's chaos. First, though, they both have to face a deadly group with a taste for human flesh.

  The Island is the first book in the Steadfall series, about two people trying to establish their own order in a mad world, and about the horrors that take place when humanity is let off the leash.

  OTHER BOOKS

  BY AMY CROSS INCLUDE

  Horror

  The Farm

  Annie's Room

  At the Edge of the Forest

  Eli's Town

  The Cabin

  The Priest Hole

  The Lighthouse

  3AM

  Asylum

  Meds (Asylum 2)

  Tenderling

  The Girl Clay

  The Prison

  American Coven

  The Night Girl

  Devil's Briar

  Ward Z

  Ward Z: Revelation

  The Devil's Photographer

  Take Me to Church

  Fantasy / Horror

  Dark Season series 1, 2 & 3

  Ascension (Demon's Grail book 1)

  Evolution (Demon's Grail book 2)

  Dead Souls Volumes 1 to 4

  Lupine Howl series 1 to 4

  Grave Girl

  Graver Girl (Grave Girl 2)

  Ghosts

  The Library

  Journey to the Library (The Library Saga 2)

  The Ghosts of London

  Thriller

  Ophelia

  The Dead City (Ophelia 2)

  Fallen Heroes (Ophelia 3)

  The Girl Who Never Came Back

  The Dead and the Dying (Joanna Mason 1)

  The House of Broken Backs (Joanna Mason 2)

  The Pornographer's Wife

  Other People's Bodies

  Dystopia / Science Fiction

  The Island (Steadfall book 1)

  The Shades

  Finality series 1

  Mass Extinction Event series 1 to 4

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Part One

  Ivy Jones

  Part Two

  Doctor James Ratcliffe

  Part Three

  Ivy Jones

  Part Four

  Doctor James Ratcliffe

  Part Five

  Ivy Jones

  Part Six

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  Part Seven

  Ivy Jones

  Part Eight

  Doctor James Ratcliffe

  Part Nine

  Ivy Jones

  Part Ten

  Ivy Jones

  Part Eleven

  Ivy Jones

  Epilogue