LOVE NEVER DIES

They say love never dies, that the dead never really leave us. When Maya’s first love is tragically taken, she wants to believe it, but all she can feel is the lack of him. Until love finds her in the least expected way. A bittersweet story of first love beyond the grave.

LIBERTALIA TALES: FIRST LOVE

You never forget your first love. The way they made your soul sing. The colour of their eyes. Their scent. How they broke your heart. Love comes in as many different forms as there are lovers. Find your perfect match in this brand new collection of stories about first love, some of them sweet, some of them spicy, some of them a little dark and twisted. Fall in love with a new story as more titles are added to the series.

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LOVE NEVER DIES

DISCLAIMERS & CONTENT WARNINGS

This book deals with grief and how to go on when your loved one is dead. There are mentions of pregnancy, death, and graves, as well as what some would consider inappropriate behaviour throughout the story. There is also a paranormal element that involves a raven.

Love Never Dies is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

ABOUT LOVE NEVER DIES

GENRE(S):

Gothic Romance
Dark Romance
Paranormal Romance
Bittersweet
First Love

FORMAT(S):

e-Book
Kindle Unlimited

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EXCERPT

“The dead never really leave us.” Someone said that to me, while I shook, jack-knifed around the absence of him, in the days after it happened.

They’re still there. Watching. Waiting patiently until we join them again.

That’s what they told me, but it wasn’t true. I touched his chest as he lay in his coffin at the funeral home, and it was like touching a stuffed doll. I wanted to laugh, to tell him, “Look! They said this was you!” Share the joke with him. I remember my eyes flicking from corner to corner, as if he might be hiding there, out of his body somehow, watching us all like it was some great prank he was about to reveal. Surprise! But the punchline never came.

It was late summer when they put him in the ground. All winter I watched for him, like a crow watches the dead, ploughed tracks in the fields, waiting for the first movement of spring. Hunger gnawed me hollow, starved of him. I walked and walked, long, grey streets where the rumble of traffic or the rush of the river barely made it through the fog of numbness. I always ended up at the same place. Here, this quiet corner of the graveyard, with the stone that says his name. Bran.

The crow spreads its wings, glides lazily down and comes to rest with its feet splayed firmly on the top of his stone. It shakes itself a little, as if it’s getting comfy, stretches its wings up and down, then folds them neatly at its back, its head cocked. I remember reading somewhere that crows are as smart as seven-year-old kids. It should creep me out, but it doesn’t. Bright, black eyes regard me keenly. It feels like a greeting.

“Hello,” I say.

The crow cocks its head again and its beak opens in a low “caw”.

I relax. This crow obviously hangs around people a lot. I search my pockets for the food it must be anticipating, and find a half-eaten granola bar. Cautiously, trying not to startle it, I stretch forward to sprinkle crumbs of oats at the grassy foot of the stone, on the little rise that covers Bran’s body.

The crow watches me, calculating. Can it trust this person? They say crows can recognise individual human faces. I wonder if it knows me, has seen me all the many times I’ve come here, sat on the wet earth hugging my knees in the rain, in the snow. Do crows understand grief?

ABOUT FANNY

Everyone loves Fanny. She’s an angel with a dirty face and sticky fingers, though she scrubs up well enough, given a bubbly bath and the right company. By day she works in a certain High Street store known for the quality and sensible nature of its undies; by night she writes raunchy tales that largely involve ripping such items off. In her fantasies, she wears a lacy bodice and French knickers, or something tight and made of leather, depending on whether she’s an innocent maiden at court or a vengeful pirate queen. In reality – well, who cares about reality?

Come join Fanny in her frenzied fantasies? It’s always fun to play with new friends.