Prudy's Horror Novels

DEVIL EYES

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At a luxury resort on a remote key off Florida’s Gulf coast, guests, staff and townspeople people are threatened by the spirits of a deranged French au pair and her Seminole lover. . . a conflict brought into focus through the eyes of a child, an albino Indian and an antique toy — a stereopticon.

An excerpt from

~ Devil Eyes ~

by

Prudy Taylor Board writing as  Prudence Foster

The sound of shattering glass caught her attention, and Liliane DuBois lifted her head as rain swept into the bedchamber. She gazed at the hazy shards of glass jutting up inside the window frames. There was no haze. It was her sight. Focus. She must focus! The paddle-shaped leaves of the sea grape tree smashed the dormer windows, striking with the fury of the gusts that twisted the branches into contorted silhouettes. The keening wind invaded the presidential suite and extinguished the lamps.

Curled like a fetus on the canopied bed, Liliane clasped her stomach protectively, but beneath the slashed fingers the shiny pattern of her paisley shawl glistened with her blood. Francois, her husband, lay spread-eagled across the September 10, 1908, edition of the New York Times. He’d been seated in the Morris chair reading when the au pair had struck him from behind with the wood axe from the Inn’s kitchen. His grunt of surprise had awakened Liliane from a nap.

Francois was dead. She was dying. The loss of blood was rending her weak, but her senses were alert, and in the next room she heard the au pair croon her daughter Marguerite’s favorite song, “When comrades seek sweet country haunt by twos and twos together, and count like misers hour by hour October’s bright blue weather.”

Liliane yearned to see her children one last time, but could she make it? Gingerly, she eased off the bed, and on her knees, she crawled inch by inch to the threshold of the sitting room.

The pain worsened, and she closed her eyes and gathered her strength. With her final surge of energy, she dragged herself into the room. When she opened her eyes, she was overwhelmed by sadness. Marguerite was sprawled on the carpet, a crimson aura around her golden ringlets. Her blue eyes were wide with surprise, but fixed in death’s final stare.

Her son, Henri, lay face down, hand outstretched, reaching toward the door connecting the sitting room with their parents’ bed chamber. Darkening gore formed a ruff encircling his neck, staining his corn silk hair and drenching the wooden stereopticon he’d been holding.

Seated on the carpet next to Marguerite and holding a damp washcloth, the au pair was singing. Her sweet, young voice rose as she sang, “O sun and skies and flowers of June, Count all your boasts together, Love loveth best of all the year October’s bright blue weather.” She stroked Marguerite’s face with the washcloth and lovingly ruffled Henri’s golden locks.

Liliane’s legs grew cold, but oddly the chill was not uncomfortable. She slipped gently into her final slumber.

~ * ~

Shortly before dawn, the storm abated. When rescue workers from the mainland arrived at the hotel two days later, it was deserted except for the four bodies. In the corridor, the would-be rescuers followed crimson footprints to the edge of the Inn’s terrace, where the trail vanished.

Steeling himself, one man re-entered the scene of the carnage. In the far corner of the sitting room, he noticed a clump of gore-stained rags. As he approached warily, a tiny hand pierced the clotting, glutinous tissue. He willed himself not to throw up, for lying amidst the torn placenta and other detritus of human birth was a newborn babe—crying as if its world had not begun, but ended.

BLOOD LEGACY

By Prudy Taylor Board writing as Prudence Foster

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IN THE HELLISH HEAT OF THE FLORIDA NIGHT, THEY SATE THEIR RAVENOUS HUNGER... He calls himself Count Ferencz Nadasdy, and his foreign manner and brooding ways are an impenetrable mystery to the townspeople of Fort McIntyre. Yet beautiful Angelique Gaudet is drawn to the stranger. His gifts of rare jewels entice her. His dark, searching eyes seem to probe, impale, invade her soul. And his urgent arms promise unearthly pleasure.
 
But Angelique is in mortal danger. Police lieutenant Gil Spencer knows it. He has seen the carnage Nadasdy and his loathsome minions have left behind¡ªthe mutilation, the madness, the unspeakable horror. Now he must make Angelique believe. He must make her see the nightmare lurking beneath the dream. He must risk everything to save the woman he loves, before the ancient ones awaken the terrible secret buried deep within her heart...