Excerpt!
Move, my brain screams—my arms and legs lag behind. Blood pools behind her head, oozing out over the tile floor. Her eyes roll back into a blank stare. If I want to get out of here, this is my only chance. I don’t have much time before someone misses her.
I grab the key card out of her coat pocket and gingerly pull off her lab coat, being careful not to stain it with the growing river of blood.
As I slip on her whitecoat, my head darts around for something I can use as a weapon–but this isn’t a surgical center. No scalpels. No razors. Nothing sharp.
Syringes.
Scads of them.
Yes, this can work.
I fumble through the medicine cabinet, and it’s like a candy store for drug addicts.
Ketamine.
Midazolam.
Haldol.
Potassium chloride, instantly deadly.
But only if I can hit a vein.
Nope. Too risky.
I rip a syringe open with my teeth, push in the plunger, tear open the vial tabs, and stab the needle into the first vial, then the second. I fill the syringe with a lethal dose of ketamine and midazolam, hoping that it will work fast enough, if it comes to that.
Two or three minutes or so for onset, injected into a muscle.
I’ve never envisioned myself as a murderer. But what choice do I have?
Footsteps outside the door stop me in my tracks.
Someone’s hovering, and I can only hope they don’t call out her name.
She moans.
She’s alive?
What if she cries out for help?
Sweat moistens my palms as I wait. I wipe away the dampness, willing myself to calm down. I can’t afford to have slippery fingers with what I’m attempting.
Now it’s quiet. Too quiet. I didn’t hear footsteps or anyone leaving.
Are they just standing there?
Maybe they heard our scuffle?
If she makes a sound, I’m as good as dead.
I rip open another syringe, grab a vial of potassium chloride out of the cabinet, and fill it. On reflex, I tap it to get out the air bubbles, and a nervous chuckle slips out.
What’s the point of that?
I find a vein on the top of her hand, which is creepily warm. She seems to have passed out again, or else she’s dead. But I’m pretty sure she’s still alive, although I can always tell myself she wasn’t. But I’m not positive.
Can I actually do this?
For a split second, I hesitate.
Before this moment, it was self-defense.
It’s her or me, though, so I prepare to jab the needle into her vein.
Instead, I check again for a pulse.
She’s dead … I’m pretty sure.
The door handle turns.
I rush behind the door and ready my other syringe. My heart’s pounding so hard, I’m afraid someone will hear it. My pulse thrums in my ears as I await what’s next.
Then the handle catches, the lock saving me–or whoever’s on the other side.
I wait in stillness as the sound of a woman’s heels click, click, clicking on the tile floor fades to silence, willing my racing pulse to slow.
At least it’s not Cameron.
Then I make my move.
When her mirror twin goes missing, Casey is led to a deadly paradise where no one escapes…
Casey and Nora are mirror twins, identical—sort of. Casey is right-handed, Nora is left-handed. Their moles sit on opposite cheeks. In terms of personality, they are also diametrically opposed.
So, when her high-strung sister disappears after a fight with her husband, Casey shouldn’t be as concerned as she is. Nora’s done it before.
But this time, things feel different. It’s a twin thing; Casey knows it in her bones. Something is terribly wrong.
Casey hires private investigator who discovers that Nora’s been on the dark web—lured by an entity that calls itself Switzerland, promising to take away your pain and leave you in a state of eternal bliss, for a hefty fee.
The trail leads to a luxury wellness retreat hidden in the Mexican jungle. Determined to find her sister before it’s too late, Casey poses as a resort guest and heads to Mexico to rescue her sister.
As Casey digs deeper, she finds something far more sinister than she could have imagined, and it’s possible that neither of them will get out alive.
Author bio:
Bonnie Traymore is the Amazon bestselling author of fourteen domestic/psychological thrillers. Her thrillers feature strong but relatable female protagonists who peel back the layers of suburban American life and give readers a peek inside. The plots explore difficult topics such as jealousy, infidelity, murder, and the impact of psychological disorders, but she also includes bits of romance and humor to lighten the mood from time to time.
Bonnie loves Hitchcock movies, psychological thriller novels, coffee, and dark chocolate, not necessarily in that order and sometimes simultaneously. She has a doctorate in United States history and resides in Honolulu with her family. She's an active member of International Thriller Writers and Mystery Writers of America.
