Haven: Revenge of the Viper by D.C. Akers Read Free Book Online Page B

it to himself. Sam continued to look in disbelief at the damage a baseball could do to a garage.
    When he finished reading, Travis looked up from the letter with a puzzled look in his eyes.
    “What is Narra—”
    “Don’t say it!” Sam yelled out! “Are you crazy? You want to get us killed!”
    “That’s the word you used to stop it!” Travis said defiantly.
    “Yeah, and it’s also the word I used to make it happen in the first place, so don’t say it!”
    Travis looked back down at the letter and then at the box. He slowly bent down and picked up the pouch.
    “What’s in here?” he asked.
    Sam shrugged. “Don’t know, take a look.”
    Travis opened the pouch and pulled out one of the slivers of black onyx.
    “Wow, that’s pretty cool.”
    He touched the tip of the long triangle.
    “Man, that would hurt if you fell on it. Looks like there’s quite a few of these things too,” Travis said.
    “Eleven,” Sam replied.
    “Weird. Odd number …”
    “Everything is odd about that box,” Sam sighed. “There’s some kind of picture in there too, but I don’t know what it is.”
    Travis put the crystals back into the pouch and placed it back in the box. He glanced at the picture, but it was the ring that caught Travis’s attention.
    “Whose ring is this?” he asked, holding it up.
    Sam moved closer, stepping over the wooden beams and around the bikes. “I’m not sure,” he said.
    Travis brought the ring closer to his face to take a better look. He examined it carefully, scrutinizing every detail. Then he stopped and gazed up at Sam. “There’s something written on the inside,” he said.
    Sam met his gaze. “What? How did I miss that? What does it say?”
    Travis looked back down at the ring and swallowed, then spoke with a slight hesitation, knowing that what he was about to say was going to hurt.
    “It says: Rylan, a Keeper of faith.”
    Travis looked up at Sam. His cheeks were flushed and he had a solemn blank stare on his face. The words hung in the air and for a brief moment there was silence.
    “My father?” Sam said in a broken whisper.
    Sam hadn’t spoken of his father much, but Travis knew how he felt about him. Travis felt the same way about his parents. Just because you didn’t speak about them didn’t mean you weren’t thinking about them.
    He handed the ring over to Sam and purposely began sifting through the scattered remains of the garage, trying to busy himself and give Sam a moment.
    Just then, the back door sprang open and Sarah marched onto the porch. Her cell phone was to her ear in one hand and the other was waving in the air. Sam jumped in surprise and quickly shoved the ring into his pocket.
    “That’s fine Barry. FINE! But if you didn’t want to date me any more, all you had to do was man up and say so! You didn’t have to cheat on me, you CREEP!”
    Sarah began pacing back and forth.
    “Scared!” she yelled. “I’m not scared of being alone! The only thing that scares me is that someone might hate me as much as I loathe you. And just for the record, you’re not as cool as you think you are! I hate that stupid football jersey you always wear, and you’re dumb, and there is no cure for that, Barry!”
    Sarah pulled the phone from her ear, and pressed the End button with so much force Sam thought she might snap the phone in half.
    “What a loser!”
    Sam and Travis stood there in silence. Sam still clutched the ring in his pocket. He rocked back and forth, hoping Sarah would be too flustered to see the wreckage they were standing in.
    Sam looked over at Travis, who stood staring at Sarah with a devilish grin. There was a small part of Travis that actually enjoyed seeing that. Maybe not the fact that she was hurt, but the fact that there was no more Barry in her life.
    Sam was trying to get Travis’s attention when he finally snapped out of his trance. He quickly took to surveying the area once more as if he had heard nothing.
    Sarah shoved her cell phone