Skull Creek Stakeout (Caden Chronicles, The) by Eddie Jones Read Free Book Online Page A

the tree of good and evil and live forever. “But if you eat its fruit,” God says, “you will die.”
    According to the story, the young couple disobeyed God and he banished them from the garden. Then God ordered angels to stand in front of the tree of life to prevent the pair from living in a state of eternal damnation. Thus began humankind’s quest to secure immortality.
    In ancient Persia there has been found artwork depicting a man struggling with a monstrous bloodsucker. In Jewish mythology there is the legend of Lilith — a female demon who, according to some early Christian traditions, may have been the serpent in the Garden of Eden. The character of Lilith is believed to have inspired the Sumerian myths about female vampires called “Lillu” or Mesopotamian myths about succubae (female night demons) called “lilin.”
    Forester had certainly been right about one thing: humankind’s infatuation with vampires and evil began long before Bram Stoker wrote
Dracula.
    I stepped into the bookstore, causing a cowbell to jingle overhead. The shop was long and narrow with brick walls and hardwood floors. Rolling ladders reached to top shelves. The rich aroma of freshly brewed coffee mixed with the pungent smell of new books.
    Printing ink is one of those truly underrated smells. Older books still have it, but in new books the smell fades quickly. I learned this last Christmas while working in the shipping department of a local book printer. We have this rule in our family: children spend their own money for gifts. No hitting Mom or Dad up for Christmas shopping money. My parents don’t care what I buy them. It can be a ten-dollar gift card to Starbucks, but it has to be something I purchased with money I earned or something I made myself.
    Same rule for my sister. I have a drawer full of hand-painted picture frames I’ll never use.
    From Thanksgiving to Christmas last winter, I worked at the print shop and learned a lot about books — or at least a lot about how books are printed. Every time Mom complains about boys my age not reading anymore, I want to scream, “Give me a break.”
    And I mean it. I need a break from reading. It’s all I do. I read textbooks and tests and term papers. My school forces me to read awful novels because there’s this requirement that says every student must read a certain number of books by the end of the grading period. Do you have any idea how hard it is to find an “approved” book that’s interesting? No wonder booksabout boy wizards and teen vampires and children killing each other are so popular. At least the stories are
interesting.
    “May I help you?”
    I stopped scanning the back cover of a book called
The Incomplete Idiot’s Guide to Natural Cures, Curses, and Potions.
    “You the owner?”
    “Yes, Phillip Raintree. Finding everything okay?”
    Raintree was a lean man of medium height with curly blond hair tinged with gray. He wore wire-rim glasses with round lenses. He had on a green tartan vest over a white dress shirt, faded jeans, and Birkenstock sandals with gray socks.
    “Do you have any books on the history of this area?”
    He flashed a toothy, nicotine-stained grin. “Was there a particular era you’re interested in? We carry an extensive collection that covers the early years dating all the way back to when the Cherokee inhabited this area. Makes for an interesting read. Is this for a class project?”
    Ignoring his question, I asked, “Anything more recent?”
    “There’s also an excellent set of works that covers from the Revolutionary War to the antebellum era.”
    “I was thinking more along the lines of the town’s beginnings; how it got its name, the history of prominent figures, family secrets, and that sort of thing.”
    “Wait right here.”
    I went back to reading the instructions for how to cause a wart to sprout on someone’s nose by mixing celery, cumin, and goat cheese. The accompanying pictures looked hideous.
But hey, if I really