Read Dead Is Not an Option Online
Authors: Marlene Perez
Tags: #Family, #School & Education, #Mysteries & Detective Stories, #Family & Relationships, #Sisters, #Fantasy & Magic, #Siblings, #Interpersonal Relations, #High schools, #Juvenile Fiction, #Fiction, #Schools, #Psychic ability, #Supernatural, #Girls & Women, #Interpersonal Relations in Adolescence, #Social Issues, #General, #Friendship
Dead Is Not an Option (16 page)
I was convinced that he was going to leave Nightshade and live with his grandma until college started in the fall.
He parked his car near the highest point in Nightshade, and we walked hand in hand to the top of the outlook. There was a sliver of a moon in the sky. I looked down on the town.
"I wanted to tell you first," he said.
My heart ended up somewhere on the ground at his words.
"Tell me what?"
"I'm not going to go to school in Orange County," he said. "I'm staying right here in Nightshade. I know what I want to do now. I want to be a police officer. Like my dad."
"Are you sure?" I said.
He nodded and gulped back tears.
"Your dad would have been so proud of you," I said. I brushed a tear of my own away.
Ryan put his arm around me. "We'll be all right," he said. "No matter what."
Our senior year had been nothing like I had hoped or expected, but Ryan and I had made it through.
I put my head on his shoulder and we stared down at the lights of Nightshade. I didn't know everything that was ahead of me, but I knew I could face it with Ryan beside me.
Acknowledgments
A great many people worked to get the Dead Is series out into the world. So thanks to the bloggers, reviewers, librarians, fans, and friends who told one person to read this series! Thanks to all the hard-working people at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, especially my wonderful editor Julie Tibbott, who managed to keep her sense of humor even when I went way off outline. My agent, Stephen Barbara, is sheer awesomeness, but everyone already knows that.
Thanks to my writer friends who keep me sane, read manuscripts at the drop of a hat, and are always up for coffee! And to my husband and children, who give me the gift of time to write.
Marlene Perez
is the author of
The Comeback, Love in the Corner Pocket,
and the five books in the Dead Is series, including
Dead Is the New Black,
which was named an ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Young Adult Readers. She lives in Orange County, California, with her family. She survived her Grad Night party, but just barely.