• International Bestseller• #1 Best Seller in Thrillers and Occult• Top 100 Overall Best Seller (Amazon.ca)• Top 100 Best Seller in Occult, Thrillers, Horror, & Mystery, Thriller & SuspenseFrom the international bestselling author that brought you CHILDREN OF THE FOG comes a terrifying new psychological thriller that will leave you breathless…"Submerged reads like an approaching storm, full of darkness, dread and electricity. Prepare for your skin to crawl."—Andrew Gross, New York Times bestselling author of 15 SecondsTwo strangers submerged in guilt, brought together by fate…After a tragic car accident claims the lives of his wife, Jane, and son, Ryan, Marcus Taylor is immersed in grief. But his family isn't the only thing he has lost. An addiction to painkillers has taken away his career as a paramedic. Working as a 911 operator is now the closest he gets to redemption--until he gets a call from a woman trapped in a car.Rebecca Kingston yearns for a quiet weekend getaway, so she can think about her impending divorce from her abusive husband. When a mysterious truck runs her off the road, she is pinned behind the steering wheel, unable to help her two children in the back seat. Her only lifeline is a cell phone with a quickly depleting battery and a stranger's calm voice on the other end telling her everything will be all right.*SUBMERGED has a unique tie-in to Tardif's international bestseller, CHILDREN OF THE FOG.
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“From the first page you know you are in the hands of a seasoned and expert storyteller who is going to keep you up at night turning the pages. Tardif knows her stuff. There’s a reason she sells like wildfire—her words burn up the pages. A wonderful, scary, heart pumping writer.”
“Tardif once again delivers a suspenseful supernatural masterpiece.”
“From the first page, Cheryl Kaye Tardif takes you hostage with
“Cheryl Kaye Tardif’s latest novel
A very special thank you to my longtime friend, Mike, without whom this novel wouldn’t be possible. Mike, thank you for sharing your own story of addiction, of how it affected your life, your marriage, your career and those around you. Your quiet courage is inspiring. And your life now proves there
Thanks to Sharon DeVries of Yellowhead Regional Emergency Communications Center, for all the invaluable information regarding emergency services and practices in the Hinton/Edson area. As with all fiction, sometimes truth has to be bent in order to fit a plot and to rev up the pace, so if there are any mistakes made, these are completely my own, though I do strive to create believable scenes and characters.
Many thanks to Laurent Colasse, president of ResQMe, and Melissa Christensen, for allowing me to use their product and brand in my story. I am hoping this will bring more awareness to this important safety device. And my sincere appreciation for their donation of a dozen ResQMe key chains, which will be given away during the launch of this book. You can learn more about this device at www.resqme.com
And to Christopher Bain, senior manager of product planning and development at BioWare ULC, a division of Electronic Arts Inc., for allowing me the use of their company name in this novel. www.bioware.com
Thanks to John Zur, a valued reader and fan of my novels, for allowing me to turn you into a character―and a good one, at that. I have plans for Detective John Zur, and I believe he’ll make another appearance in another novel sometime in the future.
Thanks to a very special teen fan, Gabbie Gros, who allowed me to immortalize her within these pages. Gabbie, I truly hope you realize you can be whatever you want to be. Your future is in YOUR hands. You are a gift to the world! Never, ever, forget that.
And thanks to fellow author, Luke Murphy, who won a contest I held a few years ago—one in which the winner supplied me with the first line of a new novel. The first sentence of the prologue is Luke’s, and I think you’ll agree it provokes gruesome images… and an elusive scent that might linger in your mind.
You never grow accustomed to the stench of death. Marcus Taylor knew that smell intimately. He had inhaled burnt flesh, decayed flesh… diseased flesh. It lingered on him long after he was separated from the body.
The image of his wife and son’s gray faces and blue lips assaulted him.
Mercifully, there were no bodies tonight. The only scent he recognized now was wet prairie and the dank residue left over from a rainstorm and the river.
“So what happened, Marcus?”
