Ruby Hill

By Sarah Ballance

From her earliest memories, Ashley Pearce has been drawn to Ruby Hill Lunatic Asylum, and she's not the only one. Decades after the abandoned hospital ended its institutional reign of torture and neglect, something lurks in the shadows. Since she's a paranormal investigator, it's Ashley's job to find out what.

Crime scene expert Corbin Malone doesn't believe in ghosts. A born skeptic, he has no interest in entertaining the hype surrounding the mysterious deaths at Ruby Hill, but he won't turn his back while more women die. He agrees to an overnight investigation, never expecting his first encounter would be with the woman he pushed away a year ago. But when he discovers Ashley is a target, he learns his greatest fear isn't living with his own demons, but losing her for good.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Sep 30, 2013
• ISBN: 9781622662258

Book preview

One reunion. One ghost. One night that will change everything...

From her earliest memories, Ashley Pearce has been drawn to Ruby Hill Lunatic Asylum, and she’s not the only one. Decades after the abandoned hospital ended its institutional reign of torture and neglect, something lurks in the shadows. Since she’s a paranormal investigator, it’s Ashley’s job to find out what.

Crime scene expert Corbin Malone doesn’t believe in ghosts. A born skeptic, he has no interest in entertaining the hype surrounding the mysterious deaths at Ruby Hill, but he won’t turn his back while more women die. He agrees to an overnight investigation, never expecting his first encounter would be with the woman he pushed away a year ago. But when he discovers Ashley is a target, he learns his greatest fear isn’t living with his own demons, but losing her for good.

Previously released on Entangled’s Ever After imprint — September 2013

Table of Contents

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Sarah Ballance...

The 48-Hour Hookup

The Millionaire’s Gamble

The Three-Week Arrangement

Five Things I Love About You

Gambling on the Bodyguard

For Seven Nights Only

The Marriage Agenda

One Night with the Billionaire

Her Wicked Sin

An Unexpected Sin

The Sins of a Few

Discover more Entangled Select Otherworld titles…

The Shadows of Stormclyffe Hall

Ghost of A Promise

Divinely Ruined

Spellbound in Sleepy Hollow

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2013 by Sarah Ballance. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Previously released on Entangled’s Ever After imprint — September 2013

Entangled Publishing, LLC

2614 South Timberline Road

Suite 109

Fort Collins, CO 80525

Visit our website at www.entangledpublishing.com.

Select Otherworld is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

Edited by Kerri-Leigh Grady

Cover design by Louisa Maggio

Cover art from iStock

ISBN 978-1-62266-225-8

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition September 2013

For my husband Ryan, who promised we could one day spend the night in a real asylum. Maybe.

Chapter One

Death had a flavor. Equal parts bitter and bland, the damnable taste was more sickening than the stickiness in Corbin Malone’s throat. It soured his gut, leaving him with an unease he couldn’t quite swallow, and the deeper they drove into the countryside—the closer the car brought him to Ruby Hill Lunatic Asylum—the more potent the flavor. Five years a cop, he’d neatly sidestepped the ugly aftertaste until things got personal.

Until the body belonged to his brother, Cash.

Nearly six months had passed since Cash Malone fought for his last breath inside the dismal, abandoned halls of Ruby Hill. Though his body now rested six feet under a distant patch of cemetery grass, Ruby Hill remained his tomb—a giant, crouching headstone marring acres of otherwise beautiful, rolling hills. And for Corbin, a visage of murder.

Death had a flavor: metallic and bitter.

A quick glance at his superior, Joe Ellison, made clear Corbin didn’t have a choice. You’re a sonofabitch, you know that?

Joe’s attention shifted momentarily from the windshield, his expression tainted with bemusement. Play nice, Malone. You’ll scare the civilians.

Not just civilians, but ghost hunters. Crazies, as far as Corbin was concerned. People who boasted of hearing voices from thin air and seeing apparitions in the dark definitely belonged in an insane asylum, but he sure as hell didn’t want to babysit them.

And why were the ghostbusters there to begin with? Granted, blaming a ghost made for a good headline—Ruby Hill Deaths Attributed to Phantom Killer—but since when did the department fuel media hysteria?

"We’ve

Reviews for Ruby Hill

[kitchenwitch04 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Ruby Hill is a long-deserted, crumbling insane asylum with a dark history of abuse and neglect. Ashley Pearce has always felt drawn to it, and as a paranormal investigator is thrilled to get a chance for her team to spend the night there investigating paranormal activity. The asylum is currently included in an investigation due to the mysterious deaths of several women found there. It is also the place where Cobin Malone's brother died as well.Corbin is a crime scene expert who has been sent to Ruby Hill to oversee the ghost-hunting team's investigation. He does not believe in anything to do with ghosts or paranormal activity, so he is not thrilled with this task, and even less so due to the fact that he and Ashley used to be a couple. He walked out of their relationship after his brother died - he could not let go of the fact that even though he knows it was not her fault, he still holds her somewhat responsible due to the fact that she got his brother interested in the paranormal and the asylum. This will be the first time they have seen each other since he left her behind.I really enjoyed the setting of this book. I felt that it had great potential to be a seriously creepy book. Unfortunately, I did not find that level of macabre that I was expecting. I found that I was disappointed that although the beginning of the story held much promise, it pretty much lost steam in the middle. And although I understand that this was a short novella, I felt that the ending was rushed. I think that the book should be expanded to include some of the background story regarding the women's deaths as well as his brother's. I also feel like the actual overnight investigation should be drawn out a little more to give us more time to absorb the story.In all fairness, I didn't hate this story, I just felt it needed a little more substance. I think with some added content and a lot more lurid details this could be an awesome book.I received this ebook from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

[hcollins_25 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I loved this Novella! It had all the spook factors needed to keep me on the edge of my seat. The characters were amazing and fit very well together. Definitely recommend reading this one, especially with Halloween being right around the corner. I received an ARC from the publisher for an honest review.

[mybookaddiction_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Ruby Hill is an asylum that has recently been the site of “mysterious deaths”. Ashley and Corbin appear to have distant ties to the asylum and more recent romantic ties to each other. Something happened to end their relationship. Will they have a chance to re-build it or will Ruby Hill claim another victim?This is a novella (approximately 57 pages), so the characters and back story aren’t as fleshed out as they would be in a novel. I thought Ms. Ballance did a great job at letting us see the relationship between Ashley and Corbin and in explaining Ruby Hill. There were some scenes, well crafted, that created some unnerving visuals, but having said that, I didn’t find it to be too scary – just a really good ‘ghostly’ story!For this reader, there was the right blend of suspense, romance, and supernatural spookiness. I liked it and would recommend it; makes a nice addition to the Halloween list of favorites for me.Rating: 4.5Heat Rating: NoneReviewed by: Karen CCourtesy of My Book Addiction and More