TRIGGERED: A Romantic Suspense Bundle (5 Books)

by Evie Nichole

  It wasn’t for anyone else’s benefit. It wasn’t to ease people’s worries. No. It was pure self delusion. I’d been talking to myself, trying to persuade my own sense of fragility that everything was alright. If you can’t make it, fake it, and I’d certainly been doing just that.

  But I couldn’t fake it anymore.

  It’s hard to convey unless you’ve experienced the feeling yourself. When you think you have a handle on your emotions, but really you’ve just pushed them way down beneath. Then, suddenly, someone catches you off guard at the exact moment, a precise millisecond where you’re at your most vulnerable. It could be a stranger, or perhaps even a song or film which brings back a memory. Whatever it is, it reaches deep inside of you and opens a gate you prayed would always remain shut. A gate which holds back reality and all of its monstrous faces. The grief then pours out, unimpeded like a barbarian horde, and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

  Tears came. I don’t know how many, or for how long I sobbed, but staring into the eyes of my friends and my sister pushed me over the edge. The fact that they knew the way I was living my life wasn’t healthy, that they had called me out on it. Perhaps I’d been close to the realization myself, teetering on the edge of the precipice. All I needed was a push, and the push did indeed come.

  It’s not what Daniel would have wanted.

  I’m not sure which one said it, but it didn’t really matter. What was important was the message, and I’d heard it loud and clear. Deep down, a well of recrimination gave way to a voice inside myself. One which had always been there, but I’d managed to drown out. One which knew, always knew, that staying in our old house was about wallowing in grief and self pity rather than about living a life to the fullest. A life which, now I knew firsthand from Daniel’s death, could be extinguished in the blink of an eye. I was wasting something precious which Daniel and countless others had taken from them mercilessly. I was wasting time.

  Something needed to be done. For too long I’d wandered the empty rooms and halls of that house. For too long I’d waited at night, alone in my bed, expecting to hear the key turn in the door and for Daniel to come in apologizing for working late. For too long I’d dreamt of that moment, and to feel his touch. For too long…

  The pain came out and it was almost unbearable, but at the same time cathartic. The pressure had been building for three long years, and finally there was some kind of release. I was distraught, but for the first time I could sense something else inside me, a sort of pride. I wanted to take back control of my life.

  When the tears did finally cease, we talked, the four of us. I realized then how much I’d missed their company; how much I’d missed any company at all. I’d persuaded myself that being alone was a good thing, and promised myself that one day I’d rejoin the world properly; but all too often one day remains permanently on the horizon, like a mirage in a desert; a promise to be chased but never caught.

  I’d quit my job months before Daniel died, and since then I hadn’t looked for anything else. There was enough in our savings to keep the house going for a while, but it couldn’t go on forever. It was an idyllic place and that came at a cost. Eventually, and not too far off, I wouldn’t be able to afford to live there anymore. The banks would come and I would find myself out on my own, away from that place which had promised so much, but laid so empty.

  “Let us help you get back on your feet,” Jill had said, Cheryl and Heather nodding approvingly.

  But I didn’t want their help. I wanted to be with my Daniel again. To feel his warmth. To feel his body next to mine. Even just to lay eyes on him one last time, whole and complete, not dying in the woods, crushed against a steering wheel. But if I could not have that last moment, then I would have, at the very least, my pride. I would not be thrown from my home by a shapeless suit or banker; no, I would walk away from it all with my head held high.

  I needed to get myself together. This couldn’t go on, the real world was still out there and I had to rejoin it, otherwise I would be consumed by final notices or my own grief; either outcome was not something I looked forward to.

  When Jill and my friends left, I didn’t tell them what I was going to do. I merely said that they were right, that I needed to do something. What that was, I didn’t really know, but I did manage to persuade both myself and my loved ones that I was serious about it. That seemed enough for them, and I ensured all three that I’d be in touch within the week.

  As soon as the door locked behind them and I heard the cars drive away, it was as if an autopilot took over; an emergency red switch in my head: Press only in dire circumstances. Whatever pressed it, I was grateful, as it got me moving. I walked to the back of the house, to a closet which hadn’t been opened in an age. There, I found a collection of cardboard boxes folded up and flattened.

  Daniel and I had used them to move in five years previous. I’d wanted to throw them away, but Daniel said no, we should keep them in case we ever needed to move again. I’d laughed at the suggestion, the house was a dream, big enough for a family, and at that time I was reveling in it, I couldn’t see any circumstance which would make us want to leave. Little did I know that a few years later I’d be digging those boxes out to move again, to move on, without my Daniel. Not because of a breakup or argument, but because of a cruel accident - at least that’s what I hoped it had been.

  The two bikers who had hounded us on that road, the night of the accident, were never identified. My memory was so shaken and shattered by the crash - I spent six weeks in the hospital - that I questioned if it had even happened as I remembered. The images were so vivid in places, yet in others skewed somehow. Things were missing, moments, words, events; and in their place, a sea of uncertainty with a murky bottom.

  Were those bikers really trying to run us off the road?

  Did one of them have a gun? The police found no evidence of a gunshot, but neither did they find the bikers themselves. They were interlopers who had entered my world, destroyed it, and then left like a gang of ghosts in the night.

  Those last moments played over in my mind again as I began packing up my things, our things. Rushing through the rooms I tried to escape the memory; the rain, the engine noise, the road in front fading into the darkness, a path we would never tread.

  At first I put some clothes into a box calmly, but as I walked from room to room in haphazard fashion, the visceral memory of Daniel’s death lingered. His face. His beautiful face untouched by the crash, resting on its side looking at me. He almost smiled reassuringly. I still wonder if he knew what was going on, did he know that his insides had been crushed, that he wasn’t going to make it? Or did he just feel sleepy, numb, losing consciousness without realizing it would be the last time he saw the world, saw our car, saw the woods he loved, saw me.

  Tears streamed down my face as the boxes began to pile up. Clothes lay on the floor, drawers half emptied. Daniel’s chess pieces scattered on the table as I knocked them over by accident. I’d never wanted to be that away from somewhere, so compelled to leave. My world was inside out, as a place I had loved I realized that now I hated. A horrid thought had festered in the back of my mind, and now the truth had seeped out; I could never call that place home.

  My perfect little grief-bubble was closing in. Once it had felt like a comfort, letting me stay where Daniel had once been, away from the world, preventing me from having to move on. Like a drug which gives instant relief, that bubble soon turned into a crutch, and I had to be rid of it. The bubble had indeed closed in, and it was almost suffocating me.

  A few hours later, I collapsed exhausted on the living room floor, at least the packing had started. It’s amazing how quickly a person can move when motivated, especially when they have been so lethargic for so long. Boxes were half-filled, cupboards half-emptied, but my effort was anything but half-hearted. I was adamant. Now that the first step had been taken, I could close up shop. Put the house on the market, and be out of there within a couple of weeks. Where I wou
ld go, I did not know, not at that point; but I was happy that I was at least moving forward. Shattered, I felt I had done enough for the time being.

  It was night, and the rug I lay on felt thick and comfortable. Daniel and I had made love on it more than once, and lying there in the dark, surrounded by boxes I’d never thought we’d need again, I felt alone, utterly and without end. My mind rushed to thoughts of Daniel’s body next to me, his warmth on the rug, my naked legs still wrapped around him. How many times had I used those thoughts as a crutch? How many times had I refused to think about the present, and instead relied on the past to see me through.

  But this time was different. Something had happened during my almost-manic attempts to box up my belongings. It’s strange how easy it is to overlook something, disregarding it as incidental at first, only for the realization to hit later on that it is not only important, but vital. Lying there, sobbing in the darkness, an image came into my mind. Something I’d found while in borderline mania packing away Daniel’s things. I’d pulled out the bottom drawer in our bedroom, revealing the floor to prying eyes. I registered that one of the floorboards beneath the old oak chest of drawers there looked somehow… Out of place, like it didn’t sit properly with the others. Now my mind was drawn to it, like a question which had to be answered. For some reason I felt like it hid a secret, dark or dangerous, I did not know.

  The tears subsided for a moment, replaced by the mystery, an urge to find out. I returned to the chest of drawers and pulled it to the side. Yes… The floorboard was misaligned, like it had been pulled up and then placed back into position, only to be jostled out of sitting flush with the rest of the floor; no doubt due to all of the moisture in the air… How it rained in the woods, my dear Maxine, how I loved the rain... Pushing Daniel’s voice from my mind, I reached over and pulled at the floorboard. At first it wouldn’t give, but after bringing a claw hammer from the kitchen to assist, it finally popped open.

  Inside the dark little hole under the floor, I could see a piece of once-yellow cloth, like one used by a mechanic, all covered in blotches of black oil. Holding the cloth in my hand, retrieving it from its hiding place, I then felt something wrapped up inside of it. I almost didn’t want to look. No one hides something under their floorboards without having a good, or bad, reason.

  What I felt there now lay in my hand, and it spoke to me in a way that no memory or photograph ever could. A voice screaming out in the night: Something is wrong. This is not right.

  In my hand I held a key, and it was clearly not for a car or a door or a locker. It was for a motorbike, a metal pendant hung from the dark leather with a Harley Davidson badge. I didn’t know much about bikes, but I at least knew that name.

  Yet, as far as I knew, Daniel had never had a motorbike in his life. It just didn’t suit his style. He’d never even mentioned any desire to own, or even try, one. Daniel was too much a stickler for safety for that, or so I thought. But there it was, in my hand, a motorbike key nonetheless.

  Flashes of the biker pointing a gun at Daniel filtered through my mind, and in that moment I made a connection between the two. Tentative, but there nonetheless. A question now formed in my mind, one which made me fear the answer. For a moment, I started to feel that there was more to that night than some random chase on a rain soaked road. Maybe it hadn’t been so accidental, maybe those bikers had been waiting on us. In the night, alone, I asked that question out loud:

  Whose key was it?

  A couple of weeks passed, and I stayed true to my conviction. I was getting out of that house. But where to? Jill and the girls thought I should stay in town with them, but I yearned for a true change, an earth shattering one, not just a meagre step a few miles away. I didn’t just want to leave my grief behind, I wanted, no, I needed to start afresh. That’s where the sense of pride in myself led me. To somewhere I could stand on my own two feet, even away from my loved ones. I felt I had to pull myself out of that funk on my own, only then could I be truly happy with who I was and where I was going.

  It had been a few years since I’d worked, but I had skills and a great resume. My passion was fashion. A good thing too, as that was how Daniel and I had met. He’d come with a few friends to a fashion show I was part of; a mutual friend from our hometown introduced us and we had instantly hit it off.

  A lot of people always look to the models in the fashion industry. The life of a jet setter, always in the spotlight, on the cover of magazines, one of the beautiful people, but that wasn’t my interest. I loved making things, I always had ever since I was a young girl. Before my father passed away when I was fourteen, he’d managed to get me a part time job in Pennies. It was a rundown little mending place which pretended to be a boutique. The truth was we spent most of our time fixing people’s existing clothes rather than selling them new ones. But it was a great education. I learned how clothes were put together, even a little bit about the design process. I had my dad to thank for that. When he passed away, it seemed only right that I should make a career out of it, he’d helped his little girl with the first few steps and I had been determined to complete them.

  When I met Daniel, I was working for a middle tier fashion house, not exactly small, but not huge either. We were building momentum, and I was increasingly getting my chance to shine, in a way I would never have had at a bigger fashion house.

  Thinking about it, I do wonder why I ever stopped if I truly loved it as much as I claimed. Sometimes people mistake needing a break for wanting to quit. I guess I made that error, and when Daniel and I got engaged and moved in together, I decided to work on some designs at home, and then open my own little boutique somewhere, selling bespoke dresses.

  What did happen to that dream, I wonder? In the end, I spent a few years in the woods with and without Daniel, coming out occasionally for a party or a beer at the local bar. That now seemed like a million miles away, and almost the actions of someone entirely different. Sometimes I wonder if the accident affected me more than I previously thought. Perhaps I’m not who I was… I don’t know, all I can do is move forward.

  Chapter 2

  I’ve always been a biker. Deep in my heart the road continues on in every direction. It’s the freedom. People look at bikers and think they’re mad. I remember coming off my bike once on a highway, I skidded along, tumbled, and then a car had to swerve on the other side of the road to miss me. I was inches from being crushed.

  I was taken to hospital, patched up. The doctor, I’ll never forget him; his name was Montgomery, a balding man with pointed features. He looked at me disapprovingly as a nurse stitched up my left leg.

  "I’ll never understand the mentality you guys have," he said, a tone of resentment bubbling underneath.

  I laughed.

  He didn’t find it funny. "You know how we in the ER refer to you and others like you?"

  "Handsome?"

  Again, he didn’t laugh. "We call you ‘donors.’ You know why that is?"

  "No," I said, wincing as the nurse finished the stitches.

  The doctor continued: "We call you donors because most of the time your sort end up in here, deceased. The only thing we can do is cut you open and remove your organs for someone more deserving. Someone who actually values their life."

  "Nice bed manner, Doc." I jumped off the bed and tried walking on my injured leg. "Thanks, Nurse. Nice job. You wouldn’t fancy dinner tonight, would you?"

  She blushed. If she hadn’t been working in a professional capacity, I get the feeling the answer would have been yes. At least, that’s what I like to think.

  "You’ll not be very handsome if you keep riding a motorbike, period," the doctor said.

  "You might be right," I replied, and walked straight out into the carpark, got on my bike, and drove into the night once more.

  Donors. That type of talk is supposed to scare us bikers, but they don’t get it. They think talking about the dangers of riding will stop us, give us pause. What they don’t realize is that we already kn
ow the dangers. In fact, the danger is all part of the thrill, and that’s something we live with each and every time we ride.

  When you’re hurtling around a corner at 120kph and you’re not sure if you’re gonna hang on and make it, it’s not the fear or the danger that saves your life, it’s the commitment. We commit to the road. We commit to the danger. We commit to the turn, not knowing how it will turn out. That’s the only way you can make it. Any frailty, any doubt, and it’s goodnight, sweetheart.

  I’m not saying I’m reckless. Although reading that back makes it look that way. No, I’m saying that the danger is part of it. Part of what makes riding a motorbike the greatest feeling in the world.

  I don’t want to get hurt, and I don’t want to hurt anyone else either. What I want is to feel alive. Some people make grief their friend, I guess the road, maybe even the risk, is mine. The speed, the freedom of the road, the elements, and yes, the danger, all make me feel like I have a place in this God forsaken world. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  Neither would my dad have. I think about him a lot. He was the reason I fell in love with motorbikes; more than just the cylinders, the horsepower and the roar, but with the life which comes with it. Plenty of guys have bikes, but few are bikers.

  I often say to myself when I’m riding with my gang, “What would dad think of all of this?” Would he be proud that I kept his love of the road going, or would he hate what I’ve become?

  Dad was never in a gang, he never had a crew. As far as I know, he never committed a crime in his life, maybe with the exception of speeding. Yet when I used to watch him when I was a kid, working on his bike in the yard, then roaring off into the distance for days at a time, I wanted that too.