by V. L. Brock
Copyright
Transcending Nirvana:
The Dark Evoke Series #3
By V.L. Brock
Copyright © 2014 V.L. Brock
Licence Note
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyments only. This ebook may not be sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and you did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for supporting and respecting the hard work of this author.
This ebook is a work of fiction, names characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.
The author acknowledges the copyright and trademark owners of any brands/stores/establishments, which are used in the book, and that I do not claim ownership to.
Cover Design by: Cassy Roop at Pink Ink Designs.
Edited by: Brittani Pritchard.
Dedication
To the two most important women in my life: my Nan and my mother.
I love you both dearly.
And for the victims and survivors of domestic abuse:
You’re not alone. Always remember that it is YOU which holds the true power.
“You do not develop courage by being happy in your relationships everyday.
You develop it by surviving difficult times and challenging adversity.”
––Epicurus.
Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Epilogue
About the Author
Other books by V.L. Brock
Atonement
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Have you ever had the feeling that life is mocking you?
We’re put here for one reason, to get from point A to B, right? Yet why does it seem that we’re doomed to repeat certain events and pass them off as some kind of déjà-vu, as we progress through life, randomly going about our day to day activities?
One thing was for certain: this wasn’t any déjà-vu; this was one added event in my life that the fates were sitting back watching. Sometimes I wonder if they’re plotting against me.
Weakened, I pressed the release of my seatbelt, kicked the door open and fell to my knees. The late night dew was just settling on each fresh, young shoot as I sunk onto the grassy mound, while hazy and swaying vision was accompanied by the deafening ringing in my ears. Down my forehead, warm blood trickled its veiny course as I found my legs and reared up, freeing the denim coating my knees of the slick droplets.
I peered behind me and up the hillside, as my body continued to shake with shock. The divider was breached, and regardless of being surrounded by darkness, I could still catch sight of the flattened grassland and the presence of swerving tire marks.
“Kady…” the sound of him clinging to my name like it was his lifeline, had me tearing my alarmed gaze from the embankment. The truck was completely totaled with the hood smashed up against the tree trunk; the windshield was nonexistent as splintered glass lay scattered amongst the chaos.
On wobbly legs I inched closer. To see his debilitated state hanging through where the windshield resided only moments before, knotted my stomach and my lips parted on a sharp gasp.
“Kady,” he croaked again, but it was barely audible over the commotion ensuing at the peak of the hillside. Even through the buzzing of my ear drums, I could overhear a yelling of, ‘no’ and our names being called in the distance, as the source behind the frantic voices made their way closer to us.
In a dreamlike state, I was standing motionless with my feet sinking into the sludge beneath them. The inescapable events around me unraveled as I watched on in a daze, trying to assimilate what had just happened, while the life was gradually being torn away from not only a friend or a lover, but someone who taught me valuable life lessons.
He wasn’t alone in either aspect because a part of me died that night, too…
Chapter One
Four weeks earlier…
Chest heaving, my ribs ached and lungs burned and grated with each pant. I knocked fanatically on the green door.
“Alright, alright,” I heard him call; still, his acknowledgment didn’t stop my incessant knocking. “Wha––” Hard, exasperated eyes thawed as soon as he saw me standing there in the hallway beyond his threshold. “Kady…”
Hanging my head, I drew breath after breath, pushing past the pain in my heart, lungs and throat as the starvation of oxygen tortured my body. From the ground, my gaze scoured the length of his frame which was clothed in a tight black tank and gray sweatpants.
“I remember,” I panted.
Cocking his head, he dropped his weight through his hip, his arms folded across his chest while he braced his shoulder against the doorway.
My own desperate gaze hunted his eyes with as much intensity as he had shown earlier that night, when he begged with me outside McGinty’s to tell him what I remembered after serenading me with our song.
I swallowed harshly. “I remember everything…”
In the hallway, the cold air bonded with the sheen of rain upon my flesh. My chest was aching and burning as if a fire and chemical mass was imbedded in the center under my ribcage as I rapidly gasped for air.
Like some hunting bloodhound, I simply stared at the man before me as if waiting for permission to pounce. Internally, a distinct feeling that I was more than familiar with, made itself known. It may have been for the first time with him, nonetheless once again in my life, I was begging for scraps––anything at all which could be utilized to eradicate the befuddled expression and gawky silence, which was thickening the air by the second.
Walker’s left shoulder was braced against the doorframe, his arms folded over his black tank top, while gray sweats rested low on his hips. For a brief moment, as the cold satin hugged me like a second skin, I envied the fact that he had the option to change into warm, dry clothing. The external shivers prompted by the clinging material were nothing in comparison to the internal ones which were triggered just from standing there in his presence alone.
Like each and every moment spent in Walker’s company that week, the presence of those butterflies was felt in my stomach just as powerful and equally as heady. From what I had remembered, it was a relief to have those nerves bred from anticipation, and not as a result of fear, of anxiety.
The wrinkles appearing on his forehead as his dark brows were pulled together an
d downward, alongside the slight pout of his lips, displayed his apprehension. With his head hanging low, his legs crossed at the ankles, he drank in a liberal breath.
“Can I come in then…please?”
The faint nod of his head faded as he uncrossed his ankles and took two steps back, giving me entry. With my own head hanging low, I stepped over the threshold and into the apartment where less than two hours ago, I took a beating that I had secretly craved.
The muted, golden glow emitted from the table lamp at the left of the sofa formed shadows around me, while the low-key sounds of soft rock music traveled from his bedroom and filled the silent hallway to my right.
Walker closed the door behind me, and when he stepped around my motionless form, the strong, intoxicating scent of his cologne lingered in the air, drifting around me and calming me instantly as it met my nostrils. It was a scent that held so many memories––memories which had only recently been given life once again.
The moment was supposed to have been easier. It should have been simpler to press forward from the hurdle we both cleared. Nevertheless, standing on those wooden planks, feeling them dip and spring beneath my feet while watching the man who had recreated moments from our relationship to get us to this very moment, had my heart screaming that it was sorry. What was needed to be done and what I wanted, was clear to me now. Yet in that moment of truth and silence, it was impossible to assemble the words.
Studying him in the heart of the room, his arms folded and his stance intrepid, I muttered, “Please, say something.”
A low snort of uncertainty was freed, and although contained by the material which covered his body, I still noticed his abdominals tense. Broad, well-defined shoulders rose while he focused his attention on his bare feet, and countered his weight in turn through each leg. “What do you want me to say, Kady?” he asked the flooring. I was frowning when he eventually pulled his head up, his teeth scraping across the pale flesh of his lower lip as he shook his head faintly with a timid grin. “That things are grand?”
“Well that would be a start––”
“I don’t know what to say, Kady.”
I breathed his name and found myself reflecting his determined although quizzical expression. “I remember,” I told him once again, the words traveling on an exceedingly exasperated sigh. “There are still things which are a little fuzzy, but the big picture is one I can remember. I came back, Walker. I came back to you.”
“Try and see it from my point of view though will ya? I thought I had you, darlin’, not once or twice, but three times. I thought I’d won the Goddamn lottery only to have you run from me.”—he tipped his head forward and continued––“Each and every time you ran out of that door, darlin’, you stuffed my heart into your back pocket and dropped kicked it down the fucking stairs as you left, and now you come back and…”
Wounded by his statement, the dull ache in my chest waned along with his words. Despite everything we had been through, he was always there, and as his words were interrupted by the conflicted shake of his head, I knew within myself that the knife inserted into my gut had the comment, ‘taken for granted’ engraved on the injuring blade.
“How do I know you won’t do it again?”
“Walk––”
His arms uncrossed swiftly to lift his hand in a silent gesture for me to remain quiet. The flooring groaned as he took a step toward me, and I once again lacked control over the shudder as it unshackled from my body. “Each time I look at you, I thank Jesus Christ that I was gifted with sight. You’re the most beautiful woman in the world, inside and out, and all I want is to protect you and call you mine. But I can’t give you what you need.”
The creases I felt forming and deepening as I tightened my eyes were a reminder of my lost years. Oblivious, I shook my head. “What I need? I–I don’t––”
“Living the way you’ve been for all those years with having everything your heart desires…”
What? Was he really saying what I thought he was saying? My jaw dropped open to speak but the words were yet to be assembled in my mind.
His lilt came even thicker and huskier as he raised his voice, and then gestured to the apartment with a sweep of his hand. “Look around you, Kady. This is me. I can’t offer you a house in the suburbs or a closet cram-packed of nothing less than designer clothing. I can’t offer you any of that and it fuckin’ kills me because that’s what you damned well deserve. You deserve the best of everything, and my heart aches when I realize that with me, you’ll never have it.”
Walker, how could you think that? I didn’t mean to, but a small dubious grin tickled the corners of my lips while he looked practically defeated. I shook my head and took a step into his hard, towering body. His head was low and his shoulders somewhat hunched, as though the weight of the world was resting upon them, burdening him wholly.
It was my hand settling on the side of his face which finally drew his attention to my eyes. “Walker, my dad owns his own golf resort and spa. I grew up in D.C., in a house that had more bathrooms than occupants. Everything I wanted, I could have. But it wasn’t living, not really,” I murmured, a residual chuckle twisting and weaving through my words. “That’s why I moved to Boston: I wanted to find myself. My God, I worked as a stripper just to pay my rent. I’m not a stereotypical ‘uptown girl’ who only focuses on her hair and prestige, Walker. Life is what you make it, and I want mine to be exciting, I want to enjoy it, try new things. I don’t want to live in fear just to uphold status and a bank balance,” my bare shoulders lifted with my deep intake of air, before sighing, “I want it to be with you.”
“But you’ll run, darlin’. I know you will, and I couldn’t take that again.”
“Walker,”––mirroring my right hand, my left lifted to frame his face, my expression one of resolve while my thumbs moved smoothly over his dark stubble––“I won’t run. It’ll be different this time, I’m stronger.”
His eyes grew tighter and the creases burrowed into his brow. I felt my breathing catch just watching his reaction. “How will it be different? How are you stronger?”
It was one thing to remember our history, but acknowledging and realizing that someone, in a bid to trigger the most insignificant of memories, had basically replayed cherished moments of our past, that’s something else entirely. That shows devotion, it was a confirmation that made me stronger.
I smiled. “I’m stronger because now, I realize that I have you.”
Gone was the expression of defeat and uncertainty. His features visibly and physically softened beneath my hands, while a relieved smile took place, the same kind of smile that I witnessed back in the hospital when he was at my bedside only a few weeks ago.
Oh, how much can change in a few measly weeks.
“Kady, I’ve missed you,” he whispered, his hands pushing back through my hair until he was holding me firmly at the back of my head. His heated breath spread like wildfire across my face as he braced his forehead against my own. “I’ve missed you so much, darlin’,” he muttered again, and with his declaration lingering in the diminutive space between us, I tipped my head back and brushed our lips together in silent persuasion, while the serenading of a throaty voice echoed down the hallway about Savin’ Me. Poetic really.
Feeling the smoothness of his mouth, yet utilizing the perfect pressure behind the connection that I had only just reacquainted myself with a few hours before, was beyond heady. It had felt like forever since I was there with him and we were both on the same page.
In my hair, Walker’s hands grew tighter with an intense urgency, softly wrenching me toward him, deepening a connection which both of us craved. I opened my mouth in invitation and his skillful tongue instantly swept between my lips, coiling and stroking my own vehemently, obsessively––a lustful intoxication on both parts. Stubble grazed against my mouth and chin. Still, I didn’t care that my flesh was set on fire. Desire and pleasure chased away the small degree of discomfort I felt as we worked fluidl
y against one another, and the beat of my heart intensified against my ribs.
With deepened kisses and Walker’s warmth cloaking me, I felt something more profound than lust and understanding. In Walker’s apartment, and in Walker’s arms, I felt protected.
Time resumed and reality knocked when he pulled away, breathless. “You’re cold?” The way his Irish accent broke through his statements and posed them as questions made me smile.
“I’ll be okay.”
After loosening and relinquishing the grip on my hair, he offered his right hand with his eyebrow cocked. I didn’t feel that acquainted sense of anomalous or deception as I slipped my hand into his with a grin. For the first time in a long time, I allowed my heart to rule my head, and it told me that the calluses over his palm and fingers were home.
The music grew clearer as he escorted me down the small hallway lengthening the right of his living room, through the second entrance and into his bedroom. As I waited motionless a few steps away from the black, gothic-style, wrought-iron bed, I perused the area. It was an odd feeling knowing that I was there only a few weeks ago. Nevertheless, it still felt somewhat new.
A CD player was perched on the surface of the dresser beyond the foot of the bed, the top drawer leisurely being rummaged through by Walker’s large hands. The way his body moved as he walked towards me with a plain black T-shirt in his possession––the tautening of muscles framed by black ink, and the strong stance he maintained, exuded sex.
The lump of desire in my throat barely shifted after two harsh swallows. “Who’s the artist?”
A cocky grin was flashed at me as he neared. “I thought you didn’t like rock, darlin’?” he halted beside me and I accepted his offering of the clean, dry material with appreciation.
“I don’t usually, but I like them. They’re very…you,” I answered.
“Very me?” wry amusement glimmered in his eyes, and sensing the heat beneath my cheeks rising to the surface, all I could do was smile timidly and drop my head. “They’re called Nickelback. This is one of my favorites; it’s called ‘Someday’.”
