Courage (Strength Series Book 1)

by T. L. Nicholas

  “How are you feeling today, Miss Bowers?” he asks kindly. He’s the kind of man that can only be described as kind. He possesses a soft voice, slightly unruly hair that’s gone silver, and sympathetic, watery blue eyes. His touch, when he must touch, is gentle and fleeting, and seems measured so as not to startle. This man feels his patient’s pain.

  “Better I think. I can sit up a lot longer now.” I try for upbeat. I feel bad that I can’t remember his name. I know they’ve told me, but I don’t, and I can’t quite read it from here.

  “You’re still not watching TV?” he asks, looking up at the black screen on the wall.

  “No, it still hurts my eyes a little bit. Too much to bother with it.” I answer.

  He frowns. I don’t like that at all so I try to mitigate the damage I’ve caused. “It’s not terrible; I just don’t want to watch anything enough to deal with it. Tylenol would probably fix it.”

  “Except that you’re already on four kinds of pain killers, Miss Bowers. Serious ones. You shouldn’t need Tylenol for anything,” he says.

  “I am? What am I on again? I can’t keep them all straight,” I ask.

  He studies me for a moment. “I’ll write them down for you,” he says. “It’s not really all that important what you’re on at the moment, so much as how you feel, and I think you’re still not feeling well.”

  True enough. But if we’re going for truth, I’m going all the way. “I just need to know what happened. Please. I can’t concentrate. I can’t think. I don’t know where I’ve been, how I was found, where he is. I need someone to fill in the gaps so maybe I can breathe again, so I can sleep. I keep having nightmares that he’s coming to get me again. Is he? Can he? Did they catch him? Is he locked up? Dead? In this hospital? I don’t know enough to know if I should be scared, or if I’m actually safe. I don’t know if Cadan is safe. I don’t know why he didn’t go—”

  “Alright, Miss Bowers, alright.” His voice is soothing as he gently pats my foot. “You’re going to be okay. I’ll call Mr. Morris and let him know that you can be told. Just be aware the police will want to speak to you shortly after. We’ve held them off, but we won’t be able to now.”

  I can’t stop my body from shaking uncontrollably any more than I can stop the tears from rolling down my face. Now I don’t know if I want to know. I don’t know what’s going to happen. “Thank you, sir.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  I’m still attempting to finish the same page of the word find three hours later when Chance and Jace arrive. My mind keeps wandering and my eyes blur often, but the doctor and nurses have assured me this will go away in time. They don’t have Cadan with them and I’m disappointed. Jace notices my sadness first.

  “We’ll bring him in later, if you’re up to it. Or tomorrow if you’re not. The doctor said we could talk to you and we didn’t want to upset him by upsetting you. I’m sorry, Alex.” He walks over and rubs my shoulder a couple of times before sitting down next to the bed.

  “It’s alright, that makes sense.” I say, but the tears well up anyway. I miss my baby. Chance walks over to me and wipes one of my tears away with his thumb before sitting in the chair on the other side of me. His silver blue eyes look tortured and I’m afraid to hear what it is he has to say.

  He leans forward, placing his elbows on the bed next to me so he can look me in the eye, “Alex. Are you sure you want us to tell you now? Are you sure you don’t want more time? You’re still healing.” It’s a simple, even caring, question, but it sounds as though he’s pleading to not have to tell me the things I need to know.

  “I’m sure. I need to know what happened. Wondering is worse. I think the things I imagine must be worse than the reality.” I answer honestly.

  He nods and looks across me at his brother. They seem to share some communication and he nods and sets his jaw, a look of determination on his face. “Okay then. I guess we’ll go ahead then. Why don’t you start with the last thing you remember on the day you were taken, and we’ll fill in the blanks?”

  I take a deep breath and nod. “I was making dinner, spaghetti and meatballs with garlic bread. Cadan was still sleeping. I heard the door open, but I assumed it was you since Shadow wasn’t flipping out. I asked you something, I don’t remember what, and as I turned around I think he hit me with something. The last thing I remember is him, smiling down at me, and then I think he must have hit me again. Or maybe I passed out.”

  Chance is staring at the floor. When he looks up again, his eyes are the color of tornado clouds again, and his hands are shaking. “Yes, he hit you with something. With a frying pan you had on the counter, the first time, with the butt of a gun the second time.”

  “A gun? He had a gun? Did he shoot me? How did he get past Shad——” realization dawns harsh and bright. “Shadow? He shot Shadow? Oh my god.” I can’t control the tears, and I can’t control the trembling. Of all the things I had imagined, this never occurred to me.

  “I’m so sorry, Chance. So sorry. It’s my fault, I should never have brought you into this mess. Oh my god, I love that dog.” He’s saying something but I can’t hear him. I’m rocking back and forth, hugging myself, though at some point I realize he’s wrapped around me as well. I see Shadow playing in the yard, sleeping under my chair, nuzzling his head against me. I can’t imagine never looking into those big brown eyes again, or digging my fingers into the fur next to his ear and hearing him groan.

  “Alex!” Jace’s voice is sharp like a drill sergeant and stuns me into silence. “Shadow is fine. Or he will be. I found him down by the lake that night. He was shot, but not fatally, and he’s healing. He’s been home for over a week. He’s doing great. Do you hear me, Alex? Shadow is not dead.”

  “H-he-he’s n-not?” I stammer.

  “No, baby, he’s not. He’s going to be fine,” Chance says, smoothing my hair and wiping my tears. “And you didn’t bring me or any of us into anything. We jumped right in, because that’s what we do. It’s what we did. You needed us, we’re here, and you’re family now, Alex. You don’t get to blame yourself for what a psycho ego-maniac does to our family.” He smiles and looks like an angel. “You’re not alone anymore and someday you’ll have to get used to it.”

  I nod and wipe my own eyes, though I don’t believe I’ll ever get used to it. “How did Shadow get shot? Why didn’t I hear it?” I ask.

  Jace answers this time. “He came in by boat. When Shadow ran down to the shore to see what he was up to, he shot him. He had prepared for him. He knew what Shadow would do and the gun was for him.”

  “By boat? I’m such an idiot. Why didn’t I realize I hadn’t heard your truck or Shadow barking to greet you?” The hitch in my voice is mortifying.

  “Because you felt safe. Because you knew I’d be home soon, you were getting dinner ready for us. Because you were busy. Because you’re human, Alex.” Chance answers.

  “Okay,” I scrub my hands over my face and try to clear my mind, “Okay. You guys just tell me what happened and I’ll try not to interrupt or have any more breakdowns.” I try to laugh at myself, but hiccup instead.

  Chance picks my hand up off the bed and holds it in his. It’s a reassuring gesture and I try to focus on it as he continues. “After he came in and hit you, made sure you were unconscious, he carried you down to the boat and took you a couple miles down the shore to his car. He put you in his trunk and took you to a property that’s tied up in probate court, and has been abandoned and empty for over a year. He tied you in a stall, where no one would hear you if you woke up or screamed, and buried his bloody clothes just outside the barn door. Then he drove away.”

  “He left me there to die? He really did?” I ask. Even with all of the things I knew he was capable of, I never truly thought he was capable of that. Capable of accidentally killing me in the heat of the moment, yes, but just leaving me somewhere, unable to escape, with no food or water, to starve to death or worse? I never imagined him to be that cold-blooded.

 
“We don’t know.” Jace answers.

  I look at Chance to answer instead, but he only shakes his head.

  “But how can that be? How can you not know? Because you found me so fast? Because you haven’t found him yet? Please tell me you’ve found him.”

  “We found him. Or rather, the New York State Troopers did later that night, just before the Pennsylvania line.”

  “So, he’s just not talking because he doesn’t want to incriminate himself. Of course. He expects his father to get him out of this and he knows that if he talks it will be harder.”

  “He’s not talking because he’s dead, Alex. He can’t talk, to the cops or anyone else.” Chance breaks in.

  “Dead? How?”

  “He was texting his father, trying to cover his tracks, and a tractor trailer hit him when he drifted over the center line. He died on impact.” He’s watching me carefully and I wonder if he’s expecting me to break down. I’m surprised to realize I don’t care that he’s dead.

  “Oh. What was he saying?”

  “He only got one letter down. The letter H. We don’t know what the rest of it was supposed to be, or would have been. His father had asked where the hell he was, and why he hadn’t been at some meeting. Told him to get his head out of his ass. He must have started to drift while he was reading it. We don’t know if he was going back to where you were or if he’d left you for dead. We don’t know what his plan was, if he even had one. We assume he did, because he knew about Shadow, knew where you were, your schedule, my schedule. He’d clearly been planning. We just don’t know what the plan was.”

  “I see.” But I don’t. Not really. I don’t see how a man I once thought I loved could have plotted to kill me, plotted to at least injure me seriously and kidnap me. Take me away from our child. I have no clear idea of how I could have missed so many things about him. Worse, I don’t know how it is that someone I once thought I loved enough to marry is dead, and all I feel inside is a sense of overwhelming relief.

  “So… how did you find me then? If he was dead when you found him that night? What was happening with you guys? Did he have a receipt or something that led the cops to me like on TV shows?”

  Chance answers with a grim smile, “No, no receipts or anything. He had paid for all of his gas and food with cash. We’ll go back to the beginning for a second.”

  “When I came home, I was talking to you as I walked through the door, like I always do. I figured Shadow was in the house with you and I didn’t notice he wasn’t barking either. I was in a good mood. I could smell the food as soon as I walked in and it smelled good. I was looking forward to seeing you and Cadan, and that distracted me.”

  “The first thing I noticed when I went in the kitchen was the noodles boiling over and the sauce had burned into the pot, it was splattered everywhere. I shut everything off and ran upstairs to Cadan. I knew something must be wrong with Cadan for you to have left dinner like that, but when I got up there he was sleeping peacefully. I ran to the bathroom, nothing. I ran outside, nothing. I thought you must have fallen or something. I checked the basement, though I had no idea why you’d go down there, but you weren’t there either.”

  “I knew you wouldn’t just leave. You certainly wouldn’t leave the food to burn the house down with Cadan inside. I went back to the kitchen looking for clues, a note, anything. That’s when I saw the blood on the floor, splattered on the cabinets, the counter. The first time my brain had processed it all as spaghetti sauce, because that was everywhere too, but this was definitely blood. I called the cops, then Jace, then my mother.”

  “I knew you weren’t there, and I had no idea where you were, but I knew who had you and I knew he had already hurt you.” For the first time since he started this part, he pulls his eyes from mine. He stares down at the bed, leans slowly forward until his head is resting on my shoulder. “I didn’t know how to find you. I was afraid I never would.” His words are knives to my heart and I wrap my arms around him and rest my head on his shoulder.

  Jace continues for him, “When I got there he was so upset. He couldn’t find you, Cadan was on his hip, and he’d realized he couldn’t find Shadow either. We knew he wouldn’t take the dog, so we assumed, correctly, the worst. The cops couldn’t find tire tracks that didn’t match mine or Chance’s so I walked down to the lake, thinking maybe it was a boat. You’re from a coast town, he has to know how to operate a damned boat.”

  “That’s when I found where he had pulled the boat up, then I found Shadow. He was barely hanging on, but it was enough. He mustered enough energy to thump that big white flag of a tail as I was walking about twenty feet from him, and I saw it. We took care of him immediately; a cop even gave him a ride to the emergency vet, sirens and all.” He chuckles at the memory though there are tears in his eyes. Chance sits up, wiping his eyes, and takes the story over again.

  “I was so glad we’d found him, but it made all of us that much more terrified. Now we knew he had a gun, and there was so much blood in the kitchen. The police believed us that it was him, even though his father insisted it couldn’t be, that he was at a meeting at the time. Of course, his father’s text message to him says different, so there will be charges.”

  “We didn’t know what to do next. We didn’t know if he’d take you to Maryland, hole up here, or just kill you and go. And why didn’t he take Cadan? Did that mean he was coming back for him? None of us had answers and neither did the cops. When we got the news he was dead, you’d already been gone over seven hours. Your blood was in his trunk, but there were no other signs of you.”

  “The police came down hard on his father, no matter that he was one of their own, or maybe because he was, but he insisted he had no information. He didn’t know anything and there must be some mistake. So, we all just kept looking. Mom and Dad got here and took over with Cadan.”

  “It was mom’s idea to look at abandoned properties that were wrapped up in some type of litigation. It’s a matter of public record, and if they’re wrapped tight enough, no one steps foot on them for years at a time.”

  “Your mother’s idea? What about the cops? What were they doing?” I ask.

  Neither one of them says anything; they just look at each other, then me, then each other. Each time they look at me, I feel more and more pitied. I feel more and more like I’m sorry I asked that question because I’m fairly sure I don’t want the answer now.

  “They were trying to get us to accept your death.” Jace answers quietly.

  Chapter Seventeen

  “My WHAT?” I didn’t mean to scream, but it came out that way. I must have heard them wrong. “Why? Why would they want that? I’m not fucking dead!”

  “I know, baby,” Chance says, holding my hand and rubbing his thumb across the back of it. “I know. But they thought you were. When the forensics people came to the house they determined that you’d been hit in the head, and we could see you’d lost a lot of blood. A lot. Too much. And when Travis died your blood was in the trunk, along with a shovel. They thought he’d killed you and buried you somewhere. After three days of searching, they had to call it off. Everything pointed to your death and we had no one to ask for information, no way to find you.”

  It doesn’t make sense. I’m here.

  “But you did. They did. Someone did. How is that possible? And what do you mean after three days? How long was I lost?” This new world is spinning much too fast for me.

  “Like I said, mom started looking for properties in litigation. When she found some that looked promising, Jace and I would go search. We broke into places, we broke the law, we looked everywhere. The fifth one she found was the winner. She knew it when she called us, but we tried not to get our hopes up. She said she’d found one the next county over that had been tied up in probate by Travis’ family for the last five years, with no signs of getting out anytime soon. Of course, that seemed logical, but what were the odds he even knew about it? So, we went, expecting to find a fresh grave though neither of us cou
ld admit it.” His voice breaks, and I reach over to rub his back. I can’t imagine how I would have felt in a similar situation.

  “In front of the barn, we found a fresh dig, so we called the cops. It didn’t seem big enough, but we had no way of knowing what he had— we had no way to know. We explained and they were coming. I was upset, I didn’t want it to end that way. I didn’t want it to end with you gone, didn’t want to have to tell Cadan how amazing and beautiful his mother was. I wanted him to know because she was in front of him.” I can’t breathe. There’s a lump in my throat so big the air can’t seem to find its way past it. My eyes are on fire, his sadness so palpable I can taste it in the air, acrid and burning.

  “It wasn’t fair. I was having a hard time handling my emotions so I walked into the barn to wait. Jace yelled at me not to, that I was contaminating the scene, but I told him it didn’t matter. If you were gone it didn’t matter.”

  “I was just kind of wandering around, thinking about you, what I was going to do without you. When I walked into that last stall, I thought I was imagining things. You were there. Pale, hair matted, blood everywhere, I wasn’t even sure you were breathing. You were a mess and you were the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Still are, by the way,” he winks at me and my heart melts a little bit more.

  “I yelled for Jace and you twitched, just the tiniest bit, and I yelled louder. I tried to be soothing as I untied you, but you beat the shit out of me, Alex. You were screaming and clawing, kicking. You beat me up, but I was so proud of you, and I knew you were going to make it.” His smile is like the first daffodil bloom in spring. It’s so beautiful it’s actually a little bit painful, such a relief it is to see it again.

  “I thought you were Travis. I thought you called me a bitch.” I answer with a smile.