First to Fight Box Set: Books 1-5

by Nicole Blanchard

  Nearly two years, I think. Two years of waiting on this man and his wavering sense of duty and complete inability to commit to anything. I am so done with all of it.

  I had thought before about whether or not there was a time limit on love. No, I realize, there’s not, but there sure as hell is a limit on the amount of shit one person is willing to take to be with another. And I have had more than my fill. In fact, I’m full to bursting.

  Ben watches solemnly and silently from the doorway as I throw a fit of epic proportions. If I had just a hair of Walker blood in me, I would have done the outrageous thing and thrown all of his crap out of the window. Instead, my motherly instincts force me to at least toss his things in his bags. When every last trace of him is gone, I drop each bag at his feet and give him my fiercest look.

  “I have errands to run tomorrow. If you’d like to keep Cole while I do, I can drop him off at your parents or wherever else you need me to. Around noon, if that works for you, and I’ll pick him up tomorrow night around six.”

  He only nods, and his lack of response and the fact that he can shut down so easily when my heart feels like it’s withering in my chest pisses me off even more.

  I charge past him and back down the stairs. I can hear him behind me, lifting his bags and following. The sound of his steps down the stairs echo with finality.

  I reach the front door and hold it open for him, but he stops walking and turns toward me. “I know I’m no good for you, Livvie. I told you that when this first started. The only thing I ever wanted to do for you was keep you safe and be there for you. I just realized that I can’t be the man you need, the man you deserve. It’s better that we let this go now before it’s too late. If it weren’t for me, he would have never been taken in the first place.”

  It’s then that the pieces click together. “You think that Cole getting kidnapped was your fault?” Now, I hurt for him instead of me.

  His face is hard. Unreadable. “I told you that you wouldn’t understand. You don’t know what it’s like to lose people that you’re responsible for. I can’t let my failures or my weakness be the reason that he’s hurt again, Livvie. If I hadn’t been distracted by those fuckin’ fireworks, this never would have happened.”

  “Ben, we were both there. There were a million people around us. It wasn’t your fault. The person that kidnapped him is to blame, not you.”

  “I’m not going to argue about this with you, Liv.”

  “Then stay. Don’t go.”

  “I can’t.” His scent lingers as his steps recede into darkness. Tears pool and fall down my cheeks as I close the front door behind him.

  Olivia

  In retrospect, it was a good thing I had so much to do before going back to work again. Thank God the school board was understanding, considering the circumstances. Had they not, I would have been single—again—and jobless. Focusing on returning to work, getting all of the paperwork completed and lesson plans organized is just what I need after my horrific break-up with Ben.

  Could it be called a break-up if it had never really started in the first place? Can you break up considering our fucked-up way of “dating”?

  I push the thought and resulting self-doubt from my mind. The last place on my list was to visit the accounting department at the school board to turn in the last of my paperwork. Then I can pick up Cole from Ben’s parents’ house, where he is due for dinner. They’d invited us a few days ago, but—no, I stop that train of thought right in its tracks. This makes the third time Ben has walked away from me, and I am determined it will be the last.

  I get a text from Sofie and my cell rings just as I’m pulling up to the school board office. I throw the car in park and dive into my purse to retrieve it. I recognize Ben’s mother’s number and my heart leaps into my throat at the thought that something could be wrong with Cole.

  “Hello?” I answer breathlessly, putting the phone on speaker so I can make sure everything’s okay with Sof.

  “Hi, Olivia. This is Sheila Hart.”

  I try to control my instant panic. “Yeah, hey, Sheila. Is everything okay?”

  “Yes, honey, Cole is fine. Everything is fine.”

  I heave a sigh of relief and open up the text message. “Good, that’s good. Was there something you needed?”

  Back when we were all younger, Mrs. Hart had been like the local mother hen, mothering all of the neighborhood children. When my father died, she was one of the first people to come and cook up a storm to feed all of those visiting with their condolences. She reminded me a lot of my mom, Celeste, which only made me miss her all the more.

  Now, I don’t know how to handle her. It reminds me too much of what I’ve lost.

  I rub a hand into my eyes and hope I can get through this unscathed. Based on how her son essentially made me crash and burn, that’s unlikely. Sofie’s attachment to the text takes me to an outside link. Based on the URL it looks like some sort of news report.

  “You need to do something about this, girl. I’m at the end of my rope.”

  I blink at the empty parking lot in front of me then rub a hand over my brow. When I said mother hen, I meant it. She’s the nosiest, most busy-body woman in the county—probably the state. So I ask cautiously, “What do you mean?

  “I mean, I’ve had it up to here.” The word here is emphasized and I can picture her, clear as day, gesturing with one hand above her head. “…With this boy and his nonsense.”

  Considering she has four men she noses after, I say, “Which boy?”

  “It wasn’t that long ago that I thought maybe, just maybe, you’d be able to help pull him out of this funk, but he seems bound and determined not to let that happen.”

  My heart sinks when my suspicions are confirmed. She can only mean Ben and I really, really would rather not talk about what’s going on between us with her. Though it was inevitable, really.

  I decide to shoot for honesty because, well, honestly, I don’t have the energy left for anything else. “You know Ben,” I say simply. “He won’t change unless he makes his mind up to change. There’s nothing I can do or say that will pull him out of any funk unless he wants to be pulled out of it. And you and I both know whatever he’s dealing with goes a lot further than a funk.”

  She sighs, the rasp of it amplified through the speaker, and I wince as I go through the papers I need to turn in. “I just thought that I finally had my son back. It’s been so long since I’ve seen him so...happy, that I’m willing to do anything to help him stay that way. You’re a mother. I know you don’t understand now, but you will.”

  I press my fingers against my eyes. “I understand where you’re coming from, Sheila, but Ben clearly said that he and I weren’t going to work out, and I’m tired of beating my head against a wall.”

  “It’s their father,” she tells me. “All four of my kids have his bullheadedness.”

  I highly doubt that, but I wouldn’t dare say a word to her. In an uncharacteristic show of emotion, I whisper, “He hurt me and he didn’t have to.”

  “Oh, honey.”

  “I tried to give him a chance, the way he wanted me to, and clearly, that’s not what he really wants. And I’m tired, so tired, of giving and not receiving.”

  “If you could just give him one more chance--”

  The page loads and I start reading the link, which does turn out to be a news story. Sheila talks in the background, but her voice turns into a buzz and my stomach rolls.

  Local drug dealer and son die in car accident

  Police were brought to the scene of a horrific traffic accident this weekend after witnesses describe a high speed chase occurred. According to police reports, Thomas Thurston and his newborn son were fleeing the scene of an apparent drug deal gone wrong when they drove headfirst into oncoming traffic. Both Thurston and son were pronounced dead at the scene.

  The driver of the pursuing vehicle, Mason Smith, suffered minor injuries. Once interviewed by police, it was determined that Smith was into
xicated. He is now in custody.

  Thurston is survived by his wife, Lucy, and their daughter Amy, 5.

  Attached to the article is a photo of the wife and daughter. The girl looks…she looks like me.

  “Hello? Olivia, are you there? Hello?” comes Sheila from my phone.

  A knock on my car window makes me jump. I look up and find the woman from the news article. Only she’s a good twenty years older and someone that I considered to be a friend.

  Melissa knocks on the window again and opens the car door before I can lock it. She nudges her way in and presses a gun against my temple.

  “Hello, Amy.”

  Ben

  I thought cutting Olivia loose would make me feel better, but fuck if it doesn’t make me feel like shit. Lower than shit. Lower than I felt when I ignored the last couple of emails from Scott. But nothing could make me feel worse than putting Cole in danger.

  I’m lying on the couch with my arm thrown over my eyes in an attempt to ignore my mother’s glares at me from across the room. Cole is sitting on my chest, pretending to drum out a beat as he watches my brothers play some music game or another. Mom makes a sound of derision and stalks from the room.

  I was going to beg off the dinner with my family tonight, but my house was too quiet. I would take the chaos of my parents’ house over facing my own demons any day.

  Mitchell comes over and takes Cole to sit between them, and I watch with a smile pulling at my lips. A knock sounds at the door, so I leave the boys to their antics to answer it.

  Logan gives me a grim look and says, “Can I come in for a minute?”

  I open the door and move so he can enter. “What’s up?” I ask, though from the look on his face, I’m afraid to know the answer.

  “We got something off the prints from the break-in at Olivia’s house.”

  I rock back on my heels and rub a hand over my face. “That’s good, man, but you should be telling Livvie this.”

  “I tried calling her cell a few minutes ago, but I didn’t get an answer. There was something else, and I wanted to make sure to tell the both of you in person.”

  Despite what happened between us the day before, I grab my cell and try to call Livvie myself, but she doesn’t answer, which surprises me. I know we didn’t part on the best of terms, but it’s not like her to ignore a call from me, especially considering the fact that I have Cole and it could be an emergency. I try again with the same result.

  “She isn’t answering for me, either,” I tell Logan. The back of my neck starts itching, and that’s always a sign something isn’t right.

  “What was it you needed to tell us?”

  “Ben!” my mom shouts from the other side of the house.

  I glance in her direction then back at Logan. He opens his mouth to speak, but another shout from my mom cuts him off.

  “Sorry, man. Come on in. Let me see what she needs and then we can sit down and talk.”

  We find my mother in the kitchen clutching the house phone, her face sheet-white. I immediately go to her side and say, “Mom, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  Her eyes find mine. “I was just on the phone t-talking to Olivia.”

  Relief flashes through me. “Good, is she still on? Logan needs to talk to her, too. It was about the case.”

  A sheen of tears fill her eyes. “I was on the phone with her and she said to hold on for a second. Then--then I heard a scream,” she whispers. “And the phone went dead.”

  The ground shifts under my feet, and I have to grasp the kitchen counter to find purchase. A high-pitched ringing fills my ears. Logan comes up beside me and puts a hand on my arm. I shake it off, but it allows me to refocus.

  “What did you have to tell us, Logan?”

  His face is solemn. “The prints we got from Livvie’s house came up with a match. Ben...dammit, Ben, they matched the prints we lifted from the car where we found Cole.”

  “Were you able to get a name?”

  My ears are ringing—with rage or with his high-pitched screams, I'm not sure. My hands and face are coated with his blood, but I don’t care. Rivers of it rain down the sloped linoleum floor. If it weren’t for the grip on my boots, I would have slid to my knees with my next punch. The crunch is as satisfying as his unanswered pleas for help.

  “Where is she?” I don’t recognize the sound of my voice. The guttural tone and pitch of desperation sounds a lot like madness.

  His eyes widen—what little they can around the blood, sweat and swelling. One is already swollen shut, so it can do little more than twitch. His chest shudders with breath, but he doesn’t answer.

  Impatience has me getting to my knees, soaking my pants in his blood. I straddle his legs and grip his tattered T-shirt with my left hand, twisting it to hold his weight. His good eye darts to my face as he spasms underneath me. I get a warped sense of satisfaction from the fear in his eyes.

  “Listen up, motherfucker, or I will do what I have been dying to do since I got here and put an end to your pathetic life. You have one last chance to tell me where she is, or my friend Jack here will take that gun of his and start with your feet, working his way up to your knees, your balls, your gut. Then we’ll leave you here to die like the coward you are. It’ll be painful. In fact, I may just have him do it anyway, just for what you put my family through. You deserve much worse.”

  Mason Smith’s face drains of color and he nearly goes slack in my arms. I jerk him back to consciousness. When his eyes meet mine, I tighten my hold on his shirt and force my voice to calm. “Now, are you going to tell me, or do I need to let Jack have you?”

  His breath rattles between us for a moment. In that pause, I can feel everything I’ve done wrong over the past year bubble up in my chest. My regrets, my failings. I want just one chance to rectify all the mistakes I’ve made. The moment intensifies, and I don’t realize I’m not breathing until my chest starts to ache.

  “The old lady.” He wheezes until I loosen my grip on his shirt. “Melissa.”

  My hand goes slack and Mason thumps into a mass of bruises and blood on the dirty, cracked floor. I fall back on my heels and look dazedly at Logan and Jack behind me. Jack is slumped on a tattered chair, his hand running through his hair. Logan is on his phone murmuring to put an APB out on Melissa’s car, pointedly ignoring our little beat down inside the trailer.

  “Livvie said it was a white SUV.” Jack’s voice is hollow. “I never thought—I didn’t even think to consider Melissa. She has one.”

  I leave Mason on the floor and pull Jack up. “No one did. Focus. We have to find them before she gets hurt.”

  “What about him?” Jack nods to Mason, who is huddled on the floor in a pile of his own blood.

  Logan holds up his cell phone and walks back into the room. “I’ve got a car coming around. I’ll stay here until they get here. You guys go.”

  “You gonna be okay with this?” I ask, knowing he put his ass on the line, letting me get to Mason first before calling it in.

  He jerks his chin. “You don’t even have to fuckin’ ask.”

  I look at Jack and say, “You know Melissa best. Where would she take Livvie?”

  His face falls. “She could be anywhere.”

  Olivia

  I choke on the smell of fumes. Well, that and the tape covering my mouth. The gas Melissa pours on me stings my eyes and I struggle to breath.

  “Shit, girl. I swear you fuck everything up wherever you go,” Melissa says, dropping the gas can and slamming the door shut.

  Ignoring her, I search in the back seat for something to saw through the bindings around my increasingly chaffed wrists.

  We’d been driving for a half hour before she stopped to douse me in fuel. I tried to keep track of where we were going, but she took no discernible direction and she talked nonsense the entire way. I’d long since stopped listening as I was so fucking pissed yet terrified at the same time.

  She turns again, throwing me against the door and I scream against
the gag. She’d wrenched me like a rag doll when she threw me into the car and I felt something give in my still-healing shoulder. When I get out of here, she’s so not going on my Christmas list.

  I manage to work the tape off by licking my lips repeatedly until it peels off, one side hanging off my cheek. “Where are we going?” I ask.

  Melissa turns to me, all traces of the sweet woman I’d known have vanished and are replaced by malice. “Back to where it all started. Back to where you tore my life from me. If it weren’t for you, I’d still have Tommy. I’d still have my Sam. If it weren’t for you none of this would have happened!”

  My eyes catch on the speedometer which is inching towards eighty. The long stretches of back roads don’t worry me, but the close turns and pinched sections spell certain death if I can’t wrest control of the car from her.

  “Why couldn’t you leave me alone? I was finally happy. I had a family I loved, that loved me. What did I ever do to you?”

  “You ruined my life.”

  She’s certifiable. My skin crawls, knowing that I left her alone with my son, that she had her hands on him.

  “I never did anything to you. I was just a kid.”

  She turns back to me and her backhand connects with my cheek. “Shut up.” We take another sharp turn and my freshly bruised cheek strikes the window with a snap. My vision flashes white and my ears start to ring. Over that, I hear her say, “I tried to give you a second chance. I wanted to see what you were up to. I thought maybe we could even be friends. Family. But when I overheard you telling your dad that you wanted to find me, I knew I needed to take matters into my own hands.”

  That would explain why she wormed her way into our lives. Like a disease, infecting everything she touched.

  “And my dad? You dated him just to get close to me?”

  “Henry. He was sweet. I felt bad about him.”

  My fingers pause in their attempt to work a pen from between the seat cushions. “What do you mean you felt bad about him?”