Love Gone

Love Gone

A High Intensity Romantic
Suspense Thriller

Elizabeth Nelson

Copyright 2012 © Bristlecone Books

Smashwords Edition

A Bristlecone Book

All rights reserved.

Copyright © 2013 Elizabeth
Nelson

No part of this book may be reproduced
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any
information storage and retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the author and/or publisher. No part of this
publication may be sold or hired, without written permission from
the author.

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CHAPTER 1

Happiness is being in Alaska. The
cheery bumper sticker was the last thing Faith saw as they slammed
into the back of the silver Toyota Camry idling at the light in
front of them.

“Holy shit, mom!” Liam, her
15-year-old son, whispered gripping the wheel. Frightened and
exhilarated, he looked around dazedly after the crash, attempting
to recover his bearings.

“Are you alright?” She answered, and
just as quickly her pulse quickened at the thought of the baby she
was carrying. She was only four months along, was everything
okay?

Slowly and painstakingly she extracted
her arm from between his chest and the air bag and let her hands
fly protectively to her barely noticeable baby bump. It had been
pure animal instinct to throw her arm across his body at impact,
but now, as she rubbed anxiously at the baby bump with her sore,
bruised arm, she wished she’d let the seatbelt do its work without
her help. Luckily, nothing felt different and her own seatbelt
hadn’t seemed to hurt her or the baby, she surmised,
relieved.

The old Honda Element didn’t come with
modern protections like airbags, and she’d been upset about that
when they’d bought the car, but maybe it was for the best. The
seatbelts had done their work and airbags could be even more
dangerous, she’d heard. Sometimes even break ribs or hurt precious
cargo like an unborn baby. She rubbed the bump in her belly again
for good measure.

Just the thought of something
happening to this little one was enough to make her shiver in fear.
Yes, she had a lot to be thankful for, airbags or not.

“I’m okay. I think I’m okay. Holy
shit,” he repeated.

“Language Liam,” she said
automatically.

Ahead of them she could see the
driver’s door opening in the car they’d hit. Please lord, don’t let
anyone be hurt, Faith breathed. She watched as a teenage girl
–seemingly unharmed--got out and stared at them in shock before
turning to assess the damage to the back of her car.

“Stay here. I’m going to go talk to
her,” Faith ordered Liam as she wrestled to get her seatbelt off so
she could get her insurance information out of the glove
compartment.

The passenger door opened easily—a
lucky thing, thought Faith, since she didn’t even want to guess at
how much a totaled car might cost her and Mac. Expensive car
repairs were the last type of expense they needed right now when
they were trying to save every cent for the new baby and Liam’s
college education.

“I’m really sorry mom!” She heard Liam
say as she climbed out the car. “I don’t know what happened. I must
have mixed up the brake and the gas pedal.”

“I can’t talk about this with you
right now Liam,” Faith told him as she stepped out, “I need to make
sure she’s okay and give her our insurance information. We’ll
discuss this later alright. The important thing is that everyone is
okay.”

She saw him settle back into the
driver’s seat with a nod. She knew he was going to blame himself.
He’d always been a very sensitive kid. Always the first to
empathize with someone in pain and the first to take it on himself
in some way. He was sweet, and Faith was proud of his good nature
and sensitive demeanor, but she knew that Mac was hoping his son
would grow out of it soon – toughen up before life made his sweet
nature a handicap rather than an asset. He didn’t understand his
gentle son, Faith knew, and she dreaded telling him about Liam’s
latest adventure.

The important thing is that everyone
is okay. She repeated it to herself to give her courage as she
navigated the angry traffic swirling around them so she could
approach the other car without further incident. It hadn’t helped
tempers any that they had this fender bender at a busy intersection
during rush hour when everyone was trying to get home and out of
the cold Alaskan air.

“Are you okay?” Faith called to the
girl. “We’re so sorry!”

“What the hell is the matter with
you?” The girl yelled back in fury. “Are you crazy?”

Faith recoiled from her explosive
anger and instinctively put a hand over her baby bump.

“Calm down,” she yelled back. “I said
we’re sorry. It was an accident. I have insurance. The important
thing is that no one was hurt.” Why does no one else seem to think
that health is the most important thing here, Faith
thought?

“Fuck you!” the girl called back
angrily.

“Hey!” Faith yelped in surprise. A
quick look behind her at her car confirmed what she already knew.
Liam could hear everything. His eyes were wide with shock and fear
as he stared at his mom, his big blue eyes flicking quickly from
her to the girl and back to her. He looked like he was going to try
and get out, maybe try and help or something so Faith waved him
back in anticipation of his intentions. The last thing she needed
was Liam getting in the path of this angry girl.

Her hands up in front of her now,
Faith slowly walked closer to the girl in the manner most often
used by people approaching a viscous animal. With every cell of her
being she tried to convey kindness and good intentions. This girl
was a freaking basket case. The last thing she needed was this
situation to escalate.

“Okay,” she said in a soothing tone as
she edged closer. The girl just stared at her with wild angry eyes.
“I see you’re upset. You have every reason to be upset. It’s okay
to be upset.” Should I really be repeating the word “upset” to this
girl, Faith asked herself; probably not, but she wasn’t sure what
else to do. She was a wife and mother, not a psychiatrist. Anyway,
it seemed to be working. She hadn’t yelled back any obscenities in
the last few seconds and actually hadn’t said anything at all.
Faith took it as a good sign.

Reaching her side she slowly waved her
insurance card in the air. “Here’s our insurance. I’m sure they’ll
pay for everything. It’s not a problem at all. We’re so, so
sorry.”

Silently the girl watched her, making
no move to take the insurance card out of her hand.

Cars zoomed past, some with a honk as
if Faith or this girl wanted to be standing outside in the freezing
cold nightfall and just decided to have a powwow in the most
inconvenient spot for all other drivers. Faith rolled her eyes at
the insensitivity of other people. Never again would she ever even
look sideways at an accident, she promised herself. If she could
just get through this and get herself and Liam home to their warm
fire and cozy kitchen, she would never ever even breathe a sigh of
annoyance at being held up by some other accident in the
future.

“Go ahead, you can take it,” Faith
urged her – a little impatient now – what was wrong with this girl?
“Just write down the insurance information. The phone number and my
name and all that. You can give them a call in the morning. I’m
going to call them tonight,” she rushed to assure her. “But you
should also give them a call tomorrow so you feel confident
everything’s being taken care of. Is this your parent’s car? Let me
give you my phone number so they can call me if they have
questions. I really am so sorry about this.”

“My parents?” The girl asked
confused.

“Are you okay?” Faith asked again.
Either this girl was just a bizarre piece of work or she had
sustained some kind of head injury in the accident. She didn’t
appear hurt. She wasn’t bleeding or holding her head or arm like
something was broken or sprained, but she was off somehow. There
was just no other word for it. The girl was off.

“Why do you want to talk to my
parents?” She demanded again when Faith said nothing.

“I don’t necessarily want to talk to
your folks,” Faith explained. “I just want you to know that I’m
available to talk to them if they’re anxious about our insurance
paying for this, or if they need to know what happened or anything
like that.”

“Yeah, okay.” She finally replied
begrudgingly and took the insurance card Faith as stubbornly
holding out. “Give me your number. My dad might want to talk to
you.” Strangely she looked frightened as she said this, but Faith
chalked it up to a typical teenager concern about being grounded,
being blamed for the accident to the family car. Nothing
more.

“No problem,” Faith reassured her.
“Seriously, it’s no problem. Really don’t worry. I have a teenager
myself so I know just what to say. He’s learning to drive. He got
confused and accelerated when he should have braked and here we
are.” She tried for a smile but got nothing but a blank
stare.

“What’s your name?” Stick to the
basics Faith, she told herself. With this girl, just get her name,
give her your name and number and get out of here.

“Lila…umm, no wait, I mean Emily.” She
said in a rush of words.

Faith looked at her suspiciously. What
kind of person didn’t know her own name? The girl was obviously
lying. “Lila?” She said with a tone that always discouraged lying
when Liam was attempting to pull a fast one.

“No! Emily! Are you deaf? I said
Emily, Emily, Emily.”

“Okay, okay,” Faith retreated half a
step in defense, “Sorry. My mistake. Emily.” Whatever this crazy
girl wanted to call herself was fine by her. She wasn’t her
daughter and she wasn’t her problem. Get her name. Give her your
name and information. Get you, Liam, and the baby out of here
safely, she reminded herself again.

“My name is Faith. Here’s my phone
number and my address in case you need it for your parents, for the
insurance company, your mechanic…whoever. I’m just going to go
ahead and write it all down for you. You don’t need to do a thing.
Just hang on a second…”

As quickly as she could she wrote it
all out on the back of store receipt she had in her pocket.
Thankfully she always carried a pen with her. Her mama had always
told her that a pen could save a lot of hassle in a hurry and she’d
seen the truth in that several times over the years.

Handing it over to Emily, she gave her
another once over with the practiced eye of a mom with a clumsy
son. Liam was always getting banged up it seemed, so over the years
Faith had perfected her ability to sense or spot a medical
emergency even when nothing was obviously broken or bleeding.
Thankfully, the girl seemed fine. Mentally disturbed obviously.
Afraid of her strict parents, obviously. But nothing physically
wrong. Not that she could see. Nothing that Emily was
volunteering.

“Okay, well I guess we’re all set
here, huh. Is your car okay to drive?”

When Emily didn’t respond, Faith
looked up from where she was replacing her insurance card into the
folio Mac always insisted they keep the car registration and
insurance organized with and stored in the glove compartment. She
noticed that Emily was staring past her. Over her shoulder and
through the windshield of her car, straight into Liam’s frantic
eyes.

Neatly stepping in front of her so as
to cut off her view of Liam – she didn’t like how ‘Emily’ was
staring at her son --Faith said again with forced politeness, “Are
we all good then? You can drive right?”

“Yeah, okay.” Emily conceded. She
started to turn around and then with a quick pivot she came up to
Faith and whispered hotly in her ear, “You ought to be more
careful. You and him need to be real careful.”

Automatically Faith put up a hand to
push Emily back and away from herself. This girl was too close for
comfort and her breath steamed and stank in the air between them.
At this close range she could see the pockmarks of old acne scars
in her skin and her eyes had a peculiar flat sheen to them that
didn’t look normal or natural. She wondered if she was on drugs or
something and without being entirely sure why, she was suddenly
afraid of her.