Dying Embers

Dying Embers

Adrian J. Smith

Supposed Crimes LLC, Falls Church, Virginia

Smashwords Edition

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

All Rights Reserved

Copyright 2013 Adrian J. Smith

Published in the United States

ISBN: 978-1-938108-36-5

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-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're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Prologue

She needed to pry her eyes open, which required more effort than she thought she could muster. She worked mucus covered lids apart and felt the pleasant pop of her lashes separating. She looked around, and blinking rapidly, moistened her eyes. Mentally, she knew she was looking around as she felt her eyeballs pivoting in their respective sockets. Yet, everything looked the same. Dark. Black. Nothing.

No memory. No hints. No clue of her location. She panicked. Her heart pounded. Bam, bam, bam. She tried to slow the beats: beat, beatbeat, beat. She took a breath; the air sucking into her lungs nauseated her.

She choked and coughed as she squeezed her fingernails into her palm. Her body stopped rocking from the force of hacking, but she needed oxygen and air. She craved it. Her lips parted, and her head was thrown back into the dirt—a strand of hair clung to her cheek. She didn’t dare raise a hand to brush it aside.

Her heartbeat eased, but she remained on her back. She knew she should probably take stock of everything; mentally run through her body from her head to her toes, thinking about how each part of her anatomy felt—she needed to do this. She didn’t. Her eyes remained open and on the ceiling, or at least, she assumed she stared at the ceiling. Her eyes hurt. The muscles in the backs of her sockets ached, and she had a hard time keeping her lids open. She had to remind herself that she needed to keep looking up above her at all costs. To close her eyes would be a death sentence.

Air flew through her nose and down to her lungs, causing particles of dirt to lodge on the sides of her throat. They clung, staying inside her body until swallowing felt like drinking sand. She started to hack again. Her diaphragm violently surged upward, her chest thrust forward, and air came out in short bursts. She was floored by how long it lasted. She couldn’t stop, and her head started to spin. She couldn’t figure out where her feet were. She floated.

A stream of fiery pain licked up from her toes. The agony grasped hold of her ankle and consumed inch by simmering inch. She squirmed, trying to get away. But she couldn’t. She needed to move—she had no other choice. Pain tried to grab her as her insides tried to crawl away. Her guts felt as though they left her form behind. Her body cringed from the anguish—a hollow shell of what she had been was the only thing left.

She lost feeling. Her limbs numbed, and the blackness before could not compare to the darkness that began to consume her. Little hexagonal shapes took over her vision in mass quantity; more and more came, tearing through her vision and ripping it apart at the seams. Where did they come from? Ants—they looked like ants crawling all over, and she couldn’t shake them, couldn’t make them go away.

A short breath before a long one. She was off her rhythm. Her balance was gone. She felt like she rolled as if on a ship out in a hurricane; her body would not stop moving, yet she knew she lay in stillness in the dark caverns of the room. The ship rolled her around, shoulder over shoulder, from one end to the next before the movement sent her back to her original position—eyes blazing into the pitch black. The point came where she couldn’t figure out which way was up. She didn’t know where the ground was, and she didn’t know what direction she faced. No grasp on reality, no idea of where she lay, and no idea of who she was. She started to give up. Nothing mattered.

Confused, head spinning with dizzy circles: her mind refused to focus. She couldn’t think long enough to figure anything out. She needed to start to unravel her predicament, but her breathing increased. There was no way to win. Her nails dug into the dirt below as her mind rose higher and higher: the click, click, click of the track as it pulled her up, up, up with the pinnacle in sight. The point where she would go down, down, down, and there would be nothing to help her. Nothing that would be able to stop her.

Holding her breath, she waited. The dizziness became greater, the rolling more violent, and the air in her chest stopped moving.

Then, she fell.

Chapter One

Addison opened the door of the truck and breathed in the fresh air. The clean mountain breeze brushed against her warmed skin; autumn had taken hold in Norwich, and she couldn’t have asked for a better season to move. Shutting the door, she went into the leasing office to take possession of her one bedroom, hardly anything square foot apartment, and the new life that awaited her.

Hello, the quiet and happy voice cooed from behind a large desk in the back of the room.

Addison made her way forward, figuring that she would have to in order to sign her lease. The woman didn’t seem as if she was going to come out to her.

Hi, she called back.

A nerve jumped in her stomach, and she had to tamp it back down as the young woman peeked around the desk.

I’m Addison Lee. I’m here to sign my lease? She said it like an inquiry, even though there was no question.

Right! Welcome.

The young woman smiled, her dark eyes bright and her olive skin pulled into a smile.

I’m June—the property manager.

June held her hand out, and Addison took it in a firm but soft shake.

It’s nice to meet you, Addison replied.

The least fun part about moving for Addison—signing the lease. She hated signing all the paperwork and answering the hundreds of questions thrown in her direction. She really disliked all the small talk. June slid back around the desk with a long manila folder in front of her, and Addison watched as she opened it and slipped out two bundles of paperwork.

One copy is yours, and one stays in the office. The one we’ll sign stays in the office.

All right, Addison answered and checked her watch. She had sped to get there first and wondered how long the caboose of her train—meaning her brother—would take in catching up.

June smiled and pulled out two pens before turning the legal sized paper so Addison could read it correctly.

Now, while we go through this, if you have any questions shout them out. It’s a lot of information, and I tend to like to get through it as quickly as possible.

Yeah, no problem.

They started with the top. Names and numbers flew around Addison’s head, and she started to lose track by page three. She never felt well suited for paperwork—she never enjoyed it. Taking a deep breath as she initialed the bottom of the page, she started in on the papers again. She was going to do this well. She wanted to do it well. Addison intended to take on a new job, and that job required her to understand the ins and outs of paperwork, contracts, and legalities. Whether she liked to do paperwork or not, she had to complete it on time and well. Bolstering herself, Addison stared back down at the white paper with tiny black words and focused on everything that June said.

Making it to the final page, Addison let out a breath and signed her full name. She dated it and slid it back across the desk toward June with a large grin on her face. She was done.

June smiled and said, Now, we have the addendums.

Addison would have groaned out loud if she had thought it proper. She glanced at her watch again and nodded. Her demeanor deflated, and she reached forward to grab hold of the second stack of papers. The addendums. Listening to June prattle on about mold and mildew, animals—which weren’t allowed—satellite dishes, and how all her utilities were going to be metered and billed, she inwardly cringed as she signed each page with her full name and initialed in a few places.

She stopped breathing when the door slammed open. She saw a blond man slamming her front door and charging up the stairs before he entered her room. Anger spread out from him in waves, and she shuddered as she shook the image from her mind. The jackass was gone. She didn’t have to worry about him coming in. Her eyes lifted to see the form of her brother, filling the door.

Honey, you’re home!

Slowly turning in her chair to glare at the owner of the overly pleasant and chipper voice, Addison huffed.

Good morning, Rob. Glad to see you made it, Rob. Couldn’t have driven a little faster, could you, Rob? Her tone sounded passive aggressive to even her own ears, but she didn’t care at the moment.

Once Rob started, he never stopped. His words started to flit over to Addison, and she took a breath, bolstering herself for the long haul.

For you, darling? Never. I wanted all your precious possessions in the back of that monster of a truck with such a wide and pretty ass to be safe and unharmed upon our arrival. You know I ride it rough, and I was just trying to preserve it until the end. So, are you done yet? I’ve been waiting outside for like an hour.

Not quite, June answered and gave him a little smile that set Addison at ease and showed her annoyance at the same time.

Addison ducked her chin to hide the smirk and stifle the chuckle. Rob never understood when he was being silently chided. She had worked for years, trying to teach him the signs, but after eighteen years of attempted training, he never grasped the concept.

Ignoring the man, June laid out a few more papers for Addison to sign before stuffing them all back into the pristine manila folder.

There, now we’re all done with the lease.

What else is there? Addison spoke before she could think, her tone tinged with shock and annoyance, even though she hadn’t meant it to come off that way.

June gave her the sweetest smile Addison could imagine coming from the woman. Her eyes were soft and crinkled at the corners, and the tight curls of her hair shook when her head tilted.

We have to do an inspection of the property, there are the community policies you have to read and sign, and I give you the keys. Then, you are done with me after you give me your first month’s rent. I promise after all that you can start to move items into the apartment.

She reached out and pressed a hand to Addison’s arm before her heels clicked against the floor. June moved to the other side of the room, and Addison twisted in her chair, Rob moving away from her as she did so, to watch June. The young manager took the keys around her wrist that Addison had failed to notice until that point and unlocked a small box hanging against the wall. She slipped two key rings from a hook and came back. Her mind became distracted with the way June’s body moved: the soft sway of her hips and the tense muscles in her calves.

Ready?

Yeah. Addison cleared her throat and stood up. She made for the French door at the front of the office while her cheeks blushed red. Rob was ahead of her, and when she glanced back, she saw June grip a pen and clipboard.

We’re really not done with paperwork?

Nope, but I promise that this is the only time you’ll ever have to do this much of it. She smiled. Renewing is certainly far easier than signing an entire new lease. And I do hope you renew.

June’s head turned down, and she had a flirtatious look in her eye that took Addison off-guard. Addison’s stomach clenched, and she quickly left the room, hoping the breeze outside would help settle her racing heart.

Good marketing, Rob commented in his usual manner before trailing ahead to where he assumed the apartment Addison would be living in was located. Addison followed June who walked rightly in the opposite direction than Rob had. Shaking her head, she ignored him, figuring he would catch up when he smartened up a bit and realized his mistake.

Addison and June reached the apartment, the latter unlocking and swinging the door open. Addison was hit with the smell of fresh paint, chemicals for cleaning, and something else that she couldn’t quite place. Wrinkling her nose behind June’s back, Addison poked her head around the corner; the apartment was simple. She walked in, located the dining room on her right and the living room on her left. The kitchen had a bar, but the cupboards came down so low that only a foot between the top of the counter and the bottom of the cabinet remained. Addison would have walked over to run her fingers against the material, but she would prefer to do that without June being there.

The manager started again, and Addison was forced to listen. Twenty minutes later, she grew frustrated; she wanted to move everything in and be done with the whole relocation. Letting out a deep breath, Addison jumped when the door burst open with a loud bang. Luckily, no memory of the jackass surfaced this time.

So, this is where you ran off to. I’m not that much a bore that your poor brother can’t hang out with you after I drove halfway across the country with all of your stuff in the ass of the truck, now am I?

Addison ignored him. Rob was verbose and a complainer; she knew that after years of patiently listening to him whine. She would let him ramble until it annoyed her again, and ignoring him was far easier than becoming irritated.

Because really, if I was such a bore, I would expect you to pay a bit more attention to me. You know, make me up so I sounded nicer, had more interesting things to say.

Rob started to walk around the tiny apartment and toed the carpet carefully.

Make it so that pretty girls will like me, he continued with barely a pause. He gave June a goofy grin and a huge, faux wink before wrinkling his nose at the carpet. He turned to Addison.

I can fix that. So, where’s all the stuff? Aren’t you supposed to be moving in and not just staring at the walls, thinking everything is going to miraculously find its way inside these raggedy walls? No offence, he said the last bit to June with a hand in the air defensively.

None taken. June shook her head, the dark black curls jingling against her face, ears, and shoulders.

Addison was entranced with the way that they bounced and brushed across her shoulders. Temptation gripped her, and she wanted to reach out and pull on a tendril, letting it rebound back up. She was knocked out of her trance when June spoke.

This is an older property, so we make do with what we have. June cocked her head to the side, and the stare down between her and Rob began.

Addison knew that June would easily win. Rob didn’t have the attention span of a catfish or a kitten high on cat nip. No way would he would win. Sure enough, and true to his style, Rob turned to Addison in under thirty seconds.

Well?

Well, what? I’m pretty sure that I still have some paperwork to finish up then you can be the big macho man that we all know you are, and you can start hefting those oh so heavy boxes up the stairs. Her eyebrows rose, and her green eyes twinkled with humor.

Funny. So, funny, Addy, hit your brother while he’s down.

He pressed a hand over his heart and leaned back on his heels.

I think that I’m mortally wounded this time.

Addison rolled her eyes.

No, I’m serious. Mortally wounded.

I’m sure. She felt relaxed when they bantered playfully. Turning back to June, she said. You can ignore him, we all do. He’s used to it by now.

June smiled, the corners of her eyes crinkled, and she moved into the kitchen.

You just have two more papers to sign.

She laid them out on the counter and set the pen next to Addison’s hand. Just here and here. The first one is saying that we inspected the apartment and you have found nothing extraordinarily wrong, a.k.a. general maintenance issues aside. This second one is stating that you will read the community policies and abide by them.

Addison nodded and signed the two forms. She was given another long form that she would fill out and return within forty-eight hours. She scanned the paper and didn’t notice June looking at her until the woman set a hand on hers.

Well then, here you are. June held out a small key ring with three keys slipped onto it.

Addison nodded in response to everything that June added on. As if she hadn’t spouted enough information in the last two hours about leasing, living there, and maintenance practices. She grinned when June left, shutting the door behind her. Rob emerged from the bedroom, where he had disappeared to. Addison leaned against the counter, two hands behind her to prop her up, and stared at her brother with a sly grin gracing her face.

So? she asked.

I like it.

You like it? She teased him.

Yeah, I like it. It’s a little drab, needs some decoration. God knows this carpet is awful. The walls need a new color, but at least they’re not white. The toilet makes a funny noise when flushing it, and you have to flip the handle up. Might want to tell maintenance about it.

Rob.

You need a shower curtain, which we didn’t bring. I have no idea what made you think that both a love seat and a three piece couch were going to fit in here.

Rob!

You’re going to need a dining room table, which you forgot to pack. And we need to do something about the sticky kitchen floor.

The floor is not sticky. Her jaw dropped as she looked at him and moved the toe of her tennis shoe around to feel for whatever might be stuck to the brown and tan linoleum.

Rob laughed hard; he gripped his stomach and bent doubled over. She pouted her lips and glared.

Every time, Addy! It gets you every freakin’ time!

He gasped for a breath and glanced at her before starting to laugh again.

Addison joined in before long. You’re such an ass, Rob.

She pushed on his shoulder, and he fell into the cabinet.

Ouch!

Yup, an ass.

Stalking out the front door, Addison moved down to where she had parked her truck. The next few hours were not going to be fun. She was on the second floor, and the stairs had a skinny and sharp turn in them. The staircase was also steep; she noted it as she walked down them. She would have to help Rob with all large furniture. Moving her vehicle closer to the apartment, she backed into the space directly in front of the stairs.

#

Addison lost track of how many times she went up and down those steps. She couldn’t count the number of times, ways, or things she carried, but she did know that there were twelve steps to each flight and two flights. Letting out a breath, she plopped down onto her couch and reclined against the arm rest. Her neck gently cradled, her muscles begging to be put out of their misery. Turning slightly, she glared at Rob.

Tell me again why I wanted to move.

You wanted a new start.

He lifted her feet and sat, pressing her calves over his thighs.

You wanted a place where no one knew you, where no one knew about you, where no one could find you. You wanted to be done with the life you were done with, and you wanted to start with a new one.

He let the silence linger.

Addison twiddled her thumbs back and forth, and her toes pointed straight out to stretch the muscles in her legs.

Do you think it was wrong of me?

When Rob looked over, she was biting her lip and not daring to look up at him.

BattyAddy, you are doing exactly what you need to do, and anyone who says you aren’t needs to learn a thing or two before speaking.

BattyAddy?

Her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

You haven’t called me that since I was ten years old.

Rob shrugged.

It seemed appropriate.

He tapped her leg. When she didn’t move, he tapped it again.

Addy.

What?

It’s time to get some food. I’m starved.

Pizza.

Chinese.

Rob . . . I want pizza.

She still didn’t move her legs, thus keeping him locked down on the couch.

Well, I want Chinese, and if I don’t get Chinese I’m not going to install your cable box and internet for you.

I’m perfectly capable of doing that on my own! she shot back to him.

We’ll see.

Lifting her legs, he swished them off the cushions and himself, allowing space to stand.

Come on, BattyAddy.

He reached a hand out for her and tugged her to stand.

I’m buying.

That means Chinese. She pouted.

It does.

#

Night fell just as they made it back to the apartment with food in hand. The sky streaked with gray and light as the sun set over the western mountains. Addison opened the blinds as far as they could go, and she stared out at them. She gave up on the chopsticks and used one of the plastic forks the restaurant gave them. Shoving a mouthful of fried rice between her lips, she savored the flavor and oil as they mixed on her taste buds.

I think I picked a good place.

Addison slipped another piece of chicken into her mouth and reclined onto the couch.

I think that next time you move, since you work at a fire station of all places, you should have those big burly men heft your stuff for you. Rob pouted and complained.

Rolling her eyes, she turned to look at him. First of all, I don’t work there yet.

Yes, you do.

"I might have signed the paper work, but I don’t actually know anyone there. Secondly, why would I ask favors from people I barely know when I know