Fight Or Flight (Tempted Series Generation 2.0) Read online

  I tear my gaze away from Brooklyn to stare at him for a moment. The man on the verge of a breakdown locks eyes with my mom.

  “It seemed only fitting,” my mom sputters. Her blue eyes flit back to Joss. “You asked how he died…” Her voice trails and she turns to me. Grabbing my hand, she pulls me to her side. I tower over her by a good six inches, but in that second, I feel like a little boy. Tears fall from the corners of my mom’s eyes and when she finally finds the courage to continue, speaking our truth. “Bones died a hero. He saved our lives.”

  Our hero.

  Three

  Brooklyn

  When my mom first mentioned coming to New York to seek out my biological father, I tried to prepare myself for all the potential outcomes. I imagined him slamming the door in our faces and of course; he was married with two kids and a golden retriever. In my head, the man who made it possible for me to be born lived a good life—one that didn’t have room for an illegitimate child. Especially one he didn’t want. But I never factored coming here only to find out he was murdered seventeen years ago.

  Eric Nicholson, or more commonly known around here as Bones, is dead.

  Morte.

  I suppose I should feel some kind of way—some sort of emotion, but maybe I’m too shocked. Too bitter. He was a shot in the dark, this I knew, but he was our only shot and instead of worrying over what happens now, I just want to go back home. I want to spend the little time I have left with my mom memorizing everything about her. I want to commit her smile and the sweet sound of her laughter to my memory. I don’t want to be here, sitting in front of some stranger who insists we call him Riggs or Tiger and his perfect little family, as my mom cry buckets of tears.

  “Joss,” Riggs calls softly to my mom and I lift my head to study him, taking in the way he leans across the table to take her hand. I wish he would just shut up and while we’re at it, I wish his wife would keep her mouth closed too. As nice as my mom’s long-lost friend and his precious Kitten are, they break her heart a little more every time they open their mouths. At least their son, Eric, knows how to remain silent.

  “If he would’ve gotten that letter…” Riggs continues, stopping to shake his head. His voice hoarse when he finishes the sentence. “…I would’ve known. He would’ve told me and he…well, he wouldn’t have—”

  “If he knew he was a dad, he would still be here today,” Lauren, his wife and apparently his kitten too, finishes for him.

  They exchange a solemn look and I glance at their son, Eric. The poor guy hasn’t moved an inch since his mom dropped his hand to take a seat next to mine and when his parents explained how Bones jumped in front of a bullet meant for Lauren, ultimately saving both their lives, he looked like he wanted to crawl out of his skin. I don’t blame him, I kind of feel the same way.

  “You don’t know that for sure,” my mom whispers. “When it’s our time, it’s our time.”

  Her words pack a punch, one I feel deep in the pit of my belly, and I quickly tear my eyes away from Eric to stare at her. How could she be so careless with her words? Doesn’t she realize her time is almost up? That she is sitting here mourning a man who died seventeen years ago while I’m mourning her.

  My mom.

  The only person I love in this world.

  The only person who loves me back.

  When it’s our time, it’s our time.

  “It doesn’t matter if he got the letter or not,” I blurt, pushing back my chair. I turn to her, taking in her wide eyes. “He’s dead. Game over.”

  “Brooklyn,” she admonishes, clearly embarrassed by my outburst, but I don’t care. Let them think I’m a self-centered brat. I can’t do this anymore, not when we’re running out of time.

  I shake my head and stand.

  “No, he’s dead, mom.”

  “Sweetheart,” she whispers, rising to her feet.

  Full of unshed tears, my eyes plead with hers.

  “Let’s go home,” I whisper hoarsely.

  Where it’s us against the world.

  “Please,” I beg.

  Her sad eyes bore into mine as she reaches out and gently brushes a strand of hair away from my face. Seeming to sense the desperation clawing at my entire body, she nods.

  “Okay,” she murmurs.

  I instantly breathe a sigh of relief. Her hand falls from my face and she turns back to Lauren and Riggs. Just as she opens her mouth to speak, she loses her balance. My heart stops as she falls to the floor and for a split second, I’m paralyzed with fear. Lauren is quick to react and drops to her knees, rolling my mom over so her head lies on her lap. Riggs hurries around the table too—even Eric rushes to her aide. It’s me who can’t seem to move.

  Me, who silently prays this isn’t it.

  Me, who hears her voice echo loudly inside my head.

  When it’s our time, it’s our time.

  Me, who wishes for more.

  More love.

  More time.

  “Joss,” Riggs calls desperately, pressing his fingers to the side of her neck.

  “No, no, no,” I cry.

  He lifts his head and looks at his wife.

  “She’s got a pulse,” he declares. “It’s faint, but it’s there.”

  “Eric, call 9-1-1,” Lauren orders.

  Riggs’ eyes slice to me. He calls my name, but it doesn’t register. Nothing does.

  She’s dying.

  She’s going to leave me.

  “Brooklyn,” he shouts, and this time I blink through the tears to meet his gaze.

  “She’s gonna be okay,” he assures, but I shake my head.

  “No, she isn’t,” I cry, finding my voice. “She’s dying.”

  When it’s our time, it’s our time.

  Game over.

  Most people go to a church or a temple to pray, but I bet you the walls inside a hospital have heard more prayers than any of those places of worship. The same goes for airports, they see more sincere kisses in those terminals than wedding halls do.

  I’m a fan of airports.

  Wedding halls too, even though I haven’t been to many.

  I despise hospitals.

  I don’t believe in prayer much anymore either. How can I when every damn one goes unanswered?

  But back to my hatred for hospitals, it started right after my grandparents passed. Me and my mom were planting flowers—well, she was planting flowers, I was playing with the dirt. Anyway, my shoelaces came untied, and I tripped over one of the flowerpots. My mom rushed me to the hospital. As soon as we turned the corner and the familiar building came into sight, I started screaming. I couldn’t read the sign, but I knew where we were and that my grandparents never made it back home from there.

  I was just a little girl whose biggest worry was what outfit her Barbie doll would wear, and yet, I had enough sense to associate death with hospitals. Thinking about it now, I wonder if subconsciously my young heart knew the narrative to my story. Maybe it was trying to prepare me for the day my mom would be diagnosed with cancer. Maybe subconsciously part of me knew that hatred would reach new heights every time my mom got admitted, and I sat in the waiting room wondering if I’d see her again.

  But then the doctor said there was nothing left to do. Our run with hospitals was over and oddly enough, I hated that more. There was no more chemo. No more transfusions. Nothing. My mom could enjoy the little time she had left at home. I should’ve been happy that I no longer needed to worry if the next hospital visit would be the last, but I couldn’t be happy because I started to wonder if every kiss goodnight was the last. Would I wake up the next morning to find my mom dead in her bed? What would I do? Who would I call?

  The doctors couldn’t help her anymore, but I needed them.

  At least then I wouldn’t be alone when she died. The doctors and nurses would know what to do. They’d pull me away from her lifeless body I would undoubtedly cling to, and they’d call the funeral home–right before they called child services.

 
; “I didn’t know what you liked, so I got one of everything.”

  The sound of Riggs’ voice jars me away from the grim thoughts racing through my mind and I lift my head to see him juggling a smorgasbord of snacks from the vending machine. On top of his arms being full, his shades are hanging off the bridge of his nose and he’s still wearing his leather vest, only there are more snacks jutting out of the pockets. He’s quite the sight, and if my mother wasn’t dying, I’d probably laugh at him. But all I see when I look at him is the man who lifted my mom into his arms. He carried her to the ambulance and when the EMT’s insisted he couldn’t ride with us, he put one of them in a headlock and told him he’d be on the stretcher next.

  Guess who won that battle.

  Yeah, those paramedics gave in quickly.

  Riggs had a scary side which was completely unexpected because any time my mom spoke about her friend Robert, she made it seem like he was a rich nerd. If this guy is rich, he doesn’t flaunt it. I mean, that vest must be as old as me and that t-shirt couldn’t have cost more than ten bucks. His jeans look like they’ve seen better days too. But hey, I’m not judging.

  The truth is, I don’t know what I would’ve done without him. Even now, I don’t know what I’ll do if he leaves. He’s a complete stranger, and he’s all I’ve got.

  He takes a seat beside me and unloads the junk food onto the chair on the other side of him.

  “I’ve got chocolate, candy, chips, some weird gluten thing, and some cookies,” he shares. With every item he mentions, he lifts it over his head as if it’s a prize. Then he suddenly freezes and turns to me.

  “Hey, do you want ice cream instead? I’ll call Jack and have him bring the ice cream truck here.”

  I have no idea who Jack is, but the fact this guy has an ice cream truck on speed dial is pretty impressive.

  “What’s your favorite flavor? Me, myself, I’m a fan of chocolate with rainbow sprinkles.”

  Yeah, not a nerd.

  Strange, though.

  Very, very, strange.

  “I’m not hungry,” I say as he hands me a bag of chips.

  “Nonsense,” he scoffs, popping open the bag. Keeping one hand on the bag of chips, he reaches out, takes one of mine, and shoves it inside the bag. “Eat.”

  Sighing, I take the chips from him.

  “Thanks,” I mutter. I get the feeling he’s not going to relent so I shove a chip in my mouth and the guy grins like he just won the lottery or something before ripping open a sleeve of Oreos.

  “So, this is what stress eating is like, huh?” he questions with his mouth full.

  “More like emotional eating, but…po-tay-toh, po-tat-oh,” I say, holding up the bag of chips for extra emphasis. He smiles at my attempt to lighten the mood and I shove another chip in my mouth.

  “Is there someone I should call? Your grandparents, maybe?”

  I stop chewing and force the chip down my throat with a swallow. Everything happened so quickly back at Kate’s there was no time for questions. No time for me to explain me and mom only have each other.

  Tears fill my eyes as I turn my attention back to Riggs. I open my mouth to tell him the truth, but instead of words, a sob slips past my lips. He immediately tosses his Oreos to the side and wraps his arms around me, pulling me close. The tears fall fast and furiously down my cheeks, soaking his t-shirt as he gently strokes my back and I realize no one other than my mother has ever consoled me. No one but her has hugged me so tightly.

  “Shhh…it’s okay,” he murmurs. “I’ve got you, kid.”

  If only he knew how badly I needed to hear those words.

  If only he knew how scared I am.

  Lifting my head from his chest, I pull out of his arms and wipe my cheeks with the backs of my hands. Then I meet his concerned gaze.

  “It’s just us,” I confess. “That’s why we’re here. The doctors told us she only had weeks left to live and instead of processing she’s dying, she packed our bags, hoping my dad would take me in when she dies.” I pause. It sounds so desperate. “I’ll be eighteen in two months,” I explain, lifting my eyes to his. “So, no, there’s no one to call.”

  Not a soul.

  Four

  Eric

  “Rise and shine dick for brains,” my brother singsongs. In case his annoying voice wasn’t enough to wake me, he kicks my shin for good measure. It’s mornings like this I wish I was an only child. Actually, I take that back. I like my other siblings, Anthony and Bella, just fine. It’s this asshole I wish they would have put up for adoption.

  I pull the pillow out from behind my head and send it spiraling through the air. To my satisfaction, it smacks him in the face just as I open my eyes.

  “Get the fuck out of my room,” I growl, tossing the blankets off my body. Sitting up, I swipe a hand over my face and rub the sleep from my eyes.

  “No can do,” he says. “Family meeting.”

  I peer at him, spotting the twinkle of mischief in his eyes. It should be noted that Montgomery family meetings are a rare occurrence since Mom and Dad decided to close up shop on the baby making business. I think the last time we had one was when dad came home with our pet cockatoo, Flo Rida, and that was two years ago. Dad said it was a gift for Bella, but she can’t stand the dancing bird. Mainly because it only bobs its head to gangster rap and not Taylor Swift.

  “Good news, though,” Robert continues to taunt, straightening his glasses. “You didn’t kill Joss. Bad news, the uncles are here with a box truck. I think they’re shipping you out to boarding school for stealing Uncle Gangster’s car. If that’s the case, I call dibs on your room.”

  At the mention of Joss, I wake the fuck up. When that woman fell to the floor, I swear my heart stopped and then I saw Brooklyn crying and the fucking world stopped too. As sick as she appeared to be, I was sure it was all my fault, that the car accident caused her to collapse. In my head, I had her bleeding internally and in desperate need of a craniotomy. I would have fallen to my knees and performed CPR if I knew how to…anything not to kill Brooklyn’s mother. Imagine being the person responsible for both her parents dying. It’s bad enough I can’t look at her without wanting to rip my heart out of my chest.

  “What happened with Joss?” I ask, ignoring the rest of the nonsense he mentioned.

  Our dad had gone to the hospital in the ambulance with them and after my mom got Bella off the school bus, she dropped our sister off at grandma’s and met them there. I stayed up all night waiting for them to come home, but when the sun rose, I called it quits. No news was good news, right?

  Robert shrugs his shoulders.

  “They got home a little while ago but all they said was that Joss was stable and then they ordered me to get your ass out of bed. Brooklyn wasn’t crying, so I’m taking that as a good sign.”

  My eyes widen at that and I pull myself out of bed.

  “Brooklyn is here?”

  Pulling a tape measure out of his pocket, he ignores my question and measures the wall behind my dresser. I narrow my eyes.

  “What the fuck are you doing?”

  “Seeing if I can fit a sixty-inch television on this wall.”

  Crossing the room, I smack the tape measure out of his hand and grab the back of his t-shirt. In one fluid motion, I turn him around to face me.

  “Cut the shit, Rob,” I growl. “I asked you a question.”

  “I answered you,” he volleys, a smug expression on his dopey face.

  Gritting my teeth, I release his shirt and tamper down the urge to punch him in the nose.

  “The first question,” I grind out.

  “Oh,” he mutters, raising an eyebrow. “What was it again?”

  Before I can repeat the question, a knock sounds on my open door, and Rob’s eyes light up like a fucking Christmas tree. I slowly turn around to see what’s got his voltage turned all the way up and my eyes connect with Brooklyn’s. The weight that has been sitting heavy against my chest since her mom fell, eases at the sight of
her, and I breathe a sigh of relief. It’s weird and I’m sure I’ll overanalyze it later, but for now, I just want to stare at her. I want to erase the image of her crying from my mind and replace it with this one—puffy eyes, dark circles, and all.

  “Sorry to interrupt whatever is going on in here,” she says, pointing a finger between me and Rob. “Your mom said I could take a shower, but I can’t find the towels.”

  “I’d be happy to point you in that direction, beautiful girl who isn’t my sister,” Robert says from behind me. He goes to step around me, but I snap out of my trance and grab his elbow. “Down, boy,” I hiss.

  He turns his head, pushing his glasses higher on the bridge of his nose, and fixes me with a mischievous look.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he scoffs, grinning like an evil fucking clown. He pulls his elbow free and faces Brooklyn. “Let me show you where the towels are,” he says.

  The hand that grabbed him closes into a fist as I watch him make his way toward her. Brooklyn smiles at him, then her eyes shoot to me and before I can think about why I want to punch my brother in the face, I follow them out of my bedroom. My feet come to a halt halfway down the hall and I lean against the wall, watching as Rob leads her to the linen closet and grabs a couple of towels for her. She thanks him in that soft voice of hers and he points her in the direction of the bathroom. It’s an innocent exchange, but I still feel a pang of envy in my gut.

  When she closes the door to the bathroom, Rob turns to me with a goofy grin on his smug face.

  “Stay away from her,” I warn, pushing off the wall.

  He rolls his eyes at me and turns to walk away, but I quickly reach out and tag the back of his shirt. Pushing me off him, he turns to me.

  “Why? She’s fucking hot.”

  Yeah, she is and under normal circumstances, I’d be proud of my brother for recognizing that. Hell, I might even give the kid some pointers—Lord knows he needs a little help getting around the bases. But he ain’t getting around anything where Brooklyn is concerned. I’ll fucking kill him.