Cravings of the Heart (Trials of Fear Book 5) Read online

  Cravings of the Heart

  (Trials of Fear #5)

  By Nicky James

  Cravings of the Heart

  Copyright © 2019 by Nicky James

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Cover Artist:

  Nicky James

  Proofing:

  LesCourt Author Services

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the author.

  Contents

  Note to Reader

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Where you can stalk find me:

  Other Titles by Nicky James

  Note to Reader

  This book is 100% standalone. The Trials of Fear Series all take place in the same fictitious city of Dewhurst Point. You might see or hear of characters you know from other books, but they bear no relevance to the storyline.

  Phobia

  An extreme or irrational fear of or aversion to something.

  Cibophobia

  A fear of food.

  Chapter One

  Arden

  Ivory’s musical voice sang in the back of my mind as I wrapped the long string of my shoelace around the loop, tucked it under, and pulled it through to make a perfect bow. She’d learned to tie her shoes first and hadn’t given up on me until I’d mastered it as well.

  Come on, Arden. Over, under, around, and through. It’s not hard.

  Her singing faded once I’d fixed the bow, but the constant, hollow ache behind my ribs remained. She hadn’t sung that song for fifteen years, yet her sweet soprano with a hint of a lisp was alive still in my mind wherever I went.

  “Arden, hurry up! We’re going to be late to Mr. Pascals’ class.”

  I tugged my jeans down over the top of my Converse and snagged the strap of my backpack. Springing to my feet, I swung my bag onto my shoulder at the same time as I whipped around toward the stairwell.

  Malcolm peered up from the landing below, arms crossed, a slight twist in his mouth that made an indent in his smooth brown cheeks, the only sign of his growing irritation.

  We were already late for class, and Malcolm hated being late. He was neurotically on time. Organized to a fault. One of the reasons we hung out was because he kept my scattered brain on track.

  As I aimed for the first step, it happened.

  I’d been upright for all of five seconds—which was about right—and I should have known.

  Heat flooded my body, lava hot as it raced up my spine. My vision clouded with encroaching darkness. Inky spots bloomed and spread, blinding me. The constant drone of student’s voices faded into the distance like I was underwater and was replaced by a high-pitched buzzing. The stagnant, stale air inside the building thickened. Bland, concrete walls dimmed then vanished into the shadows.

  Everything tilted like the ground had turned sideways.

  I knew it for what it was. A head rush. Not the first time it’d happened to me. They’d become constant enough in my everyday life, I recognized their onslaught.

  Grabbing blindly for the railing, I lost all sense of sight and balance as my body turned heavy. I missed, groping frantically but coming up empty. Another student, too eager to wait, knocked into my shoulder, and my shoe slipped off the top landing, meeting air.

  I had less than a second to register what was happening. Spinning and flailing, my heart jolted into my throat as I bounced off another body and went down. Hard. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I thought I heard Malcolm call my name, a fresh note of fear in his tone.

  Then my head ricocheted off something unforgiving and solid. Pain lashed through my temple and into my jaw, but it was short-lived. No more than a fiery flash before the world drifted away.

  Everything went soupy. I passed out before my body stopped rolling down the stairs.

  Soft tinkling notes from a piano.

  Far away but soothing.

  I know that tune.

  Fluffy blankets tented all around.

  Feathery, apricot-scented hair brushes my cheek.

  Giggling.

  A hand covers my mouth and urges me to be silent and still.

  A sense of calm. Rightness. Longing.

  The chronic pain in my chest eases.

  Life realigns.

  It’s always too good to be true.

  Whispered, droning voices pierced the comforting veil of sleep. Hints of concern and surprise laced their tones. The crisp scent of soap fought for dominance over a sharp bite of antiseptic. One was warm and appealing, the other carried too many negative memories, and I wrinkled my nose.

  Swimming to the surface against my will, I plundered each small taste of sensory input as they returned, fighting to make sense of my surroundings. Seeking understanding.

  Where am I? What happened?

  Big, warm hands cupped my head on either side, holding me steady, restricting my movement. Their owner stood close. A satiny tenor hummed near my ear, his words comforting and reassuring, even when I couldn’t find their meaning.

  Rustling. Another set of hands touched me, carefully maneuvering me onto my side before laying my body flat once again. A pain I hadn’t felt while unconscious came alive. My entire body complained.

  Groaning, I tried to pull away but barely managed to get a hand off the ground. Opening my eyes, I squinted against the bright fluorescents hanging high above.

  “There you are. Welcome back. Try not to move,” the silky voice urged. It was warm and soothing in a way that a blanket was on a cold night.

  I blinked, working to eliminate the blurred edges around my vision.

  “Oh my God! Oh my God! Is he okay?”

  A shadow appeared behind the gentle-voiced man, and I shifted my gaze, working to focus on the new person instead.

  Hazy rings of light surrounded Malcolm’s black spiked hair. Lips pinched, glasses falling off his nose, manic dark eyes opened wider than seemed natural on my Asian friend’s face, all peered down at me with an edge of worry.

  I spent a second orienting myself, sifting through my jumbled thoughts as I tried to remember what had happened.

  Tying my shoe.

  Standing up too fast.

  Head rush.

  Falling.

  “Hey, buddy, can you follow the tip of my pen for me?” The soft voice spoke again, and I shifted my attention back, seeing him for the first time.

  A navy blue button-up shirt with a patched emblem on the left breast declared him a Dewhurst Point EMS worker. Warm, olive-colored skin and amber eyes. Long, straight nose. Buzzed hair, less than a quarter inch in length. Chestnut brown and soft. Or I bet it was soft.
It looked soft. The urge to touch it and find out was strong enough I barely found the strength to resist.

  There was something familiar about him, but my brain was mush, and I couldn’t put my finger on it.

  “Right here.” He tapped the end of his pen where he held it a few inches from my face. “Follow.”

  He moved it left to right then up and down as he studied my eyes.

  “Good. How are you feeling?”

  “Confused.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Arden McMillan.”

  The paramedic flinched as his amber eyes moved over my face. A flash of awareness flickered to life as his brow dipped, and he opened his mouth to say something but seemed to change his mind at the last minute and nodded instead, cutting his eyes to his pocket where he reclipped his pen.

  “Very good. Do you know what happened, Arden?”

  I filtered through the details of the events and eliminated the ones I didn’t care to share. “I got knocked from behind and fell down the stairs.”

  “Do you know where you are?”

  “School.”

  “Where’s school?”

  “Dewhurst Point campus.”

  “Good. Can you tell me where you hurt?”

  “Um…” I took inventory of my body, only then realizing I couldn’t move my head, and a wide strap restrained my legs around mid-thigh.

  Before I could panic, the paramedic rested one of his big, gentle hands on my shoulder, the warmth bleeding through and heating my skin. “It’s okay. Stay calm. We have your head restrained for precaution. In case of a neck or spinal injury. You’re on a stretcher and bound for transfer.”

  “Oh. But I’m okay. This is unnecessary.” I didn’t know if that was true, but it was reflexive. Those words, I’m okay, were so common in my vocabulary, they no longer held meaning. “I have a class. I’m going to be late.”

  “Arden, we’re going to transfer you to County General and have you looked at by a doctor. You took a nasty spill down those stairs and hit your head pretty good. We just want to make sure all your bones are intact.”

  Consequences of a hospital visit came at me from all sides, and I tried to lift my head again. “No. I can’t go to the hospital. Please, let me up. Please.”

  “Arden.” Malcolm bent down beside the EMS worker, my backpack clutched in one of his hands as he shook his head. “Listen to the guy. You need to get checked out. That was an insane fall. You could be bleeding inside or concussed or worse. Seriously.”

  “Stitches at the very least,” the paramedic explained as he checked under a wad of gauze on the side of my head, drawing attention to an injury and a sharp pain I hadn’t noted. “You were unconscious for a long time. In my line of work, that’s not a good sign. You have a deep gash here. You need to see a doctor.”

  “See. He knows what he’s saying.” Malcolm’s lips pinched. “Please.”

  Admitting defeat, I agreed. “Fine.” As an afterthought, I added, “Hold onto my bag for me. My sketchbooks are inside.” Along with the lunch my mother had made which I had yet to dispose of. “I’ll call you later.”

  “We can take your belongings in the ambulance if you—”

  “No. Mal, please?” I couldn’t explain my urgency to either of them.

  “Yeah, no problem. But I’m meeting you at the hospital.”

  “No! I’ll be okay. Just… keep my bag in your car. I’ll get it tomorrow.”

  “Okay.”

  Malcolm hesitated as the two paramedics stood with me on their stretcher. There was still another flight of stairs to go down before they could drop the legs and roll me along. It was embarrassing. A crowd had gathered, but they moved out of the way once they saw we were on the move.

  “Should I call your mom?” Malcolm asked.

  “No.”

  Although the hospital might go that route anyhow, seeing as my parents were my emergency contacts. Wonderful. Just what I needed.

  The second paramedic steered the foot of the stretcher while the soft-spoken one took the head. We descended carefully, and not once did either man break a sweat. Two decent-sized guys carrying my meager hundred and two pound body without a single grunt didn’t shock me. At five foot six, I was more than fifteen pounds underweight. My thirteen-year-old sister, Mya, could lift and carry me all around the house if I let her.

  Which I didn’t. Because it was humiliating.

  Almost as humiliating as being taken off college grounds on a stretcher and rolled into an ambulance because I fell down the stairs.

  I pinched my eyes closed, working the seized gears of my brain to life so I could develop an iron-clad story for all that had happened. Aches I hadn’t registered sparked to life as we rolled over the divots on the walkway.

  The ambulance was parked directly in front of the school, lights flashing silently. The two men worked together to glide the stretcher inside before locking it down so it was immobile. As they worked, they rhymed off some paramedic jargon back and forth which I assumed had something to do with my health.

  A radio up front crackled to life, and the second guy I hadn’t talked to jumped out the back doors, closing them with a bang. His partner remained beside me, securing a few more things while his buddy got into the driver’s seat and answered the radio call.

  “Ever ridden in an ambulance bef—before?” The hiccup in his question and instant rigidity in his body caught me off guard.

  Puzzlement canceled out the coiled tension in my gut, and for a second, I didn’t know how to respond. So I didn’t.

  Last time I’d ridden in an ambulance, my entire life had changed.

  Something about the pinch between his thick brows and the way his eyes flickered away so he didn’t have to look at me spoke volumes. My silence didn’t register, like he didn’t expect an answer and realized too late he shouldn’t have asked the question.

  Studying his profile, that niggling sense of familiarity returned. Something in his face. His eyes. My insides fluttered suspiciously as the pieces slowly came together, but the answer continued to elude me. I knew him. But how?

  The vehicle fired up, and the second paramedic called from up front.

  “How we lookin’, Iggy?”

  “All set.”

  Iggy!

  A wave of heat flooded my body, and I lay perfectly still as the past came back and slapped me hard in the face. I didn’t know if I wanted to run and hide or curl up in a ball and cry.

  He looked so much older. More mature. Ten years did that to a person, I supposed. His lanky, teenage-body had turned all man. His face was more angular, less rounded, and scruffy with unshaven, coarse hair. I remembered my brother, Phoenix, teasing him about his peach fuzz long ago. That was definitely a thing of the past.

  His hair was shorter. His muscles more pronounced. Voice deeper. Gaze tinged with more years of worry and life experience.

  He caught my slack-jawed observation and smiled timidly. Knowingly. “Been a while, huh?”

  I wondered if I could pass off the flush in my cheeks for anything medical. They burned with such intensity, I tried again to wrench my head to the side.

  Of all the bad luck. As though falling down the stairs at school in front of dozens of students wasn’t bad enough, my childhood crush, the man who didn’t know I was alive when I was a ten-year-old brat was the one who came to my aid.

  And I’d barely recognized him because he wasn’t nineteen anymore.

  When I didn’t respond, he cut his eyes to my head and the bandage he’d applied earlier and frowned. Leaning over my stretcher, he snagged a pair of nitrile gloves from a box on a shelf and pulled them on. From another shelf, he picked a few squares of gauze.

  “I’m gonna apply a bit more pressure here. I thought we had the bleeding mostly stopped, but you’re seeping through. Might hurt a bit.”

  I braced for the sting, clamping my jaw and wincing when he pressed over my split head. It stabbed knife-like right through to the back of my eye. I
was surprised I didn’t have a headache yet.

  “You’re looking pale. You okay?” he asked, studying my face.

  “Are my brains leaking out?”

  It was meant to be funny, but the biting edge of my tone made it sound more aggressive. A look of horror crossed Iggy’s face. “No. It’s a small gash. Not too deep, but the head bleeds a lot.”

  “Then I’m fine. I appreciate the fussing, but it’s not necessary.”

  He pinched his lips and kept a hand on my head as we bumped down the road. Discovering we knew each other served to make the entire experience that much more awkward. I hadn’t thought about Iggy in a lot of years. But those years had been filled with daydreams and fantasies. Innumerable wank sessions I would never admit to anyone. It made me wonder how obvious I’d been as a kid. Had he known about my stupid crush? Was that why he’d stopped coming around to the house?

  Dig me a hole and toss me in. What kind of sick twist of fate is this?

  I almost laughed when I considered it. Iggy knowing about my crush was assuming a lot. Most nineteen-year-olds didn’t look twice at ten-year-olds. Also, when high school ended, people often drifted. Who was to say he and Phoenix still talked. Doubtful.

  “Um… I know this is a lot of years too late, but I’m sorry about Ivory.”

  My heart clenched, and I focused all my energy on fortifying my defenses so nothing incriminating showed on my face. I didn’t want to be rude, but his condolences were six years too late, and Ivory was the last person I wanted to talk about.

  “You still talk to Phoenix?” I asked instead.

  He smiled. It was more genuine that time. Enough to show teeth. His eyes smiled with him, and the lines around his mouth were more pronounced. It was one part of Iggy that was exactly the same as I remembered. Almost child-like in appearance. Open. Free. I remembered Iggy smiling a lot when he was over. The man had always seemed perpetually happy, unlike my miserable brother.

  I wondered if that was true. Was he happy? If so, I envied him.

  “Yeah. A few times a week. We get together when we can. Not nearly like in high school, though. Work gets in the way when you grow up. You’ll see. What are you taking in school?”