The Promise of Tomorrow: An Inheritance Novel Read online

  The Promise of Tomorrow Copyright © 2019

  Candice Wright

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights Reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover design by Angela Haddon Book Cover Design

  Formatting by Gina Writes Words: Author Services

  Contents

  Note to My Readers

  Acknowledgments

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  Also by Candice Wright

  About the Author

  For my mother

  For always believing in me

  Even when I struggled to believe in myself.

  Note to My Readers

  Please be aware that I am a British writer, who writes about British characters whose stories take place in the UK. I use British spellings which some may find confusing. What can I say? We like our ‘U's’ and ‘S's. I also wear trousers as opposed to pants and I ride in lifts instead of elevators. I’m a rebel like that.

  Acknowledgments

  Angela Haddon – The super talented designer of my beautiful cover.

  Tanya Oemig – My incredible editor.

  Missy Stewart - Proofreader and lifesaver.

  Gina Wynn - Formatting Queen.

  Sosha Ann – My amazing PA and friend.

  Aspen Marks, AC Wilds and Isobelle Carmichael – I am truly blessed to have three amazing best friends. Thank you for all the love and support you give me. I adore each and every one of you.

  Julie Melton, Rachel Bowen, Sue Ryan - My Beta Angels and miracle workers.

  Thais Neves – The best Alpha reader on the planet. I love you more than coffee.

  My readers – You guys are everything to me. I am both honoured and humbled by the love and support I have received.

  Thank you for taking a chance on my book. If you enjoy it, please leave a review.

  Prologue

  EDEN

  The sign above the entrance reads Sanctuary, but I know it would never be one for me. I push the door open and step inside and find myself bombarded with the smell of dried sweat and despair. To me, though, it smells like freedom.

  A sound from the corner catches my attention but once I see where it’s coming from, I find myself mesmerised and unable to look away. I watch as a frail man in threadbare clothes sits on the edge of a shelter-issued cot bed as one of the volunteers shaves his head and mumbles under his breath about lice. The frail man is oblivious to the mumbling, and everyone around him for that matter, his eyes fixed on a spot on the wall behind me as he mutters curse words to himself. His grey straw-like hair and beard, likening him to a character from one of my favourite books, drops to the floor around him. He doesn’t seem concerned with anything other than the brown paper bag he has securely wrapped within his arms. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out the man is homeless. I’ve seen men and women like him in the city before, huddled up in shop doorways. People pass them by, looking at them with nothing more than disgust in their eyes before turning away and pretending they don’t exist anymore. Looking around me now at the people here, I don’t notice any judgemental prying eyes. Here we are all in the same boat.

  I stand in my spot and watch until the frail man wanders away and the hair clippers are left unattended on the edge of the bed. I make my way over to them like they are a beacon drawing me in. Picking them up, I head to the nearest bathroom, both surprised and comforted by their weight.

  I lock the door and flip on the light which flickers and casts shadows around the drab room, offering just enough light to illuminate the tiny shower cubicle and toilet in the corner. There’s a hair dryer plugged in at the end of the counter underneath the mirror, so I make my way over to it, all while holding the hair clippers like they are a lifeline and, who knows, maybe they are. I pull out the plug that connects the hairdryer to the wall and plug in the clippers instead. Looking up into the dirty, grime-smeared mirror, I wince at my reflection.

  My pale skin is marred by four circular bruises on my left cheekbone down to my jaw and one on the opposite side of my face. Anything more than a quick glance will reveal that the bruises form a handprint, left by a hand far larger than mine. My once bright violet-blue eyes, which usually draw people in with their uniqueness, now look dull and bloodshot, and my waist length honey blonde hair lays limp and greasy over my hunched shoulders. My lips are chapped and sore from my constant chewing as my stress and worry manifest themselves. The girl staring back at me is a stranger. I feel trapped in a body that defies me in a life that’s not mine anymore. My very essence is trapped within as if I were merely a doll who had her strings pulled by a puppet master. The way I see it, I have two choices. I can stay and play by someone else’s rules or I can leave and finally be free. It’s not even a choice anymore. I know what I have to do. It’s time to run.

  I turn on the clippers. The noise humming through the quiet room is both comforting and exciting. Today is going to be the first day of my new life. Eden Myers is going to die and a new girl will rise from the ashes. She will be stronger and will be able to stand up for herself. She will be able to fight back.

  I place the blade against the start of my hairline and drag it backward toward the nape of my neck and watch as my long hair begins to fall to the floor around me. Tears run down my face but I don’t stop until nothing but stubble is left. I look at the girl in the mirror, watching as a small smile appears through her tears. There she is. These tears are not cried in sadness. They are tears of relief, cathartic, releasing the shame from inside me and washing it away.

  The door opens behind me making me jump but it’s just the elderly volunteer I noticed earlier.

  She presses a hand over her mouth and gasps when she sees me. “Oh, child. What have you done?”

  “Nobody will ever grab me by the hair again. Now they can’t hold me down or yank me back. Now that I’m not pretty, they might not even see me anymore.”

  She looks at me, really looks at me as I fight the need to squirm under her stare. I stop myself though, as I don’t feel her judging me. In fact, it’s the opposite. There is something in her eyes that speaks of her own experiences. It’s possible this woman before me has a story that would make mine pale in comparison. I harden my heart to it. That soft-hearted shit is for the dead girl who wanted to change the world. The new me just wants to survive and that means adapting.

  “How old are you, child?”

  With zero hesitation in my voice, I answer, “I’m eighteen. It was my birthday yesterday.” It’s true that it was my birthday yesterday. I just didn’t turn eighteen. I turned fifteen. However, if she knew that, she would be obligated to call social services who in return would call the police. They would think they were helpin
g but all it would do is condemn me. See, my stepfather is a psychopath protected by his badge. Too smart to become a criminal, he became a highly decorated police officer. He is charming and charismatic, mimicking the people around him to appear like a normal person, but behind closed doors he is violent and abusive without a sliver of remorse. My mother fell for his charm. He manipulated her into making decisions and choices she would normally question, all in the name of love—an emotion he is unequipped to deal with. By the time she realised she was living with a monster, it was too late. We were trapped with no escape. Or, at least, I was. My mother had found her way out with a discarded razor blade in a lukewarm bath, leaving me behind to face the monster alone.

  See that’s the thing about judgements. That frail old man muttering to himself that you crossed the street to avoid is just trying to make it through the day. However, that police officer who instantly put you at ease just because he carries a badge and wears a smile, he may be living a double life behind closed doors. It would never cross your mind that his favourite thing to do is watch me bleed. How could you know that he had turned my once happy home into a prison? Tripped feet and slaps morphed into punches and kicks which then became—No.

  I pinch my eyes shut and shake my head. Nope, that girl died. I won’t give up like my mother did. I will run and hide and fight and scream and go down in a blaze of glory if I have to, but I won’t let him win. He doesn’t get to take any more from me. He has already taken more than I was ever willing to give.

  “Who hurt you?” she asks, snapping me out of my tumultuous thoughts.

  “My husband,” I lie easily. “He’s a cop and he won’t stop until I’m dead.”

  She stares at me for a beat before coming to a decision.

  “I know someone who can give you a fake identity and relocate you out of the city but then you would be on your own. You won’t be able to use anything that’s in your name now—passports, bank accounts, mobile phones. They will all have to be left behind. You won’t be able to be the person you once were anymore.”

  I look in the mirror again and drag my fingers over the baby soft stubble covering my head.

  “That girl died a long time ago anyway. The time to grieve is over. This girl,” I point to my reflection that looks so different from moments before, “she wants to live.”

  Six years later

  Chapter One

  NOAH

  “This the place?” Eli asks from beside me.

  “Looks like it, yeah,” I answer, wondering if he feels as uncomfortable being here as I do.

  “Doesn’t look like much from the outside does it?” he observes.

  “They rarely do anymore. It makes them easier to blend in with the rest of the city’s architecture and being less conspicuous means fewer complaints from the city’s residents.”

  “Been to a few before, have we?” He laughs, pulling on the nondescript large black door. The small gold lettering reassures us we are indeed in the right place. The name reads Midas and walking inside I find exactly what I would expect coming to this kind of establishment. A long bar covers most of the far wall while small, flimsy looking tables, strategically placed to face the staging area, are scattered around the rest of the room. Sticky floors and red velour curtains at either end of the stage make me wonder if the owner bought a book labelled One Hundred and One Ways to Outfit a Strip Club.

  I’m guessing that Midas’s touch is the theme and girls wrapped in gold are the name of the game. They walk around wearing little more than gold bikinis and forced smiles, delivering drinks to tables of men who ignore them as they watch the girl on stage work the pole. As the song comes to an end and a smattering of applause is heard throughout the room, I decide I need something stronger than my usual beer. We head to the bar making a few of the scantily clad women turn their heads appreciatively. We’re good-looking guys. I’m not conceited, it’s just a fact. Sometimes we can play that to our advantage. Lord knows it’s bought us out of trouble more times than I care to admit on one or two of the many jobs we’ve done over the years. Luckily, things have quieted down now since I signed on to work exclusively with Turner and Smiths Solicitors. They pay us a large retainer to keep us happy. Sometimes that means we are travelling all over the place without a lot of downtime, but at other times things are quiet and we might pull in only one or two jobs in six months. This one, though, has been one motherfucking headache right from the start. I signal the bartender and when he makes it to us, I order two whiskies neat. Eden Myers, that is who we are here for. She ran away at nothing more than a day over fifteen and hasn’t been seen since. Now people go missing every day but not many manage to avoid one single sighting in six years. The ones that do are usually dead. But that doesn’t seem to be the case with Eden. If we have the right girl—and just to be clear I’m rarely wrong—then little Eden Myers grew up to be Eve Temptation. How quaint.

  “What has you scowling so hard?” Eli elbows me before tipping his head back and necking his drink. I turn to answer him when the music starts up again, cutting me off. The opening bars of Marilyn Manson’s “Tainted Love” blast through the speakers making me roll my eyes. Jesus, the only way that could have been anymore cliché would be if they played “Pour Some Sugar On Me” by Def Leppard. I swirl the whisky in my glass and raise it to take a sip when I freeze with the glass pressed against my lips. If this is Eden, then it’s no wonder there have been no sightings. The little honey-haired girl with indigo-blue eyes who hadn’t quite grown into her body has turned into a Victoria Secret model.

  Her hair skims her jaw in a short bob that is now a white-blonde and looks like someone has run their fingers through it multiple times. Probably before fucking her against the side of a wall. My fist tightens around my glass at the thought, which pisses me off. This chick is nothing to me but a payday. I can’t see the colour of her eyes from here, but I can see the curve of her heart-shaped ass as she bends and struts like she owns the stage. Her costume is nothing more than a short plaid skirt and a white blouse tied between her breasts that play peekaboo with the white lace bra underneath. White thigh-high stockings paired with black six-inch heels finish off the sexy schoolgirl ensemble. Something about the whole thing sets my teeth on edge. Maybe it’s the fact that I have been staring at the photo of the fifteen-year-old version of the woman in front of me for so long that it’s hard to connect that image with this one.

  I watch on when, with deft movements, she opens the blouse, showing us the lace covered expanse of creamy flesh, before turning her back to the crowd and slowly pulling it down her arms. The skirt is next as she moves to the music, effortlessly sliding it over her waist before gravity takes over and it drops to the floor, pooling at her feet. She flicks it with her impossibly high heels to one of the guys at the table nearest the stage then winks at him as she struts toward the pole. Her confidence is alluring, seeming as comfortable in her lace bra, thong, and stockings as she would be in jeans and a T-shirt. She wraps one leg around the pole and lifts herself off the ground with one hand before spinning around at a dizzying speed. The next five minutes are spent with me trying to keep my mouth from gaping open and my dick under control as she works the pole like a lover before flipping to the floor and performing a series of gravity-defying acrobatics.

  “Do you think that’s her?”

  I jump, so engrossed in the act that I completely forgot Eli was even here. “Yeah, I think it’s her.” I down the rest of my drink and slam the glass on the table with far more aggression than necessary.

  “She is fucking beautiful though. I don’t know what I was expecting. Actually, that’s a lie. I was expecting a skinny, strung-out junkie. I guess she must have gotten herself clean because that girl looks healthy as fuck to me.”

  I know what he means. When her stepfather Karl approached Turner and Smiths and asked them to help get Eden declared legally dead as she had been missing without a trace for six years, we were put on the job. Many people run away from home for lo
ts of reasons, some of those are heartbreaking, others not so much. But it’s usually devastating for the families left behind, caught between wanting to grieve but not wanting to give up hope. You just end up stuck in this weird kind of limbo, refusing to face a tomorrow without them in it, trying to recreate a yesterday where you can play out your would haves, should haves, could haves. The problem is that life doesn’t stop just because you refuse to live it.

  Once upon a time, I was a five-year-old little boy who watched on helplessly as his mother became a shell of the woman she was when one evening her husband didn’t return home from the pub. Years of investigations and false sightings meant we paid a toll none of us wanted to pay. Christmas went uncelebrated and birthdays were shrouded with a bitter longing. It was five months after my mother died from a heart attack, when I was twenty-three, that what really happened came to light. Seven months after my father’s disappearance, a body was recovered from the inky depths of the River Thames—a man whose DNA revealed him to be Thomas Jeffries from Brighton, reported missing by his wife. Case closed. Or at least it was until eighteen years later when Thomas’s widow found a box in the attic containing wedding photos with a woman that wasn’t her. Thomas Jeffries had led a double life and, using a false identity, married my mother despite having a wife already. The box contained a diary with page after page inked with words of regret and of the love he had for two women that ultimately tore him apart. His death was ruled with an open verdict, but I truly believe the coward took his own life instead of facing up to his actions. I don’t know if it was better that my mother died before his treachery came to light, but with life there are no do-overs and what’s done can rarely be undone. I ended up specialising in locating missing people both at home and abroad partly, I think, to give these people the closure my mother never had.