Believe Read online

  Believe

  Oni Fighters Book 2

  NATALIE GAYLE

  EBS

  Contents

  Copyright

  Author’s Note

  Dedication

  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

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Epilogue

  After Word

  Acknowledgments

  Also by NATALIE GAYLE

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Copyright © 2015 by NATALIE GAYLE

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Author’s Note

  Author’s Note

  Brave was all about the obvious. It was about Eden’s physical scars and it was about a very public event in Xander’s life that left his soul scarred.

  Believe is different. It’s about how even people that outwardly appear to have everything together, often don’t. Well at least, in their own minds they don’t think they do. Isn’t that what matters? What we believe about ourselves?

  The story is also about challenging our ideas on what is normal and ordinary. I find this a fascinating topic and I enjoy looking at others’ perspectives on this and how society has shifted it’s thinking over the last twenty or thirty years.

  I’ve also explored two very real and often colliding topics—domestic violence and special needs children. As always, I’ve done extensive research and have had key points clarified and verified by experts in their respective fields. I’ve also written large parts of this story from close experience.

  This book is not intended to be dark. There maybe a scene or two that potentially contain triggers for some people. I think I’ve handled it sensitively, although I’ve never walked a day in your shoes so I can’t be sure.

  Finally, I wanted to create story that had a strong family centre. Family seems to be an often overlooked and under valued resource for so many things these days. I value family of blood and heart more than anything. In Believe, I’ve given you a window into the sort of family environment I’ve experienced and enjoyed.

  I know, I’m blessed to have them.

  I hope you enjoy Believe.

  Love

  Nat

  This book is dedicated to family. Yours, mine, ours. It doesn’t matter what form family comes in. It can be through blood or forged through shared experience. It’s about a mutual enjoyment of being together and love for each other.

  Embrace your family.

  Their strength will help you achieve anything.

  Prologue

  Dane

  Have you ever hit a point in your life where everything looks good from the outside, but there’s this feeling deep in your gut that tells you something is wrong? It’s a strange hollow feeling. Sometimes it feels a little like fear, other times excitement and often just plain damned empty.

  That’s how I felt then. My life looked good from the outside and it was. But if that was really the case why did I feel like that?

  My feet kept hitting the pavement in regular strides. The weather was still warming up to spring. I liked jogging; it’s all part of the martial arts training that makes up such a big part of my life. Long ago I reached the point of not even really knowing why I did it anymore. The training and commitment becomes more a habit than anything else. Something I’d done most of my life. I guessed I was okay at it.

  My belt was black and it carried a few stripes and some fancy arse embroidery that told me and the rest of the world, that apparently this was the case. So I figured it must be true, but why didn’t I feel it? Why didn’t I really believe it?

  To me, I was just an ordinary guy. Ask anyone. They would tell you, there was nothing special about me. My best mate Xander, he was extraordinary, but me—no. Xander’s always been special. Ever since I’ve known him, which is about twenty years, he’s always known exactly what he wanted to do. Xander’s known what it was he wanted, gone after it and achieved it. Quite frankly it was both awe inspiring and fucking intimidating—not that I’d ever told him that. The guy had won more martial arts titles and fights than I could remember. And then when that shit went down with The Cobra, did he curl up and crawl into a ball? Hell no. He started his dojo Onigashima the next week.

  That took guts and balls of steel. Shit, I often thought The Cobra’s death shook me up more than him. Don’t get me wrong. I loved Xander as a brother and I was so fucking proud of him, but it can be hell on your confidence having him for a best mate.

  I’ll never forget that conversation. Xan still had the faint discoloured bruises on his face from the hits The Cobra had managed to land before he…well…died from a punch Xander landed in the cage.

  He’d come over one night and told me he was starting a dojo and he wanted my help. He offered me a financial stake, but I turned him down. The dojo was Xander’s baby. At the time, I was content with my online martial arts supply business which I started just out of high school.

  Regardless of whether I had a financial stake or not, I’d help him anyway I could. That was never the question or an issue. Deep down I knew Onigashima was something Xan needed to do for himself. We’d talked some more and cracked open a couple of cold ones. Neither of us drank much because of all the training. That was one of those nights which warranted a cold beer with a mate.

  It only took a couple of beers and we had the name…it was hardly a stretch. We’d both been fascinated by the Japanese folk legend of Onigashima for years. It fit. Onigashima is what the dojo had been right from the start and so that’s how it had come about. Just as I’d expected, it had gone from strength to strength. There’s no way anything Xan did would be less than rock solid and stellar. I wish I had his confidence and that unrelenting drive. Oh, it can be taught and practised, but there was just something in Xander that took it all to the next level. That special something was the bit I agonised over.

  I didn’t think I had it.

  Me, I was just your average everyday guy. I was just plain Dane Roberts. And about the most extraordinary thing about me was that my parents didn’t call me something like Barney. I’m sure that was a fluke rather than good management. Thank God mum had a thing for romance novels and picked my name from some hero she’d been reading about twenty six years ago. I’m just incredibly grateful she wasn’t reading about some dude called Barney. Shit, I would have been Barney Roberts. Could you imagine that?

  Barney Roberts, now that would have taken ordinary to a whole new level. Yep, definitely counted my blessings on that one. But getting back to the ordinary thing, I guessed if you get told something all your life and you’re brought up in a household that was normal and ordinary then that’s exactly what you
believe. It becomes your reality. Why would you think anything else?

  I lived my life like others did—day to day, with a moderate amount of planning for the future. Somehow I’d managed to create a reasonably comfortable life for myself. Nothing spectacular, but I did okay. Regardless, nothing seemed to be enough anymore. Everything seemed empty and meaningless and I didn’t know why. What was wrong with me? It just felt well—weird.

  That was what played through my head as I ran that early spring day. Does that happen to you? It does to me. I kind of have these little conversations with nobody but me in my head.

  Right there was a pretty good summary of where I was at before Arianne Le Flegg came crashing into my life and turned it upside down.

  Man did she hit me for a six…knocked me clean out of the park.

  Arianne Le Flegg: now there was a name that’s anything but ordinary.

  I’d find out very soon just how far from ordinary we both were.

  This is our story.

  Chapter 1

  Arianne

  Marcel was here! I felt it. God, why couldn’t he just leave us alone? I tried to glance behind me subtly, using the glass windows of the stores in the shopping mall for clues. It wasn’t a feeling I’d had for months, but the tiny hairs on the back of my neck only rose for one reason and it wasn’t a good one—Marcel was close.

  My hand tightened a little more around my son Isaac’s smaller one. He was doing okay at the moment, but I couldn’t let him sense my fears. I walked a very precarious tight rope every time we went out to places like the mall. Small, strange and innocuous things would set him off. He was doing better but better was a relative term.

  As if on cue, he tugged hard on my left hand and halted dead centre of the toy store we were passing. There was a Lego display of castles. Two of his absolute favourite things. Lego and castles. Why? Why today? Why me? Why now?

  I so didn’t need that.

  Isaac said nothing—he didn’t need to. His eyes scanned each of the five model castles. No doubt mentally photographing and cataloguing every block. The first thing he’d do when we got home was build an exact replica of each one, given the opportunity.

  Fear tickled up and down my spine. Marcel was getting closer; I just knew it.

  I took the opportunity to have a good look both ways and I breathed slightly easier when I didn’t see him. Maybe I was imagining it? Please God, let that be it—I prayed silently.

  “Mum.” Isaac tugged on my hand and moved to the entrance of the store. I was still glancing around, trying to figure out if the fear I felt was real or imagined. Surely he hadn’t come back? He’d moved on with a new woman—plus I had a restraining order out against him.

  Before I realised what was happening, Isaac had towed me down the aisle to the Lego section and was staring at a box of Lego.

  My mind locked back on the here and now. “Isaac we agreed no more Lego until your birthday.”

  “I want it.”

  “I know you do. We agreed though. Besides you already have half a dozen castles.” I tried to reason, which wasn’t always easy with Isaac.

  “I don’t have this one…” I glanced at the box and tried to make sense of it. It was just a massive box of Lego pieces and not actually any of the sets that had been on display in the window. “Castle Neuschwanstein was built between 1869 and 1892 as the summer palace for King Ludwig II of Bavaria. King Ludwig only officially lived in the castle for 172 days.” His eyes remained fixated on the box. My mind whirred trying to keep up. This was not a strange phenomenon, when your child had high functioning Asperger’s syndrome. Isaac made connections with things that I often failed to make.

  “That’s great Isaac honey, but we really need to go. I’ve got a lot of things to do today. You understand don’t you?” I almost pleaded with him. I just wanted to get out of there and to somewhere I felt safe.

  After everything Marcel had put us through I cherished and valued the safety of myself and my son above just about everything.

  “I need this set to build castle Neuschwanstein. There is 660 pieces in this set.”

  “I can see that honey, but we really need to go; besides you have a heap of Lego at home. Surely you can build it with that?” Please buy my argument Isaac, I silently prayed. I didn’t have time to go through the rigours of negotiating with him today.

  “No Mum, I can’t. I’m 286 pieces short.”

  “Can’t you use something else?” Isaac had three book cases full of Lego, surely there was something that could be reused?

  “No. I don’t think so Mum. That would mean pulling something apart. No, that won’t work at all. No, won’t work at all.” He shook his head emphatically and kept muttering the “wont work at all”, more to himself than me.

  I sucked in a deep breath and tried to keep my cool. Think quick Arianne—think quick, I urged my mind.

  “How about we go and grab an ice-cream and think about it some more. Perhaps you’d like to draw up a plan first to make sure this is exactly the set you need. It’s important to get the right pieces.”

  He thought that over for a second and I could see his brow pull into a frown. “The right pieces are important,” he conceded and hope sprang forth in my heart.

  “I’d really love one of those salted caramel ice creams. Doesn’t that sound good?” I was drawing at straws, but I didn’t want to be here arguing with him over a Lego set that was far closer to two hundred dollars than one hundred. Our budget didn’t stretch to that.

  Besides, regardless of his behavioural challenges, buying him things to solve a problem wasn’t the answer. Tempting, particularly now—not smart in the long run.

  Any other day I would have tried the No route. That would have likely ended up in an all-out tantrum, probably the type that would be the equivalent of a dead cockroach act. It was hard enough at times.

  I didn’t need more helpful comments from well-meaning bystanders today—not when my skin still prickled and my pulse raced.

  I took his hand and started to guide him away from the Lego aisle.

  “The foundations are going to take 34 six holed blocks. There will need to be ten rows of that. Then the…” I blocked out his voice as he went on. Isaac could talk about castles non-stop for days.

  It wasn’t that I didn’t find what he had to say interesting, mind-blowing and often amusing, just not today. Today, I needed us not to be here out in the open. I wanted us home behind locked doors.

  He kept talking all the way out the door of the shop, rattling off facts about how he was going to build his castle. Isaac might only be nine, but I had no doubt he’d build the castle exactly as he’d seen it in the window. The image of that castle was locked firmly in his brain.

  My eyes kept sweeping left and right as we made our way down the long rows of shops. As we crossed the entrance to the shopping mall and exited out into the carpark, I breathed a sigh of relief. The car was just a couple of rows over.

  Just a little further.

  Isaac was still talking away about the castle. “Do you know that they had to remove 25 feet of stone in some places to prepare the foundations to build the castle? That was in the summer of 1868. There is three feet and three and three eight inches in a metre. That would be 7.62 metres they had to remove…” I didn’t know if he’d read it or calculated the numbers; either was impressive for a nine year old, although totally normal for my son.

  “Amazing effort with the equipment they had in those days.” I threw into the conversation. I was still too anxious to really focus on what he was saying. Finally, the car was just a few spots away. I pressed the remote I held in my hand and the lights flashed.

  Almost there.

  Once we were alongside the car I opened the back passenger’s door for Isaac and leant in to make sure he was buckled in properly. That was when the familiar smell of a cologne I’d never forget invaded my nostrils. Every muscle in my body tensed and terror streaked through me.

  Ever so slowly I stra
ightened and went to close the door, and that was when his hand landed on my arm and my heart rate spiked to a level that I knew was off the charts.

  “Hello Annie, you’re looking beautiful as always and how’s the retard?” His voice was silky and seductive even with his strong French accent—all that ran through my veins was hate and cold hard fear.

  Slowly my eyes met the icy, evil hardness. I read the calculating smirk and all I felt was dread.

  Marcel Beauchamp was back in my life—not only was he very bad news, he was also my ex-husband and the father of my son.

  Dane

  I pulled into the carpark of the local shopping mall. No sooner had I shifted into park and shut off the engine of my truck, than my mobile rang. I didn’t even need to pick it up from the centre console to know it was my mum. Each member of my family had their own tone in my phone. It was a little quirk of mine and easy to do. Small minds and all that.

  I’m fine admitting that I’m easy to keep amused, particularly with anything shiny; like mobile phones, video games and technology.

  “Hey Mum,” I answered. My eyes flicked across the carpark to a good looking woman who had a young boy with her. My truck being higher than just about every vehicle in the carpark, gave me a distinct height advantage. Yeah the woman was attractive, but that wasn’t what caught my attention. She was acting nervously about something. Her gait was choppy and her movements tense, as her eyes darted back and forth. There was something about the kid as well—I couldn’t quite pick it.

  “Dane are you still coming to dinner tonight?” I glanced at my watch, instantly annoyed that I needed to look away to check the time. There were still a few things I needed to do today before I took the 5:00pm class at Onigashima for Xander.

  “What time Mum?”

  “Well you know your father likes to eat at 6:30 but I can stretch it to 7:00 if it means you’ll be here.”