Impulse Read online

  Impulse

  vanessa garden

  www.harlequinteen.com.au

  The Submerged Sun series

  by Vanessa Garden

  Book One: Captivate

  Book Two: Impulse

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Vanessa Garden lives on the beautiful coast of Western Australia with her husband and their three children. When she is not writing, Vanessa can be found at the local bookstore where she works part-time. When she is not gushing about her favourite reads to customers, or dreaming up her next novel, she enjoys spending time with the people she loves most.

  For Raymond, Grace, Lara and Marin

  CONTENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  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

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  ‘THIS IS THE street; turn left here,’ Lauren shouted over the song blaring from the radio.

  I was about to ask her what Jackson’s friend’s house number was, but when I turned onto the Jacaranda-lined street, a messy trail of parked cars showed me the way. After mounting a curb seven houses down, where the last wedge of free space remained, we got out, my stomach contorting into knots the entire time.

  A soft, summer breeze tickled the sweat-dampened hairs at the back of my neck. Stars glowed mutely in a deep purple sky that would soon be black. Music thumped from the backyard of the host’s house, punctuated by shrieks of laughter and some kind of chant, which was soon followed by a deafening cheer. In a last-minute attempt to ditch the party, I glanced at my sister over the roof of my car.

  ‘They’re pretty loud,’ I said, shrugging. ‘The neighbours will probably complain soon so maybe we should just…I don’t know, do something else instead.’

  Lauren rolled her eyes.

  ‘It’s one night of fun, Randy, just one. And come on, you promised.’ Lauren grinned at me while brushing on another layer of mineral makeup—the seventh maybe. The streetlight reflected the lush golden waves of Lauren’s hair and the glow of her sweat-dampened skin. She was one of those girls who looked her best without makeup, but I said nothing, and watched her cake her face, because, well, we all needed our vices.

  Mine after Mum and Dad’s accident used to be food, occasionally washed down with goon-bag wine. Now it was recalling snatches of memories starring Marko Tollin, a beautiful king who awaited me at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.

  I only had to think of him—of the way it felt to be secured within his arms, of the sometimes soft and sometimes demanding (but always knee-dissolving) way that he kissed me, or of that look on his face whenever his steely blue eyes locked with mine, like he was drowning in my soul and actually liked it there—and life’s problems temporarily melted away.

  ‘You look good, Loz.’

  She shoved the brush and the jar of pain-concealer into her handbag and shrugged my comment away.

  ‘I know I do. Don’t change the subject. We’re going in and we’re gonna have fun.’

  I sighed and drummed my fingertips against the car, wondering what on earth Lauren and I were doing here. It seemed crazy to spend our precious last twenty-four hours together with a bunch of acquaintances and strangers—well, apart from Lauren’s boyfriend.

  ‘Look, I know I promised; but I just thought…seeing as this is our last night…’ I paused and picked at a rust bubble above the chrome window frame, mini earthquakes erupting inside my stomach at the thought of what I would be doing at midnight, tomorrow, on the night of my eighteenth birthday.

  Lauren sighed and shook her head again. ‘I knew you were going to pull out at the last second.’

  The look on her face and the disappointment in her eyes was like a kick to my stomach with a steel-capped boot. I hated the idea of making her this upset just before my departure.

  Maybe in her mind this was the best way to spend our last night together. Maybe losing ourselves in the blissful ignorance of alcohol and dancing was a good way to avoid the inevitable. Since she was the one being left behind, I could sort of understand why. It was different for me; easier perhaps. I had somewhere to go; somewhere amazing—a place so unbelievable that it still shocked me to think that it actually existed. And I was so rattled about whether or not Marko would still have feelings for me—feelings I still felt for him—and absorbed with wondering if he was even still alive, that I was able to distract myself and skirt around the unthinkable fact that I was abandoning my family, and my home, for a strange world at the bottom of the sea.

  A shirtless and severely sunburnt guy stumbled into the middle of the road and vomited up the entire contents of his stomach, which looked like about ten litres of bright orange liquid, before urinating against the base of a streetlight and then tripping and shuffling his way back to the party.

  Lauren wrinkled her nose and covered her mouth. ‘Urgh, I think I’m gonna be sick. Let’s get inside.’

  My feet remained rooted to the grass beneath my flats.

  ‘Wait, Loz!’

  Lauren paused and spun around to face me, arms now folded across her chest. She was so dead set on this party that I wondered why I was even bothering to try and change her mind. She glared at me, her eyebrows raised as if to say, ‘What now?’

  My eyes roamed to the orange puddle in the middle of the road before returning to Lauren.

  ‘I don’t want to waste time…just partying…and then wake up in the morning and forget what we did. I want to remember everything about our last night together.’ I shrugged my shoulders and felt my throat squeeze around the hard lump of emotion growing there. ‘I just want to be at home with you, and Nana and Pop before I…’ Before I disappear for who knows how long.

  Lauren sighed and turned around, giving me her back.

  For a few minutes neither of us said anything. Jacaranda leaves rustled in the warm breeze. The trance music suddenly stopped before ‘Add It Up’ by the Violent Femmes came on to a roar of approval. Seven houses up, clusters of partygoers on the front lawn danced, their arms swinging wildly. Others were sprawled out on bonnets of cars, staring up at the stars, the tops of their heads a rainbow of colours from the party lights that decorated the front of the house.

  ‘Have you ever thought that I might have things going on? That I might need to see Jackson tonight about a certain problem we’ve been having?’ Lauren spun back around, tears glistening on her cheeks. ‘It’s not all about you, Miranda. Other people have problems too.’

  For a second, I didn’t know what to say. I’d been so self-involved the past few weeks that I hadn’t even noticed that something might not be right with Lauren and her boyfriend—she had broken up and reconciled with him too many times to count over the past year.

  ‘I should have noticed.’ I rubbed at my forehead, where the beginnings of a headache throbbed. ‘I’ve just been so nervous about tomorrow, that I…I don’t know.’ I shrugged. ‘Sorry.’

  She threw her head back and sucked in a deep breath throug
h her nose. Her hands swept across her cheeks to dry them, causing the bracelets that decorated her wrists to rattle against each other. ‘Don’t worry about it. It’s my problem to deal with. I’ll have to get used to being on my own from tomorrow anyway.’ She threw me a loaded look; one that sliced right through me.

  We’d become so close since what happened last year that I had known it was going to be hard saying goodbye to Lauren. But I hadn’t thought it was going to feel this painful, like a truck was driving back and forth over my chest.

  The music stopped, and when I opened my car door the hinges screeched like nails down a blackboard. The rainbow heads from up the street all swung in our direction and a guy called out to Lauren. She waved at him.

  ‘I think I’ll head home.’ I shrugged. ‘Text me later when you’re ready to leave, and I’ll pick you up.’

  Lauren said nothing.

  I got into my car, slamming the noisy door shut. My knuckles bulged around the steering wheel. What a shitty night. Why couldn’t I have just gone into the party and made Lauren happy? Why did I have to be such a huge sopping-wet blanket? I turned the key in the ignition and revved the engine, the satisfying roar of all eight cylinders calming me a fraction.

  The passenger door swung open and Lauren knelt on the ground beside the seat.

  ‘Wait. Forget what I just said. I shouldn’t be making you feel bad. You care for Marko; I get it. So of course you want to see him again. I’d do the same for Jackson.’ She inhaled unsteadily and swore. ‘Okay, confession time. There’s another reason why I brought you here besides me needing to talk to Jackson. I thought—it sounds stupid now—but I thought that if we had an amazing night and I introduced you to some cute guys then maybe you wouldn’t go tomorrow night. Stupid, hey?’

  I killed the engine.

  ‘Not stupid at all,’ I said, trying to hide the constriction in my throat with a smile.

  ‘Just let me go in and speak to Jackson, then we’ll ditch and go for a drive and maybe get pancakes and ice-cream, my shout.’ She shrugged before meeting my gaze. Her blue eyes shone with fresh tears. ‘Since you are definitely going and I can’t change your mind, I don’t want to be here with these jerks either.’

  Before I could stop my words they were out. ‘Hey, if there’s stuff going on between you and Jackson, and you need me, I won’t go tomorrow. I’ll stay.’ My fingers immediately sought the sun ring on my left hand, the ring Marko had given me for our fake engagement. The light-crystal stone felt warm beneath my touch. It killed me to imagine never seeing Marko again, but if my sister truly needed me…

  ‘Don’t be stupid. It’s nothing.’ She looked me in the eye. ‘You have to see Marko again. I’m the selfish one, trying to stop you from seeing the one guy who’s ever…who you’ve ever liked.’ I knew she was going to say, ‘the one guy who’s ever liked you’; but I didn’t care. I wasn’t even gone yet and already I missed my sister’s company, even if she was painfully blunt most of the time.

  ‘I’m serious. I’d stay for you.’

  Lauren rolled her eyes and grinned, masking her sadness. ‘Yeah, yeah, I already know that, so shut up already. I’ll be back in a sec.’

  ‘Okay.’ I sighed with relief, wound down my window and rested my arm against the windowsill. The night had cooled somewhat, but I was still sweating profusely in my so-old-it-didn’t-have-air-conditioning car.

  After five, then ten, then fifteen minutes passed, I got out and leaned against the bonnet to try and catch what little of the tickling breeze I could, and spent most of the time slapping mosquitos from my arms.

  Where on earth was Lauren? Was she purposely taking her time so that I’d come looking for her and wind up at the party after all? No. She had stuff to sort out with Jackson. That was all. I’d give her five more minutes before I went in.

  The breeze was just starting to cool me down, giving me goosebumps, when the music stopped abruptly. Lots of shouting replaced it. One of the voices I immediately recognised. I ran to the front door of the house just as Lauren burst out, slamming the screen door behind her.

  ‘Arsehole!’ she screamed over her shoulder.

  ‘Slut!’ shouted a gruff male voice—Jackson’s—from inside the house. He didn’t follow her out.

  ‘Are you alright? What happened?’ I gently touched her arm and steered her towards the car but in a burst of fury she yanked out of my grip and began kicking at the nearest tyre.

  ‘I can’t believe I thought he was—’ She shook her head and pressed the balls of her palms into her eyes, hard.

  ‘What the hell did he do to you?’ My heart was banging against my ribcage.

  She sucked in a deep breath, leaned against the car and threw her head back. Her tears shone silver beneath the half-moon.

  ‘He thinks…because I’m not staying at the party…that I’m going out to meet another guy. And then he broke up with me. He thinks I’ve changed since you and I have been hanging out.’ She shuddered back another sob then swore beneath her breath. ‘Control freak…’ she started pacing back and forth along the strip of grass between my car and the next. ‘Jealous dick of a boyfriend…stupid jerk…’ It went on and on.

  I remained silent and didn’t press her for more information. Everything about tonight, our last precious night together, was circling its way down a huge toilet bowl.

  We drove around for an hour, past our old primary school, which had quadrupled in size since we’d attended, and our high school, which looked the same except for the huge chain-link fence around it. We did a few laps in town and one slow drive past the cemetery. We didn’t have the nerve to enter the wrought-iron gates in the dark, so we settled for a few minutes of quiet talk in the gloomy carpark; but even then we couldn’t shake the cold, shivery feeling that comes with being only metres away from the decaying dead. So we left and decided to return home, where the house was stifling hot and still smelled like the lamb roast we’d eaten for dinner.

  The TV was off and I assumed Nana and Pop had gone to bed, but we were surprised to find Pop sitting up at the kitchen table, staring blankly at an open, unmarked Sudoku puzzle book.

  ‘You didn’t have to wait up,’ Lauren said, her voice hoarse.

  He glanced up in surprise, as if he hadn’t heard us enter, and quickly wiped his damp, red face. My heart twisted. Pop had been crying.

  I approached the kitchen table with hesitant steps, my flats squeaking against the linoleum.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Surely he hadn’t found out I was leaving second-hand. I’d wanted to be the one to break it to them. Lauren was the only one who knew of my plans, but when I searched her eyes she shook her head and shrugged. She seemed just as puzzled as me.

  Pop’s wrinkled face quivered momentarily before he spoke.

  ‘I suppose it’s time you girls knew.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘PUT THE KETTLE on, love,’ said Pop, forcing his trembling mouth into a barely-there smile. ‘Everything’s bearable with a cuppa.’

  I nodded and filled the kettle before setting it to boil. Within seconds, the soft white-noise of water heating filled the crater of silence in the room and calmed my skittish heartbeat.

  Lauren dragged a chair out, scraping its legs against the tiles before collapsing into it. Her face still wore the dried tear streaks from her fight with Jackson.

  ‘Go sit down.’ Pop rested his hands on my shoulders and gently steered me back to the table before setting to work. He gathered mugs, milk from the fridge and teabags from the pantry. By the time I’d reluctantly slipped into my seat across from Lauren—who had her head in her hands—Pop had finished making the tea and was setting steaming mugs down before us.

  Finally, he got his own mug and sat at the head of the table with a sigh, before clearing his throat.

  ‘You know how your nan has been forgetting things lately?’

  Lauren looked up from her mug. ‘Like forgetting to turn the oven on today?’ She took a sip of her tea and set the mug down gently
. ‘She did that last week, when we were making pizzas.’

  I shifted in my seat, wanting to leave the room. Deep inside, I kind of knew what he was about to say.

  Pop nodded. ‘Yes. Like that.’ He sighed and took a long gulp of hot tea, wincing afterwards. ‘I didn’t tell you this because I didn’t want to scare you both, but last week, while you two were at the movies, your nan disappeared from the house. One minute she was making spaghetti, the next minute she was gone. The pot had boiled over.’ He shrugged. ‘Anyway, I turned it off, thinking maybe she was in the laundry or the loo. I searched all over the house, but she was gone. Then I tried outside. The gate was flapping open in the wind, so I ran out onto the street, calling her name.’

  I met Lauren’s gaze and I could tell she was experiencing the same sickening, fluttery fear I was.

  ‘She was at the bus stop.’ Pop closed his weary eyes and opened them again, perhaps recalling the picture to mind. ‘I went mad at first, ranting about how she’d left the stove on and nearly burnt the bloomin’ house down.’ He paused, brought his mug to his trembling lips and took another noisy gulp. After swallowing he cleared his throat. ‘But then I noticed the lipstick she’d put on, bright red and all over her mouth like a clown. She had some gloves on—ones she hadn’t worn in over fifty years.’ He wiped at his eyes and took a deep breath.

  Blinking back tears, I hung my head. I’d noticed Nana doing odd things. But I’d pretended, along with everybody else in the house, that it was nothing. That she’d been too tired or had had too much on her plate looking after Lauren and me. But this was different. This was serious.

  He sighed and shook his head.

  ‘She said she was going to work—at the perfume counter at Myer. She hasn’t worked there since before we were married.’

  Pop slowly turned his mug around in his hands, as if it were a precious artefact.

  Lauren sniffed, brushed a hand across her face and after a while whispered, ‘Poor Nan.’