Nancy Bush's Nowhere Bundle: Nowhere to Run, Nowhere to Hide & Nowhere Safe. Nancy Bush

as a supposedly wonderful expression of love—was just another part of life that she wasn’t able to experience like everyone else.

      Cynical. That’s what she was. And afraid . . . afraid to open a package from someone who’d sent it to her long, long after her death.

      The following morning she went through the shower, dressed in black slacks and a black, long-sleeved T-shirt, drank a glass of orange juice and ate a piece of peanut-butter toast, her gaze on the envelope. She grabbed her purse and keys and headed out the door, then turned around abruptly and went back for the package, ripping it open while her heart pounded. She fought the crippling anxiety that sometimes overtook her and left her gasping for air and practically in the fetal position and shook the package’s contents onto the counter.

      Out tumbled several pictures and a couple of folded pages.

      She saw her mother with several other people in one of the pictures, and she staggered backward to the couch and sat down hard, the photo in her hands; the other papers flew to the floor—someone’s birth certificate among them . . . hers.

      Drawing a long breath, she tried to stem a tsunami of coming panic. Her ears roared. She couldn’t think. Couldn’t see. Could scarcely recall where she was.

      Her vision went inward, to the memory of a long ago, cool, summer evening, the air breezing inside the kitchen through the opened back door. The toes of her mother’s shoes drifted from side to side . . . her face purple . . . her tongue fat and sticking out....

      Liv squeezed her eyes shut. Attempted to shove the image into blackness, but it shone white on the insides of her eyelids like a negative. Her eyes flew open again, and for just a moment her mother was standing right in front of her.

      “I’m done,” Mama said, then the mirage poofed into mist.

      Chapter 2

      Liv drove home from the office during her noon hour, even though there really wasn’t enough time, even though she would probably skip lunch entirely. She’d left the package opened and spread across the coffee table. She couldn’t look or touch any part of it when she’d left for work this morning, but the way everything was exposed had haunted her inner vision all morning.

      Now, she took the steps up from the apartment parking lot to the second level of the L-shaped building where her apartment lay one in from the end unit. She threaded the key in the lock and pushed open the door before she felt someone behind her.

      She screamed. One short, aborted shriek and stumbled into the apartment, turning, facing the intruder.

      “Whoa, whoa! Sorry!”

      It was her neighbor, Trevor or Travis or something. He was standing there in shock, holding up his hands. Liv felt the energy drop out of her and she leaned against the wall, near collapse, quivering inside.

      Worried, he grabbed for her and said, “Geez, sorry.”

      She flinched away. “I’m okay. What . . . are you doing?”

      “Come on.” His arm was around her shoulders and he started to help her to the couch against her protests, her legs moving forward, but feeling detached from her body.

      “What do you want?” she asked, trying to keep all traces of fear from her voice.

      The pictures from the package were scattered across the coffee table as was her birth certificate and the note from her mother. She glanced at them, then at him, but he was only looking at her. “Just wanted to invite you over tonight,” he said apologetically. “Didn’t mean to freak you out.”

      “Oh.” She didn’t know what to say. She was working to get her pulse under control.

      Then his gaze swept over the photos and he focused on one where an angry-looking man was stalking toward the cameraman, his hand up as if he were about to rip the offending camera away. The same man was in several other photos with Liv’s mother, but he was always turning away, frowning, as if he didn’t want his picture taken.

      “Who’s that?” he asked.

      “I don’t know,” Liv said stiffly.

      “Looks really pissed. This an old photo?”

      The color had leached out of the print and the women’s permed hair and over-the-shoulder tops and black stretch pants, straight out of Flashdance, spoke volumes about the date of the picture. “Yeah.”

      “Huh.” He turned back to her. “So . . . Jo and me . . . we’re just havin’ some drinks and pizza. We don’t get goin’ till late. That work for you?”

      “Thanks, but I’ve already made some plans.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. She’d determined over the course of the morning that she was going to show her brother the contents of the package. Hague had his issues, but he was strangely insightful as well.

      He’d only been a baby when their mother died, but maybe there was something buried in his psyche that could offer some explanation. “Another time, maybe? I’ve gotta run. I’m on my lunch break.”

      “If you change your mind, just stop by,” he said.

      “I’ll do that.” And she hustled him out the door.

      The apartment where Liv’s brother, Hague, lived was on the third/top floor of an older, industrial building on the east side of the Willamette River that had been converted into loftlike units during the ’60s. Those lofts had subsequently grown tired and in need of maintenance over the intervening years, but the place still had a spectacular view toward Portland’s city center, its westside windows looking back over the river. Hague’s unit was in the northwest corner and would have commanded an amazing slice of Portland skyline had he ever opened his blinds.

      Liv parked her blue Accord a block and a half from Hague’s building, the closest spot she could find. She hurried toward his apartment, the package tucked beneath her coat, feeling unseen eyes following her, though there were probably none. It was more likely her own paranoia, always on the prowl. She usually could hold it at bay, but there were times when it simply took over and she was powerless to do anything but feel its paralyzing grip.

      She wished fervently, like she always did, that she could change the past, but it was impossible. She’d lost her mother and huge parts of her life—days, weeks, months, years—and there was no getting them back. She could still remember the policeman’s probing questions after she’d woken from her trauma-induced coma. She was in a hospital with its bad smells and gray walls.

      “Did you see anything when you were in the kitchen?” he’d demanded. She didn’t know he was a policeman at first. He didn’t have the clothes of a policeman.

      “I saw Mama.” She forced the words out. Her lips quivered uncontrollably.

      “Anything else? Something?” He threw an impatient look toward the woman who’d come with him. A social worker of some kind, she knew now, but she hadn’t understood at the time.

      Livvie’s quivering lips were replaced by out-and-out sobs.

      “Useless,” he muttered.

      “She’s just a child,” the woman responded tautly.

      He turned back to Livvie. “The back door was open. Did you notice that?”

      She nodded jerkily.

      “Did you walk outside? Look outside?”

      “NOOOOOOOO!”

      “Calm down,” he told her. “Was there anyone—anyone—around?”

      “H-Hague was in his bed,” she stuttered, plucking at the covers. “He—he started crying. . . .”

      “Any adults!” His mouth was smashed together like he was holding back something