Page 3 of The Triangle

“Then who was it?” The question comes out like an instinct. Like it’s something Christine would ask the day after waking up from a night gone wrong. “Him?” I ask. Even though I don’t know who ‘him’ is. Just another instinct.

This one chews the inside of his lip as he shakes his head. “No. I mean…” He sighs. Loud. Heavy. Runs the fingers of both hands through his thick, blond hair, pushing it away from his face. “Usually I’d blame him first but he called me, Christine. Told me you were here. And just what the fuck, man? Why the fuck didn’t you call me?”

It’s unfortunate. This moment. Because decisions have to be made. And that little thing inside me—the one that probably saved my ass when… whatever went down and I got this gash on the back of my head—it’s telling me to shut up. Get rid of him. Then pack up my painkillers, ditch the guns, and disa-fucking-ppear.

But that voice doesn’t seem to have the full story. There’s no indication that it understands I don’t know who the fuck I am. What I did. Or where to go.

So a decision has to be made.

Trust this guy or kill him.

Option two should worry me. At the very least should give me pause.

But it doesn’t.

Because this is my reality whether I remember it or not.

“Christine,” he whispers. And now all ten fingers are threading through my hair. They pull away—I’m getting used to that—when they find the blood-crusted gash on the back of my skull, and then, just as quick, he’s turned me around, bent me over, and gently—so gently—pushed the hair aside so he can see what’s there.

“Jesus fucking Christ.” He stands me up. Roughly, but I like it rough—don’t know why that thought popped into my head—and takes me by the shoulders again. “What. The fuck. Happened?”

So we’re back to that moment of decision.

“I don’t know,” I say, choosing a path forward. “I don’t remember anything.”

“What do you mean you don’t remember?”

My arms move instinctively. Up, open, and break the hold he has on my shoulders like I’m a pro at that. He doesn’t startle but he does lean back. Uncertain.

“I mean,” I say, looking down at my dirty feet, letting my hair fall in front of my eyes, “I don’t remember.” I tip my head back up, look at him through the hazy curtain of auburn mane, and say, “I don’t know who I am. Or who you are. Or what I did. Or how I got here. Or—”

He just stares at me.

“Or if I should kill you now.”

His mouth slackens a little, slightly open as he breathes in my confession. His blue eyes softer. His shoulders slightly slumped in… disappointment? Sadness? What? Why is he looking at me this way?

“What?” I say.

“You don’t remember me?”

I shake my head.

“Do you remember him?”

I’m about to shake my head no to that too, but… “Alec,” comes out instead. “He’s… Alec.”

CHAPTER TWO - ALEC

TWO NIGHTS AGO

Ag, man. I hate being fokken shot at.

“Mr. van den Berg, sir! Get down!”

That’s what the laaitie closest to me says before a bullet chases him back behind a fortunately-for-him bulletproof SUV. He can’t be more than nineteen. Maybe twenty. He darted out from his hidey-hole to try to pull me back. And I appreciate that level of commitment and loyalty. I truly do. I’ll have to remember to do something nice for him later. If he lives.

Hell, if I live.