A Shattered Moment Read online

  Praise for the Woodfalls Girls Novels

  Contradictions

  “Tiffany King pours her soul into each book. She captures the hearts and minds of her characters perfectly, weaving tales of angst, hope, and redemption.”

  —M. Leighton, New York Times bestselling author

  Misunderstandings

  “A beautifully woven story of a love that can withstand anything.”

  —Molly McAdams, New York Times bestselling author

  “Funny, real, moving, and passionate, Misunderstandings is a MUST-READ for New Adult contemporary romance fans.”

  —Samantha Young, New York Times bestselling author

  “Sweet and sexy! Great characters and an intriguing romance . . . So good!”

  —Cora Carmack, New York Times bestselling author

  “I was completely captivated and caught up in this story. I haven’t had a book make me laugh, swoon, or cry as much as Misunderstandings did in a while.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  No Attachments

  “Allow me to summarize No Attachments: Great story. Amazing characters. Awesome read.”

  —Book Freak Book Reviews

  “Readers will spend the first half of this story on the edge of their seats and the last half hugging a box of tissues.”

  —Priscilla Glenn, bestselling author

  “Sweet, beautiful, funny, and heartbreaking all rolled into one amazing story.”

  —Tara Sivec, USA Today bestselling author

  “Super sweet and swoon-worthy!”

  —Jennifer L. Armentrout, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “The story itself is heartwarming, which really is a characteristic of a Tiffany King book. Her stories always turn struggles into strength and her characters always find the good. That’s one of the reasons I love to read her books. They’re real. They’re emotional.”

  —Stuck in Books

  “No Attachments will leave you more than a little attached to Ashton and Nathan.”

  —Book Angel Booktopia

  “Absolutely heartbreakingly beautiful.”

  —Once Upon a Twilight

  “Anyone who loves a great contemporary should check out this title. You’ll laugh, you’ll swoon, and you’ll love these two characters just like I have.”

  —A Life Bound by Books

  Berkley Titles by Tiffany King

  The Woodfalls Girls Novels

  CONTRADICTIONS

  MISUNDERSTANDINGS

  NO ATTACHMENTS

  The Fractured Lives Novels

  A SHATTERED MOMENT

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  This book is an original publication of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Copyright © 2015 by Tiffany King.

  Excerpt from Misunderstandings by Tiffany King copyright © 2014 by Tiffany King.

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  BERKLEY® and the “B” design are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  For more information, visit penguin.com.

  eBook ISBN: 978-0-698-18764-1

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  King, Tiffany.

  A shattered moment / Tiffany King. — Berkley trade paperback edition.

  pages ; cm. — (A fractured lives novel ; 1)

  ISBN 978-0-425-27950-2 (softcover)

  1. Life change events—Fiction. 2. Traffic accident victims—Fiction. 3. Women college students—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3611.I5863S53 2015

  813'.6—dc23

  2014046513

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Berkley trade paperback edition / May 2015

  Cover photo: Flowers by Vilor/Shutterstock.

  Cover design by Lesley Worrell.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  To Valerie, Shana, and Rob. Thank you for your support during my ride on this amazing crazy train.

  contents

  Praise for the Woodfalls Girls Novels

  Berkley Titles by Tiffany King

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  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

  Epilogue

  Special Excerpt from Misunderstandings

  prologue

  graduation night 2013

  The breeze blowing through the open windows of the SUV was hot and sticky thanks to the blanket of humidity that was normal for this time of year. Not that my friends and I cared. Even with sweat running down our backs and our hair plastered to the napes of our necks. We were too amped-up to worry about something as pesky as the weather. Today we were free. This was the moment we had discussed at length. The moment we had planned for and dreamed about. We didn’t need drugs or alcohol to experience our current state of euphoria. We were high on life and the anticipation of what the future held.

  Laughter filled the interior of the Suburban, drowning out the roar from the oversized off-road tires as we cruised down the highway. It was the sound of exhilaration and triumph fifteen years in the making. Fifteen years of friendship that had stood the test of time. Through the muck of adolescent squabbles, preteen dramas, and the turbulent years of high school, we had made it to the other side of graduation. Our friendship was unbreakable. We made a pact many years ago over mud pies and juice boxes. We swore we would always be friends. No matter what the obstacles, we managed to stay inseparable. Our parents, who had also become close over the years, had coined us the “Brat Pack.” They would laugh every time they said it, like it was some inside joke only they were privy to. I guess you had to be older than forty to get it.

  I swept my eyes around the vehicle, listening to the loud music blaring from the radio as the wind played with my hair. With the exception of my family, anyone who had ever meant anything to me was here.

  Zach was always our driver. His parents gave him the keys to the Suburban when he turned sixteen, knowing it was the perfect vehicle for our group. We were used to doing everything together, so it only made sense that the first of us to obtain a coveted driver’s license would receive a vehicle big enough to carry everyone. The Suburban was a year older than we were and had its fair share of dings and rust spots, but it was trusty and reliable.

  If
he minded becoming our designated chauffeur, he never complained. That was Zach in a nutshell. He was the guy everyone liked, and for good reason. He was the first to lend a hand or volunteer his services, or even listen if you needed someone to talk to. He had been the captain of the football team and class president junior and senior year. Zach was a born leader, which is why he was bound for FSU in the fall on full scholarship. He had also always been my stand-in boyfriend. It was an on-again/off-again routine we had fallen into. I knew I could always count on him. My plan was to avoid a serious relationship before college. Zach had provided the perfect buffer. All along we had planned to spend this final summer together before we headed off to separate schools. If Zach promised, I knew I could bank on it, or so I thought.

  I pulled my thoughts away from their current path. There was no reason to muck up the evening we’d been planning forever. Instead, I moved my eyes to Dan and Kathleen sitting in the third row with their heads pressed together. They had been a thing since we were kids. Not a thing like Zach and me, but a real couple. Their love had been forged over shared cookies and building sandcastles. It had always been Dan and Kat/Kat and Dan. In the beginning, their parents tried to rein in their kids’ feelings for each other, but that was like telling the sun not to shine. They were the image of soul mates. The pending separation of our group would be hardest on them. Kat’s parents insisted on the idea of her and Dan attending separate colleges, at least for the first couple of years. They wanted her to be sure that Dan would be more than a childhood romance. Kat confided to us that she only planned on giving it a year, if that long. This is why I’d always kept things casual. As close as we all were as friends, the idea of planning your college career around a guy seemed extreme to me.

  “Class of 2013, bitches!” Jessica yelled from the second row, where she sat with my best friend, Tracey. Filled with exuberance and more adventurous than the rest of our Brat Pack, they were usually also the loudest. They were ready to take on the world and would stretch their wings wider than any of the rest of us in the group. I actually felt a little jealous, wishing I had an ounce of their fearlessness. Tracey’s eyes met mine briefly before darting away. I grimaced without saying a word. Nothing would mar today. That is the vow I made to myself. Tomorrow would be soon enough to analyze what I had discovered.

  I shifted back around in my seat as Zach drove over the causeway. We all whooped with our hands in the air as we reached the top. In the remaining light of dusk, we could see the dark never-ending expansion of water in the distance. We were close to our first destination of the evening.

  Zach slowed to a crawl; maneuvering the Suburban around an old Lincoln Towncar going twenty-five miles per hour, even though the speed limit was almost double that. I had respect for my elders, but anyone who says teenagers are the worst drivers has obviously never lived in Florida.

  Of course, Zach didn’t mind. He was patient and cautious, even after jerking the wheel to avoid a moped that darted in front of us. The bikini-clad girl perched on the back didn’t even bother looking at us as she flipped us off.

  “Stupid asses, huh?” Zach laughed, shooting me a smile I thought I returned until I saw his face fall slightly before he looked back to the road. Sighing, I turned my head to look out my window. Of all the days for me to discover what had probably been going on under my nose for some time, why did it have to be today?

  Seeing Zach’s smile drop, I realized I wasn’t fooling anyone. I could put on a facade that everything was okay, but deep down, three of us in this vehicle knew differently.

  Minutes later we arrived at the public parking lot at New Smyrna Beach. We piled out of the Suburban, breathing in the salty sea air. Kat linked her arms with mine and Tracey’s while Jessica linked my other arm. Our human chain was complete when the guys bookended us on either side and we raced down the grassy slope to the long expansion of sand. We kicked our shoes off the instant our feet touched the sand, which had already started to cool now that the sun had gone down.

  Laughter rang through the air as we raced toward the dark water without slowing. Our graduation robes flared out behind us like capes. With the wind whipping them around, we almost felt like we could fly as we splashed into the incoming waves. Nothing could hold us back. We were invincible.

  • • •

  We never made it to our second destination that night. Sadly, we weren’t invincible.

  I would later be asked countless times what happened, forced to recall what I remembered about the accident that changed everything. Clarity of the events was never an issue. I breathed it—had nightmares about it. It would haunt me for the rest of my life.

  Zach had just merged onto the interstate, heading toward Orlando. Everything happened so quickly and unexpectedly. My mind was still focused on what had transpired as we left the beach. Not on the careless driver on the highway who acted like we were never there.

  It was Jessica screaming after the semitruck slammed into the side of the Suburban that will be forever burned into my mind like a bad song that refused to go away. The oversized advertisement for fresh strawberries that ran the length of the trailer was the last thing that appeared upright after Zach jerked the wheel to avoid another collision. I would later learn that our momentum combined with the impact from the trailer were the culprits for what happened next.

  With the horrific grinding sound of metal against metal and the sickening smell of burning rubber, the wheels on the right side of the Suburban left the road, sending us airborne. I had heard once that when you’re in an accident, everything passes in a blur of slow motion. That is total bullshit. It’s instant chaos. Fast and scary are more accurate—and loud. So loud you feel like your ears will burst. So hectic you can’t tell where sounds are coming from. It’s a jumbled mess of groaning metal beat out of its original shape, shattering glass, blaring horns, and worst of all, screams of pain from your friends. And yet, through it all, I remember every detail with painstaking lucidity.

  “How could you possibly know how many times the vehicle rolled?” That is always the first question asked when I recount the series of events for someone. It was a question that haunted me as well. It was as if I was being cosmically punished for some wrong I had committed. If I knew what it was, I would take it all back. I would trade places with any of my friends over being forever tormented by vivid memories that I could never escape. Each roll of the vehicle was significant by what it did to my friends. The first roll sent Tracey’s head against her window with a thud. The second roll abruptly silenced Dan, who had been swearing from the moment Jessica started screaming. Kat shrieked Dan’s name in anguish, overpowering Jessica’s screams during the third bone-crunching roll of the vehicle. On the fourth roll, Jessica’s screams stopped like someone had flipped a switch. I panicked, believing at any moment my last breath would be snuffed out like the flame of a candle.

  We stopped on the fifth roll, finally coming to a rest mid-turn, leaving us upside down. The bench seat Zach and I shared tore away from the metal bolts that attached it to the floorboard and tumbled forward, pinning me to the dashboard. My head exploded with pain as it bounced off the windshield. I vaguely remember wondering why an airbag hadn’t opened. It turns out the old Suburban that Zach had been given by his parents was a year away from that upgrade. A steady hum filled my ears. It was as if I had been swaddled in a cocoon of cotton. I felt absolutely nothing.

  one

  Mac

  one year later

  “No, Mom, not this weekend,” I said, rolling my eyes at the phone even though she couldn’t see me. “I have a big test next week in sociology. I have to stay and study.” I sank down on the dorm room bed, which was adjusted to the perfect height for my bum leg.

  “But, Mackenzie, you haven’t been home in ages.”

  “Mac,” I corrected automatically.

  She sighed, but didn’t comment on my correction. I had decided to change my name over a year ago, after the accident. For a while, she protested, whi
ch led to the same argument so many times, I could recite it word for word. I think she assumed I would eventually get sick of the shortened version or that if she ignored it and continued to call me by my full name, I would concede and “come to my senses,” as she would say. I could have told her not to hold her breath, but that would be like telling her I was fine, which was pointless because my mom had selective hearing. She didn’t understand what I had endured and probably never would.

  I only half listened as she rattled out all the reasons I should come home for the weekend. My eyes drifted to the other side of the room that belonged to my dorm mate, Trina. I noticed her belongings were slowly beginning to disappear. It was no secret she was unhappy living with me. She had certain expectations for a college roommate, like occasional conversation, some exchanged pleasantries, maybe even a friendly smile once in a while. What she got instead was mostly silence mixed with shrugs, an occasional grunt, and a half-darkened room because I usually turned off my lamp at 9 p.m. each night and pretended to be asleep, even if I wasn’t really tired. She put up with it for a while, but eventually gave up trying to coax me out of my shell.

  None of it was her fault, of course. I just wasn’t ready to be anyone’s friend. That was my mistake when I convinced my parents I would be better off living in the dorms than making the forty-five-minute commute from home for classes each day like I had done freshman year. I thought I was ready to interact, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. I wished I could find the words to explain myself to Trina, but I couldn’t seem to muster up enough emotion to care.

  Mom broke through my thoughts when she switched the conversation to where it inevitably always ended up—the accident. I wondered if we would ever have a normal conversation again. She droned on about the letter that had come in from the law firm that was handling everything for the victims. That’s how we were referred to now—the victims. A full year had passed and the insurance companies were still dragging their feet, not allowing anyone involved to move on. They had proven to be complete scumbags. I couldn’t care less about the money or who was suing who. All I wanted was to be able to have a conversation with my parents without the words “victims” or “lawyers” or “insurance claims.”