Desires of the Dead (7 page)

“Do we have to?” Jay grumbled, trying to hold on to her.

“Unless you have a better idea . . .” she hinted suggestively, only half-joking.

But she knew that Jay wouldn’t take the bait, much as she wanted him to. Instead he gathered the leftovers while Violet folded the blankets and helped carry everything to his car.

“Do you mind if we stop at Mike’s house on the way back? He helped me run my errands this afternoon, and he left his wallet in my car. I just need to drop it off.” He slid the cooler in the trunk.

Violet sighed, wishing they could have this one evening without anyone else. It didn’t seem like too much to ask. “Can you take me home first?”

He looked at her like she was crazy. “It’s right on our way,” he explained. “Besides, it’ll only take a sec.”

“Whatever,” Violet muttered under her breath. She didn’t slam the door, but she’d wanted to.

She hated feeling this way, and hated it even more because she definitely was
not
supposed to act like this . . . pouting over a quick stop on their way home from the perfect date. What the heck had gotten into her anyway?

She knew she was being irrational, but she couldn’t help herself. She crossed her arms over her chest when they stopped at what she could only assume was Mike’s house, and when Jay promised he’d be right back, she refused to look at him.

Clueless to the wrath she was mentally raining down upon him, Jay left her there, bounding up the short porch steps in two long strides and pounding on the front door. When it opened, he disappeared inside.

Only once she was alone did Violet pay any attention to her surroundings, to the dilapidated little house where Jay’s
new boyfriend
lived. It was set back in the woods, down a long, single-lane dirt driveway that afforded them complete privacy. And it was dark, with only the porch light to break up the blackness that settled bleakly over the property. Tall trees encroached all around the tired-looking house. The paint was faded and peeling, and there were rusty window screens propped alongside the rickety front steps. There was something about the isolated location, the spooky house, and the absolute darkness that gave Violet the creeps.

But just as he’d promised, Jay was back out within minutes, and Violet was relieved to see him, despite the fact that she was determined to keep her oath of silence where he was concerned.

It was then, however, that Violet felt the unexpected whisper of
real
jealousy shoot through her. Mike’s sister, Megan—not Mike—poked her head out the front door, waving to Jay. She said something that Violet couldn’t hear, but the tone of her voice, which Violet
could
hear even through the closed windows, was something that Violet would have recognized anywhere.

It was the same voice she’d heard too many times before, from girls who were flirting with Jay. Her good-bye was a little too eager, a little too choreographed, as if she’d planned her moves before Jay had arrived.

Violet noticed too that Mike’s sister was cute, almost at the same time she realized that the other girl had no idea that Violet was sitting there, in the dark, watching them while she waited for Jay.

The girl cocked one foot up behind her. It wasn’t an obvious gesture, but Violet recognized it for what it was meant to be: coy and endearing. And then she saw the girl twirl a strand of hair from her ponytail with her finger as she spoke again, trying to capture Jay’s interest.

Jay was just opening the car door as he turned around to respond to her. That was when the interior light blinked on, and Violet was suddenly aware that she was no longer cloaked by darkness.

Mike’s sister saw too.

Violet bit her lip as she raised her hand and waved innocently at Megan, who was standing motionless, like a statue, her foot kicked up behind her. She almost felt guilty as Megan visibly slumped, her foot dropping back to the unstable-looking floor beneath her. Almost.

Jay smiled at Violet, oblivious to Megan’s flirtations, as he climbed in and closed the door. “See, I told you I wouldn’t be long.”

Violet felt better, realizing that Jay didn’t seem to notice the other girl. Although Jay wasn’t off the hook that easily, she was still mad at him.

Now, not only did he have a new boyfriend, apparently he had a new admirer too.

Just as they reached the mouth of the driveway, Violet felt the sudden stab of a headache coming on. She massaged her fingertips over her temples, and then at the base of her neck, trying to rub away the tension.

A pair of headlights met them at the junction of the road, and just as Jay turned, a beat-up red pickup truck barreled past them into the driveway they’d just pulled out of. It barely gave them enough time to get out of the way.

As they drove in silence, Violet tried to tell herself that she was being a baby. That Jay loved her. And
only
her. Not Mike, and not Mike’s sister either.

And she believed it. But she was still annoyed that their date had been tarnished by the detour.

She felt the pain in her head subsiding, diminishing a little more with each rotation of the tires, until it was nothing more than an uncomfortable memory.

Jay pulled to a stop in front of her house, and she let him kiss her good-bye. It was a good kiss. And within moments, she was too preoccupied to remember that she was trying to be mad at him, too distracted to care about her grudge, the one he was still annoyingly unaware of.

Dazed by the passionate farewell, she forgot
not
to wave good-bye to him before closing the door behind her.

She may have even lifted her foot demurely as she did so.

Chapter 8

Violet was unlocking her car when the woman in the crisp white suit appeared.

School was just letting out, and students crowded the parking lot and lined up on the sidewalks in front of the bus lanes, eagerly awaiting their chance to escape. Somewhere behind Violet, a stereo with its bass turned way too high was bumping out a country song that shook the windows of the cars around it.

“Violet? Violet Ambrose?” The woman didn’t really seem to be asking the question; she seemed to know
exactly
who Violet was.

But Violet had no idea who
she
was; all she knew was that the woman was definitely out of place amid the students of White River High, and she looked even less like she belonged to the faculty. Besides, Violet was certain she would have remembered this woman if she had seen her around school. And while the boy who trailed behind her looked barely older than Violet, he too seemed oddly out of place in his faded black T-shirt and ripped jeans. Straight, nearly jet black hair, too long and unkempt, fell sideways across his eyes, adding to the impression that he would be more at home at a skate park than in the parking lot of a small-town school with country music playing in the background.

He kept his hands in his pockets and glared at the asphalt beneath him, never glancing Violet’s way.

Violet pulled her key out of the lock.

“Are you Violet Ambrose?” The woman awaited Violet’s confirmation.

“Uh-huh.” Her curiosity was definitely piqued.

The woman stepped forward, holding out her hand formally. “I’m Sara Priest. I’ve been trying to reach you.”

Sara Priest?
That name . . .

Of the FBI? That Sara Priest.

Oh, crap, crap, crap!
Violet silently cursed herself.

Violet scrutinized the woman as she absently shook her hand, taking in the details of her meticulous appearance. Not just the pristine suit and the flawlessly sleek ponytail but also her no-nonsense demeanor. She exuded a confidence that Violet knew she would never be able to pull off.

“Can we talk?” FBI Sara asked when it was evident that Violet didn’t have anything to say.

“I guess so,” Violet conceded, looking around to see if anyone was watching the three of them. She tried to think of some pretense—some reason—
not
to have this conversation right now.

She was suddenly irritated with Jay for having to work today, mad that she’d driven herself to school.

So now here she was. All alone. With FBI Sara Priest.

Crap!

From the sidewalk, near the entrance of the school, Violet saw Mike waiting for his bus. He waved to her, enthusiastic, kind of like a puppy. Guilt over how envious she’d felt toward his new friendship with Jay flooded her, reminding her of how childishly she’d been behaving. Violet lifted her hand and waved back.

Unfortunately, Lissie Adams was standing right behind him, and she saw Violet too.

Lissie was everything Violet wasn’t: blonde, trendy, and insanely popular, and it killed her that Jay had chosen Violet over her as his date for the Homecoming Dance. She got her digs in whenever he wasn’t around.

And this happened to be one of those moments. Lissie raised a stylishly manicured middle finger and flipped Violet off.

Violet closed her eyes; she was so sick of taking Lissie’s crap.

“So who’s your friend?” the woman asked, tipping her head in the direction of the school.

Violet sighed. “She’s not my friend.”

The woman smiled. “Not her. The boy you waved at.”

“You mean Mike?” Violet frowned. “He’s just a new kid at school.”

FBI Sara pursed her lips, pausing briefly. “What do you know about him?”

“Nothing. Why are you asking?” Violet asked hopefully. “Is
that
why you’re here? To talk about Mike?” Suddenly conversations about Mike Russo didn’t seem like such a bad idea.

To her credit, Sara Priest didn’t miss a beat. “Not at all. I’m here to talk about you, Ms. Ambrose. May we?” She pointed to Violet’s car. “So we can speak in private?”

Violet’s stomach sank. She was fleetingly aware that she’d never actually been shown a badge, and she knew her parents wouldn’t like the idea of her talking to strangers—even if they
were
from the FBI. Still, she had a hard time mustering the courage to do anything but agree.

Her heart skipped nervously as she climbed inside. She thought about
not
letting this Sara person in her car, and instead just locking her doors and taking off. But even as she weighed the option, she knew it was useless at this point. Obviously they knew her name and her phone number. They knew where she went to school and probably where she lived. Did she really think she could
escape
the FBI?

So instead of leaving, she reached across to the passenger side and unlocked the door as she made a hasty scan of the seat to make sure there was nothing there that could make a big, nasty stain. She was afraid that the woman’s suit was in danger of being defiled by her dilapidated rust mobile.

Violet wondered if the dark-haired boy would get in too, but he never moved; he just stood there, silently guarding Sara’s door.

Strange,
Violet thought as she started her car to get the heat going. She hoped that whatever the woman had come to say would be finished before the car actually had a chance to warm up.

“So I’m guessing you want to know why I’m here.”

“Uh-huh.” Even those two—nearly inarticulate—syllables sounded shaky coming out of her mouth. She hoped she wouldn’t be expected to say much.

“Well, it seems that your name has come up during the course of an investigation.” The woman beside her brushed invisible lint from her knee before looking up to judge Violet’s reaction.

Violet’s heart pounded. Hard.

This could go one of two ways. One, she could deal with. The other was bad. Very, very bad.

Maybe they’d found another missing girl’s body in the woods somewhere.

She couldn’t believe she was hoping for something so terrible.

“Uh-huh . . .”
So far so good on the speaking part,
she thought.

The banging sound that came from the driver’s-side window felt like an explosion to Violet’s already raw nerves. She jumped hard and was immediately embarrassed by her reaction as she turned to see who was there.

Chelsea’s nose was pressed against the glass, making her normally pretty face look distorted and hideous. Violet could practically see the girl’s sinuses from her vantage point; it was more than she’d ever needed to witness.

Violet rolled down her window with the old-fashioned hand crank, and Chelsea jumped back before her face went down with the glass.

“Sorry to interrupt,” Chelsea declared, not sounding the least bit repentant. She glanced disrespectfully at the woman in Violet’s passenger seat when she said it and then instantly ignored her without waiting for a response. She looked earnestly at Violet. “Do you know where Mike went? I’ve been looking all over. He wasn’t at his locker after class, and I haven’t seen what’s-her-name, his little sister.”

Violet rolled her eyes impatiently. “I just saw him waiting for his bus.”

Chelsea sighed. “
Crud!
I was hoping to offer him a ride home.” But the way she wiggled her eyebrows implied that “ride home” meant more than a simple car ride. Knowing Chelsea, she was hoping it would.

Violet smirked as a big yellow school bus pulled out of the lot. “I think you just missed your opportunity, Chels.”

Now there were only a few straggling vehicles left in the student lot, Violet’s and Chelsea’s among them, as well as a big black SUV that Violet could only assume belonged to the woman sitting beside her, since it sure as heck didn’t belong to anyone at school.

“Fine,” Chelsea sighed. “I’ll see you tomorrow, I guess.”

“Sorry about that,” Violet mumbled to the woman once Chelsea was gone.

“I just have a couple of questions for you,” FBI Sara continued as if their conversation had never been disrupted at all.

Violet’s airway narrowed painfully.
Here goes,
Violet thought, hoping against hope for the familiar questions that she’d already answered a hundred times before.

“First of all, how did you know the body was there?”

Violet stared at her. She wasn’t sure how to answer the question. It wasn’t clear; FBI Sara hadn’t given her enough details to be sure which body she meant.

Violet thought about the first body she’d found last year, discarded and bloated in the shallow waters of the lake. She closed her eyes, trying for the millionth time to purge the image from her mind’s eye. But it was too vivid, forever etched into her memory.

“I saw it,” she mumbled, hoping that
that
was the body the woman was talking about.

The woman shifted uncomfortably. “You
saw
him?” she asked, eyeing Violet suspiciously. “What do you mean,
you saw him
?”

And that was it. That one clarifying word, and Violet could no longer deny it to herself.

Him
, she’d said
him.
Violet had been wrong. Precautions or not, she hadn’t been careful enough. All of the bodies Violet had found last year had been of missing girls.

They knew. The FBI knew. But how in the world was that possible?

She looked at the woman, trying to convey to her that this was all a mistake. It was her only chance. “I—I think you’re confused. Maybe you have the wrong person.”

“Violet Ambrose? That’s you. You placed an emergency call from a pay phone almost two weeks ago.” She watched Violet guardedly; her eyes narrowed just enough to look doubtful. “In it, you told the operator that you ‘heard something
.
’ You didn’t say anything about
seeing
the boy.”

It all came crashing down on Violet at once. Her head was spinning. She felt dizzy and sick in an instant.

She closed her eyes, trying to will her head to stop whirling so she could catch hold of her out-of-control thoughts.

She knew she shouldn’t have called 911. What had she been thinking?

But she’d used a pay phone. She shouldn’t be having this conversation.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she denied, but her voice sounded tinny and hollow, an obvious lie. She thought she was going to be sick. This was some sort of nightmare, almost as bad as her dream about the boy himself.

There was silence, and Violet struggled to keep it together. She needed to find a way out of this, out of her own car, if that’s what it took. And away from this woman who had managed to track her down.

“Look, Ms. Ambrose, there’s no point denying it. We traced you back using the shipyard’s security cameras. We had your license plate. That, coupled with the call you placed, made it easy for us to find you.” FBI Sara leaned forward, and Violet thought she might be trying to convey understanding, compassion. Instead she was intimidating.

“It wasn’t me,” Violet croaked.

“We both know that’s not true. I have the recording of that call, if you’d like to listen to it.” She pulled a small tape recorder from her jacket pocket.

Violet stared at it, unable to string together another denial.

“I didn’t think so.” She put the recorder back in her pocket. “We already know you had nothing to do with the boy’s disappearance. Or his death. Like I said, cameras. Besides, we have DNA evidence that rules you out.

“So here’s the deal. I want to make this easy for you. All I need to do is to ask you some questions. Not now, but soon. It will be quick and dirty, just the facts of how you came to”—her lips pursed again—“‘hear
’
the boy. But for what it’s worth—and this is just a hunch on my part—I think there’s more to it. I think you didn’t
hear
him at all.”

Violet blinked once, trying to clear her thoughts as she apprehensively watched the woman in her car. She refused to give even the slightest hint of what was going on inside her head.

Sara continued without waiting for a response. She didn’t seem to want one. “In fact, I
know
you didn’t hear him, because you called on Sunday. The coroner says that the boy we found had been dead for at least two days before we recovered his body.”

Puking became a very real possibility at that point as Violet felt the acids from her stomach swelling dangerously high in the back of her throat. Sweat prickled like icy barbs across her forehead and along the nape of her neck.

Still, she refused to speak. Not so much refused, actually, since she felt like it would be physically impossible now.