Vicarious (26 page)

I smile. “What was it like to grow up biracial?”

Jesse chews the nacho chip with a thoughtful look on his face. “It was cool,” he says. “I'm an only child, which is unusual for a Mexican family, but we lived in a neighborhood with a lot of friends and relatives, so I never felt lonely. My parents made sure I learned to speak both English and Spanish as a kid, which really helped.” He reaches for another chip. “I know it's something kids struggle with a lot, but I guess I was really lucky in that aspect. I almost feel like I had the best of both worlds.” He winks. “Especially when it comes to food.”

“It always comes back to food for you, doesn't it?”

Jesse swallows and then takes a drink of soda. “Basically,” he says with grin.

Gideon calls while we're waiting for the check. “Sebastian found the guy who attacked you on the building security feeds,” he says. “Not without his mask, though.”

“So nothing helpful?”

“Not yet.”

“Have you heard anything from Detective Ehlers?”

“He said there was nothing overtly suspicious on Rose's phone record. Mostly calls from you and me and a few from a guy she might have been dating. He's going to follow up. He's also confident he's located the hotel where she was killed, and he has people going through the list of registered guests, but that's a tedious process.”

They're all things Jesse and I discovered on our own, but Gideon doesn't know that.

“Can I speak with Jesse for a moment?” Gideon asks.

I hold the phone out to Jesse, who quickly wipes his hands on his cloth napkin before accepting it. He says, “Yeah,” and “I will,” and “I promise,” probably all of which are in response to Gideon telling him to watch out for me. Then he hangs up and sets the phone on the table. We pay the check and return to the front desk, where we find out our room is ready and the bellhop has already delivered our bags.

The hotel room is nice, with two queen-size beds, a big-screen TV, and a small kitchen. I claim the bed closest to the door. Grabbing a pair of sweatpants and a black T-shirt from my duffel, I duck into the bathroom and change into them. After splashing water on my face and brushing my teeth, I head back into the main room, where Jesse is lying on his stomach in a pair of plaid pajama pants and no shirt. His back is layered with muscle, a faint tan line evident at his neck and shoulders.

He rolls over when he hears me coming. My eyes are drawn to his tattoos. In addition to the initials of his friends who died and the military insignia on his right arm, he's also got an elaborately decorated skull on his shoulder and an eagle with a Mexican flag wrapped around it on the left side of his chest.

“Sexy.” He gestures at my outfit.

I snort. “You too. Don't cover up on my account. Get comfortable.”

Jesse laces his fingers behind his head and smiles a slow grin. “I usually sleep naked.” He arches his eyebrows suggestively.

There's no way a former army MP sleeps naked. He probably sleeps in full gear with a loaded machine gun snuggled in the crook of his arm. “Go ahead.” I give him the eyebrows right back. Then I yank the bedspread from my bed and leave it balled up on the floor. “You know I saw this TV show not too long ago about how hotels never wash their comforters. The investigators found all kinds of horrible stuff on them—fleas, mites, blood…”

Jesse makes a face but doesn't budge. “Did they find snakes?” he asks. “Giant camel spiders? Otherwise I think I'll survive.”

“I don't know what a giant camel spider is, but it sounds terrible.” I shudder. “Aren't soldiers supposed to zip their tents closed or use mosquito netting or something to keep out the bugs?”

“Yeah. Unfortunately. It would have been nice to be able to sleep under the stars without worrying about the wildlife or other humans.” He sounds wistful, like he's remembering an unspoiled wilderness instead of a war zone. “In the desert, there are more stars than you ever thought possible. Ten times as many as you can see here.”

“I like listening to you talk about your experiences.” I sit cross-legged in the center of my bed. “Even the sad ones. I hope someday I find something I love that much.”

“If you do, I hope the world doesn't take it away from you.” Jesse looks over at me from his bed. “It was the one time when I felt like I was doing what I was meant to do, like I had a real purpose, you know? I was part of a team trying to make the impossible possible for people who are oppressed.”

“Being one of Gideon's recorders isn't purpose enough for you?” I say dryly. “We make the impossible possible for people who are lazy and afraid.”

“I know, right?” Jesse says. “Sometimes I just want to say, ‘If you really want to dive with sharks, why don't you just tell your fear to get lost and go do it?'”

I wonder if it's really that easy for him. “Is now a bad time to tell you I'm afraid of sharks? Normally I'd be already nervous about tomorrow, but I've been focusing so much on finding Rose's killers that I'm too exhausted to worry about anything else.”

“Your fear is what's going to make this an epic ViSE.” Jesse's voice is full of pride. “I love how you're the kind of girl who runs toward the thing that scares you, not away from it.”

I can't bring myself to tell him he's only partially right about me, that what scares me the most is other people, and that I run away from almost all of them. That the only people I even talk to are the ones who haven't grown weary of chasing me. That's partially why I do all the adventure stuff, why no job is too dangerous for me. Because I'm compensating. Because if I do a bunch of incredibly daring things, then no one can call me a coward.

“What about my fear of elevators?” I ask.

“You're not
afraid
of them. You just don't like being enclosed,” he says. “That's a survival instinct. A lot of military guys won't take elevators either, because being in one is an indefensible position. Plus,” he adds, “no one would pay for an elevator ViSE, so who cares?”

He's got a point. And as usual, he knows exactly what to say to make me feel better. “Speaking of ViSEs, I went through another three on the plane. Lucky number thirteen is another switch party. Baz was there. So was Isaiah. He's only been working for Gideon for a couple of months, right? What do you know about him?”

“Isaiah is a good guy,” Jesse says. “He was probably recording it too. There's no way he's involved in this.”

“I wonder what Helene would think of him recording stuff like that.” Isaiah seems like a nice guy and he treated Rose like a gentleman. I don't want to think of him as someone who cheats on his girlfriend.

“They can't have been together for too long,” Jesse says. “Otherwise I would have heard him talk about her.”

I remember Isaiah mentioning Thanksgiving in the recording. Jesse's probably right. He could've made it when he was still single. “Well, I hope the rest of the ViSEs aren't switch parties,” I say. “I couldn't tell if the nausea was from the overlay or from making out with a bunch of strangers.”

Jesse sits up. “Give the recordings to me. I slept so long on the plane that I hit my second wind. I can probably get them all done for you, right now.”

“But it's getting late and we have to wake up at seven,” I protest.

“It's like nine o'clock and I slept half the day. Just give them to me.” Leaning over the edge of the bed, he pulls his headset out of his duffel bag. He unfolds the spiderlike skeleton and slips it on his head.

“If you're sure.” I slide out of bed and give him the music box of ViSEs along with my notebook, averting my eyes from his bare chest. “Don't forget to write down who is in them and anything that seems odd. The recordings of the Phantasm break-in and Rose's overdose are in there too, if you want to play those once more in case we missed something.” I still haven't been able to bring myself to experience my sister's death again.

“No problem,” he says.

“All right. See you in the morning. If you don't get through them all, we'll finish them tomorrow.” Sliding safely under my own covers, I give him a little wave and then click off the light over my bed.

“Good night, Winter.” Jesse reaches up for his own light.

And then we're alone in the darkness.

 

CHAPTER 28

Panic
claws at my chest as I open my eyes. The furniture is in the wrong spot; the walls have moved. Then I remember where I am. Miami. The hotel room. I sit up slightly. I'm in the bathtub. I know I fell asleep in bed this time—I remember Jesse saying good night to me from across the room. I must have sleepwalked. I tell myself it doesn't mean anything, that the symptoms were brought on by the stress of my sister's death. But fear thrums slow and steady beneath my skin.

I pause in the bathroom doorway to gather my bearings. Just enough moonlight trickles through the blinds to illuminate the outline of the room. My bed is empty, the sheet neatly folded back as if I rose in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom but never returned. Jesse is lying on his stomach, the sheets twisted around his naked back.

“Nice necklace.”

I whirl around at the sound of the voice. Rose is perched on the dresser. Reaching up, she adjusts her blond wig. Her red dress is wrinkled, matted and torn in places, and she's barefoot. But otherwise she looks fine. My gaze goes immediately to the door that leads to the hallway. It's closed. Bolted.

I lift a hand to my neck—the rose pendant hangs in the hollow of my throat, even though I know I wasn't wearing it when I went to sleep. “You're not real,” I whisper, glancing over at Jesse again. He mumbles something but doesn't wake.

“Of course I am,” she says.

“No. You're not really here. You're dead.”

“Do you want me to be dead?”

“What kind of question is that? You know I don't.” Tentatively, I reach out for her with one hand. I half expect my fingers to pass right through her forearm, like she's a ghost. But she feels solid. Warm even. She rotates her arm and touches her hand to mine—the scars on our palms line up.

There is something very right about that.

“Gideon-oppa says I make my own reality sometimes to avoid the truth.”

Rose flicks her wrist as if she's batting away my concerns. “You have more important things to worry about. You're in danger, little sister.”

“Danger?”

Before she can respond, the door to the hallway creaks open and a dark figure bleeds into the room. Rose's eyes grow wide. “Run,” she says. She throws herself at the menacing form. He grabs her by the hair. Lightning flashes from outside the window and I recognize the intruder. It's the one-eyed man from my dreams. He's holding a knife. With one violent thrust, Rose's body goes limp.

“No!” I scream. I lunge for him and then he turns toward me. I lash out with my fists and feet, but they glance harmlessly off his muscular frame. It's like punching stone.

He tosses me back onto the bed like I am made of feathers. His face leans low. I reach up and jab at his empty eye socket. My fingers penetrate the skin, slipping inside the gaping flesh. For one horrifying second I feel my body being pulled into his.

I yank my arm back. “Let me go!”

“Winter,” he says calmly. He's pinning me against the bed now, his hands firmly cupping my shoulders, one knee bracing my legs.

I scream again but he doesn't relax his hold.

“Wake up, Winter.”

Gasping, I open my eyes to see it's Jesse holding me, not the one-eyed man. When he releases me, I sit up so quickly I nearly tumble off the end of the bed. My throat feels like I swallowed a bucket of sand. I can manage only a single word: “Rose.”

Jesse sits next to me on the mattress. He rubs my back as I slowly choke out what I saw. “It was just a dream,” he murmurs.

I let my head dip low, my hair fall forward to hide my eyes. Then I turn and bury my face in his chest, his bare skin cool against the hot tears beginning to fall. “It felt so real, like I watched her die,” I say. “And that man was there—the one from Phantasm.”

“Shh.” Jesse strokes my hair. “We'll find him, okay? I promise I'll help you figure everything out.” Slowly, he lays me back down and arranges the covers around me. Then he rises to return to his own bed.

“Could you maybe…” I trail off, struggling to form the words. Eventually I just pat a spot on the mattress next to me. “Just for the rest of the night?” My voice hitches.

He nods soberly. “If you want.” He slides under my covers.

I turn to face him. “Thank you,” I whisper.

“Come here.” He pulls me close, curling his arms around me. For a second I'm scared. The tight embrace reminds me of too many terrible memories from when I worked for Kyung. But Jesse's not touching me like the men used to. He's just holding me, stroking my hair. Over and over until I feel calm. By the time my breathing is back to normal, I have molded my body to his. Our heartbeats have fallen into an easy rhythm, their overlapping cadence comforting me.

My eyes are even with his collarbone. I watch it rise and fall with each breath he takes. I slow my breathing even further to match his, and finally I feel safe. It's like we're on a ship, a ship inside of a bottle, the rest of the world locked away outside the glass.

A soft aching spreads throughout me. I could lift my chin, so easily, and pull Jesse's head toward mine.
Kiss him.
I could touch my lips to his and just let go—let him have control. Maybe it's what I need. Maybe then I wouldn't feel alone anymore. Being with him like this feels so familiar, so right. A hard breath escapes my lips.

Jesse's chin tucks against his neck as he looks down at me. “You okay?”

I hide my face in his chest. “I think so.”