“I know, it’s just … I worry.”
Me, too. About you and Jessie. “You shouldn’t worry. I can take care of myself.” The residuals of anger left over from Burnett popped up. “Is it because I’m a girl and you think I can’t take care of myself?”
“No. It’s … because when a guy likes a girl as much as I do, he sort of wants to protect her.”
“Then stop liking me so much!” she said, and rubbed her aching temple.
“It’s a little late for that.” Silence filled the line. “Do you need me to do anything?” he asked.
“No, I think I’ve got it under control.” She’d already accepted Miranda’s and Kylie’s help. That was already two people she could get into trouble if things didn’t go smoothly. She didn’t want to add a third person to the equation.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“Sure,” she said, hoping by Saturday she’d at least have some answers.
A knock sounded on Steve’s side of the line.
“Hang on a second,” Steve said. “Jessie’s at the door.”
Jessie was at his bedroom door? For what?
Della could guess what she wanted. Clenching her hands, she listened.
“I’ll put her in room two,” the feminine voice said. Della could almost hear the adoration in the girl’s soft flirty voice.
“I’ll be right there,” Steve answered.
“You might want to put a shirt on first,” Jessie said with a tease in her voice. “You might give her a heart attack looking like that.”
Della growled, remembering distinctly how good Steve looked without a shirt. Right then her dislike for the doctor’s daughter inched up a few degrees. Okay, more than a few.
“Then again, she’d probably die happy,” Jessie added.
Steve laughed. “Don’t worry, I’ll get dressed.”
So Jessie did make him laugh. And she knew how to flirt. Jessie was flirting with her boyfri—with Steve, who didn’t even see it. Or did he?
“Hey, Della, I gotta run. We’ve got a patient. But I can’t wait to see you tomorrow. We need to talk.”
“Talk about what?” she asked.
“About us,” he said.
“What about us?” she asked.
“I’m sorry, but I have to go,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay? Maybe you’ll tell me about the phone-sex movie.”
Della growled again.
Steve laughed.
She frowned. And it wasn’t until he hung up that she realized she hadn’t told him she was leaving this weekend. Chances were he wasn’t going to be happy. But he could join her in the unhappy wagon. The thought of him off playing doctor with Jessie didn’t exactly fill her with joy.
Was it better to ask for permission, or to ask for forgiveness? The question hung in Della’s thoughts, bumping against her conscience.
She sat at her computer Thursday morning, dressed in black, missing her first class and staring at the face on the screen. Lorraine Baker’s brown hair hung in loose curls around her shoulders. Her smile was … magnetic. Her green eyes bright with … life. That light wasn’t there anymore.
Dead.
Della hadn’t been able to sleep last night after Steve’s call, so she’d gotten up and started surfing the Internet for something boring enough to put her to sleep. Instead, she’d found a story about Lorraine in the local online paper. A nineteen-year-old college student with a promising future who’d died tragically in an automobile accident with her fiancé.
Lies, Della thought. Lorraine and her fiancé had died horrifically at the hands of a vampire.
And today was her funeral. Della didn’t have a clue why she felt compelled to go. But the compulsion was there and it was strong.
In the back of her mind she could already hear Burnett listing reasons why she shouldn’t go. Reasons that didn’t mean diddly-squat to Della.
Permission or forgiveness?
She looked at her phone to check the time. She had to make up her mind.
Chapter Fifteen
“Is Burnett here?” Della stuck her head into Holiday’s office.
“No, he was called away for the day.”
“The FRU?” Della took another step inside the doorway when Holiday nodded. “Is it about the recent murder case?” Della asked, ready to get mad that he hadn’t taken her with him.
“No, it’s a case in Dallas.” Holiday rose belly-first from the chair. Her belly bump was getting bigger by the day. Della couldn’t help but wonder how that would feel. To have a life growing inside you.
All of a sudden, Della noticed Holiday’s black dress. Unlike Della, the fae never wore black. Bright colors were her trademark.
“Is there a problem?” Holiday asked, noting Della staring.
“No, I just … you’re dressed in black.”
Holiday nodded. “I’m going to a funeral.”
So am I. “Whose?” Della asked.
Holiday’s brow wrinkled as if concerned. “Aren’t you supposed to be in class?”
And just like that, Della instinctively knew. “You’re going to Lorraine Baker’s funeral, aren’t you?”
Holiday leaned against her desk and nodded. “She’s stopped in for a visit, but isn’t communicating yet. I thought if I went to the funeral, I might be able to help her.”
“Help her do what?” Della asked. “What does she want from you?”
“I don’t know. They usually want something. But in some cases, especially in unexpected deaths, the spirit just needs to be consoled and told that it’s okay to cross over.”
“Or maybe she knows something about the killer. Maybe she wants you to help catch this creep.”
“That’s a possibility, too,” Holiday said.
Della hesitated one second. “I want to go,” she said.
Holiday pulled her hair around her shoulder and twisted it. “I don’t know if that’s protocol for an agent to—”
“I don’t give a flip about protocol. Look, here’s the truth. I was going,” Della said. “I was just going to sneak out and then I decided to try to reason with Burnett to let me go. That’s what I wanted to talk to him about. I stumbled across the article about her online last night, and I … I want to go.”
“I know it was upsetting for you to see the crime scene, but—”
“I need to do this, Holiday. I don’t know why, but I just need to say I’m sorry. Please don’t try to stop me.”
Empathy filled Holiday’s green eyes. “Sorry? How is this your fault, Della?”
“It’s not, but … it was a vampire and … I want to make it right.” Even as she said it, she knew she couldn’t make it right. There was no bringing back Lorraine. But something inside her said attending that funeral was the best she could do.
The grief was so thick in the air, Della could hardly breathe. In spite of the fact that Della didn’t know the victim, the heavy feeling of loss lodged in her chest.
Men in dark suits kept moving bouquets and wreaths around the casket. The smell of too-sweet flowers clogged the air. While they were still colorful cut from their vines, the scent of their upcoming death made Della question the custom of floral arrangements.
She and Holiday had arrived ten minutes earlier and sat in the last pew in the back of the church, taking the last seats. The crowd kept getting bigger. People shifted closer until everyone practically sat shoulder-to-shoulder. Della fought the need to cry out for more room. But she knew the crowding sensation was as much internal as physical.
Too many emotions—emotions from all her issues. Though right now, the one foremost on her mind was the one in the casket. The guilt she somehow felt for the couple’s death … guilt for just being vampire.
The echo of the crowd seemed to vibrate the ceilings. Obviously, Lorraine had a lot of friends and loved ones.
Della sat listening to the sorrowful mourners. Some people cried. Other just sighed—sympathy lacing that low sound. Others talked about her, little things. She loved c
hocolate mint ice cream. She hated algebra. She sort of snorted when she laughed really loud. They said things as if saying them would somehow keep Lorraine alive.
“Is she here?” Della leaned into Holiday’s shoulder and asked. She should have felt frightened at the thought of a ghost around, but oddly she didn’t. If Holiday could get any clues to the girl’s death, Della could find the bastard who did this. She really wanted to find him.
“I haven’t seen or felt her,” Holiday whispered back. “But there’s another spirit here. I think it might be the same one that’s hanging around Kylie. It keeps flashing past. Definitely vampire.”
Della closed her eyes for a second, not wanting to believe the spirit was her own uncle or aunt, but it did make sense.
“And I was really hoping Lorraine would be here,” Holiday whispered.
“If she does show up, make sure you ask her about her killer.” Della let her gaze shift around the room, and it landed on the casket centered in front of the pews, surrounded by people.
“She looks good,” a woman at the front told the other woman accompanying her. “You can’t even tell she was in such a bad accident.”
Good? She’s dead! Della wanted to scream out.
Then a vision of Lorraine, bloody and mauled, flashed in Della’s mind. The vision kept showing the girl’s fingers drenched in more blood. Della blinked and inwardly flinched.
“Are you okay?” Holiday asked, no doubt reading Della’s wayward emotions.
“Fine,” she lied.
Holiday rested her hand on top of Della’s. Some of the weightiness crowding her lungs lightened.
The pieces of dialogue echoed around the church.
So sad. She was just starting her life. Did you know she got a puppy?
Della closed her eyes. Why had she felt driven to be here? How was paying respect going to help the poor dead girl or her fiancé? How would it help Della find their killer?
It wouldn’t, Della realized. In some crazy way she was here out of guilt. Guilt because one of her own kind had done this.
Funerals aren’t for the dead, they are for the living. Della recalled her father’s words when she begged him not to make her attend Chan’s funeral. She hadn’t wanted to see her aunt cry, or to see them drop her cousin’s coffin in the earth. In a way, she’d felt that if she hadn’t been forced to go to the funeral she could have pretended he was still alive. Little did she know, he had been alive after all.
A sob escaped from someone standing beside the casket.
“Are you going to Jake’s funeral tomorrow?” a young girl asked another girl sitting two rows up. Their dialogue played like distant music. Music about a life lost. Della forced herself to listen.
“Probably. I just keep wondering if this wouldn’t have happened if Phillip hadn’t run off like he did.”
“She loved Jake.”
“I think she loved Phillip more.”
“Phillip broke her heart, leaving her like that.”
So Loraine had boy troubles like everyone else, Della thought.
“At least she and Jake went together.”
How did that make it better? Della wondered, not wanting to think how terrifying those last few moments of Lorraine’s life had been. Facing a monster. Fearing for her life, and fearing for someone she loved.
Music started playing. The pastor moved to the podium and talked about Lorraine’s love of life, and helping others. After his ten-minute memorial service finished, the crowd stood and everyone walked past the casket. Della almost broke the human chain to escape having to see the body. Then, realizing it might be insulting, she slowly, with Holiday behind her, made the trek to the casket.
She told herself she wouldn’t look, that it wasn’t necessary. But once she got to the front, her gaze fell to the too-still girl, wearing a pink dress. Her dark hair was the only thing about her that didn’t look dead. Her hands—no longer bloody like they appeared in the flashes of Della’s mind—were folded together. Her eyes closed. Her throat no longer mangled.
Della paused by the polished wooden casket just long enough to leave a promise.
I’ll catch him. I’ll catch the monster who did this to you.
Right before Della walked away, a tiny feather floated from above and landed softly on the girl’s cheek, almost looking like a tear. Della fought the need to brush it away, but hesitant to touch the body, she followed the crowd out of the church.
“So you never saw her?” Della asked Holiday as the fae drove back to Shadow Falls.
“No,” Holiday said, “but maybe she’ll come back later. Sometimes…” Holiday’s phone rang and she pulled it out of her purse and checked the number. Frowning, she took the call. “Is everything okay?”
Della tried to listen to the call but she couldn’t pick up the voice on the line. Her hearing was out again, but she studied the camp leader’s expression. And knew whatever was being said on the other end wasn’t good.
“We’re about two minutes out,” Holiday said. “Set him up in the conference room. Tell him his daughter’s at her cabin and that you’ll bring her right up.” When Holiday hung up, she glanced at Della, her eyes filled with concern.
“What?” Della asked, worried that one of her friends’ parents were causing problems. Both Kylie and Miranda had home issues. Oh, heck, it could even be Jenny.
Holiday’s expression tightened with empathy. “It’s your dad, Della. Hayden says that he is really upset. He claims you took something of his from the house and he wants it back immediately.”
Della’s heart sank to the pit of her stomach, and the organ proceeded to knot.
Holiday stared at her with questions. “Do you have any idea what he’s talking about?”
Della went straight to the cabin to get the picture. Careful not to bend it, she tucked it into a pristine white envelope and started to the office. The only thing she’d told Holiday was she’d taken an old photograph of his family. While the fae waited for Della to explain her reasons, she didn’t offer any. She’d just stared out the window. They’d driven the next few miles in total silence while the chaotic noise of hurt in Della’s heart rang far too loud.
Now, as she walked toward the office, the picture in her hands, her entire body shook with nerves at the thought of facing her father. Or rather, at facing the disappointment she knew he’d have in his eyes. The memory of the look in his eyes when he’d caught her in his cabinet hurt like a burn. His accusation of her stealing his brandy vibrated in her ears.
She made it up the steps up to the office, but paused at the door. What the hell was she going to tell him? She couldn’t tell him the truth about Marla overhearing his conversation about his twin. Her father valued privacy; he’d be furious. And Della wouldn’t throw her sister under the bus. She’d rather take the blame and be run over by the bus herself. Besides, where her parents were concerned, she was already under that bus—had been plowed over several times.
Questions bounced around her head as she made those last steps inside. How had her father discovered the missing picture? Did he regularly go through the album? Suddenly, Della recalled the phone conversation with her mom where she’d denied drinking her father’s brandy and telling her mom that she’d been looking for Chan’s picture. It had been a lie, but closer to the real truth.
Her mom must have told her dad this, and that had him going through the album. She could almost imagine him angrily flipping pages, suspecting she’d taken something. And wouldn’t you know, she’d proved him right. At least this time, she was actually guilty of the crime he accused her of.
She walked into the meeting room, her stomach a quiver of nerves. Her father sat at the back of the table, facing the door. He frowned when she appeared in the doorway. Not that Della expected any differently, but it still stung—the deep kind of sting that hurt all the way to the bone.
There had been a time when his eyes would have lit up with love. Now all she got were frowns, disapproval, and disappointment.
/> Where was the love he’d held for her? Had it died so quickly? It’s not my fault, Daddy. I caught a virus, I didn’t want it.
She inhaled and felt her breath sputter.
His brows pinched in what appeared to be anger, with a hint of disappointment. She preferred the anger. He pointed a finger at her. “Can I assume that’s my picture?”
She moved in and set the envelope on the table. The hugeass lump in her throat made talking difficult. “I … I stumbled across it and it looked like … you had a twin brother. I was curious.”
“You had no right to go through my personal things.”
Why do you hate me daddy? She breathed in deep to keep the sting of tears from her eyes and nodded . “I’m sorry,” she said, knowing arguing wouldn’t help.
“You told your mom you weren’t drinking,” he said. “Why didn’t you tell me that?”
“You were so angry. I didn’t think you’d believe me.”
“What were you looking for?” he asked, his tone still hostile. She suspected her mom had already told him what she said, so she repeated that lie. “I’ve been thinking about Chan and thought maybe you’d have a picture of him.”
He stood up. “Chan is dead. Let him rest in peace.”
But he wasn’t dead, Della thought. And perhaps her uncle wasn’t either. She watched her father start to walk away. He hadn’t hugged her since right after she’d been turned.
“Daddy?” she said.
He turned and glanced back. For one second, one heartbeat of time, she could swear she saw regret in his eyes. Regret for all they had lost.
“What?” he asked.
She hurried to him, wanting to feel his protective arms around her. Wanting to know he didn’t hate her.
Before she got all the way to his side, he held out his hand to stop her. Her heart tightened into one big knot of pain.
She inhaled and swallowed. If she wasn’t going to get a hug, maybe she’d at least get answers.