Desires of the Dead

Violet watched her leave. She liked Ann, loved her even. She was quirky and funny, and she never made Violet feel unwelcome. Their home was a place that was as comfortable to Violet as her own.

She dropped her coat on the back of a chair and crept quietly up to Jay’s room. She did her best not to wake him as she pulled the door closed behind her. She watched him sleep, stretched out on his back, feeling herself coming back to life in his presence.

“What are you doing?” he mumbled without opening his eyes.

Violet startled, feeling like she’d been caught doing something she shouldn’t have been. Like when they were little and they were busted for looking at a dirty magazine one of the other kids brought to school.

Jay rolled onto his side and squinted one eye open at Violet, grinning. “Come over here,” he growled, lifting the corner of his sheet up, inviting her in. He looked rumpled and messy and alluring.

Violet slipped off her shoes and climbed in beside him. He wrapped his arm around her back, pulling her close. His breath was warm, his body warmer, and she felt herself thawing for the first time since she’d stepped out into the shipyard that morning. Even the heat blasting inside her car on the way home hadn’t helped.

She tucked her feet between his legs.

“What are you doing here so early?” His voice was rough from sleep but it sounded like soft velvet. He stroked her back lazily. “Are you feeling better today?”

Neither question really needed an answer; they were just Jay’s way of letting her know he’d been worried about her.

“I didn’t mean to wake you,” she whispered as she let herself get comfortable against him. She’d been cold and tired, and now that she was warm again she thought she might actually be able to fall asleep, right there in his arms.

He rested his chin against the top of her head. “You didn’t,” he assured her. “I was already awake.”

Violet sighed. It felt so good to be here. It was the first time she’d felt comfortable since she’d gone to Seattle yesterday with Chelsea. Jay made her feel safe—among other things—and she needed that right now.

She closed her eyes; they were gritty and raw from lack of sleep. She breathed deeply, inhaling him, and relaxing as she sank further into him . . . and into the pillow beneath her head.

She fell asleep like that, wrapped in warmth.

Wrapped in Jay.

When Violet awoke, she was alone.

She was in Jay’s bed, and even though he was gone now, she could still smell him in the blankets around her. She stretched long and hard, waiting for the blood to start flowing so she could find the strength to get up.

She rolled onto her back and stared up at the familiar cracks in the faded plaster above her. Bright daylight strained to get through the closed curtains. Violet stretched again, and then reluctantly threw back the covers.

Jay was in his kitchen when she came downstairs.

“Hey, Sleeping Beauty,” he said, looking up from the beat-up laptop he was working on at the kitchen table.

Jay’s mom was a lot of great things that Violet admired; technologically savvy was definitely not one of them. She was one of those people who were loath to move into the twenty-first century and embrace all things modern. She was the only adult woman that Violet knew of who didn’t own a cell phone, and she refused to buckle beneath the pressure to pay good money for high-speed internet, so Jay was forced to plug his secondhand laptop into the phone line and use dial-up. Not because they couldn’t afford such luxuries, but because Ann Heaton wasn’t going down without a fight.

Violet smiled lazily at him. “Thanks for letting me sleep.”

“I figured you were pretty exhausted.”

“Yeah, sorry about waking you so early. I probably should’ve gone home.” She wrinkled her nose, hoping it looked adorable, so he would forgive her.

Jay grinned, and suddenly he was the one who was adorable. “You didn’t wake me. Your mom called before you got here to see if I knew where you were.”

Violet cringed as she glanced at the clock. She was surprised to see that it was already after lunchtime. “Oh, crap! I better call and let her know I’m alive. She’s probably freaking out!”

“Don’t worry. I called her after you fell asleep. She’s fine.” And then his face became serious. “So? Where were you?”

Violet bit the inside of her cheek. She hadn’t planned on telling him, but she couldn’t lie either. He would know. He always knew.

She lifted one shoulder, trying to play it off as nothing. “Seattle.”

From the look on his face, it was the last thing he’d expected her to say. “So you went all the way to the city and back before, what, like eight o’clock? What time was it when you got here anyway?”

“A little after seven thirty,” she confessed, gnawing on her cheek again.

“Really, Vi?” He ran his hand through his messy hair, a sure sign that he’d moved from confused to irritated. “Why? Did you forget something yesterday that you had to go back for?”

Violet nodded halfheartedly, noncommittally. “Something like that.” She turned around so she didn’t have to face him. She grabbed the kettle from the stove and filled it with water.

“Mm-hmm.” Jay’s voice was filled with skepticism. “So, what exactly?”

She set the kettle back on the burner and turned around, leaning against the stove. She was going to have to tell him. There was no way around it.