Wiccan, A Witchy Young Adult Paranormal Romance (15 page)

“
Sorry about the other
night, at the party. I got sidetracked when I went to get you a
drink and when I came looking for you, you were already
gone.”

I wanted so badly to laugh in his face
and tell him what an idiot he was, but I showed admirable restraint
and just smiled politely. “Don’t worry about it. My friends and I
left right after you…after that.”

Jake eyed me a little longer than what
was necessary and I wondered if he was wondering whether I knew
what had happened with the vomit or not. Inwardly, I was pleased at
the thought that he might squirm a little over it.

“
Oh. Well, I hate I didn’t
get to spend more time with you. I was really looking forward to
it.”

I just kept smiling, not saying a word.
I wasn’t going to help him out. Not even a little bit.

“
So,” he kept right on
talking as if my silence wasn’t bothering him. “I was thinking that
maybe I could make it up to you this weekend with a
movie.”

Had I not been so ill, my ego would’ve
been flourishing. “I appreciate the offer, but I have other plans
this weekend.”

He was eyeing me again, this time a
little more suspiciously. Finally he said, “Is this about the other
day? With the cops?”

My frown was genuine. “No.
Why?”

“
I just don’t want you to
hold that against me. It was all a mistake, a big misunderstanding.
Don’t give it a thought.”

“
Oh, I haven’t. I know you
didn’t kill Lisa.”

It was his turn to frown. “You
do?”

“
Of course I do. That’s
ridiculous.”

“
I know, right?”

“
Well, I’m glad they let you
go. I’ve really got to run, though. I’m about to be late for
class.” I turned to walk off then looked back over my shoulder to
say, “See you around.”

That image of Jake, the one where he’s
just standing there, dumbfounded, watching me walk away, was one
that I’d be able to bring out on many dreary days in the future and
derive great pleasure from. It actually went a long way toward
improving my mood.

As I made my way to class, I found
myself wondering what the police had found that caused them to let
Jake go and how they were going to find the real killer.

All day long I had to listen
to wild speculation about Jake’s reappearance at school. It was
wearing on my fragile nerves, making me very anxious to get home
and call Grayson. I had to find out what was
really
going on.

Later, with my house key still in the
door, I was jiggling it with one hand and dialing with the other.
The key wouldn’t budge and the phone was ringing, so with a growl,
I put my foot against the door and pulled the key as hard as I
could. It finally dislodged, saving me from having to rip the door
off its hinges in a juvenile fit of temper.

I slammed the door shut, wondering
again what in the world had gotten into me lately. I got Grayson’s
voicemail again, but this time I didn’t leave a message. It hadn’t
done me a bit of good last time and I didn’t want it to seem like I
had nothing better to do than hound him (even though I
didn’t).

Dumping bag, shoes, phone and keys
right by the front door, I stomped into the living room and flopped
down on the couch. I had to find something absorbing to watch or I
was going to lose my mind.

I channel surfed, which provided
absolutely no significant amount of stimulation. It just left me
with a mindless use of my finger while my thoughts raced to parts
unknown. My frustration and impotent indignation rose pretty
steadily by the second.

When my cell phone rang about twenty
excruciating minutes later, I jumped up and launched myself at it
where it lay at the front door, nearly tackling it from the living
room doorway.

I tried not to dwell on how relieved I
was that it was Grayson calling me back. Instead, I answered in a
very casual, rather bored voice.

“
Mercy, it’s
Grayson.”

“
Oh, hi.”

“
I saw where you’d called.
Sorry I didn’t get back to you last night.”

“
That’s ok. I know you’re
busy. I just wanted to check on DeCarlo.”

“
He’s doing better. The
bullet hit him in the shoulder. It’s a miracle considering how
close the lady was when she shot him.”

I could almost hear him shaking his
head I amazement.

“
I’m glad to hear he’s
alright. So how’s the other stuff coming?”

“
Well,” he said on a sigh.
It was one of those bone-weary types of sounds that said he hadn’t
slept again and he was desperately missing it. “The crime scenes
are a nightmare. Both rooms were rentable by the hour and you know
what that means. There were so many different DNA and fingerprint
contributors, the lab is having trouble keeping them all separated.
It makes it nearly impossible to pin down any real
suspects.

“
We got a couple of hits in
the NCIC and IAFIS. I’m going to run those down and see what I come
up with. Cases like these are usually very labor intensive, but
with very little pay off. Do you have anything else for
me?”

I had to smile at how hopeful he
sounded. It’s funny how far we’d come, from him scoffing and
calling me a psychic to him basically asking for my help. I’d never
have guessed things would have turned out this way.

“
No. But I do have another
question for you.”

“
Shoot,” he said lightly as
he chewed something that sounded like a potato chip.

“
What happened with Jake
Wheeler? I saw him on the way to school today.”

I heard the squeaking of Grayson’s
chair. He must’ve sat up. My guess was that he had been leaning
back in it, having a bite to eat until I mentioned Jake.

“
Did he approach you? He
didn’t get aggressive toward you, did he?”

“
No, of course not. I told
you before that I don’t believe he killed Lisa.”

“
I hope you’re right, but I
still don’t want him hanging around you.”

I smiled. That sounded an awful lot
like either concern for my safety or jealousy. Or maybe even both.
That would be nice. Either way, I’d take it as a huge compliment
and leave it at that.

“
Well, I don’t think you
have anything to worry about. I pretty much blew him
off.”

“
Good,” he said, but he
didn’t sound like he felt any better about it.

“
What happened? What did you
find out that made you let him go?”

“
His alibi finally turned
up. He’d said he went back to his apartment with a friend, but we
couldn’t find that friend. And when the wig turned up, I really
didn’t care. The hair was a match; it was a done deal as far as I
was concerned.

“
But now this friend turns
up, swears they were together all during that time
period.”

“
What about the wig
then?”

“
That’s another thing. Jake
told us that he’d taken it off after Lisa left the party. Said he
laid it down in the bathroom then didn’t know what happened to it
after that, but it was in his apartment Sunday morning. He thinks
someone borrowed it and then returned it to him.”

“
That does sound kind of
suspicious. I’ll give you that. I still don’t think he did it,
though.”

“
Well, maybe you’re right. I
don’t know. This puts me back at square one, though. And the body
doesn’t have any more information for me either. The river washed
it clean of almost all forensic evidence.”

He sounded so frustrated and I wanted
to help him so badly, but I just couldn’t. I’d told him everything
I knew about the murder.

That’s when it occurred to me that
there was one other thing I could try again, one thing that might
help him if it worked. I could always walk over the spot where Lisa
died again, see if I could trigger the vision one more time. Maybe
I didn’t see it before because Grayson had been with me. Maybe I
had to be alone.

“
I wish I could help more,”
I said. “Tomorrow on the way to school, I’ll walk by the site and
see if maybe I can get a flash of something, ok?”

“
I know how much you don’t
want to see this stuff, but I’d really appreciate it if you could
get anything else that might help.”

“
I’ll try my
best.”

“
Thanks,” he said. He
started to say something else, but stopped after the
Uh
that he muttered.
Though it was just one short word, the way Grayson said “uh”
reminded me of someone making a segue into something unpleasant.
Turns out, he was. “Look, there’s something I’ve got to tell you,
but I don’t want you to panic yet.”

“
Yet?” My stomach twisted up
into a tight knot. “Will there be a need for me to panic later?”
When he said nothing, I had to ask. “What is it?”

“
I’ve done everything I can
to keep your involvement in these cases to a minimum, as far as who
knows how much information you are giving me and that kind of
thing. But since DeCarlo was looking into these last two as a
serial crime, some of that is out of my hands now.
I
won’t be mentioning
your help to the press, but I can’t be absolutely certain that he
won’t let it leak out or even announce it on purpose.”

The bottom dropped out of my
stomach. I could just see me being labeled, very
publicly
labeled, as some
sort of psychic-wannabe, freak show, spotlight hound. All sorts of
cheesy clichés and B-movie lines flitted through my mind in one
long and humiliating treatise.

He must’ve taken my silence to mean
that I had decided to panic now rather than wait until later. “In
every statement and interview I’ve done so far, I’ve just referred
to you as a reliable source and that’s what I’ll continue to do. I
just wanted to give you a head’s up and let you know that some
things are now beyond my control.”

He sounded remorseful. And, really, it
wasn’t his fault. I’m a big girl and I’d done what I thought was
right. I knew there would likely be consequences and I was just
going to have to deal with them.

“
I know. And I appreciate
that. We’ll just deal with it if and when it happens.” I hoped I
sounded more calm and optimistic than I felt.

“
It’s a terrible thing to
say, I know, but look at it this way. DeCarlo should be out of the
picture for a little while anyway. He has to be medically cleared
for duty before he can return to work and who knows how long that
could take.” He paused and then said quietly. “It couldn’t have
happened at a better time.”

Sadly, that did make me feel a little
bit better. It also lessened my guilt over possibly pushing some
innocent woman into shooting him. It didn’t kill him, which was
good. And he obviously wasn’t the nicest guy in the world. Not that
his character made a shooting excusable, but it sure did lessen the
horror of it. I was almost wondering to myself what I had to feel
bad about. Almost.

A thought popped into my mind as a
response to that, but I refused to even think about what had become
of the woman who’d shot DeCarlo, his assailant. She was no doubt
having a very bad week. I’d have plenty of time to feel guilty
about that later, though. Right now I was just going to be relieved
about DeCarlo’s timely absence.

I snickered a little. “Good
point.”

“
Listen, I’ve got to run,
but I want you to stay away from Jake Wheeler. I’m still not sold
on his innocence. Probably won’t be until we can find the person
who really did kill Lisa Bauer.”

I thought it was kind of sweet, his
protectiveness. “Alright. I’ll stay away from him. I’ll just have
to find someone else to take me out for a cappuccino this weekend,”
I teased.

Though I was just kidding, as soon as
I’d said it, I became lost in a pleasant daydream about sharing
coffee in a secluded spot with Grayson. I’d get whipped cream on my
lip and he’d kiss it away…again and again and again.

“
Hey, you know what?”
Grayson’s voice dropped to a husky rumble. “I think I know somebody
who’d be more than happy to treat you to a cappuccino. Today
even.
And
you’d
get to enjoy it in the privacy of a Dodge Charger,” he said, really
making a pitch.

My stomach twisted again, but this time
it was a knot of a different kind. A warm and gentle anticipation
blossomed in my gut and spread throughout me. I dropped my voice to
match his. Though my only connection to him was a wireless one, it
suddenly felt like we were the only two people in the
world.

“
Wow. That’s quite an offer.
And, personally, I couldn’t think of a better way to enjoy
one.”

“
Call you later?”

“
Sounds good.”

He hung up again, which
didn’t bother me as much as it had before. Now it just left me
feeling a little…unsatisfied for some reason. The least he could do
was say “bye” or something. It was just so
sudden.

I shook off that feeling as I stared
down at all the items I’d dumped in the kitchen floor—shoes, bag,
purse, phone, keys. I picked it all up and carried the load back to
my bedroom. Mom would have an attack of some sort if she came home
and saw that mess.