“You ready?” Jay asked when he found them, and Violet lifted her eyebrows at Chelsea, silently asking her if she was through.
Glaring, Chelsea made a disgusted sound and studied Violet with pinched lips, but she didn’t say anything else.
Then, just as she was about to leave them, to go the opposite direction toward her class, Chelsea lifted her first two fingers up to her eyes and then pointed back at Violet, the universal sign for
I’m watching you.
Jay looked confused. “What was that all about?” he asked.
Sighing, Violet leaned into him as they walked, feeling the burden of too many secrets weighing on her. “Chelsea thinks I’m hiding something from her.”
He snorted and pointed out the obvious. “If she only knew.” But before Violet could punch him in the arm, they reached her classroom and he stopped short. He scowled, but not at Violet; it was meant for Rafe, who was waiting for Violet, leaning against the wall, wearing a smug grin on his face.
Jay had accepted the fact that Rafe would be at their school every day, but she knew it bothered him. How could it not? It bothered her, and he was her friend.
“You okay?” Violet asked, shifting on her feet to block his view of Rafe, forcing him to look at her instead.
Jay exhaled noisily. “Everything’s . . . fine.” He smiled at her, and Violet’s heart shuddered. She didn’t try to stop him when he closed the gap between them, his lips finding hers in a deep—and territorial—kiss.
When he was finished, she couldn’t find her voice for a long, breathless moment. “That was for him, wasn’t it?”
“The kiss? Nah, that was for you, Vi. Only for you.”
She giggled. “I feel like I’m stuck in the middle of some kind of tug-of-war. Only I’m the rope and you two are trying to pull me apart.”
“Don’t kid yourself, you’re not the rope, you’re the prize.” Jay’s lazy grin reached all the way to his eyes. “And, for the record, I’ve already won.”
Violet shook her head. “It’s not a contest, Jay,” she replied as she started to walk away.
But Jay put his hand over hers, pulling her back for one final kiss. “I know, Vi.”
When she passed him on her way into the classroom, Rafe scowled. “Nice show,” he bit out acerbically. Violet tried to pretend she didn’t know what he was talking about as she headed down the row of desks to her seat.
“Whatever,” Violet answered, not wanting to have this discussion.
Guys are ridiculous
, she decided as she kept walking, glad Rafe was behind her and couldn’t see the scowl on her face.
If only it were that simple, because then it was Rafe stopping her. Rafe with his electric touch, and when his fingers reached for hers, she couldn’t help jolting. “Sara told me,” he said, his voice so quiet Violet could barely hear it above her music-box imprint. “About what you read in your grandmother’s diary.” His eyes were deep and mesmerizing, and Violet told herself it didn’t matter because Jay already had her. “She also said you told her your friend didn’t do it,” he whispered.
Violet glanced around, wishing that everyone had heard the truth in those last words, but knowing they couldn’t. Yet all she could say was, “He’s not my friend.”
Through the cafeteria window, Violet could see Chelsea and Rafe sitting on the grass in the quad, rather than at their usual table. While the weather cooperated, the grassy area out in the courtyard, and benches surrounding it, was crowded during the lunch hours. After that, when the rain returned, or when it was too cold to be comfortable, only the loners—either by choice or by circumstance—would continue eating out there, sitting alone and thumbing their noses at the rest of the school for forsaking them.
But for now, as the sun beat down, and students crowded every open space, eating outside didn’t seem like such a bad idea.
Violet had expected to interrupt another lopsided conversation, in which Chelsea talked and talked, and talked some more, while Rafe only half listened, nodding occasionally so she wouldn’t think he was a total D-bag. As far as Violet could tell, that was about as far as his social charms extended . . . to attempt to tolerate those around him.
Except that wasn’t what she walked into at all. It wasn’t until that very moment, when Violet approached the two of them, Chelsea sitting with her legs crossed in front of her, and Rafe sitting up, leaning one elbow on his knee, that she realized just how chummy the two of them had gotten. So much so, that she heard Rafe, his voice as low as ever, actually responding when Chelsea asked what he was reading.
When he told her it was
Catcher in the Rye
, Chelsea cast him a knowing grin and said boldly, “‘In my
mind
, I’m probably the biggest sex maniac you ever saw.’”
Rafe laughed then, and Violet froze in place, trying to figure out what had just happened. Trying to unsort the jumble of emotions that knotted tightly in her chest, making it nearly impossible to breathe.
Rafe’s laugh was such a foreign sound. Of course Violet had heard him laugh before, but never that kind of laugh. An encouraging one. A flirtatious one. And that’s what that laugh had been, Violet was sure of it. They were sitting there, in the quad at school . . . flirting. With each other.
Violet took an uncertain step backward, thinking that sitting outside might not have been such a great idea after all. Suddenly all this fresh air was making her woozy. Or possibly it was the company. Either way, her head was spinning and she felt like she might be coming down with something.
Rafe glanced up then, at that very moment, and saw her standing there gaping at them. And she saw something cross his face, something dark and unexpected, filling her with guilt. It was a look so close to longing it made Violet wince. “Violet?” he said, his voice no longer flirtatious and teasing, and she thought she might have actually heard a note of regret, buried in the deep timbre of her name.
Violet wanted him to stop looking at her like that, and she certainly didn’t want Chelsea to see him doing it, so she dropped her gaze to her friend, ignoring Rafe altogether. “Did . . . did you just quote
Catcher in the Rye
?” She couldn’t help asking the question any more than she could stop the incredulity that saturated her voice. Since when did Chelsea quote anything from the required reading list at school? Or more importantly, since when had Chelsea ever
read
anything from the required reading list?
Chelsea’s smile was mischievous as she glanced up at Violet, admitting, “It’s the only line I know. And that’s probably the only chance I’ll ever have to use it.” She turned back to Rafe, her grin widening lasciviously. “Or maybe not.”
But Rafe was no longer flirting with her, and Violet’s legs felt unsteady, and all she wanted to do was turn and run away. Because standing there, with Rafe’s blue eyes boring into her, she felt far too vulnerable . . . far too exposed.
And far too confused.
When she felt a hand at her elbow, she jumped and spun nervously to face whoever had just grabbed her.
Jay was there, staring back at her with his warm, faithful eyes and a crooked smile on his lips. Gemma stood beside him, looking like they’d just arrived together.
“You aren’t serious, are you? We aren’t really going to eat our lunch in the dirt, are we?” Gemma folded her arms across her chest and eyed the grass as if Chelsea and Rafe were rolling around in an oozing pile of sloppy mud.
“You don’t have to sit here at all,” Chelsea told her, lifting her chin defiantly. One thing about Chelsea, she either liked you or she didn’t, and you didn’t have to guess which side of the line you fell on. And Gemma, for whatever reason, had landed on the wrong side. “We were doing just fine before you got here.”
Violet was still dazed, and then Jay’s hand slid down to hers, his palm settling lightly, gingerly over her own. For several seconds their hands stayed like that, their fingers lined up in perfect rows, from thumb to pinkie, his dwarfing hers. She savored the feel of his rough skin sliding over hers. It was electric, his touch, but not in the way it was when Rafe touched her. This kind of electricity started inside of her, filling her up and spreading to every fissure, making her feel connected. Whole.
Rafe glanced away, and she could feel him withdrawing once more, disappearing inside himself. A different kind of guilt stabbed her; she didn’t want to be responsible for hurting him.
But Jay’s fingers were still there, and when he finally slid them in and through and between hers, Violet felt the knot in her chest loosen. She could breathe again. And more than that, she could feel the rush of her own pulse pumping blood past her ears. Without saying a single word, Jay drew her down onto the grass, and Violet followed, letting her knees fold beneath her as she stayed right by his side . . . where she belonged.
Gemma, still standing above them, rolled her eyes and exhaled dramatically. “Fine,” she snapped, just as Claire and Jules came out into the quad, joining them. “I guess I’d rather sit in the dirt than sit alone.”
She scowled at each and every one of them in turn, but most especially at Chelsea, who smirked as the blonde girl tried to find some position that would keep both her and her clothing from touching the ground at all. Ultimately, Gemma ended up using her fancy new book bag as a cushion of sorts, keeping her knees bent so that her jeans didn’t so much as graze the tops of the grass. She brushed obsessively at nonexistent pieces of dirt or pollen or whatever else it was she thought might be landing on her, and she barely touched her lunch.
But it was Jay who had captured Violet’s attention, when he leaned across her shoulder, his breath finding her ear and sending shivers along the length of her spine. “What do you say we spend some time together tonight? Maybe do some homework?”
By the time she reached Anatomy & Physiology, the class where Violet had spent the entire first week of school pretending Grady didn’t exist—trying not to look his way or draw attention to herself—she’d nearly allowed herself to forget what happened. But now that she was standing inside the classroom they shared, Grady was all she could think about. Even though it had only been a week since school had started, the seat he’d occupied during that brief time had indisputably become his. And now it sat empty. Untouched. A shrine of notoriety.
Violet slumped solemnly in the chair next to Gemma, who’d fled from lunch early so she could wash her hands—and probably everything else she could reach—after being subjected to the “filthy outdoors.” Violet didn’t bother trying to contain the conflicting emotions she felt toward her classmates: anger, unease, disgust, worry—all coiled together in one enormous mass that had turned her into a time bomb of sorts. Even if Gemma hadn’t been an empath, she probably would have sensed something was wrong.
Turning an exasperated glance at Violet, Gemma scooted her chair a little farther away.
Violet just shrugged, not bothering to apologize or explain as she pulled out her notebook. She didn’t care whether she was making Gemma uncomfortable or not.
“Oh, for god’s sakes,” Gemma huffed. “It’s so hard to make you miserable if you don’t give a shit. Fine, I give up.” Her voice shifted, becoming . . . almost nice. “I’m sorry you had such a craptastic weekend. And . . . sorry about that guy, even thought you sorta hated him.” She nodded toward the empty chair. “If it makes you feel any better, I think everyone else hates him now too.”
Violet’s jaw tensed. “It doesn’t. And I don’t hate him. I just . . . we just . . .” She didn’t owe Gemma any explanations. “We weren’t friends anymore, but that doesn’t mean he deserves this.”
“So it’s true then? What Sara said about him not being guilty?”
Sometimes Violet forgot that Gemma lived with Sara and Rafe, that they were the only family she had, and that she knew what they knew.
She nodded. They might not be friends—she and Gemma—but it was nice to have another person she could confide in. Or rather, not have to lie to all the time. Not to have to hide her ability from.
She wished it could be this easy with her
real
friends.
“Hmm,” Gemma exhaled. “I sorta pegged him as an ass.” When Violet turned in her chair to gape at her, she lifted her shoulder. “
What?
I did.”
“Well, just because someone’s an ass doesn’t make them a murderer.”
Gemma’s lips twisted into a meaningful smile. “You got that right, sister,” she said. “If that were the case, Rafe would definitely be a serial killer.”
Violet couldn’t help the smile that slid over her lips. Gemma was right. She thought of the way Rafe generally kept others at a distance, ensuring that no one got too close or became too attached, by offending everyone. In that sense, it almost seemed logical that he’d be drawn to Chelsea. She was sort of offensive herself.
But Violet knew there was another side of him too, he’d shown it to her. He’d told her how he felt.
Unfortunately, Violet couldn’t share Rafe’s feelings.
Couldn’t
, she thought, turning the word over in her mind. It was a strange way to phrase it. Hadn’t she meant
didn’t
? That she
didn’t
share Rafe’s feelings?
It didn’t matter though, she had someone. She had Jay.
She and Rafe could only ever be friends.
“People are talking, you know?” Gemma said, interrupting Violet’s thoughts and dragging her back into the classroom.
“About Grady? I know.”
“No. About you.” She shrugged. “I mean, not about you, really. But about the person who found the bodies. They know it was someone who goes to school here. There’s a lot of guessing going on about who it could be.”
Goose bumps broke out over Violet’s skin. “Have they . . . ? Did they . . . ? Has anyone said my name?”
Gemma made a face, dismissing the notion as absurd. “Of course not. They point at each other mostly, trying to get someone to admit it was them. Really, they have no idea who it was.”
Violet looked around her, at the other students in her class, most of whom she’d known her whole life. Somehow, Gemma’s assurance, even with her empathic abilities, didn’t make Violet feel any more secure.