The Body Finder (22 page)

WHEN VIOLET AWOKE, SHE WAS CONFUSED.
Disoriented, like the strange sensation of waking up in a bed that wasn't your own and then struggling to remember where you'd fallen asleep.

Only this time, Violet was pretty sure she hadn't fallen asleep in the back of an ambulance.

The details of how she'd gotten there were hard for her to grasp and felt like scraps from a dream—or a hallucination—pieced together in incomplete segments.

She remembered running….

And being chased.

And a voice calling out to her.

She tried to sit up, only to find that she was fastened to the stretcher and her neck was being held immobile by a huge brace strapped around her.

She remembered falling,
a memory made more clear by the pain shooting up from her ankle. She assured the paramedic riding with her that her neck was just fine, but he insisted that she stay put, and no amount of pleading on her part could change his mind.

“How did you find me?” Violet finally asked him, giving up on the idea that he would release her.

“Some kid called it in, said he was your boyfriend. He's coming right behind us.” He waved his metal clipboard toward the rear doors of the vehicle as if Violet could see out of them. She couldn't of course; she was strapped to a gurney. “I think he thinks the sirens are for him too.”

Violet closed her eyes.
Jay
had
been there, it hadn't been a dream after all. He'd come looking for her
. She didn't allow herself to think about what might have happened if he hadn't.

Relief spread through her, insulating her in the knowledge that she was safe now. She kept her eyes closed and concentrated on the sounds of the wailing sirens to distract her from the throbbing pain in her ankle.

She was embarrassed by all the attention she drew when the ambulance pulled into the emergency bay at the hospital. Jay met her inside, and never left her side, holding her hand silently—reassuringly—throughout the triage process, where she was cleared from the restraints. And when she was finally wheeled back to a room with long curtains hanging down to
separate one bed from another, Jay pulled a chair close to her.

He captured her hand between both of his and touched her fingertips to his lips. “Are you okay?” he finally asked, seeming to breathe for the first time since she'd seen him.

She felt guilty for causing him to look so troubled. “I'm fine, really. I think I just twisted my ankle a little. It's nothing. As soon as my parents get here, we can go home.”

She hated being in the hospital. She'd already felt several imprints moving around her. She doubted those who carried them were murderers exactly, but Violet was certain that echoes attached to those who administered lethal doses of painkillers too…even when it was done to give the dying a more peaceful passing.

Jay's mom was a nurse and carried an old, faint imprint of her own. Violet had never asked Jay about it, but when she'd told her mother once, her mom had explained that sometimes it was too much to watch someone suffering when they died.

“What were you doing so far off the trail, Vi?” Jay continued to cup her hand tenderly.

She didn't answer him. This wasn't a question she wanted to discuss yet—especially not with Jay. She asked him a question of her own. “I thought your mom needed you. How come you came back?”

She didn't tell him how grateful she was that he had. Or why.

It was enough of a diversion to keep him occupied for a moment. “She only needed me to let her into her car. She locked her keys inside, and I had her spare with me. But by
the time I got back to your house, your mom said you'd gone for a run. I was gonna try to meet up with you on your way back and walk with you, maybe sneak you behind the bushes for a few minutes.” He smiled at her before turning more serious. “And then I heard you yelling for help…and crap, Violet, it scared the hell out of me. How did you fall, anyway? What were you doing down by the river?”

She heard her parents then, before she saw them, and their chaotic arrival saved her from answering Jay's questions. She could hear them at the nurse's station outside her door, asking about their daughter's condition, still questioning one of the nurses as they dragged her into the room with them.

Violet assured her parents—in the same way she had Jay—that she was fine. That it was just a fall, some bruises and scrapes, nothing to worry about. And still, no one seemed to believe her.

After a full workup, and a painful, and humiliatingly unsuccessful, attempt at standing on her own, she was sent down to Radiology for an X ray on her right ankle. By the time Uncle Stephen arrived with Aunt Kat, Violet was ready to make a run for it. Only she doubted she could get very far.

On the other hand, her uncle was
exactly
the person she wanted to see right now. She had been biding her time until she could tell him what had really happened to her. But now that he was there, she wasn't sure how to start. So she waited for the right moment.

He ruffled her hair as he came in, all uncle and no cop about him now. She far preferred her uncle to the chief; he had inherited the sense of humor in the family, while her
father got the receding hairline and mad skills with numbers. “Geez, Vi, you didn't need to break your own leg to get out of going to the dance with Grady Spencer. A simple ‘no' would have been just fine, I'm sure.”

Apparently no one had noticed that Jay had barely let go of her hand for a second. His thumb was now tracing lazy circles around her palm, and he answered her uncle's teasing comment without looking away from Violet for even a split second. “She's not going to the dance with Grady,” he announced, smiling at her mischievously, and for a moment Violet forgot how to breathe. She hoped she never got used to how a simple look from him could turn her into a blithering idiot.

“Really?” her aunt Kat asked, her eyes narrowing as she glanced from Violet to Jay, and then down at their intertwined hands. Clearly she wasn't going to let the comment pass unnoticed. “Why is that?” she asked in a voice filled with unspoken meaning.

Stephen Ambrose looked at his wife curiously, a little slow to catch on, which was sad, really, considering it was his job to seek out clues and solve mysteries.

Jay answered Kat without missing a beat. “Because she's going with me.” He winked at Violet, whose cheeks had flushed to a brilliant shade of scarlet. She wasn't entirely sure she was ready for this.

Violet saw her mom and Aunt Kat exchange meaningful glances.

They knew, she realized. And now her uncle did too.

Uncle Stephen gave Jay his best
I'm-keeping-my-eye-on-you
look, but a quick “Hmm” was the only sound he made.

How much embarrassment could one person possibly survive?

There was a moment of awkward silence, made even more uncomfortable by Jay's refusal to look anywhere but at her. He reached out and brushed his finger along her cheek. Violet almost forgot to care that everyone in the room was looking at them.

Her uncle Stephen cleared his throat, and Violet jumped a little.

“So, what exactly happened, Vi?” Suddenly the police chief was back in the room with them.

Violet pursed her lips. She wasn't sure where to start, but she knew it needed to be said. “Well,” she began, “I went for a run.” She paused to chew her lip, trying to put her words in the right order. “Anyway, I thought I, you know,
heard
something. An echo.”

“Really?” her uncle asked. “Do you think it was a body…a
person
? Did you stop?”

Violet shook her head. “No, it wasn't that, exactly.” She cursed herself for being such a chicken, but she was afraid of how everyone was going to react if they knew she'd been followed—and very nearly captured—by a man who had obviously been chasing her. “I…it wasn't a body.”
Spit it out, already!
“It was a man.”

The words didn't have quite the impact she'd expected, and she knew from the clueless looks on their faces that she was going to have to explain it to them.

“Someone was following me,” she stated, and finally she had their full attention. Before they could bombard her with questions, she plunged ahead. “It was a man, and he was carrying an imprint on him. That was how I first knew he was there. He was hiding, wearing camouflage so I couldn't see him, and he was…following me while I ran.” She paused to take a breath, feeling a little light-headed now that she was in the middle of her explanation. “When he realized that I'd seen him, he started to chase me. I knew I needed to get off the trail to try to get home faster, but I got turned around and ended up heading toward the river instead.” She looked at Jay gratefully, fresh tears stinging her eyes. “That was when I heard you calling for me.”

Violet glanced up. Everyone was watching her uncle, who was pacing now. He seemed to be deep in thought. It wasn't quite the reaction she'd expected from him.

“What is it?” her dad asked his brother.

Stephen didn't hesitate. “I knew we were missing something” was his only explanation at first.

“Missing
what
?” Violet's mom rounded on her brother-in-law like a protective mother bear. “If you know something, then tell us…now!” she demanded.

Her uncle looked torn, but his familial obligation won out. “Look, Maggie, I'm not even supposed to be talking about this. We're in the middle of a
murder investigation
, and the things we uncover are confidential. I could be compromising the case just by discussing it with you.” He sighed then, having gotten it out of his system, and continued. “But we've been following a lead based on evidence we recovered at the
suspect's home.” Violet thought it sounded strange to call him a “suspect” when she knew exactly what he'd done—what he'd
confessed
to doing—to those girls. As far as she was concerned he was the
killer
, not the suspect.

Her uncle went on: “I was hoping we were wrong, but it looks like it might be true after all.” He shook his head, as if he were having a hard time believing it himself. “We were starting to suspect that he wasn't acting alone, that he might have had a partner.” He held up his hand when Violet's dad was about to interrupt him. “I know what you're going to say, but up till now it's been more speculation than fact. We have no idea who this accomplice might be or even if there
is
an accomplice at all. My detectives are going over phone records and following every lead they can, but most of them have been dead ends. We've even enlisted the help of the FBI forensics to go through his computer. But so far, nothing.”

“Until now,” Jay challenged.

“Until now,” he agreed, ignoring the accusation in Jay's words. “I'm sorry, Violet. If there was any chance,
any chance at all
, that I thought someone might come after you, I would never have kept this to myself. As it is, only a handful of men are even working on this aspect of the case.”

“So then why Violet? How would this…
person…
know that Violet was involved?” Now it was Kathryn Ambrose who was criticizing her husband.

He shrugged. “That's just it…. I have no idea. It could just be a coincidence, but I doubt it. And if it's not, if somehow he knows about Violet, then we need to find him. Fast.”
He sounded resolute now.

When the doctor came in with Violet's discharge orders, he explained that a bad sprain like hers could take weeks, even months, to heal properly, and that she would need to stay off her foot as much as possible. One of the nurses expertly wrapped the Ace bandage to the point that Violet thought her toes might not be getting enough blood circulation. Her parents were handed a prescription for some painkillers and heavy-duty-strength ibuprofen for the swelling. And Violet was fitted for crutches, which always sound like fun when you're little, but in reality chafe your underarms and make your muscles burn from the constant strain.

Her uncle was on his cell phone, ordering a round-the-clock police presence at Violet's house. And Violet could feel the walls closing in on her. Between her current inability to walk on her own, and the suffocating notion of being watched 24-7…
and not just by the cops
, she thought, as she glanced at the worried faces of her already overprotective parents, she could sense her world shrinking. She had just barely escaped being on lockdown, and now she was going to be in maximum-security solitary confinement.

Jay smiled at her encouragingly, taking in the ashen look of horror on her face, and she could practically read his mind as he imagined the two of them locked up together until this maniac who had hunted her in the woods was finally caught.

She supposed that, if she had to be in isolation, isolation with Jay might not be so bad after all.

DESPITE LISTENING TO THE REASSURING WORDS
repeated by her parents, and by her uncle and even Jay, Violet was having a hard time trusting that she was safe. They tried to assure her that there was no way the man in the woods could have known that she'd had any part in locating his victims—or in the capture of his partner. That he'd come across her the same way he had all of those other girls, by simple, random chance. And that she'd just been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The extra safety measures were simply to prevent him from coming back for her.

So she convinced herself that they were right, mostly
because it made it easier for her to get through each day. Having Jay around helped too.

The weekend passed peacefully, and after everything that had happened, Violet welcomed the reprieve.

The day after the incident in the woods was a Friday, and Violet stayed home, keeping her ankle elevated and iced. Jay reluctantly went to school, but only because his mother made him, so Violet was left on her own. Well, alone with her mom, and an armed police officer who was stationed out in front of her house.

She had meant to use the time to catch up on some reading. She had several books she'd been wanting to read, but instead she sprawled out on the couch surrounded by pillows and blankets, and spent the hours flipping channels between
Judge Judy
,
The People's Court
,
Maury
, and
Jerry Springer
, and rounded out her afternoon with
Dr. Phil
and
Oprah
. All in all, it was a complete waste of a day. At least until school got out.

Jay showed up after school with a bouquet of flowers and an armful of DVDs, although Violet couldn't have cared less about either…
he
was all she wanted. She couldn't help the electric thrill of excitement she felt when he came strolling in, grinning at her foolishly as if he hadn't seen her in weeks rather than hours. He scooped her up from the couch and dropped her onto his lap as he sat down where she had been just a moment before. He was careful to arrange her ankle on a neatly stacked pile of pillows beside him.

He stubbornly refused to hide his affection for her, and if Violet hadn't known better she would have sworn that he was
going out of his way to make her self-conscious in her own home. Fortunately her parents were giving them some space for the time being, and they were left by themselves most of the time.

“Did you miss me?” he asked arrogantly as he gently brushed his lips over hers, not bothering to wait for an answer.

She smiled while she kissed him back, loving the topsy-turvy feeling that her stomach always got when he was so close to her. She wound her arms around his neck, forgetting that she was in the middle of the family room and not hidden away in the privacy of her bedroom.

He pulled away from her, suddenly serious. “You know, we didn't get much time alone yesterday. And I didn't get a chance to tell you…”

Violet was mesmerized by the thick timbre of his deep voice. She barely heard his words but rather concentrated on the fluid masculinity of his tone.

“I feel like I've waited too long to finally have you, and then yesterday…when…” He stopped, seemingly at a loss, and then he tried another approach. His hand stroked her cheek, igniting a response from deep within her. “I can't imagine living without you,” he said, tenderly kissing her forehead, his warm breath fanning her brow. He paused thoughtfully for a moment before speaking again. “I love you, Violet. More than I ever could have imagined. And I don't want to lose you…. I
can't
lose you.”

It was her turn to look arrogant as she glanced up at him. “I know,” she stated smugly, shrugging her shoulder.

He shoved her playfully but held on to her tightly so that she never really went anywhere. “What do you mean, ‘I know'? What kind of response is that?” His righteous indignation bordered on comical. He pulled her down into his arms so that his face was directly above hers. “Say it!” he commanded.

She shook her head, pretending not to understand him. “What? What do you want me to say?” But then she giggled and ruined her baffled facade.

He teased her with his mouth, leaning down to kiss her and then pulling away before his lips ever reached hers. He nuzzled her neck tantalizingly, only to stop once she responded. She wrapped her arms around his neck, trying to pull him closer, frustrated by his mocking ambush of her senses.

“Say it,” he whispered, his breath warm against her neck.

She groaned, wanting him to put her out of her misery. “I love you too,” she rasped as she clung to him. “I love you so much….”

His mouth moved to cover hers in an exhausting kiss that left them both breathless and craving more than they could have. Violet collapsed into his arms, gathering her wits and hoping that no one walked in on them anytime soon.

 

The weekend progressed in pretty much the same fashion. Chelsea stopped by once, to check on Violet, which was actually kind of sweet. Sometimes it was easier to be around Chelsea outside of school, when she didn't have an audience. She brought Violet a couple of magazines, some beef jerky,
and two packs of gum, all wrapped in a brown paper bag…stuff she'd gotten from a convenience store on the way. It was her version of a bouquet of flowers.

The rest of the time, Violet's parents were around, but they were never really
around
, leaving Violet and Jay on their own for the most part. When it got late, Jay would help Violet up to her room so she could go to bed; then he would head home, only to be back first thing in the morning. Her parents had agreed to let him take Violet's car back and forth, so he could come and go easily without having to tie up his mom's car all day.

The only news from Uncle Stephen was that there was no news. They'd gotten no further in determining who the mystery man following Violet in the woods had been. Violet felt bad that she couldn't help the police in identifying him, since he'd been wearing camouflage makeup when he'd chased her, and all she could really tell them was that he was tall.

By Monday, Violet couldn't avoid the real world any longer, and it was time to face school again. Pretty much everyone in school had heard about what had happened to her, although none of the details were exactly right, and Violet didn't bother correcting them.

It was Homecoming Week, which also meant it was Spirit Week, the most important week of the fall quarter. And Violet's perilous escape from an unknown assailant got lost in the shuffle of Homecoming rallies and pep assemblies, along with the impending announcement of the Homecoming Court and anticipation over the game
and dance the coming weekend.

Violet had a hard time being overly excited, knowing that she wouldn't be able to participate in any of the activities outside of school. She wouldn't be allowed to go to the game, and even if she could convince her parents to let her attend the dance on Saturday night, there was no point. On crutches she would only be able to sit on the sidelines and watch anyway.

It was too bad, because her dress was amazing…and she would have liked to see Jay in a suit.

She tried not to be too disappointed, and it was made a little easier for her when the Homecoming Court was announced and Lissie Adams was named Homecoming Queen after garnering the most votes from the student body. Several of her perky little sidekicks were named “Lissie's princesses.” It was enough to make Violet feel ill, and to make her feel much better about not being able to attend the game, where Lissie would be crowned at halftime, or the dance, where Lissie would be the center of attention.

Jay was a huge help at school, and he carried Violet's backpack as she hobbled from the car to her first-period class. If she'd have allowed him, he probably would have carried her. As it was, he got special permission from the Attendance Office to leave all his classes early so that he could help Violet get from one class to the next.

By the end of the first day, Violet's arms were killing her, and Jay insisted on making her wait at the curb while he got her car. Queen Lissie surprised Violet by appearing out of nowhere as soon as Jay had disappeared from sight.

“Hey, Violet,” she said, as she eyed Violet's bandaged ankle and the crutches with spiteful superiority. “Walk much?”

The two bleach-blonde girls with her giggled at their queen's lame attempt to make fun of Violet's injury.

She wanted to smack that superior smirk off Lissie's face. But she couldn't think of a clever comeback, so she finally just mumbled, “Shouldn't you be polishing your crown or something?”

Lissie smiled sweetly past Violet, waving her fingertips at Jay as he pulled the car up to the curb where they stood. Her face was the picture of serenity, as if she hadn't been mocking Violet while he was gone, but under her breath she got in one last barb at Violet's expense. “Jealous?” But it was a little hard to be overly offended when it was so far from the truth.

Violet didn't bother responding, and Jay bounded from the car to help her inside.

He gave the briefest of glances at Lissie, barely acknowledging her presence as he gently eased Violet onto the seat. For good measure, and Violet was sure it was premeditated, he gave her a long, sweet kiss before closing her door.

Violet was surprised at how quickly she responded to his touch, even when she knew it was more for Lissie's benefit than for hers. But she had to suppress a triumphant smile when she stole a quick look at the other girl's disgusted expression before Jay put the car in drive and left Lissie standing there, gawking after them.

“Sorry about that,” he said apologetically as he concentrated on maneuvering through the busy parking lot. “I've
been so worried about strange men following you around that I forgot how dangerous Homecoming Queens can be.”

Violet smiled at him. “That's okay. That kiss was a nice touch, by the way. Sheer genius.”

“Yeah, that one just came to me,” he chuckled.

“Maybe you can show it to me again…later,” she said playfully.

He reached over and gave her leg a squeeze, his eyes never leaving the road. “I like the way you think, my friend.”

“Is that how it is now, we're back to
just friends
?” Violet asked, raising her eyebrows at him challengingly. “I'll remember to keep that in mind next time we're ‘doing homework.'”

He was suddenly serious, his tone determined. “We'll never be just friends again, not if I have anything to do with it.” And then with conviction he added, “I love you too much to go back now, Vi.”

It was still strange to hear him saying things like that. The words sounded so foreign to her ears, but her heart responded, as if it had been waiting a lifetime to hear them, by beating erratically.

 

They spent the evening watching one of the movies that Jay had rented, snuggled up on the couch together, while her mom popped a frozen lasagna into the oven for dinner. Of course.

They ate together at the table that night, she, Jay, and her parents. They talked carefully around one another, avoiding the conversation that seemed to hang ominously over them: the glaring lack of headway in finding the man who'd been
after Violet. Violet actually preferred it that way, the
not
saying it, almost as if not speaking the words out loud somehow erased what had happened to her…at least to some extent. She knew that was foolish thinking, and she tried to ignore the fact that she carried the grim reminder of how real it was all day long as she limped from place to place.

She was afraid to organize her disjointed worries into an actual, articulated concern. But ignoring it didn't make it go away, and she couldn't help wondering if
he
was still after her. It was a question that had begun to haunt her thoughts more and more frequently as the police, and even the FBI forensics team, seemed to be getting nowhere in figuring out who she'd seen out in the woods that day.

When Jay left that night, Violet collapsed onto her bed in a state of exhausted apprehension, trying to convince herself that her worries were unfounded, that she was probably just a casualty of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Just like all those other girls had been.

So why couldn't Violet push away those nagging thoughts, the ones that hovered around the fringe of her consciousness, telling her it was no accident that he'd been out there that day? Why couldn't she shake the feeling that
she
was the reason he'd been lurking in the dark cover of the forest? That he'd been waiting for her?

She got up and double-checked her window, making sure it was locked, and glanced down to see the officer in his car, leaning back in his seat, settling in for his shift. She bounced in two hops back to her bed after first trying to put
some pressure on her foot, only to be disappointed that it still wouldn't support her weight without sending a jolt of pain all the way up her leg. She nearly fell over after the excruciating attempt to stand.

She settled in, struggling to shut off the disturbing thoughts that raced around inside her head, until she finally fell asleep, where they haunted her dreams instead. In them she was hunted by a stalker so dangerous, and so mysterious, that even her subconscious couldn't give him a face. His unrevealed image pursued her with unrelenting stamina, finding her wherever she hid, while she ineffectively struggled to elude him. His determination knew no bounds.

Violet woke in the night feeling like her chest was being crushed beneath the panic that settled over her. She convinced herself, after checking her window again, and making sure the cop was still awake outside, that it was just a dream. That her faceless assailant couldn't stay that way forever, that eventually he would be caught.

But until that time, Violet knew she would be fearful of closing her eyes for too long.