Wraiths of Winter (The Haunting Ruby Series Book 3) (31 page)

24. The Dirty Hands of Fate

I walked into school on Monday with my chin up,
determined to do just one thing—put some distance between
me and Lucas. But you can’t fight fate, apparently. When I
tried to avoid him, he seemed to be everywhere. I took the
long way to class and he was around the first corner. I went
to the library during study hall to work on my English paper
that was due Friday and there he was doing some research of
his own.
At lunch, I begged Mr. Raspatello for permission to
use one of the open computer labs so I could work on the final
draft of that paper and somehow Lucas ended up there, too.
Apparently, I couldn’t fight fate.

Rachel had good news for me that she refused to
share at school. Finally. Something good to take my mind off
of all the negative thoughts I’d been having. She was going to
stop off at Boone’s house for a few minutes and then head
straight over to Rosewood. I barely had my coat off though
when there was a knock at the door. Bring on the good news!

As the door swung open, I saw that it wasn’t Rachel
after all. It was the one person I’d been trying to avoid all
day—Lucas.
There he stood in his black leather jacket and
sunglasses—his dark hair ruffling in the wind like the cover
model on a cheap romance novel. Cliché, yes. Unappealing,
hell to the no! In fact, he was about as hot as I’d ever seen
him. I guess those models were cliché for a reason—that look
definitely
worked! But what was he doing here?

He lifted his sunglasses and settled them on top of his
head revealing his warm brown eyes. “Hey, Ru. Sorry to
bother you but I was wondering if I could borrow your math
book tonight.
I forgot to grab mine out of my locker and I
couldn’t help but notice that you carry yours around with you
like it’s a bible.”

I breathed a sigh of relief.
All he wanted was my
book—I could handle that. “Just a second, I have to dig it out
of my bag.” He was right. I did bring it home some nights
even when I didn’t have to. There was something about
solving equations that I found soothing.
They were neat,
orderly
and
always
had
a rational solution—three things
distinctly missing in my life. I left the front door hanging wide
open while I dug around in my bag. It was probably best not
to invite him in. You know, just in case.

Then fate walked into the entry hall and dipped its
nasty fingers into my life. Okay, so it was actually Shelly who
walked in but she did have something for me that threw me
way off track.

“Ruby! I know you weren’t raised in a barn—shut
that door its freezing outside!” she declared as she walked in
from the kitchen.
When she got close enough to see Lucas
standing just on the other side of it, she reamed me out again.
“Where are your manners? Invite him in for heaven’s sake!
I’ve seen popsicles frozen less solid than him!”

I knew Shelly wasn’t a big fan of Lucas but apparently
her southern hospitality wasn’t to be suppressed by this.
“Sorry, Lucas. Come on in,” I muttered without looking at him.
Looking at him was unadvisable.
When I looked at him, I
started thinking bad things. Really bad things.

He closed the door behind him and took a seat on the
bottom step while I rummaged through my bag for my math
book. My bag wasn’t that big, why was it taking me so long to
find it?
Oh yeah, right. It was because he made me nervous.
Real nervous. Pee your pants kind of nervous. It was the kind
of nervous you got when the boy you really, really, really liked
started
talking
to you and
you
said something
stupid in
response.
Trying to avoid Lucas only seemed to be making
my situation worse.

When I calmed down enough to identify the book I
was looking for, I turned around and handed it to him. “Here
you go. Just don’t forget to give it to me in the morning—I
can’t live without my bible, you know.” Dork. I had better
lines than that one, why couldn’t I find a single one to use
now?

Lucas replied with a grin, “Like I could forget you if I
tried.”

I could feel my cheeks blushing at his comment.
It
was a flattering thing to say and I forgot Shelly was still in the
room.
When she cleared her throat purposefully to get my
attention, I got even more embarrassed.

“Here, Ruby,” she said handing me two envelopes—
one thick and the other thin. “These came for you today.”

She handed them to me face down and returned to the
kitchen. I flipped over the thick one first. It was from Trinity
College—the school Lee and I chose so long ago.
Everyone
knew what thick letters
meant—they meant you
were
accepted.

I ripped open the envelope to find that I was right and
let out a little squeal. “I’ve been accepted to Trinity College!”
But why was I so excited? Pendleton was the school Zach and
I picked—the one we were planning the next four years of our
life around.

“Really?” Lucas replied curiously. “So was I.”

Shut the front door. And no, not because it was cold
outside, either. Trinity College wasn’t that popular—what
were the chances that anyone else from Charlotte’s Grove
even applied there?
Or even knew where it was, for that
matter? Figures. Every inch of space I tried to put between us
brought us another foot closer together.

“You’re kidding, right? That’s the school Lee and I
decided we wanted to go to years ago.” Dead or not, Lee and
Lucas still seemed to have some kind of weird twin sense like
Zach and Rachel did.

“Not kidding,” he replied. “I got my letter on Friday.”

So fate smiled down upon us. But it wasn’t a happy
“everything is right with the world” kind of smile. It was
more like a “see what happens when you try to cross me” kind
of sneer.
How much longer could I tempt that malicious
force?
With my luck, the front door would suddenly blow
open and a strong wind would knock him right into me and
“oops, there goes my virginity”. How would I explain
that
one
to Zach?

“I’m not sure I’m actually going there, though,” I said
coolly. “Pendleton is where Zach and I really want to go.”

 

“Oh, so why did you even apply to Trinity then?”

Good question.
Not so good of an answer.
What
would he say if I told him I applied there to put distance
between Zach and me?
It was months ago and a decision
made under extreme duress but that was still the reason why
I did it. Once it was done, I couldn’t
un
do it. All I could do was
hope for similar good luck with Pendleton.

I shrugged my shoulders casually. “I don’t know—I
just did.”

Lucas stood up and tucked the math book under his
arm.
He took one step forward so that we were face to face
and only inches away from each other. “I think you know
why. You’re just not ready to admit it to yourself. But when
you are—” he lowered his voice to a whisper, “You’ll know
exactly where to find me.” He flipped his sunglasses down
from where they were perched on his head and walked out
the door.

No, I’d made up my mind—I was going to Pendleton
with Zach.
We were getting an apartment together and we
were going to live happily freakin’ ever after.
The end. With
renewed determination, I gathered up my stuff and started up
the stairs.
When I reached the
second
floor landing,
something fell out of my hand and fluttered to the floor. It
was the second envelope—the one I’d forgotten all about in
my excitement.

It fell face up with the return address staring at me
with a wicked taunt—Pendleton University.
Nothing good
ever came from letters that thin. I opened it hastily and read
until I got to the “we regret” part. I didn’t get in—all I got was
Fate’s middle finger jammed in my face. How in the world
was I going to break the news to Zach?

No sooner was I upstairs in my room than Rachel was
knocking on the front door. Hauling my ass back down the
steps, I tried to decide what to do. Starting college a semester
late wasn’t a crime but I knew Dad would see it as just that.
He would be afraid that once I got a job and started making
some real cash, I wouldn’t want to go back to school. Zach
would be disappointed and he would feel like it was his fault
that I was throwing my life away. Dammit!
I had to do what
was right for
me
—I just didn’t seem to know what that was
anymore.
Maybe I
never
knew, maybe I just thought I did.
One thing was clear, though—I’d dug myself a deep hole on
this one.

When I opened the door, Rachel burst inside with a
gale force.
Her unfettered enthusiasm was exactly what I
needed right now.
And since her good news was the only
good news I was going to get, apparently, I was ready to ditch
my problems and hear what she had to say.
thought I was.
I stashed the letters
from
Or at least I

Trinity
and
Pendleton under my bag on my desk and asked her for the
information she’d kept secret from me all day.

“Okay, so I didn’t want to say anything until I knew it
was official but now that it is, I can tell you. They let Drake
out on bail today! His parent’s seem to think it’s a good sign
that the police don’t have enough evidence against him.
Because of his status, they set the bail high—over a million
dollars high—but he’s out!” She said every last word in one
breath and by the time she was done, she needed mouth to
mouth.

“That’s good—maybe they have another suspect and I
can cut the cloak and dagger routine at the Bantam.” I should
have been a little more enthusiastic. But, hey, at least I was
trying.

“Maybe, but not yet at least. I know you’re scared of
that place—I am, too!
But unless they drop the charges, we
still have more work to do.”

We? What was this “we” crap? I was the one in real
danger here. I was the one in the crosshairs of a wraith intent
on exacting “soulless revenge”. My life was the one getting
toppled over like a house of cards in a hail storm—not hers.

“Yeah, about that—,” I began, ready to tell her my real
thoughts on the subject. But I didn’t. Things were already too
complicated to start another senseless argument with her.
Instead, I decided to tell her about a nagging feeling I had
about Sunday night.

“So I get the feeling that I’m missing an important clue
from
what happened at
the theater last night.
Like the
answer’s right in front of me but I just can’t quite make it out
yet.”

Rachel pondered my statement for a moment, twirling
her hair around her finger. “Like what?”

 

I shook my head in frustration. “I don’t know—just
something.”

“Well, I can’t help you there. You’re the one with the
supernatural powers—not me.
If I had something to go on
maybe, but ‘just something’ isn’t a good start.”

She was right. What I had was nothing. I wasn’t
psychic. I could communicate with the dead—that’s all. And
poorly at best.
That feeling
was
probably
just due to
exhaustion. My brain
had
been working overtime lately. Even
sleep wasn’t a safe place for me to hide.

So I changed the subject. “So how’s memorizing your
lines coming? Rehearsal seems to get cut short almost every
night now.”

“I know, right? I could use some more help if you have
the time.” She gave me those same mesmerizing eyes Zach
always gave me and I couldn’t say no.

“Okay, but just for an hour or two—I have some
French homework I have to finish. And Biology, too.” Little
did she know that Lucas bought her my help by taking my
math book away from me for the night.

We ran lines until almost six o’clock then she headed
home for dinner. Dad brought home Moo Goo Gai Pan from
Chow Ming so I snagged a container and took it to my room to
eat while I did homework. The letter from Pendleton still sat
on my desk as I worked—burning into me like it was the
Scarlet Letter.
It was a reminder of a time when I thought
getting away from Zach was the right thing to do. Was it still?
What if all those times I thought I was being a martyr by
letting
go of
him
for his
own
good,
I was
actually just
following the path that I was meant to take?

I scribbled out my assignments in one big sloppy mess
and closed my books.
I had a decision to make.
Then my
phone buzzed twice with two incoming calls—Zach and Lucas
both. Make that two decisions. With no hesitation, I chose to
ignore Lucas and talk to Zach instead.

“Ruby! I got a letter in the mail today—a nice fat one!
Wanna guess who sent it?”

No, not really.
Even though Zach had his doubts, I
always
knew he
would
have
no
problem
getting
into
Pendleton. He was way smarter than he gave himself credit
for.
Zach thought I was the smart one but he was wrong. I
mean, which one of us was stupid enough to not apply by the
deadline?

“You got into Pendleton, didn’t you? I knew you
would. Congratulations.” I didn’t want to dampen his
excitement by telling him that I didn’t but I knew I had to. He
deserved at least a few minutes of happiness, though, so I held
off.

“Thanks! You should be getting your acceptance letter
any day now, I’m sure. I figure when the weather gets a little
nicer we can drive up there and take a look at the campus,
maybe scope out some of the apartment buildings, too.
Their
website says there are nice one bedroom apartments within
walking distance of practically everything. You just have to
find a way to break the news of us living together to your dad.
But be sure to warn me ahead of time—I’d prefer to be a few
counties away when you drop
that
bomb.”