Wraiths of Winter (The Haunting Ruby Series Book 3) (48 page)

“Sure. When I show them the newspaper, they’re both
going to feel like total jackasses. But after that mystery text,
it’s going to be a while before I’m allowed to date again.”

Whoops. I didn’t tell her about the text because I was
afraid that we would argue when I told her who I thought sent
it. Now, I would
have
to discuss it with her—but later tonight
and definitely not with Zach and everyone else in homeroom
within earshot.

As the bell for first period rang, I gave her a quick,
“We’ll talk about it tonight,” and ran out the door before Zach
could approach me.
My life was still far from good, but at
least
things
seemed
to be heading in
the
right direction.
Talking to him today would have been nothing but a step
backward for me.

I got into Shelly’s car with a stony expression even
though I was giggling like a happy little idiot on the inside. I
didn’t want her to know that something was up so I
pretended to be just as grim and unemotional as I had been
since Sunday night.
Curtly, I requested that she stop at the
convenience store so that I could pick up a copy of today’s
newspaper.
She gave me a funny look but pulled into the
parking lot anyway.

I walked through the lot nonchalantly but once inside,
I excitedly asked the first employee I saw to point me in the
direction of the newspapers. As soon as it was in my hot little
hands, I flipped it open and stared with satisfaction at the
front page. “Local Man Imprisoned for Brutal Slayings.” Who
would have thought that such a grim headline could bring a
smile to my face?
Paranoid that the other customers were
asking themselves that very same question, I hurriedly cashed
out and was already out the door before I realized that I didn’t
even wait for my change.
Oh well, what I now held in my
hands was worth the extra quarter I paid for it.

When I got home, I read the story like twelve times.
Although my name wasn’t specifically given, it was mentioned
that the gifts Jackson sent me were what cracked the case
wide open. There, everyone should be satisfied now. I helped
police capture a dangerous psychopath—that ought to be
enough to help me win back my freedom.

I waited until dinnertime to share my surprise. When
Shelly called up the stairs to let me know that our meal was
ready, I tucked the newspaper under my arm and gladly
joined them at the kitchen table. Before I sat down, I tossed it
onto my dad’s still empty plate and took my seat without a
word while I waited for my apology.

“What’s this?” he asked before he caught a glimpse at
the headline.
Once he saw what the story was about, he
buried himself in the paper until he was done reading it.

My apology should be coming any second now. Any
second. Okay, so he was making me work for it. Fine. He had
a hard time saying he was sorry but it would be worth the
wait. Finally, he opened his mouth to release those gushing
words of forgiveness I was expecting but something else came
out.

“This doesn’t mean you’re completely off the hook,
you know. You may not have been lying about this part but it
still doesn’t erase the fact that you keep sneaking boys into
this house without our permission. I’ll let you have your
laptop back but that’s it. You’ll have to earn my trust before
you get the rest of your stuff.”

Disbelief. Complete and utter disbelief. How could he
be so mean to me? He just didn’t understand me at all! He
handed the paper over to a very curious Shelly who gasped
several times while reading the article. When she lowered the
paper, She replied, “I’m sorry I didn’t believe you, Ruby. But
why didn’t you come to us with a problem so huge? Why do
you insist on trying to handle everything all by yourself?”

“Because I was afraid you wouldn’t believe me—looks
like I was right. And I wasn’t handling it alone. I had help
until you guys took them away from me.”
I took a scoop of
mashed potatoes from the bowl and acted like I hadn’t said a
word. “Chicken?” I asked as I held out the plate of barbecued
breasts after taking one for myself. If Dad wanted to act like
he hadn’t done anything wrong, I decided that two could play
that game.

We
ate in
silence and
before I left the table I
announced, “I’m going to IM Rachel and tell her that it’s okay
to come over tonight. I need my laptop back now.”

Shelly looked at my father like a deer caught in the
headlights until he nodded his head in agreement. “I’ll go get
it for you,” she said and headed for the stairs. I followed her
to their room, took the laptop, and ignored her when she tried
to talk to me. At this point, I had nothing to say to either of
them.

I
did
have something to say to Rachel but I decided not
to say it. When she got there and started asking me questions
that I didn’t want to answer, I simply told her the truth.
“You’re here to learn your lines—not grill me
about my
personal life.” My new commanding attitude was working
well. She didn’t ask me about Zach, Lucas, or the mystery text
for the rest of the night. And I especially didn’t want to hear
anything about Valentine’s Day.
Between
scenes,
we
discussed Crimson, Allison, and the Bantam Theater instead.

“Oh, Ruby! I’m just so excited—excited for Drake,
Crimson,
and
for you!
I hated having to ask you to face
Allison’s wrath to help but I didn’t know what else to do.
They’re going to find Crimson alive—I
know
they are. I may
not be able to see ghosts like you can but I just know that if
she were already dead, I would be able to feel it. I haven’t told
anyone else this because I thought they would think I was
weird, but the day Grandma Mason died, I sensed it. I woke
up feeling like I’d lost something but I didn’t know what it
was. As soon as they told me the news, I knew that it was her
that I was missing. I don’t have that feeling about Crimson.
She’s definitely still alive.”

Imagination, that’s all I thought it was. Rachel was so
afraid that Crimson was dead that she found a way to make
herself believe the exact opposite. But since there was a good
chance that she was still alive, I agreed with her.
The only
thing I didn’t want to mention was the fact that with Jackson
in custody, the sand in Crimson’s hourglass was quickly
draining away.

With
only
two weeks
until opening
night,
Rachel
needed to buckle down on learning her lines and I didn’t
hesitate to tell her that—bluntly.
with
everything
else
that was
concentrate on the play. But she definitely needed to. For the
next two hours, I fought to keep her attention. If she didn’t
embrace the role of Kira, her performance was going to be
disastrous.
A bad review would simply kill her confidence
and any hope she had of becoming an actress someday. Just
like with Lucas and Clay, I metaphorically rapped her on the
nose repeatedly to get her to focus. Perhaps in the midst of all

After Rachel left, I got ready for bed slowly.
There
were things in my life that I really needed to put some serious
thought into. Now that I was no longer in danger from ghosts
or gross maintenance workers, all of the big decisions I’d been
avoiding were now approaching the point of unavoidability.
Two big decisions in particular—college and love, however,
not necessarily in that order. In all actuality though, the two
issues were intricately tied together and one large, messy
decision would resolve both problems. But I was too tired to
even solve a Sudoku puzzle tonight, let alone find an answer
to life’s big questions.

As I settled into bed and gave my pillow a quick punch
to flatten it out, my hair got tangled up in my ring. “Ouch!” I
exclaimed out loud. When I looked down at my promise ring,
I saw that a full ten strands or more of my once perfectly
straightened hair were now woven around the stones instead
of attached to my scalp like they should have been. Angrily, I
unwound them and let them float to the floor. I slid the ring
from
my
finger and
placed it in
the top
drawer of my
nightstand before turning out the lights.

The cold shoulder—aside from Rachel, that’s what I
was giving everyone in my life.
I was still mad at my parents
for not believing me. I was mad at Lucas for barely talking to
me after the incident with my dad. Sure, I understood that he
was probably a little bit afraid to talk to me. My dad was a
surgeon after all and unlike most pissed off fathers, fully
capable of castrating
him
if he
came anywhere near his
daughter. That fact acknowledged, I still didn’t see why he
wasn’t at least talking to me at school. I was mad at Zach for
so many reasons that I could barely keep track of them all.

As Valentine’s
Day drew closer, I found myself
becoming more bitter and cynical with each passing moment.
While two boys both claimed to love me, neither one of them
seemed capable of showing it.
As I walked out of my last
period math class on Wednesday, I “accidentally” ripped the
Cupid Cotillion poster off of the door and deposited it into a
garbage can on my way to my locker. They really
should
have
named it the Stupid Cotillion because love was for dreamers,
idiots, and fools.
People with brains should never listen to
their hearts. Never.

By the time Thursday morning arrived, I seriously
wanted to stay home from school.
Love was in the air and
there I was caught without my gas mask. While everyone else
seemed happy and excited for the infernal holiday, Rachel and
I were the only exceptions. She had Boone—what reason did
she
have for being depressed? Even she was starting to get on
my nerves—until I finally asked her what was wrong.

“Jackson still hasn’t told the police where Crimson is!”
she said through teary eyes. “They searched all of the places
he’s familiar with—his apartment building, the campus, and
even the Bantam. There isn’t a single trace of her anywhere!”

Okay, so she
did
have a legitimate excuse for her
depression. “I wish I could help, Rachel, but I just don’t know
what else there is for me to do. I’m sorry.”

“I know you are, Ruby,” she replied with a sigh.
“You’ve already done more to help than most friends would
even dream of doing. I guess it’s time for me to except the
truth—she’s probably dead and they may never find her body.
It’s such a shame that someone with so much beauty and
talent should have to die like that.”

There wasn’t anything I could say to make her feel
better. Considering Jackson’s methods of torture, Crimson
was tied up somewhere and slowly starving to death at this
very minute. So I did the only thing a best friend
could
do—I
gave her a hug and invited her over to hang out again after
dinner.

“Make that
you
have rehearsal tonight. I’m just a stage
hand and I’m not risking my life to set up props anymore. It’s
okay—I’ll make some popcorn and watch a movie or
something. You can drop by for a few minutes on your way
home if you want to though.”

“Thanks again but I’m going to Boone’s for a bit after I
leave the theater to exchange Valentine’s Day gifts.” She
paused for a moment and then asked quietly, “No plans with
Zach tonight?”

She had to go and ask that dreaded question, didn’t
she? I shook my head briskly and said, “No. I have to get
going—Shelly’s waiting for me in the parking lot. My car’s
still impounded indefinitely.” I reached into my locker and
grabbed my jacket and bag. With a dramatic flair, I tossed my
math book onto the shelf and slammed the door shut. Solving
extra equations to get my mind off of things wasn’t going to
do the trick for me tonight. Now that I knew I wasn’t about to
be murdered by an actual serial killer, I was in the mood for a
good old fashioned horror movie. No ghost stories obviously,
but curled up watching a nice chainsaw wielding, machete
brandishing gore fest was how I wanted to spend the rest of
my Valentine’s Day. Oh and chocolate—I definitely needed
some hardcore chocolate.

When I got home from school, I found that Dad had
reinstalled all of the doors to the attic. No one commented on
it so I figured that he was slowly realizing that he jumped to
conclusions and acted irrationally but wasn’t ready to admit
that to me yet. My phone and car were the only things left to
be returned but they were the two things that I missed the
most. As soon as dinner was over, I ran upstairs to start my
horror marathon. I turned on the TV then went through my
movie collection to find the bloodiest of the bunch. Once I’d
made my selection and slid it into the Blu-Ray, I remembered
that I never watched the evening news that I recorded the
night Jackson was arrested. My craving for horror movies had
to go on hold for a few minutes so I could see what they had
to say about him.

The news of his arrest was their opening segment. I
cranked up the volume and sat on the floor directly in front of
the screen so that I wouldn’t miss a thing. The story was quite
lengthy and the anchorman left out no details of anyone
involved with the case, except for me of course. It was simply
mentioned that a potential fourth victim produced crucial
evidence that led to his arrest. At the end, they mentioned
that
Jackson
was
taken
into
custody
at
his
place
of
employment, the soon to be reopened Bantam Theater. That’s
when they replayed a portion of the clip that I recorded the
news for in the first place.
As I watched the camera pan
across the balcony, it finally hit me. I knew
exactly
where to
find Crimson.