Wraiths of Winter (The Haunting Ruby Series Book 3)

by Joy Elbel

  “I wouldn’t have it any other way.” I’d never celebrated New Year’s Eve with anyone other than my dad and Shelly but I always wanted to. “I’ve never had a New Year’s kiss—hint, hint!”

  I could picture his face as he laughed—the way his eyes crinkled at the sides, his lip as it curled ever so slightly to the left. Zach was always gorgeous but there was something special about the way he looked when he laughed. But it wasn’t there for just any dumb joke—that look was only there when I was the one he found amusing.

  “Geez, Ruby—it’s not like you have to twist my arm or anything! Any moments you’ve never shared with anyone else are moments I want you to share with me.”

  “In that case, I’ve never had an Easter kiss or a St. Patrick’s Day kiss. You know, come to think of it, I’ve never had a Valentine’s Day kiss either.”

  “What? I find that one hard to believe. You must have been dating Lee for at least one Valentine’s Day.” “I have the Valentine’s Day curse—no matter what, Lee and I always ended up fighting on that day even before we were officially dating. I’m warning you now—don’t count on that being a romantic day.”

  He laughed again. “I’m going to take that as a challenge. Just you wait, Ruby, I’ll end that curse for you!” There was something I wanted to ask him and something I should have told him but the conversation was going so well that I didn’t want to spoil it. One thing stood out to me, though. Aside from asking me to support him at the funeral, I noticed that Zach hadn’t shared his feelings with me concerning his grandmother’s death. Why? I would have thought mine would be the first shoulder he would have wanted to cry on. I knew he was upset—why didn’t he want to talk to me about it? And the thing I should have told him was that I’d invited Lucas to the party, too.

  When New Year’s Eve arrived, I wished I had. I decided to call Zach that day to prepare him but kept finding reasons to procrastinate. I had to go pick up the karaoke machine Shelly rented for the night, I had to do laundry because my favorite jeans were dirty. Hell, I even changed the litter in Coco’s litter box when it didn’t need changed— anything to put off the inevitable.

  When I saw Zach’s smiling face at the door, I knew I’d made a big mistake. Lucas would be here at any moment and Zach was still clueless. I invited him up to my room so I could tell him before it was completely too late.

  “Zach,” I said in my sweetest voice, “There’s something about tonight that I haven’t told you yet.” The instant smile on his face made me feel even worse. I don’t know what he was thinking but it clearly wasn’t anything to do with what I was about to lay on him. After five more seconds of procrastination, I finally spit it out.

  “I invited Lucas to the party—he’ll be here any minute now.” I knew Zach would never hit me but my first instinct was to duck anyway.

  Smile erased. “What? When did you invite him? More importantly, why did you invite him?” I launched into the details, explaining that it was really only for Chloe’s sake but I could see that he wasn’t buying it.

  “I thought tonight was going to be our night, Ruby! Our chance to start the year off right. Do you know how big of a slap in the face this is to me?”

  I did now. I guess he took his grandmother’s view of the holiday more seriously than I realized. “I’m so sorry, Zach, but I can’t un-invite him now! It’s still our night—you’ll still be the one kissing me at midnight.”

  Zach was about to burst into tears or screams—I couldn’t tell which. Honestly, maybe even both. Before he did though, I excused myself to use the restroom. I didn’t even need to go—I just wanted to give him time to cool down. So I sat down on the closed lid of the toilet for an appropriate amount of time and then flushed just in case he was paying attention. I went back to the living room positive that my plan worked. Until I saw what was in his hands, that is.

  My ruby red hockey skates were staring me in the face the second I walked through the doorway.

  “Where did you get these?” Zach asked, suspicion thick in his voice. Busted. I didn’t tell him about Lucas’s Christmas present because I knew how it would make him feel. If I didn’t come clean about it now, though, Lucas might talk about it in front of Zach and make me look like even more of a liar. So one more time, I told the truth and defended Lucas both in the same breath.

  “He’s trying to buy you, Ruby! It’s obvious to everyone but you! First that fancy French restaurant and now these,” he said shaking the skates in midair. “Hell, in two weeks he’s spent more money on you than I have since we met! I thought you wanted love but if money’s really what you’re after, then you’re better off with him!”

  “Zach, no! It’s not like that at all!” I pleaded defensively. Then it hit me—I never told Zach where Lucas and I ate while we were in Pittsburgh. How did he find out? I switched gears and ran an offensive play.

  “Wait a second—how do you know about the French restaurant?” I had a hunch and I went with it. “You followed us that day, didn’t you?”

  For once, I turned the tables on him. Now Zach was the one with a little bit of explaining to do. I folded my arms across my chest and glared at him.

  “Look, Ruby,” he stammered, “It’s not what you’re thinking—I didn’t follow you because I didn’t trust you. I just wanted to make sure that you were okay.”

  Even homicidal stalkers had good intentions sometimes, didn’t they? He was not getting off the hook that easy. “You can’t watch everything I do for the rest of my life, Zach! You have to learn to trust my decisions!”

  There was a rebuttal brewing in his head and I could almost see it developing word by word. But something changed his mind. He counted down backwards from ten then apologized.

  “You’re right, Ruby. I have to give you your space. I have to let you make the right choices for the right reasons. Even if it’s not the right choice for me.”

  “What do you mean by that? What choices do you think I need to make?” I asked the question but I already knew the answer—the choice between being with Zach or being with Lucas.

  “Never mind that now,” Zach said calmly. “I still want you to be with me at midnight. Can we call a truce?” Gladly. Fighting in private was bad enough—I knew for a fact that I didn’t want to do it with all of our friends and family watching. “Truce.” I took the skates, tossed them into my bedroom and closed the door. “I still want that midnight kiss, by the way.”

  He gave a weak smile which was more than I expected and followed me downstairs. Lucas was walking in the door as we got to the second floor landing so I reached for Zach’s hand to display where my loyalties lay. It didn’t go unnoticed by either of them. Zach gave my hand a squeeze and Lucas averted his eyes.

  I did my best to make Zach the center of my attention. I held onto him lovingly when he reminisced about his grandmother’s view on New Year’s. I looked at no one but him when I sang karaoke. I told him he sounded great when he sang to me even though it was a big, fat lie—anything to make him feel special. I was doing a pretty good job of it, too. He didn’t seem nearly as tense or unhappy. Things were going well until Lucas took the microphone.

  The song he picked was from the eighties and dorky at best but, oh, that voice! His voice was naturally deep—deeper than Zach’s by far—and when he sang he sounded sexy as hell. I didn’t know the song well but I knew enough of the lyrics to get the message. The song was about being in love with someone just out of your reach and he was singing it to me.

  Though the room was still full of laughter and festivity, I could hear only him. Every smooth note, every soulful word cut through straight to my heart. I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. And the way he looked at me—I knew I wasn’t just imagining the emotion behind those lyrics. Lucas was in love with me.

  Zach cleared his throat and woke me from my trance. Did he notice my reaction? Did he make the connection between the song and what Lucas was trying to say to me? What was I thinking? Zach wasn’t stupid—he probably caught on l
ong before I did. Oh God, what am I going to do?

  With only fifteen minutes until midnight, Dad turned on the TV so we could watch the countdown in Times Square. Thank you, Dad! I needed something harmless to focus on, something other than Lucas.

  It was the distraction I badly needed. With the new year merely minutes away, it all seemed like it was going to be okay. Maybe his grandmother was right. Maybe this one night could set the tone for the months to come. Maybe things between Zach and I would find a way to work themselves out. Maybe…I was wrong.

  It all started with the ring of a phone. The ringtone was unmistakable—the theme song to Monday Night Football. Boone was the one with the call. He answered it while joking that his brother must be too drunk to realize it wasn’t quite midnight yet. After the word hello, though, everything changed. Something was dreadfully wrong.

  He put down his phone and stood up. “I have to go guys. The police got a search warrant for our house. I don’t know what they found but Drake’s on his way to jail.” Boone swallowed hard and his whole body quivered. “For murder.”

  The room was silent except for the sounds of celebration pulsing from the surround sound. Once the countdown began, so did the chaos. After Boone’s words sunk in, everyone pitched in with words of support. Rachel started to cry.

  CRASH! Something heavy smashed to the rosewood floor behind me. The remnants of a lead crystal vase lay in jagged pieces on the floor beside Lucas.

  “TEN! NINE! EIGHT!” Lucas bent down to clean up the mess. “I’m so sorry— I’m such a klutz. I bumped into the table and it toppled over. I tried to catch it but I was too late. Can you help me out here, Ru?”

  “SEVEN! SIX! FIVE!” “Don’t worry about it—I’ll get the trash can.” No sooner were the words out of my mouth than I saw a thick line of blood roll down his palm.

  “FOUR! THREE! TWO!”

  “Dammit! Can you get me some towels first?” Lucas asked while trying to keep the blood from hitting the floor. I grabbed a pile of napkins and knelt down beside him. As I wrapped them around the gash, my hand touched his. He was on fire.

  “ONE—HAPPY NEW YEAR!” Our eyes met and I felt dizzy as though I were the one losing gallons of blood. “Happy New Year, Ru,” Lucas whispered.

  “Yeah, Happy New Year, Ruby.” Zach stood above us, even more solemn than he was at the funeral home. I dropped Lucas’s hand and scooted away from him. “I have to get the trash can,” I mumbled and hurried away. I needed that trash can, alright. Where else could I dispose of the splintered remains of my relationship with Zach?

  16. Ghost of a Chance

  The rest of the party was a bust—obviously. Boone and Rachel left to see if there was anything they could do to help Drake, and Garrett and Diane went with them. Rita clearly hadn’t consumed alcohol anytime in this millennium so Andy offered to give her a ride. Chloe had to be home by one, so Lucas drove her home and Chelsea back to her dorm. Dad dragged a drunken Shelly up the stairs with the empty wine bottle still clutched in her hand. That left me and Zach alone in the living room.

  Remnants of the party lay scattered about the room but there wasn’t a hint of our earlier happiness still lingering. We sat silent—so silent that I could make out the faint ticking of the grandfather clock down the hall. What could I say? I knew how he felt about the magical moment the clock rang in the New Year. I knew exactly what he was thinking. It wasn’t my fault that I was with Lucas at that very second. He was a guest in my home—I couldn’t very well let him bleed to death while I kissed Zach, now could I?

  Zach sat on the edge of the couch, a Siberian tiger ready to pounce. His left leg bounced up and down in a nervous rhythm and his eyes remained fixed on the far wall. I sat a few feet away from him growing more apprehensive with each passing second. After what seemed like an eternity, he spoke three small words but they blasted into me like bullets from a revolver.

  “He planned it.” What ? He blamed Lucas for this? “How?” I asked in bewilderment. “He couldn’t possibly have known about Drake’s arrest before Boone even knew! Breaking the vase only seconds before midnight was a coincidence, Zach! You were in the room—you saw the kind of chaos that erupted in here!”

  He still wouldn’t look at me. “Not the part about Drake—he only saw his opportunity and took it. If it hadn’t been that, it would have been something else. He heard me tell everyone about Grandma’s superstition—he knew I believed it. He knocked that vase over so you would rush to his side. Hell, he probably even cut himself on purpose!”

  “Zach! You make him out to be a complete sociopath! It was just an accident!” Though I didn’t care for the things he was saying about Lucas, I was seriously glad that he didn’t blame me.

  “Ruby, I’m telling you I don’t trust him! Until tonight, I wasn’t positive—but now I am. I saw the way he sang to you—I’m not blind, you know.”

  I wanted to play it off like I had no idea what he was talking about but I could feel myself blushing violently. There was no way I could talk my way out of this one.

  “Okay,” I conceded, “Maybe he does have a little crush on me but that doesn’t mean he cut himself to get my attention.”

  “You call that a crush? Seems more like a stalker to me.” He finally turned to look at me and I instantly wished he hadn’t. Calm rage was the only way to describe it. It would have been the perfect time to remind him that he was the one who followed me to Pittsburgh, not Lucas. But I was trying to repair our relationship not destroy it.

  “What he does shouldn’t matter, Zach. I love you! I’m wearing your ring, remember?” I thrust out my hand and pointed to my promise ring. “When you put this ring on my finger, I promised to always be yours. I promised to never take it off and I haven’t. What more do you want?”

  “What I want is for him to leave you alone—to stop playing his games.” We were at an impasse. No amount of arguing could convince him that Lucas wasn’t playing games. I refused to believe that Lucas was anything more than an innocent bystander caught in Zach’s jealousy radar. We had to find a way to agree to disagree.

  “I’ll make you a deal—I’ll agree to only see Lucas at school and the theater if you agree to back off of him. If we’re never alone together, you won’t have anything to worry about.”

  “Fine—but what about finding his birth parents? That was the excuse he kept using to get you to spend time with him.” Zach had all the intensity of a hostage negotiator.

  I forgot about that. A mutual desire to find his parents was the reason Lucas and I started hanging out together in the first place. I couldn’t just give up on that altogether.

  “I’ll put that on hold for a while. Once you see how wrong you are about Lucas, then maybe you’ll be able to let me spend time with him without worrying so much. Deal?” When Zach and I fought, it was like ramming an iceberg into my own chest—bitterly cold and excruciatingly painful. But I refused to give in completely. He had to know that my life was still just that—my life.

  The leg stopped bouncing as the Siberian tiger pranced a few circles around his cage and lay down with his head on his paws. “Deal. Now can I get that kiss I missed or what?”

  I thought he would never ask. Once my lips were entangled with his, the iceberg slowly melted into a warm pond. Which quickly turned into a sizzling hot spring. One more kiss and I was sure that Old Faithful would blow sky high. But as we kissed, Lucas crept into my thoughts. The way he looked at me, the way he sang to me. No! Maybe some distance from him would be a good thing after all.

  What I wanted more than anything in the world was to take Zach upstairs so I could fall asleep beside him. It was a big house—maybe Dad would never notice. With the state she was in, Shelly definitely wouldn’t notice. When I posed my plan to Zach, he hesitated briefly before shooting it down.

  “Even if your parent’s don’t notice, mine will. I’m surprised they haven’t called yet.” Zach checked his watch and sighed. “It’s almost three already—I think I’ve pushed my luc
k about as far as it can be pushed. See you tomorrow?”

  With a disappointed pout, I agreed. “See you tomorrow.” After walking Zach to the door, I returned to the living room one last time. I stared at the spot where the vase once sat and said aloud, “Happy New Year.” Then I turned off the lights and went to bed.

  The first week back to school was a hectic one. Instead of having midterms before winter break like we did at my old school, they were all scheduled for the week after. It was supposed to give us more time to study but let’s face it, no one studied over break. So the first chance I had to discuss things with Rachel was on our way to the first rehearsal at the Bantam on Friday. I wanted to talk to her about the Zach/Lucas situation and get her opinion on what happened with the vase. But understandably so, Rachel’s one track mind was focused on helping Drake and finding Crimson. As a matter of fact, when I mentioned the broken vase, she had no idea what I was talking about.

  “So I’m really counting on you to make contact with Allison tonight, Ruby. Without your help, an innocent man may spend the rest of his life in prison—or worse. They still have the death penalty in Pennsylvania, you know.”

  Great—no pressure there. “I’ll do my best but no guarantees, okay? She wasn’t exactly a great conversationalist last time, don’t forget.” Just thinking about that hideous gaping mouth of hers gave me goose bumps.

  “I know—but anything is better than what we have right now which is nothing.” I was curious about something but I wasn’t sure how to approach the subject. Drake was happy to fill us in on the details of Allison’s disappearance but hadn’t said one word about what happened between him and Crimson the night she went missing. I found that odd. And just what evidence did the police find that made them confident enough to lock him up?

  “So,” I said slowly, “What’s Drake’s side of the story? From Halloween, I mean.” There—that ought to be tactful enough.