“You don't have to tell me. God, I want to get out of here so bad, but I don't know how.” She shrugged and let her head hang.
“Hey, don't do that.” Grant put a finger under her chin and tipped her face up. “You're the only ray of sunshine around here. Don't let this place beat you.”
“I'm not college material and I don't know anything else to do with myself. I thought about dancing, you know.” She pantomimed a pole dance with such a goofy look on her face that Grant had to laugh. “But that ain't me.”
“There's always a way. You just have to hang in there until you figure out what it is.” Grant's thoughts turned to Cassie. Was there a way out for her? Did she even want one, or was she going to come back and choose Carl? He kicked himself. Stupid. Cassie had made her choice, and a part of him was happy for her. She was smart enough to get away from everything, for a little while at least, even if that meant getting away from him too. So be it. He turned his attention back to Jazy.
By the time they'd downed a few beers, a half a rack of ribs, and the crunchiest, greasiest onion rings he'd ever eaten, he had managed to put Cassie out of his mind. Jazy wanted to know everything about him, his life, and the problems with his father. She laughed at all the right places and kept touching his arm in a familiar way. She adored the idea that he was a musician and made him promise to play for her soon. When her hand crept down to his lap, he knew it was time to leave. He left enough cash on the table to cover their check plus a generous tip, and followed her out the door, his eyes only drifting from her hips long enough to see two young men grin and give him the thumbs-up.
He smiled as he closed the door. Maybe things were finally looking up for him.
Chapter 13
“This is it.” Grant ushered Jazy inside the cabin, closed the door behind them, and locked it, vowing that any Stallard who interrupted them would pay in blood.
“Not bad,” she said, looking around. “I've never been up to this part of the mountain. It's nice and quiet here away from town.” She turned and draped her arms around his neck. “Very romantic.”
He drew her close and pressed his lips to hers. They fell onto the old couch, arms and legs entwined. He ran his hands up and down her body, half his mind refusing to give up thoughts of Cassie and the other half marveling at Jazy's fine curves. That second half quickly won out and he pulled the t-shirt off over her head. Passion lent them urgency and it was no time before they were both naked and thoughts of any kind beyond the carnal found no further purchase in Grant's beer-buzzed brain. He forced himself to take his time, let all his frustrations and concerns boil away in an unquenched furnace of desire.
By the end they had migrated to the rug in front of the big fireplace. Grant wanted to get up and light it, but their bodies were still hot and glistened with a fine sheen of sweat, and he was reluctant to remove Jazy's head from his chest, or her leg from where it lay hooked over his. She ran a finger in gentle swirls over his belly, sending pleasant shivers through his body.
“You wanna take me away for a few days?” she asked dreamily.
Grant frowned. That seemed like a strange and sudden request. “Take you away?”
“Sure. You know, go somewhere fun and exciting. I know I have to work my own way out of this shitty town, but maybe you and I could take a few days, you know? We can have some more fun like this, and maybe I'll get some ideas for my escape plan.” She brushed his earlobe with her soft lips, making him shudder with pleasure.
He tried to ignore the urge that was already stirring again inside of him, and focused on the moment and her request. He wanted to say something along the lines of I hardly know you, why would we go away together? but given what they had just done, that seemed like the wrong way to go. “I dunno, I have a still lot to sort out here,” he said. “Maybe we could, you know, just hang out around here, and maybe go away in a week or so once I've got everything straightened out?”
She pushed herself up onto one elbow, and stretched, displaying her figure to full effect. Her hazel eyes, suddenly flinty, gazed at him through a curtain of tousled hair. “I got me the wanderlust.” She whispered the last word like an incantation. “I want to be spontaneous. Let's go right now! The cabin will still be here when we get back.”
He reluctantly tore his gaze away from her amazing breasts. “Right now?”
“Yeah! Let's get in that hot car of yours and just go somewhere. It don't have to be anywhere fancy. I just want to go.”
Grant laughed to cover a sudden unease. Guilty thoughts of Cassie flitted through his mind and Jazy's strange insistence on going away raised uncomfortable suspicions. From the corner of his eye he saw his shirt draped over the arm of the sofa and the material of the top pocket shifted and bucked. He winced and pulled Jazy in for a kiss before she could notice. As they moved apart again, he rolled her over to his other side to put her back to the hideous dismembered finger and brushed back her hair. “I'm too beat to drive anywhere right now,” he said. “Why don't we talk about it again in the morning?”
She pouted, but nodded. “Sure. But what are you gonna do to keep me entertained till morning?” She sat up, straddled his hips and put her palms on his chest. She shifted back and forth, eyes alive with a mischievous gleam.
Grant refused to give a moment's notice to the thoughts tumbling over each other in his mind and reached up for her again.
The dawn pushed shadows from the bedroom. They had retreated to the comforts of the bed at some very late hour of the night. Or early morning depending how one measured such things. Grant watched Jazy sleeping, half-covered by the sheets. She was one gorgeous girl, but the cold and sober light of day brought with it troubling concerns.
He slipped from the bed, careful not to rouse her, and tiptoed out into the front room. He began searching through boxes and it wasn't long before he pulled out a small paperback volume. Ancient Mysticism in Appalachia by Professor Charles McKenzie. His mind buzzed as he imagined his father checking the book out of the library. He thought of the horrible leatherbound volume the Stallards had stolen. The blackened finger they had missed. Coupled with this book, his own concerns and Cassie's nightmares, not to mention McKenzie's violent death, everything about Wallen's Gap took on a darker hue. And something else, something that had been bothering the edges of his conscious mind for a while that he couldn’t ignore. His father's death. He remembered what the waitress in the diner had said just a few days ago, even though it seemed like a lifetime. So young for a heart attack.
There was no family history of heart disease that Grant knew of and his father had never been a smoker, or a particularly heavy drinker. By the time Grant had arrived in Wallen's Gap, the local doctor had already made the official announcements and the memorial service was for a man already cremated. Grant's hands began to tremble. His father had definitely been a part of this Kaletherex group, but had he perhaps found things he didn't like? Had he learned things he shouldn't have? Had he perhaps not died of a heart attack at all?
Grant shook his head, rubbed one hand back over his hair. This town had him so confused, so many things made no sense. Or seemed to be far more complicated than they needed to be. Was he losing his mind? His thoughts fell to Cassie again and a burning guilt rose up from his gut. He had been so ready to believe Jazy the day before, but now even that seemed unreal. Was checking the book out of the library one of the last things his father had done?