Getting out of the shower, I snatch my towel off the hook on the back of the door and wrap it around me. My last call was from Bellamy, so I expect it's Eric's turn now. But when I grab the phone off the counter, it's neither of their names on the screen. Unless I've been standing in the shower for several hours, it's still before dawn, so I'm shocked by the call. Holding my towel in place with one hand, I push the button to connect.
“Jake?”
“I've been calling you for the last twenty minutes,” he starts, almost accusingly.
“I was in the shower. But it's also not even daylight yet. What's going on?” I ask.
Knowing I'm not going to be able to make it back into the shower, I release my towel and reach in to turn off the water. Within seconds the temperature in the bathroom drops. My wet skin intensifies the cold, which at least helps to wake me up.
“I need you,” he says.
That's a sentence a lot of women long to hear murmured to them in the dark of night. But not in that tone.
“Jake, what is going on?” I ask again.
“Something horrible happened. Can you meet me at the bar? Please, Emma.”
Emotion cracks in his voice. He sounds like he's right on the edge, and my training to diffuse tense situations kicks in.
“Alright, Jake. I just got out of the shower, so it will take me a few minutes to get ready. But I'll be there as soon as I can. Is there anything I can bring you?” I ask in a slow, calming voice.
“No. Just you. Please, hurry.”
The call disconnects, and a chill runs through me. Forgoing the stretch pants and sweatshirt I initially brought with me into the bathroom, I rush out of the dissipating steam and into the bedroom. I dress in layers to ward off the biting cold of the early morning air and blast my hair with a blow dryer before rushing out of the cabin.
The drive into town feels longer than it should. The curving driveway and twisting road unfurls in front of me but never seems to get any shorter. Jake's voice was frightening, and my mind is jumbled with different scenarios of what could be happening. Halfway there, icy snowflakes drift down and land on the windshield.
When I finally get onto the main street, I notice Jake standing outside of the bar. He’s leaning against his car with his arms folded tightly over his chest, staring down at his scuffed boots like he's lost to the rest of the world. I pull up in front of his car, and when I'm within a few steps of him, he looks up. As soon as he realizes it's me, Jake rushes toward me, gathering me tightly in his arms and burying his head in my neck. I'm startled but wrap my arms around him and run my hand over strands of long, glossy hair chilled by standing outside in the ice.
“My father's grave,” he whispers, struggling to get the words out. “They destroyed my father's grave.”
“What? Who?”
I take his shoulders and guide him back away from me so I can look into his face. Bloodshot eyes flash back and forth like they can't find anything to rest on. His hands still clench around me. He seems afraid to let go. Snowflakes cling to the tips of his eyelashes and brush his cheeks like they did the first time we stood in the snow. He was gorgeous then. Now he looks drawn and about to crack.
“I don't know. The police just called me. They got a report and went to the cemetery. I want to go see what happened. Will you come with me?” he asks.
“Come with you? To the cemetery?”
“Yes. The police are there, and I want to know what's going on.”
“Maybe that isn't the best idea,” I tell him. “They're investigating.”
“Which is exactly why I should be there. That's my father, Emma. I'm the only one to speak for him. I want to make sure they're respecting him. I need you there with me,” he pleads.
It feels strange, uncomfortable in its disruptive intimacy, but there's so much desperation in his voice I nod.
“Of course. I'll go.”
“Thank you.”
He takes my hand and rushes me around to the passenger door. His hands wrap so tightly around the wheel as he drives that his knuckles turn white. The tendons along the sides of his neck are taut, pressing against his skin so hard they look like they might snap. I want to say something, but don't know what. I'm still not entirely sure what's going on, and I don't want to push Jake any further.
After a few minutes, we leave the main part of town and head into the outskirts. A massive black iron gate looms ahead. With pointed tips and closely arranged bars, the gate is a cemetery cliché I wasn't expecting. Feathered Nest is so small I was expecting a tiny graveyard behind the church or even a family plot tucked in a field somewhere. Instead, the cemetery looks like it contains the final resting places of every citizen who has ever lived within the town.
Set on a gently sloping hill, hundreds of stones, from ancient crumbling monoliths to humble flat markers, fill the grass. But it's hard to focus on any of them with the red and blue lights flashing from the police car parked at the edge of the road.
Jake doesn't even bother to pull up behind the car. He stops his car haphazardly with the nose pointed toward the cemetery gate and the back still hanging in the road before throwing off his seatbelt and tumbling out onto the frozen grass.
As I move to follow him, something tugs on the cuff of my pants. I reach down and feel a piece of metal sticking out from the bottom of the seat that had snagged the fabric. As I release it, my hand hits something under the seat, and an umbrella rolls out. The snow is falling harder, so I grab the umbrella before climbing out of the car to follow Jake.
He's already through the gate and stumbling through the stones. I try to rush to catch up with him, but the ice-glazed grass is slick beneath my feet, and I struggle to stay upright. As I make my way through the grave markers, I notice the yard doesn't seem arranged like others, in sections designated by time. Instead, the graves are interspersed, so the eras of the town mingle with each other. Stones of people from a century ago are right against those only there for a matter of months.
It's why I find Jake leaned against a Celtic cross-shaped stone weathered smooth and sinking into the dirt. His hand grips the side of the stone, but his knees look like they're going to buckle under him. Ahead of him, three men move slowly around the tattered ground. Clods of dirt and torn-up grass scatter the plots around the gaping grave. The stone that stood at the head of the grave lies in three pieces.
Everything in me wants to walk up to the officers meandering around and ask what's happening. But I have to remember they don't know me as a federal agent. They've already made it clear they don't want anyone interfering with the happenings in their town, and I don't think they'd respond kindly to me sticking myself into this. I have to force myself to stand back and glean what I can from the distance.
I slide my hand along Jake's back. “I'm so sorry.”
“Who would do something like this?” he asks. “Why would they do this to my father?”
I shake my head. “It might just be stupid kids. Teenagers like to pull stupid pranks and destroy things because they think it makes them seem cool, or some stupid shit like that. For some reason, they really like to target graves, but…”
“They took his body.”
The words send a chill down my spine.
“What?”
“His body, Emma. It's gone. My father isn't in his grave. Whoever desecrated it took his body.”
Somehow his voice sounds stronger like his shock has reached an intensity that forced his brain to shut down. I've seen it happen many times before. Jake's here. But he's not processing it anymore. I open the umbrella and tuck it into his hand before walking over to the nearest officer. I don't care what they think anymore.