Dead Girls Don't Lie (23 page)

“Hold on.” He goes to the back of the room, moves aside the backdrop, and opens a drawer under the cupboard. He pulls out a white dress. “This was my mom’s.”

“Oh.” The idea of putting on his dead mother’s dress kind of freaks me out.

He must realize how strange this is for me. “Not
hers
hers. She used it as a costume for some of the pictures she took, but I think it will fit you.”

“Why do I have to—”

“Trust me. You’ll see.” He hands me the dress and then heads toward the door. “You have ten minutes and then I’m coming in, whether you’re ready or not.”

I still feel stupid, but it feels good to slip out of the too-tight shorts and suffocating tank top and pull the dress over
my head. It’s soft, flowy white cotton with a round neckline and a wide blue ribbon that I cinch tight at the waist because it’s too big. I retrieve my phone from the pocket of Claire’s shorts, frown at the time, 12:45, and slip it into the pocket of the dress.

Then I walk over to the sink and use a paper towel and some soap to scrub off the layers of makeup that Taylor so carefully applied. I look in the mirror above the sink to make sure I don’t have streaks of mascara. My skin looks even paler against the white dress, and the sloppy bun Taylor made is falling out and looks frizzy. I wish again for Rachel’s sleek dark hair and tan.

“I’m coming in,” Skyler announces. I notice Evan’s paper, still sitting on the cabinet. I pick it up and slip it into the dress pocket. The door swings open and I turn. Skyler stands at the door and whistles. “You look amazing.”

“Thank you.” I feel my face get hot, but for once it feels good.

He crosses the room, wraps me in his arms, and kisses me for real, finally finishing where he left me yesterday. “You ready?”

“Since I don’t know what we’re doing, I guess so.”

“Cool.” He reaches behind the door and gets his camera. Then he digs around in a cupboard under the sink and gets a couple of small cylindrical, yellow canisters.

“What’s that?” I ask suspiciously.

“Film for the camera.” He opens a hatch in his camera and puts the film inside.

“What are you planning to do with it?”

He gets an evil glint in his eye. “Trust me.”

“I don’t want to—”

He stops me with a kiss. “Remember, you promised, tonight is mine.” He shoulders his camera bag, puts one arm around my waist, and we walk out of the darkroom.

We walk away from the noise of the party, behind the shed and up a little path. He stops. “How’s your ankle?”

“It’s good,” I answer.

“Let me know if I go too fast.” He pulls me behind him, clinging to my hand. It’s still bandaged with my scarf.

The little dirt path leads to a hill on the far end of the Cross property. I huddle next to Skyler as we pass the duplexes that serve as temporary housing for the migrants that work on Skyler’s dad’s farm. Most of the lights are out, but outside one of them is a little knot of men talking, their cigarettes glowing red. Their eyes follow us as we walk away.

I stumble as the path gets rougher, and Skyler stops. “Is it your ankle?” I shake my head and show him my bare feet. He laughs. “Where are your shoes?”

I look down, embarrassed. “I left them in your darkroom.”

He shakes his head. “I guess I have to carry you again.”

“You can’t. I’m too—” I start, but he picks me up before I can finish. I cling to his neck as he carries me the last few steps up the hill. At the top he sets me down in the middle of a bunch of white wildflowers. I fall back on my butt. Embarrassed, I scramble to get up.

“Wait. Stay there,” he says.

“What?”

“No, seriously.” He takes the camera out of the bag. “You look great.”

I rise up on my knees. “Remember, I hate pictures. I always come out looking horrible.”

“But I’m a great photographer, remember?” He kneels down next to me and twists a piece of my hair between his fingers. “Besides, your looking horrible is not possible. Just relax.” He pulls out the bun Taylor spent half an hour on and runs his fingers through my hair. “The moonlight behind your hair makes it look like a halo. Lie back.”

“What?”

“Trust me.”

I lie down among the wildflowers. He brushes through my hair with his fingers until it circles my head. “Relax. You look like you’re in pain.”

“There’s a rock under my head.”

He laughs. “Pretend it’s a pillow. Close your eyes.”

I close my eyes and try to relax. He runs his finger over my lips, and I open my eyes. He shakes his head. “Eyes closed. Pretend you’re having a really great dream.” I close my eyes again. “Are you dreaming about me?”

“You!” I open my eyes and beat my fist on his chest.

He stops my fist and then holds my hand against his chest. “Sorry. I couldn’t resist. Please close your eyes and stay still, for me.” His lips curve into a sexy pout that makes his dimples stand out again.

I lie back down and close my eyes, but I can’t relax.
He’s taking forever. “Any day now,” I say with my eyes scrunched shut.

“Hold on a second more, I’m waiting for the perfect expression. This is film, so I don’t have unlimited pictures.”

I try to think of something nice, something that will make me look like I’m having a good dream. All I can think of is how cold the ground is, how hard the rocks are under my head, and what will happen if my dad finds out I went to another party, or worse, that I’m here alone with Skyler. Then he kisses me. As soon as his lips touch mine, everything else rushes from my head. I smile and he takes the picture.

“Perfect,” he says.

“Mmmm, yeah,” I murmur. Then I sit up, embarrassed. “How will you know if it’s perfect until you get it developed?”

“That’s the fun part of taking real pictures, the anticipation.” He puts the camera in the bag and lies down next to me. “And if it doesn’t work, we’ll come back again.” He slides his arm under my head, cradling it against the rocks. “And again.” I snuggle up next to his body and forget about being cold. “And again.”

“That sounds nice,” I say as he nuzzles up against my cheek.

He kisses my cheek. “It does, doesn’t it?”

“But I want a picture too, and I’m not as patient as you are.” I pull my phone out of my pocket and then lie down on his arm again. I hold it above us and snap a picture. I look at it. I don’t look stiff or horrible in this one either, just happy.

He reaches for the phone. “Let me see.”

I hold it out of his reach. “If I have to wait, so do you.”

“Oh yeah?” He buries his face in my neck and blows on it. It tickles, so I start laughing. He reaches for my phone again, straddling my waist and pinning one of my arms against my body. I’m trying to get away, trying to hold the phone out of his reach, and laughing so hard that I’m crying. He leans over so his face is close to mine. I stop laughing and look into his eyes. He brushes the hair out of my face, curling it around my ear and sliding his hand down my cheek. “You’re beautiful, you know that?” he says.

His expression is so intense that I don’t even close my eyes when he leans in and his lips touch mine. I kiss him back, dropping my phone and wrapping my arms around his neck, pulling him closer to me. He relaxes his body on top of mine so our legs are tangled together, my bare toes sliding against the cool leather of his boots. He moves his hands down my back, and I close my eyes, letting go of everything—all the pain of losing Rachel, all the frustration at not knowing what happened, all the pressure of being the good girl who always does everything right.

I let it all go, just for a few seconds, just until I feel something desperate about the way he’s kissing me, and I feel it in the way I’m kissing him back. I want to keep going. I want to close my eyes and melt into him and forget everything. But I can’t. I’m too afraid that this will get out of my control like everything else.

“Stop.” I push his mouth away from mine. His lips move down my neck, leaving feathery, butterfly-wing kisses that churn up everything inside me again. “Stop. Please.”

He finishes one last kiss on my shoulder, so soft and tender that for a heartbeat I regret pushing him away. He rolls onto his back and stares up at the sky, breathing hard. “I’m sorry, Jaycee. I don’t want you to think that’s the reason I brought you up here. I just …” He breathes out. “Wow.” He rolls over on his arm and his expression changes. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah … I just … we need to do something else.” I stand up, brushing dirt and dried grass off my back.

He picks up my phone and hands it to me, his hand lingering on mine. “I have an idea.”

“What?” I say. His eyes are full of mischief again.

He picks up his camera bag and twists it over his arm. “You want to go into the darkroom with me, see what develops?”

I laugh, glad to get rid of some of the tension. “Is that some kind of photographer’s pick-up line?”

“Yeah, that’s exactly what it is. I actually heard Evan use it once. So, do ya wanna?”

“Do I wanna what?”

“Go to the darkroom with me.” He indicates his camera. “I could show you how to develop the film so you could see for yourself how beautiful you are.”

“How long is that going to take?” I ask.

“About a half hour, depends on how fast of a learner you are.”

“Sure,” I say. “I’m always open to new developments.”

“Ugh.” He rolls his eyes. “That one was worse than mine.”

“You have to hook the leader on the little tabs, here.” Skyler is trying to guide my fingers, but I can’t seem to make them work right.

“Does it have to be so dark?” The darkroom is so black I can feel it pressing around me like a fog.

“Absolutely pitch black, or you’ll end up with a black strip and no pictures.” He moves my hand to the other side of the plastic film roller. “There, I think you’ve got it. Start turning the crank.”

I roll the film out onto the little wheel while Skyler keeps his hand on my wrist. For a second I wonder what my dad would think about me fumbling around in the pitch black with Skyler, but I guess it’s better than what we were doing in the meadow. The wheel starts clicking.

“Okay, you’re done. Now we can put it in the developer tank. The lid has a seal that keeps light out, so we can turn the light back on. If you really want to.” He touches my face and then kisses me, but he misses and ends up kissing my nose.

I giggle and lift my mouth up to meet his. “I think we’d better.”

“Right.” He turns on the light and sets the canister on the cabinet. “Now we put the developer in and let it work for fifteen minutes, but we have to agitate it.”

“You mean like make it angry?” I giggle again. I’m not sure how late it is, but the lack of sleep is getting to me and making me act silly.

He starts pouring in the developer. “No. I mean you have
to shake it. But you have to get it just right; the more you shake, the higher the contrast.”

“So it has to be ‘shaken, not stirred’?” I say in a bad James Bond imitation.

He starts moving the bottle back and forth. “Something like that.” He shakes his head. “How come you’re so silly tonight? Are you sure you didn’t have anything to drink at the party before I got there?”

I can’t tell if he’s kidding. “No. I just get loopy when I’m tired. Once when I slept over at Rachel’s we got so silly that we made this video,
The Jay and Ray Show
. We told really stupid jokes and laughed until we almost peed our pants. I wonder if she still has it. I mean …” As soon as I say it, I realize my mistake, Rachel doesn’t still have anything. “I wonder how long she kept it.”

Skyler looks sad for me. “You miss her a lot, don’t you?”

“All the time.”

“I’m sorry.”

I spin the desk chair around and make an effort to lighten the mood again. “It’s not your fault. But it feels good to forget it all for a while and just be here with you.”

He kneels down in front of me, stopping the chair from spinning. He crosses his arms over my legs and looks up at me. His eyelashes frame his blue eyes, and for a second I glimpse the innocent little boy I saw in the picture. “I wish I could help you forget it all forever. I wish I could take you away from here, someplace where you’ll never have to be sad again.”

I rest my elbows on the arms of the chair and lean on my hands. “Now you’re the one who’s drunk. There isn’t any place like that.”

He stands up, kisses me on the top of the head, and goes back to the bottle. He looks so sad that I wish I hadn’t said anything. “If there were a place like that, would you go there with me?”

“Definitely.” I spin the chair again. “Actually, that sounds kind of perfect. Can we go there tonight?”

He puts the bottle down and crosses the room to me again. He traces my lips with his finger. “Maybe not tonight, but someday, I promise.”

Chapter 25

I’m frozen. Backed against a wall that’s wet with paint. Someone is in the curtains, his back to me. Rachel screams from upstairs and he turns. His eyes, blue and hard, fall on my face for a second before he slips away.

My eyes flutter open, and I’m face to face with another pair of blue eyes. I scream.

Skyler startles backward. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I was just watching you sleep.”

“What time is it?” The darkroom is pitch black. I dig for my phone. It says 4:45.

I don’t remember falling asleep. I remember Skyler getting a pillow and blanket out of the cupboard, saying that he sometimes slept in the darkroom when his dad was mad at him. I remember him lying on the floor beside me while he explained about little silver crystals clinging to the places where the film was exposed to light. I remember watching him move the bottle back and forth hypnotically and me getting sleepier and sleepier while I lay against his chest.

“I have to get back. Now!” I scramble to my feet.

Skyler scrambles with me. He stands up and heads to the door. “I’ll get my truck. Meet me behind the barn in five minutes. Where you met me before.” He goes outside and breaks into a run.

I stuff my phone in my pocket. We are so so busted. I can already picture Dad’s face, pinched with pain and disappointment, as he escorts me onto a plane that will take me to live with Mom and away from Skyler forever.