I might be inclined to agree with that assessment, except Devon’s paying absolutely no attention to me, not waiting for praise or recognition. He’s thoroughly absorbed in his sketch, hand moving swiftly over the page.
Jesus, Jo, he knows you’ve had a rough day. Maybe he’s just trying to be kind. Ever heard of it?
Rolling my eyes at myself, I tear open a box of peanut butter granola bars and pull one out, ignoring the phone.
I want to call the hospital, see if Izzy made it. If the EMTs were able to get her out of there in time. I want to call Chessa, just because. The need to reestablish my connection to my normal life pulses in me, growing more intense by the minute. It’s as if I need that tether to keep from floating away into this… insanity.
But right now, Chessa thinks I’m with Carter. Safe and sound and screwing up my life with more unrequited love and longing looks. I don’t want to have to explain why that’s not the case and where I actually am. Not to mention who I’m with.
I study Devon, the concentration in his expression, the dimple that has appeared next to his pursed lips.
“What are you drawing?” I ask, through a mouthful of granola.Attractive, Jo.
I don’t care about being attractive to him.
Uh-huh.
Devon looks up, startled, then uncomfortable. “It’s just how I make sense of things,” he says, color rising in his cheeks. He starts to close the black plastic cover of the sketch pad.
“Can I see?” I ask, more intrigued by this glimpse of vulnerability than the drawing itself.
Reluctantly, he pulls the cover back open and holds the pad out to me. I dust my hands off on my sweats before taking the sketchbook and settling on the edge of the bed.
On the white page, the south end of Beecher’s campus is rendered in tiny but precise detail. The ivy on Hayes and P. Edgars, Branwick’s gabled roof, the columns on Theta Iota, the lines demarcating the sidewalk out in front of Delta Pi Gamma. The Foreign Language House down the street looks as squat and dumpy as it does in real life.
He’s even got crows perched in the trees over the old cemetery.
It’s like his brain took a picture and this is the output, one of those instant cameras, only with pencil and paper.
“Holy shit,” I say before I can stop myself.
He flushes and reaches out to take the pad away from me.
I hold it out of reach. “No, it’s perfect.” Beautiful. Artistic, but not in the way that artists play with lines and shadow or bending reality, more like a ship in a bottle. Life in perfect miniature.
“You just… in the car you mentioned that it seemed like the spawn was following you. I thought it would be good to see it, laid out in one place.” He’s marked the side garden of Branwick and thefront yard of the Delta Pi Gamma with tiny red stars, like splashes of blood. Which is not inaccurate.
“Maybe they’ll close your campus now, send everyone home,” he says.
I shake my head. “I don’t think so. We’ve had deaths on campus before. And they’ve never done that.” Though murder is a new one for Beecher, if you don’t count the stories about a serial killer fifty-some years ago that are more legend than anything. So maybe? I don’t know.
Something about that…
I frown, trying to grasp a thought slipping through the back of my mind, but it squirms past me before I can pin it down.
“It’s interesting that both events happened so close together on one end of campus,” Devon points out, gesturing to the page with his pencil.
“Where I’ve been,” I say flatly.
“Yes, but you’ve been to other places that haven’t been affected.” He gestures for me to turn the page.
On the next page, he has a detailed timeline of yesterday and today written out in neat squared-off letters. Including my Friday classes, my work schedule at Hayes, and the time I arrived at Happy’s.
I raise my eyebrows. “You were spying on me?”
“I was researching,” he corrects with no hint of shame.
He leans closer to me, and I can feel the heat of him against my back. The constant low-level hum of attraction buzzes louder in me. Like my cells are clamoring to touch his.
