The Darkest Corner (Gravediggers #1)(54)

Friends and family came to lay Delores Schriever to rest. The rain had started up again sometime during the night, so everyone huddled under the tent as the preacher gave the CliffsNotes version of her life. Jo Beth had a freshly colored and styled mane of hair, and she looked an awful lot like Peppermint Patty from the Peanuts gang, only the wet had made the whole thing fall flat so she looked mousier than ever. But Tess had a new respect for Jo Beth after hearing her opinions on Henry the day before. And no one would ever hear it from her about the mechanical bull or the lap dance.

Delores had had a good and fulfilling life, and Tess guessed that, in the end, that's all you could ask for. She waited until the crowd dispersed and then gave Axel and Elias the go-ahead to lower the casket into the grave and fill it with dirt. She left them to the job and then drove the Suburban from the cemetery back two blocks to the funeral home. By the time she finished up the final paperwork and put on an old pair of sweats and her University of Texas T-shirt that was so worn and thin it was indecent, it was well after three o'clock.

That's when her best friend, Miller Darling, showed up with two bottles of wine and her emergency bag of supplies. The emergency bag included a cookie mix, binoculars, chocolate-covered almonds, nail polish, The Breakfast Club, and a forty-eight pack of condoms.

"Emergency" was kind of a loose term where the emergency bag was concerned. It might be brought out for anything from a bad breakup, to PMS, to having weird hairs show up on your body that had never been there before. It was an all-around emergency bag. And Tess hated to even think about how long that forty-eight pack of condoms had been in there unopened. The rest of the supplies had been refilled as the years passed and the movie changed from time to time. 

"My God, would you look at that?" Miller marveled as she peeked out the window of the kitchen. With binoculars. "You think they do that on purpose?"

Miller was wearing a pair of tight jeans and a sleeveless black shirt that draped open in the back, showing the tattoo of an open book on her left shoulder. Her hair was dark brown with several lighter shades woven in-at least for now, since she tended to change it like underpants-and she had it pulled up into a loose ponytail that looked beachy and arty at the same time.

Miller had been Tess's best friend since the first grade, when her family had moved to Last Stop. The Darlings were still considered outsiders, which was probably why she and Miller had hit it off so well. They'd both been outcasts. And Miller had given Libby Barlow a fat lip when the bully had thrown Tess's sandwich on the ground during lunch.

"Do what on purpose?" Tess asked, opening the oven door to check on the cookies. "Are they supposed to be black like that around the edges?"

"No, black isn't good for cookies. Take them out."

Tess opened the oven door and black smoke billowed out. The smoke alarm shrilled, but she didn't see any flames, so she figured that was a step above the last time. Miller glanced over and sighed before opening the kitchen door and letting some of the smoke out. Then she went back to watching through the binoculars. Apparently the view was much more appealing than burnt cookies.

"Damn, they're leaving," she said. "Do you think they exercise like that on purpose? With their shirts off and bodies gleaming all seductively?"

"Yes, I'm sure it's all very intentional," Tess said sarcastically, grabbing the hot mat and pulling the cookies out of the oven. "I'm sure that's all part of their devious plan as they work out inside their private gym. They take their shirts off and wear those shorts that hang down low on their hips. And then they slick their bodies up with fake sweat and pose seductively, hoping above all hopes that the creeper staring at them through binoculars might come fulfill their every sexual fantasy."

Miller put down the binoculars and gave her a droll stare. "I see what you did there. And I don't think I care. If they really wanted privacy, they'd close the blinds."

"Ahh, the Peeping Tom credo."

"Shut up and give me a cookie. I can tear off the black parts. And it's not like I didn't notice you sneaking little peeks too."

Tess pinched her lips together and didn't bother denying it. She'd done nothing but think about kissing Deacon again. It had been almost forty-eight hours since his lips had touched hers, and she was going through withdrawal. She hadn't told Miller about their kisses, and she wasn't sure why. They told each other everything. But kissing Deacon had been different, and she wanted it to be something that was just hers.

She and Miller made an odd pair, but maybe that's why they'd always meshed so well. Tess was the more introverted of the two, preferring to spend her time with dead people, and also the fictional people in the books she inhaled like oxygen.