If Only Tonight Read online

  Table of Contents

  If Only Tonight

  In Between Days

  Just Like Heaven

  The Perfect Boy

  Sleep When I’m Dead

  Watching Me Fall

  The Empty World

  Burn

  To Wish Impossible Things

  About the Author

  Originally published as “If Only Tonight” by Jessa Slade

  The Mammoth Book of Southern Gothic Romance

  Constable & Robinson Ltd., London, 2014

  Copyright © 2014 by Elsa Jade

  Cover Design © 2016 by La Voisin ~ Victoria Cooper Art

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as factual. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be scanned, reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author.

  In Between Days

  I hate being goth in So Cal.

  No matter how much powder I use, my foundation turns to paste, then the flat iron that is my giant middle finger to genetics fails me within half an hour and my Blacktastic Starless Night™ hair frizzes into a fright wig. And the sun…

  It. Never. Fucking. Stops.

  I curse the sunlight bouncing off the Pacific—like it’s glaring right back at me—while I trudge down yet another hell of palm trees and pavement that is Ocean Avenue. I was an idiot to come back here. They say you can never go home again, and yet Greyhound is always willing to sell those one-way tickets. But I don’t belong here, I never did.

  Though I haven’t found anyplace else either. I guess I belong nowhere.

  A mile or so behind me, the cemetery where I just left the only remaining link to my past reminds me there’s always one last place to go. Against my will, my breath catches, and I taste a whiff of the Santa Ana the weatherman has been threatening for days. It’s thick in my throat, cinders mixed with a metallic tang like diesel.

  Or blood.

  The hair on the back of my neck tries to prickle, but sweat is matting Starless Night into Bottomless Tar Pit, decided not trademarked. I stop to hike up my skirt and use the studs in one of my leather bracelets to rip another hole in my fishnets. Anything to get a breath of air on my hoo-ha.

  “Show us your tits!”

  I hear the catcall over the music flowing through my earbuds. How dare anyone interrupt The Cure? Yeah, I know it’s old shit, but you get more cred when you’re halfway dead. I tilt my head to squint at the guys in the bronze pimped-out Monte Carlo cruising past. Slowly, I straighten, running my hands over my black velvet hips, into the cinched curve of my waist, up to the tits in question, which I cup with loving tenderness—one of the boys is hanging halfway out the window to look back at me—then I flick my fists up in the constricted OK gesture that silently yet so eloquently says asshole. “In your dreams, pendejo!”

  “Witch bitch!” he screams back.

  Did I mention I hate being goth in So Cal?

  Which is why I’m cursing again as I step off the sidewalk without looking both ways. The last thing I see is a flash of chrome—like the sun has beamed a solar flare right into my brain—and real darkness comes. At long last.

  Just Like Heaven

  It’s still dark when I blink, my eyelids scraping over my dried-out eyeballs. That’s what I get for falling asleep in my stainless steel designer contact lenses… No, wait. I’m not home in bed, and the tinny stench of the Santa Ana is strong enough to gag me.

  Except it’s not just the devil wind this time.

  I touch the back of my head, and my fingers stick. Ugh. Bottomless Tar Pit With Half-Dried Blood Streaks is not an improvement. Gingerly, I lever myself to my elbows. Where I’m sprawled, yuccas and manzanitas block my view. God, how far did that car hit me?

  My fishnets have new unplanned holes through which I can see my road-rashed knees, and my arms are scratched where the vicious desert plants bit me to hell. But other than that and my seeping head wound, I think I’m not too fucked up.

  Not physically, anyway.

  Something rustles in the dark brush. Rat or palmetto bug. Or something worse, drawn by the perfume of blood? I don’t want to find out. I force myself to my feet. My black platform boots are heavy enough to keep me upright, but my knees are still shaky as I look around.

  Standing, I realize it’s not quite as dark as I thought. The shadows are charcoal, not black, and there’s a faint misty light, the same shade as my stainless steel eyes. Sometimes the Santa Anas bring a strange fog, as if the ocean is trying to creep back in while the winds aren’t watching. The grayish light picks out the rough burlap texture of the palms so the dark trees look wrapped in burial shrouds.

  I can’t believe I’ve been laying here long enough for the sun to set, and no one stopped to…

  Wait. I’m not on Ocean anymore. I turn a slow circle, but I can’t see the street or the water. Whatever the time of day or night, I should be able to hear cars or at least the waves that never stop.

  But there’s nothing.

  Did the asshole who hit me pick me up and dump me somewhere? My messenger bag is still crossed over my chest, so I swing it around front to dig out my phone. A crack jags a frozen lightning bolt across the screen, but it powers on… to no bars, no service, no luck. FML.

  I’m still in So Cal, I’m sure of that. At least, I think I’m sure. My first shocked gasp sucked in a lingering dusty heat and the rotten sweetness of fallen jacaranda blossoms. No place else on Earth smells like home.

  “What the hell?” The mutter just slips out of me, but it sounds right, so I say it again louder.

  The fog swallows my voice, and no one answers, but the rustling in the bushes has stopped. I get the sense something is holding its breath, listening. Not just the invisible wandering creature, but some other, more restless presence.

  Suddenly reluctant to stay, watched by unseen eyes, I take a hesitant step forward. My left ankle aches, but the tight laces and buckles of my boot hold it firm.

  Sometimes the ass you need to kick is your own.

  I hobble another step forward, and as my angle of view changes, I realize that the palm trees are arrayed in two parallel lines. A pathway. But it doesn’t look much used. The Bermuda grass is dense and spongy and I leave a clear track of footprints behind me. But mine are the only ones.

  Even though it doesn’t seem very promising, I follow the path. If no one has found me yet and the sun has set, I’m on my own.

  But then, that’s always been the case.

  When the palm path finally opens up, I am too exhausted to do more than stand and sway and stare at the Mission Revival hacienda crowning the low hill. In the soft gray light, the pristine stucco arches of the front arcade curve like the rib bones of some giant moon-bleached whale carcass. Across the second story, small windows flank a series of balcony doors, all dark, as if a row of beings with empty eyes and gaping mouths are peering over the balustrade.

  Centered above the front door, a bell gable rises into the weirdly overcast night, but there’s no bell in its heart, just another empty arch framing the ashy sky.

  I hesitate again. It looks as if no one’s home. Maybe I can break in and try to find a landline phone. Maybe I can get a view around from the hilltop, see if there’s another house nearby. Or at least someplace I recognize.

  I limp out onto the lawn that skirts out from the concentric tile s
teps leading to the front door. The moment my foot hits the grass, matted like dreadlocks, I hear that rustle again. Shit, something is following me.

  I whirl around, gasping as my ankle twists.

  From out of nowhere, there’s a guy standing behind me. Even in the crappy light, the blond waves of his hair gleam a little, as if the Pacific sun—invisible at the moment—is shining through a secret passage to ruffle his locks. Though we’re outside, my gut clenches in claustrophobic panic, and the reek of the Santa Ana suddenly reminds me of high school hallways where no amount of scrubbing can remove the taint, too close, too confining, the lines of lockers and empty doorways stretching into dull eternity.

  When I stumble, he starts to reach out but stops himself. My faithful shit-kickers catch me anyway, and I flinch back. The chains around my waist chime a warning that I repeat aloud, “Don’t touch me!”

  “Hey, easy.” He holds up his hands, fingers outstretched like stars. “I saw you coming. Are you lost?”

  The Perfect Boy

  He’s a golden boy. You find them everywhere in So Cal, buffed and burnished, until it stops meaning anything, just a shiny penny you think you’re lucky to find as a kid and step over when you’re older and wiser by, like, a day.

  I can’t believe I ever fell for that look.

  He’s taller than me by a lot, but most guys are. His Chinos are slung baggy around his lean hips, and his T-shirt is tight enough to show off his surf-ready musculature. Through the thin white cotton, I can just barely see the shadow of a tattoo circling his bicep, though the design isn’t clear. He’s barefoot, which is crazy because Bermuda grass is coarse and cruel. That happens sometimes to things that bake too long under the hot sun.

  I drag my gaze back up to his sunny-sky-blue eyes when he takes another step toward me, a worried furrow in his brow as he studies my various bangs and bruises. My achy skin prickles at his close attention, and I wish I hadn’t put the extra holes in my stockings.

  “You were hurt,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  Once upon a time, I would’ve killed for someone like him to look at me and care. But not anymore. I glare at him. “Are you the one who hit me?”

  “What?” He stops in his tracks. “No. I didn’t—”

  “Then why are you sorry?”

  The furrow turns into a scowl. “Because no one should end up here just because they didn’t want to be wherever they were.”

  “Here?” I echo. His cryptic explanation makes me even more guarded than before. “Where did you come from?”

  “The house.” He gestures behind me.

  “I thought nobody was—” I glance over my shoulder “—home. Huh.”

  The hacienda is ablaze now, every window and door and the arcade on both sides glowing with a yellowish light. Only the upper gable where the bell would have been is still dark, and the Santa Ana fog twists restlessly through the white arch.

  “Come on,” says Golden Boy. “The mistress is waiting to meet you.”

  “Mistress?” I echo doubtfully.

  He doesn’t respond.

  Just because I’m dressed in a leather corset doesn’t mean I’m into anything kinky. But it’s not like I have a lot of options. Reluctantly, I shuffle along beside him, feeling particularly short and drab next to his shining shelf. Shit, I thought I’d left this pathetic insecurity behind. “How did you know I was out here?”

  “The mistress told me to look for you.” His mouth turns down. “She knows everything.”

  I’m momentarily distracted by the curve of his lips. He doesn’t have the tight mouth of many blond Anglos. In profile, his top lip is lush, slightly overreaching the lower lip in a reverse pout.

  Which only reminds me how long it’s been since I was kissed. I booted my last fuck-buddy a few months before I boarded the Greyhound. He’d used the words “get” and “over” and “it” one too many times for my taste. But if he’d had lips like those, maybe I wouldn’t have cared so much what words were coming out of them.

  “What’s your name?” I ask, keeping it casual.

  Cuz maybe I’m willing to fall for that golden look one more time.

  He glances down at me. Whatever he sees on my face causes one corner of that mouth to tilt upward again. “I’m Wyatt. And you are…?”

  “Alma.” When he starts to speak, I cut him off. “Here’s the thing, Wyatt. I’m not sure how I got here, but I just want to go home, wash off the blood, drink too much of something made from liquefied agave as revenge for being cut up by those fucking yuccas, and then I’m going to sleep like I’m dead.”

  Wyatt recoils. It’s not obvious, but he moves so gracefully, as if the ground is water under his feet, that I can’t help but pay attention to his body. Though he keeps his gaze fixed on the house, his blue eyes are half-shuttered, and unreadable shadows lurk behind his lashes like the mysterious tattoo on his arm.

  Maybe he thinks I’m rude, or maybe he thinks I’m a drunk. Whatever. I’m not a pretty little princess, and I’ve got places to be.

  Except I don’t, not really. The cemetery, to say goodbye, was my last stop. But I’m not going to tell Golden Boy that.

  We leave the grass for a terra cotta walkway that leads up to the front door which is wide open. I squint, but my eyes, which have gotten used to the gloom, can’t see past the yellow light coming from within. Flanking the front walk are potted palms, and the glare behind them makes their frayed bark shiver like they are on fire. The walkway splits to circle around a central fountain. Wyatt walks to one side and I take the other, glancing at the stone figurine in curiosity.

  It’s an angel holding an urn angled above her head. Not so unusual, except the urn has been cracked open and the angel’s wings hang limp and defeated from her shoulders, trailing down into the water.

  Or where water would be. The fountain is bone dry. Only a rusty stain marks the angel where the shattered urn has dripped, from her breast down her skirts to the basin below. She looks as if she has stabbed herself with the broken remnants of the stone and is standing in a pool of her own blood.

  “Alma.”

  I jerk my head around to see that Wyatt has gotten ahead of me. He waits with one bare foot up on the first step. The faintest Southern drawl of his Dust Bowl ancestors—some slow Okies, maybe, whose dying wheat swapped their children for golden-haired changelings—makes my name sound strangely sweet in his mouth.

  “You can’t go back,” he says.

  I know that, and yet the way he says it makes me stiffen. There’s a darkness lurking at the bottom of his blue eyes that makes me think he knows more about me than he possibly can, and I’m about to show him exactly what I can’t do—take can’t as an answer, for example—when a figure appears in the yellow light of the doorway.

  For a confused moment, I think the angel has come alive. But then the woman steps farther out into the courtyard, and I see what my bumped head mistook for wings is actually her long pale hair. The silvery waterfall of her hair glides past her hips, perfectly silky, perfectly straight. I’d thought the word kinky earlier when Wyatt mentioned his mistress, but this hair has never had a hair out of place.

  A crow taking a crap on the fountain angel’s bowed head wouldn’t have been more out of place than me standing here among these fair beauties.

  “Welcome.” Even her voice is beautifully smooth. I get the impression she is older, but she is slender, and her face—moon round and pallid in a way that I’ll never achieve, not with all the foundation and powder in the world—makes it impossible to guess her age. “I am Bianca, mistress of this house. Please, come in.”

  Wyatt glances back at me, a peculiar appeal in his eyes. I wonder if she’s hurting him. She’s his mistress, after all, so maybe he likes it. He’s a big boy, with the broad shoulders to prove it, and despite his bare feet, he could walk away if he wanted, right?

  “I just need to make a call,” I say.

  “Of course you do.” She smiles, her dark eyes bright.

&nbs
p; Wyatt doesn’t move until I pass him on the steps, then he follows us silently into the house.

  A breath of the fog swirls behind me, chilling my scratched arms. For a second I think I hear whispers, quieter than the chime of chains around my waist as I pass beneath the terra cotta medallion set into the stucco above the lintel. There’s a phrase etched into the tile, the house crest, I guess.

  Las Ombras del Sol.

  “My kind of place,” I mutter.

  Despite my low voice, Bianca looks back at me with another smile. “Indeed.” Her eyes are very dark, so dark I can’t see where pupil meets iris, which looks odd on someone so pale. Like the hacienda looked when I first saw it, seemingly empty.

  Bianca’s skirts whisper across the tiles, and my boots thud with reassuring toughness, but Wyatt is still silent behind us. But of course, he is barefoot.

  Though Bianca is triggering my weird-o’-meter, my focus is still on Wyatt. Something’s bothering me about his bare feet, but I can’t quite…

  Then it hits me. When I first turned and saw him standing behind me out on the lawn, the sharp tufts of grass were crushed by only one set of footprints: mine.

  As if he had appeared out of thin air.

  Sleep When I’m Dead

  I’m not interested in mysteries, I just need to make a damn phone call.

  I stop abruptly in the middle of the foyer. Bianca pauses with her hand on the wrought iron newel post of the grand staircase leading upstairs. With the dark wood floors and exposed beams and stark white plaster walls, I feel like I’ve fallen into an old black and white movie. The only color comes from the sickly glow of the Moorish-style chandelier—wrought iron, big as a medieval gibbet—suspended two stories above our heads. Yellow lights flicker behind the glass; they must have lit candles when the power went out and the house went black. Seems unnecessarily dangerous to me, there could be a fire. But then, I don’t mind sitting around in the dark.