Read A Scarlet Cord for Free Online Page A

had enjoyed their time together immensely and almost hated to have the morning end. In the parking lot, they stood by their cars, still chatting.
    “Have you found a permanent place to live yet?” she asked as he unlocked his car door.
    “Well, right now I’m in the Manor Haven apartments over on Crestview, but I wouldn’t mind finding a small house eventually. You don’t know what’s available around here, do you?”
    “Hmmm … I really don’t. But I have a friend who’s a Realtor. She might be able to show you around. I think I have one of her cards at home. I’ll bring it to church tomorrow.”
    “That’d be great. Thanks.” He looked at his watch again. “Good grief, it’s almost lunchtime.”
    There was an awkward moment when Melanie thought he was going to invite her to lunch. Instead, he climbed into his car and drove off with a friendly wave.
    She got in her own car and turned toward Jerry and Erika’s, but as she thought about the morning, she had to admit that she wouldn’t have minded a lunch invitation from Joel Ellington. “Stop it, LaSalle,” she chided aloud. “You’ve been down this road before, remember?”

Four
    Joel Ellington rolled onto his back and plumped the pillow beneath his neck. Beside him on the nightstand, the digital numbers of his alarm clock glowed red in the semidarkness. He turned his head and watched them change minute by minute, marching toward 5:00 A.M. His thoughts swirled like mist, carrying him back to a time that was painful to revisit. He floated on vapors of memory into a dreamlike trance, feeling powerless to change the course of his thoughts.
    He was in his dorm room at Hartwick with its peeling paint and battered desks. He was studying, trying to concentrate on a particularly boring chapter in his world civilization textbook, when his roommate, Brent Payne, hung up the phone complaining loudly that his parents and younger sister were in town and making an impromptu visit to the campus. They planned to stay over the weekend, effectively putting his party plans on ice.
    Listening to Brent’s grumbling, he kept silent, but that afternoon he watched with envy as Brent’s parents embraced their son and bombarded him with questions about campus life. He was angry at Brent’s irritation with his family. His own parents had been dead for several years now, and his brother was three thousand miles away, attending college on the West Coast. He would have given anything to have a family to intrude on his life once in a while.
    But the weekend had turned out to have one great redeemingquality. That was when Victoria Payne had walked into his life. Brent had always painted his kid sister as a brat, but Brent was wrong. She was incredible. At eighteen and a high school senior, Tori, as she liked to be called, was mature beyond her years. And beautiful. They’d hit it off immediately.
    “It’s like we’ve known each other forever,” Tori told him that Sunday night before she climbed into the car to go home with her parents. As he watched their car disappear through the campus gates, he realized he felt the same way. There were many more weekend visits that spring. Victoria entered Hartwick the following year, and after that there’d never been anyone else for him.
    The memories floated disconcertingly through his mind. Joel rolled onto his side and stared at the bare wall of his bedroom. His eyelids grew heavy, and he felt sleep trying to overtake him. He struggled against it, knowing that the dreams would follow. The minute he closed his eyes, the familiar scene flashed before him. He fought it, but the pull was too strong. Like a drowning man, he finally ceased struggling and gave in to the nightmare. It dragged him under, suffocating him as surely as any murky depths of water. The dream played like a film on a continuous loop. Victoria was there … so beautiful … so beautiful. It all seemed real … as though it were happening all over