Except that he’d had no interest in the meek college librarian David had been dating the last time he came to town. Or the physics teacher several years before.
But Rachel was a different thing altogether, and even looking at her was making him hard.
“You got a problem?” she snarled. “Did I grow another head or something?”
He turned away, pulling the threadbare curtains and the blackout shade. “Just thinking about something else,” he said. Which was true enough. He was thinking about how he could justify touching her, kissing her after he’d kidnapped her, and he was coming up empty.
“So you think I’m just going to do what you say and stay here?” she said when he turned back.
“Well, I could always tie you to the bed. I’d certainly enjoy it, but I don’t know how happy that would make you. If you leave you’ll have a long walk in a deserted part of the country, and there are bears.”
“Don’t try to scare me,” she snapped. “In case you haven’t figured it out yet, I don’t scare easy.”
“You ever hear the term ‘foolhardy’?” he said.
“You ever hear the term ‘fuck you’?”
“Do you ever stop fighting?”
“Never,” she said, and dove for the door.
He caught her before she could unfasten the chain, spinning her around and pinning her against the solid pine. “I told you not to do that,” he said. He was too close to her, his body pressed up against hers, and he knew he was in deep trouble. He had to fight it, to get the hell away from her before he made a big mistake.
“Haven’t you figured out I don’t listen?” she said, looking at him out of steady eyes.
He didn’t move. Neither did she. They stayed the way they were, pressed up against the door, and he could feel her heart pounding against his through the layers of clothing, and what he saw in her eyes was nothing but wishful thinking on his part, he was crazy, but he was going to kiss her anyway, just kiss her, because he wanted to and what the hell difference would it make?
So he lowered his head and put his mouth against hers.
16
He had her pinned against the door of this shit motel, Rachel thought. And if she had any sense she’d bring her knee up hard enough to send him screaming to the floor, and she’d get enough of a head start. She could even hot-wire his car if he didn’t leave the keys in there, and if she couldn’t she could disappear into the woods and to hell with the bears, and then he lowered his head and she thought, if he doesn’t kiss me I’m going to die.
And he did. His mouth covered hers, rough, demanding, and she broke her arms free enough to put them around his waist, pulling him closer, while she kissed him back.
It was heaven. It was hell. It was slipping into a darkness so deep and rich that she never wanted to emerge. She closed her eyes, to shut out the cold motel room, the glaring light, the reality of what she was doing, she just let herself feel the sensations of his lips, his tongue in her mouth, and she shivered, needing more, wanting more, her hands moving between them, sliding up to his shirt, pulling at the buttons.
He pulled away, so abruptly his shirt tore, buttons flying. He moved out of reach, a dark, unreadable look in his eyes.
She could reach behind her and unfasten the lock and it would take him too long to catch her. Or maybe he’d move fast enough and then he’d kiss her again and this time he wouldn’t stop.
But she was smarter than that. She’d gotten caught up in the moment. Momentary insanity, that was it. “What in hell was that all about?” she demanded after a moment, trying to look affronted. “You really have to hit on all your brother’s women?”
He ran a hand through his tangled hair. “That was mutual.”
“The hell it was,” she shot back, ignoring the simple truth of his statement.
“Are you in denial about everything? You’re married to a monster, you’re attracted to his brother, you’re living a life you hate, trying to be someone you’re not and never wanted to be. Does that pretty much sum it up?”
“And you’re such an expert on me,” she said sweetly. “Why do you think you know anything at all about me?”
“Because I do. Because we’re alike, you and I. We’re wanderers, adventurers. Neither of us belong in a dead town with no sunshine, trapped into playing a role that has nothing to do with who we are. Where are your parents? Why didn’t they help raise Sophie?”
“None of your damned business!”
“They kicked you out, didn’t they? You were the bad girl, just like I’m the black sheep. You’ve been wandering, looking for a home, and you found the wrong one.”
“What if I told you my parents were dead, but they’d never been nothing but loving and supportive of me and Sophie?”
He looked at her for a moment, considering. “I’d tell you you were lying,” he said.
And she didn’t lie, not if she could help it. Not to him. “At least my brother isn’t a sociopath,” she snapped. And then she realized what she’d just said, and the simple, inescapable truth of it was horrifying. “Oh, holy Christ,” she moaned, sagging a little.
He was across the room in a flash, catching her, and there was concern, not lust in his eyes as he picked her up and put her on the bed. She wasn’t used to being picked up. The sensation was oddly threatening and yet comforting at the same time. Almost erotic in the protective feel his body gave hers.
“It’s not true,” she said, turning away from him, burying her face in one of the limp pillows, breathing in the smell of dust and mothballs. It couldn’t be true. But the moment the words had left her mouth she’d known.
She felt the sagging mattress give beneath his weight. He’d sat down beside her, all sexual threat vanished. “I know,” he said. “I’ve spent most of my life telling myself that. I just couldn’t keep lying to myself, knowing people might have died because I never said something, never pushed it to the edge to find out the truth.”
She turned to look at him over her shoulder. “How long have you known?”
“Known for sure? A couple of days. Suspected? Since I was a child. I may have been the one blamed for torturing the animals, but I knew who’d really done it.”
She shuddered. “It still doesn’t make sense. Are you absolutely sure? Maybe I’m just reacting to your manipulations.”
“You haven’t signed the adoption papers. You must have a reason for that. I do know that it’s made David very angry, and it’s dangerous to make my baby brother angry.”
She shook her head, still trying to take it all in. “You don’t understand, he doesn’t…” She couldn’t bring herself to say it, so she simply wrapped her arms around herself, hugging tight. “Sophie’s safe?”
“Sophie’s more than safe. No one will get anywhere near her,” he said. “I think Maggie Bannister suspects. Or at least she doesn’t take everything at face value the way people have in the past. And for what it’s worth, I don’t really think David will hurt you. You’re too precious to him.”
“Precious? Hardly.” Her ironic voice couldn’t hide her pain. “I’m an assault to his nerves and the peaceful beigeness of his life. I still can’t figure out why he married me.”
“Can’t you?”
Rachel closed her eyes. “Sophie,” she said finally. “But he’s never made advances, done anything icky. I just don’t get the weird child-sexual vibe from him. He doesn’t feel like a pervert.”
“He’s a serial killer who rapes his victims after he kills them. Just because he’s not out to have sex with your thirteen-year-old daughter doesn’t mean he’s not a pervert. He’s just waiting for her to get a little older.”
“Please, stop,” she said weakly. “I really don’t want to think about it. Besides, it doesn’t make sense.”
“Why would you think a sociopath would make sense?”
She rolled over on her back to look at him. “That’s not what doesn’t make sense. The killer rapes his victims. Your brother…has problems in that a
rea.”
“What kind of problems?”
God, did she have to spell it out for him? “He has a hard time with sex. He’s not that interested in it. We’ve only managed to do it a few times. We only had sex once before we got married, and he was nervous then, so I didn’t realize he had performance problems. I’ve been patient, waiting to work it out. So why would he rape dead women when he can barely manage with me?”
“Rape has nothing to do with sex,” he said slowly, staring at her. “It’s an act of anger and aggression.”
“Against a dead woman? He’s already killed her—what more does he need to prove?” This conversation was taking on a nightmare tinge—maybe she’d wake up in her own bed and find out she’d been having some hideous dream. Which would serve her right, for being inexplicably attracted to the one man she couldn’t have.
“Total domination and destruction,” he said, almost absently. “But…if he can’t get it up, then who’s the father of your baby?”
“I didn’t even know your brother fourteen years ago. Sophie’s father is dead.”
“I mean the one you’re carrying.”
She looked at him, simmering. “Are you telling me I’m fat?”
“What? No. But you’re pregnant, aren’t you?”
“No,” she said.
He sat on the bed, staring at her, motionless. And then he dropped back beside her, almost touching her, and she edged away carefully. “Thank God,” he said. “The thought of my brother reproducing is enough to give me chills.”
“Why in the world did you think I’m pregnant?”
“You threw up. You had cravings. You…you…glow.”
“Animal abuse makes me ill, In-N-Out burgers are worth craving, and I’m not radioactive. What do you mean, I glow?”
He turned his head to look at her. It was strange lying side by side on the bed, like two lovers on the sagging mattress. “Hell, I don’t know—you just have this luminous quality about you. I thought it was hormones.”
For some extremely bizarre reason she was feeling almost lighthearted. “You’re probably right about that, but it’s your hormones, not mine. You already told me I’m not your type, but clearly the stress of the situation is making you deluded.”
“When did I say that?” He seemed astonished.
“The night we went to In-N-Out Burger.”
“Well, I lied.”
“No, you didn’t. I’m definitely not the type of woman you get involved with.”
“What do you mean by that? How do you even know what my type is?” He frowned at her.
“Just by looking at you. You like leggy blondes, right? Model-thin with muscles.”
“No.”
“All right, then you like petite brunettes, who are fragile and delicate.”
“No,” he said. “I like big, curvy redheads, who aren’t afraid to fight back.”
She stared at him, looking for lies, looking for trickery, looking for a hidden agenda. Either he was as much of a sociopath as his brother, or for some insane and unbelievable reason he really wanted her.
“Those are hard to come by,” she said slowly.
“That’s why you can’t afford to let them get away, just because the time isn’t right or she’s married to the wrong person. Whether it makes sense or not, whether the timing’s right or screwed all to hell, you have to grab what feels right when you can, or the chance might not come around again.”
“You’re a liar.”
“I am,” he said. “About a whole lot of things. But not about this.”
She didn’t move. If she had half a brain she’d get off the bed, fast, before he could stop her. She’d try for the door, and if he didn’t let her out she could always sit in the one straight-back chair the room boasted. Or she could sit cross-legged in a corner, as far away from him as possible.
If she had half a brain. “I’m your brother’s wife,” she said.
“You’re married to a man who kills women for pleasure. Do you think you owe him anything?”
“I don’t have any proof.”
“You don’t need proof,” he said, sitting up and swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “You know it, deep inside. He’s a sick fuck and you know it—you’ve just been afraid to look at things clearly.”
“So I’m ready now. Take me home, I’ll get Sophie and I’ll get out of town.”
“It’s too late for that. He’ll follow you. You’re safer here, where I can look out for you.” He got off the bed, moving over toward the door. He’d hooked it with the chain when they’d first come in, but now he unfastened it. “There you go. If you want to risk it, want to go back to him, then I won’t argue. Just keep Sophie away from him. You don’t have the right to risk your daughter’s life because you’re being stubborn.”
“All right.” She got off the bed and headed for the door. He didn’t move out of the way.
“I’m going back home,” she said. Because she had to. If she stayed she was going to do something really stupid, something she hadn’t done in years. She was going to sleep with the wrong man simply because she couldn’t help herself.
Hell, maybe she’d never given in to this kind of overwhelming temptation. She couldn’t even remember feeling this way. She had an iron will, and she wasn’t easily swayed. Keeping Sophie safe had precluded romantic entanglements—she didn’t want her daughter to have a series of “uncles,” never knowing who she could trust, which one was a constant.
And now, suddenly, as the worst possible time in the world, she was ready to throw everything to the wind just to have him touch her again.
She was crazy, but not that crazy. “Open the door,” she said.
He didn’t move. “You can’t go back to him. He’s too dangerous.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong. He has no reason to want to hurt me—I’m not in any particular danger. I’ll keep Sophie away until I find out the truth of what’s going on. You’re right—I can’t risk her. But he’s not going to hurt me.”
He didn’t move, looking at her out of narrowed eyes. “He knows you’re attracted to me. Don’t you think he’ll see that as the ultimate betrayal?”
“No. Because I haven’t done anything about it.”
He moved then, turning his back to her, and she expected him to unlock the door. Instead he slid the chain back in place. “Then I guess we’re going to have to do something about it.”
She felt a fluttery little leap inside. “What do you mean by that?”
He leaned back against the door, reaching out and threading his long fingers through her curly hair, cradling her skull, pulling her closer. “I mean you won’t go back to him if you’ve cheated on him. Which means you’re going to cheat on him. Right now.”
“I’m not—” His mouth silenced her. It was a full kiss, hot and hungry. When he’d kissed her before he’d been holding back—not this time. Her body slid up tight against his, and there was no chance of her not kissing him back.
He could kiss like a devil, or maybe a saint. No one had ever kissed her like that, with such single-minded dedication and intensity, and she wanted to dissolve into the kiss, just drift away on a tide of sensuality. Her eyes closed, and she felt his hands on her shirt, unfastening the buttons.
Her eyes shot open. “No.”
“Yes,” he said, pulling her shirt free from her jeans, moving his mouth down the side of her neck, sinking his teeth into her earlobe, a move that sent sparks directly between her legs, and she moaned because she couldn’t help it.
“No means no,” she whispered, as he pushed the shirt from her shoulders.
“That’s right,” he said, reaching for the snap of her jeans. “No means no, except when the mother’s life is in danger. Then all bets are off.”
She needed to get it together, push him away, but it was too delicious. “You’re getting your issues confused,” she murmured. “We’re talking rape, not abortion,” she said as he moved his mouth down and kissed the swell of
her breast above the lace. She heard the sound of her zipper, and it should have been enough to galvanize her into action. Instead it made her knees weak with longing.
“This is a very bad idea. It’s wrong,” she said, as he put his mouth against her navel, licking her skin so that she shivered.
“It’s for your own good,” he said, shoving her jeans down her hips, taking her panties with them. “Just close your eyes and think of England.”
She opened her eyes at that. “Fuck you.”
“Now you’re getting the idea.” He scooped her up and deposited her on the bed, pulling her jeans off her as she landed. “You can get under the covers if you’re feeling shy, but we’re doing this.”
“We are not.” She’d already pulled all the buttons off his shirt earlier, and he shrugged out of it, then reached for his belt buckle. She let out a little shriek and yanked the chenille bedspread around her. “Don’t take your pants off!”
“It’s a little tricky to manage if I leave them on,” he said. “Not that I couldn’t do it, but you’d really be more comfortable without my zipper rubbing against your thighs.”
“I don’t want any part of you rubbing against my thighs,” she said in a tight voice, trying to control the treacherous way her body was reacting. Even the enveloping chenille bedspread felt luscious, sensual.
“Sure you do,” he said, kicking out of his jeans and getting on the bed with her. “You just won’t admit it.” He slid up next to her, pulling her cocooned body into his arms, and he let his lips feather across her stubborn mouth, his tongue touching the corners, teasing her.
She was having a hard time keeping her body rigid in protest. She’d told him no and he hadn’t listened, she reminded herself, trying to drum up outrage. But his body felt too good up against hers.
He caught the edge of the bedspread with his hand, slipping his fingers beneath it, cool against her heated skin. “I tell you what. You can hate me. You can have me arrested. But you’ll be alive, and that’s all I care about.” And before she realized what he was doing he’d pulled the bedspread away from her, wrapping his body in it as well, and he was kissing his way down her body, his mouth latching on to her breast, sucking it into his mouth so hard she arched up off the bed. The pleasure was so fierce she couldn’t deny it anymore. She wanted, needed more, and when he moved to her other breast she almost came from the power of her response. Her deep, guttural groan filled the room, and she gave up, leaning back to give him better access to her shrouded body.