Silver Falls - Anne Stuart [6]
Sophie had never been particularly fond of malls, and Silver Falls’s pathetic version of it was even less enticing. However, Kristen looked hopeful, so she nodded, agreeable as always. “As long as we don’t have to meet any boys.”
“You are such a party pooper,” Kristen said cheerfully. “I think Crash has got a game tonight.”
Crash being Kristen’s current crush, a singularly thickheaded soccer player on the junior varsity. Sophie wasn’t particularly impressed with the crop of young men Silver Falls had produced. But then, she wasn’t interested in falling in love, not yet. Not until she was sure her mother had made the right decision.
“Kristen?” Sheriff Bannister’s voice called from the kitchen. “I need you girls to come down here.”
Sophie knew that tone of voice. She’d heard it before, when Tessa had died, and she recognized it now with a certain sick dread. For a moment she froze.
“I wonder what’s up with Mom?” Kristen said, clueless. “She doesn’t sound like she’s going to want to take us to the mall.”
“If I were you I wouldn’t even ask,” Sophie said, climbing off the bed and following her friend down the stairs in the shabby old split level.
Mrs. Bannister had a grim look on her face, and she was still wearing her uniform, and Sophie knew what was coming before she even opened her mouth. “Girls, there’s been a murder.”
And Sophie had the feeling that things weren’t going to be right again for a long time.
Stephen Henry Middleton was being called upon to read. The old ham never missed an opportunity, Rachel thought, scooping up a tray of empty glasses and heading for the kitchen. The only way she survived these cocktail parties was to make herself busy—drinking wasn’t an option. She had too great a tendency to say what she really thought when she had a drink, and being honest in the sacred halls of Silver Falls College was definitely frowned upon.
She put her butt against the swinging door into the kitchen and backed out of the room before David could see her. Stephen Henry wouldn’t notice. Stephen Henry never noticed anyone but himself.
Sure enough, his sonorous tones began to spread throughout the downstairs of the old house, and Rachel set the tray down, then made a dash for the porch door. The rain had stopped for the moment, the air was cool and damp, and she slipped outside, closing the door behind her very quietly. A little fresh air would do wonders, and this party, in honor of Stephen Henry’s fifteenth collection of self-published poems, would go on until the old man had read every single last one to his adoring crowd. No one would notice she was missing.
Her stomach rumbled. She was on a diet—hell, she was always on a diet. With her bone structure she didn’t dare eat as much as she wanted, and she’d gotten through the day with a green salad with lemon juice, a fat-free yogurt, and a thin slice of gluten-free bread. A healthy mind in a healthy body, David used to say, but right then Rachel didn’t feel like either. She felt like pancakes and bacon and scrambled eggs and real maple syrup. She’d sell her soul for an IHOP.
The polite smattering of applause drifted out from the house, followed by the faint sounds of Stephen Henry. Even from a wheelchair he managed to project, and the occasional word would leak into the night outside. She was going to have to study her inscribed copy “—to darling Rachel, the loveliest daughter-in-law a poet could ever have—” because Stephen Henry was bound to quiz her, and a simple “I loved all of it” would never work.
Maybe she had time to drive out to the interstate for a Happy Meal or something, she thought, leaning against the damp brick and breathing in the cool night air. She wasn’t eating enough to keep a bird alive, though David would smell a Big Mac on her breath and look troubled. David was a strict vegetarian, so strict he wouldn’t even kiss her when she ate meat. And she’d been eating a lot of meat lately. Maybe Stephen Henry had