Silver Falls - Anne Stuart [80]
“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 area.”
“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