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He stood and took her hand, letting her long fingernails scratch his palm. She giggled and let him lead her.
“Teeny room,” she commented, as they entered the only bedroom he’d ever known. At that moment, he thought of how well off her family was. And he hated her more. “But cozy,” she added.
No, it wasn’t cozy. In her small way, she was being polite. He pushed her onto the bed, and as he’d suspected, she liked it.
She looked up at him, her eyes weary from too much alcohol. “This is so wrong,” she said, then she giggled.
He nodded.
“But we won’t tell anyone. It’ll just be our secret, right?”
He nodded. It would. It would definitely be a secret.
She giggled again. Still staring up at him, she brought her fingers to her shirt and unbuttoned it, then pushed it away from her narrow shoulders, letting it fall into a heap behind her. She was wearing a black, lacy bra and he could make out her nipples through the sheer material.
His body grew warm all over. She had full breasts, not as big as the models’ in his magazines, but they were large for her small body. She laughed as she pulled one of the straps from her shoulder. “You know how long I’ve wanted to do this?” she asked, her eyes seeming even droopier than a moment ago.
“No.”
She laughed again. “A looooooong time.” She pulled the other strap down, then reached back and unclasped the bra. Full, pale breasts with taut, pink nipples popped out. The heat grew more fierce. He was getting hard.
She lay back on the bed. “You like what you see?” she slurred.
He stood at the edge of the bed and studied her.
“Touch me.”
Reluctantly, he lowered himself onto the bed.
She reached out and kissed his neck, then guided his mouth to her breasts.
The heat consumed him, flip flopping its way between his legs. He pressed his lips against a nipple, then opened his mouth and pulled it in. His erection pulsing, he shifted his knees forward and reached for her other soft breast and ran his tongue over the nipple.
She arched her back, her long hair cascading behind her. She giggled for the millionth time. “You’re kinda clumsy,” she whispered, barely moving her lips.
The light went on inside his head and he jerked away, instantly softening down below. All the heat in his body gathered and climbed into his head. She was teasing him.
She sat up, not bothering to cover her sinful breasts. “What’s wrong?” “Did I say something wrong?”
Blood crashed inside his head and the room seemed to shift.
“Why are you staring at me like that?” she asked, her eyes wide. “I didn’t mean nothing, honestly. It’s just. . . it’s just that you. . .”
He backed away, disgusted at the wetness in his underwear.
She lay back. “Oh God, I’m getting soooo dizzy. . .” she said, the ugly smile returning to her lips. She giggled, then waggled her index finger at him. “Come back here.”
When he didn’t, she leaned forward and pulled him by the belt loops. She unclasped the button on his pants, then unzipped him.
He was shaking.
She reached in and gently took him out. As she brought him to her mouth, the room began to shift faster. He seized her wrists and held onto them tightly.
“Ooooh,” she purred.
She liked it.
His head ached, not from the alcohol but from what she’d said. What they were doing. He squeezed harder.
Her eyes widened. “Hey, that’s starting to really hurt,” she said.
But he didn’t loosen his grip.
Her eyes darted between his and where her wrists were pi
“You don’t like pain?” he asked, looking at her hard. Confusion flooded her eyes.
“Then why would you cheat on your boyfriend?” he asked. “Didn’t you think that it would be painful for him?”
“What?”
“Why would you cheat—”
She glared at him. “Yeah, you’re one to talk! Let me go! Dammit, let go of my fucking wrists!”
He gripped them tighter.
“I don’t go to bed with whores,” he barked. “You should have known that.”
When she spoke next, her voice was softer. “I’m sorry,” she said, tears welling up beneath her eyelids. “I’m sorry. I. . . I thought you liked me. I mean, you acted like it. Look, let me go and I’ll just leave. We shouldn’t be doing this anyway.”
He released her wrists, and she leaned forward, covering her breasts. Fat, pathetic tears streaked her mascara.
He picked up a pillow.
Her eyes followed his movements as she struggled to button her shirt, having forgotten her bra that now lay on the floor.
Ian scratched at the window.
He turned to look at him, and felt the bed shift. One of her legs was on the floor, the other quickly dropping.
He lunged forward and brought the pillow to her face. She kicked and shrieked into the pillow, but he pi
He felt fantastic, better than he had in a decade. His rage flowed out of him as though a vent had finally opened. A powerful titillation filled him, a feeling much more erotic than the one he’d felt earlier when he was tasting her sinful flesh. Every part of him was now alive.
“It’s all right to be afraid,” he whispered.
She clawed at his neck and chest, but he didn’t feel a thing. Eventually, her protests grew weaker and he shifted the pillow so he could see her eyes. They were wide at first, big green crystals of pain. But then they wilted, and she grew still.
Ian, at the window, hollered.
He turned and glared at the cat. It regarded him, its features unclear from where he knelt, but he was certain it looked angry. He’d get rid of it, too. He took air deep into his lungs, let it out, finally able to breathe freely.
He stared at the girl’s lifeless body that was now twisted and still. He’d robbed her of her dignity, her power. The realization was liberating.
The screen door at the front of the house snapped shut. Allie was home.
His eyes had been closed for only a few moments when there was a loud crash. He shot up in the bed, and for a long beat had no idea where he was. The room smelled foreign, the window wasn’t where it usually was.
Just as he became oriented, an orange light illuminated the hallway and streamed through the inch of space between the door and carpet.
Then he remembered he wasn’t in his house at all. No, he was at Rachel’s, lying in her daughter’s bed.
The footsteps grew closer. He slipped out of the bed and, as he fumbled to get under it, the door flew open.
Chapter 32
THE SECOND WEEK of July was blistering. The grass was burnt, the plants wilted, and the people were unusually quiet. When they did talk, they were irritable. Truck drivers lumbered into Luke’s simply in their undershirts, yellow stains pooled at their arm pits. Blue-collared workers hurried in, ordered tall glasses of sweet tea, then asked for refills. The sheriff and the few men he had busied themselves with reports of domestic abuse, leaving Detective Guitreaux primarily in charge of finding out what happened to Tiffany Perron.
In the afternoons, high school kids from all over the area piled in, girls in short skirts or shorts, barely-there tank tops, their hair pulled off their necks. The boys wore muscle shirts and khaki shorts, their feet squeezed into black rubber sandals or mud-splattered sneakers.
During the winter months, the kids who went to the Catholic schools in the surrounding towns tended to hang out only with one another, while the kids who went to the public schools did the same. But during the brutally hot summer months, the teenagers abandoned their cliques and congregated wherever it was coolest, leading a little over a dozen to meet regularly at Luke’s.