When she reached the kitchen door, she heard voices inside and paused with her hand on the panel.
"Something's wrong with her, Brian. she's not herself Has she talked to you?"
"Kate, Jo never talks to anyone. Why would she talk to me?"
"You're her brother. You're her family."
Jo heard the clatter of dishes, caught the lingering odor of grilled meat from the breakfast shift. A cupboard door opening, shutting.
"What difference does that make?" Brian's voice was testy, impatient. Jo could almost see him trying to shrug Kate off.
"It should make all the difference. Brian, if you'd just try, she might open up to you. I'm worried about her."
"Look, she seemed fine to me last night at the bonfire. she hung out with Nathan for a couple of hours, had a beer, a hot dog."
"And she came back from the campground this morning pale as a sheet. she's been up and down like that ever since she got back. And coming back the way she did, out of the blue. she won't talk about what's going on in her life, when she's going back. You can't tell me you haven't noticed how ... shaky she is."
Jo didn't want to hear any more. she backed away quickly, turned on her heel, and hurried to the front of the house.
Now they were watching her, she thought wearily. Wondering if she was going to snap. If she told them about her breakdown, she imagined there would be sympathetic-and knowing-nods and murmurs.
The hell with it. she stepped outside, into the sunlight, took a long gulp of air. she could handle it. Would handle it. And if she couldn't find peace here, just be left alone to find it, she would leave again.
And go where? Despair washed over her. Where did you go when you'd left the last place?
Her energy drained, bit by bit. Her feet dragged as she descended the stairs. she was too damn tired to go anywhere, she admitted. she walked to the rope hammock slung in the shade of two live oaks and crawled into it. Like climbing into a womb, Jo thought as the sides hugged her and let her sway.
Sometimes on hot afternoons, she had found her mother there and had slipped into the hammock with her. Annabelle would tell stories in a lazy voice. she would smell soft and sunny, and they would rock and rock and look up through the green leaves to the pieces of sky.
The trees were taller now, she mused. They had had more than twenty years to grow-and so had she. But where was Annabelle?
I He strode along the waterfront in Savannah, ignoring the pretty shops and busy tourists. It had not been perfect. It had not been nearly perfect. The woman had been wrong. Of course, he'd known that. Even when he'd taken her he'd known.
It ha (I been exciting, but only momentarily. A flash, then over like coming too soon.
He stood staring at the river and calmed himself A little game of mental manipulation that slowed his pulse rate, steadied his breathing, relaxed his muscles. He'd studied such mind-overbody games in his travels.
Soon he began to let the sounds in again-piece by piece. The jingle of a passing bicycle, the drone of tires on pavement. The voices of shoppers, the quick laugh of a child enjoying an ice cream treat.
He was calm again, in control again, and smiled out over the water. He made an attractive picture, and he knew it-his hair blowing lightly in the breeze, a man handsome of face and fit of body who enjoyed catching the female eye.
Oh, he'd certainly caught Ginny's.
she'd been so willing to walk with him on the dark beach and over the dunes. Tipsily flirting with him, the southern in her voice slurred with tequila.
she'd never known what hit her. Literally. He had to bite back a chuckle, thinking of that. One short, swift blow to the back of the head, and she'd toppled. It had been nothing to carry her into the trees. He'd been so high on anticipation, she'd seemed weightless. Undressing her had been ... stimulating. True, her body had been lusher than he'd wanted, but she'd only been practice.
Still, he'd been in too much of a hurry. He could admit that now, he could analyze now. He'd rushed through it, had fumbled a bit with the equipment because he'd been so anxious to get those first shots. Her naked, with hands bound above her head and secured to a sturdy sapling. He hadn't taken the time to fan her hair out just so, to perfect the lighting and angles.
No, he'd been too overwhelmed with the power of the moment and had raped her the instant she regained consciousness. He'd meant to talk to her first, to capture the fear growing in her eyes as she began to understand what he meant to do.
The way it had been with Annabelle.
she struggled, tried to speak. Her lovely, long legs worked, drawt'ng up, pumping. Her back arched. Now Ifelt that calm, cold control snick into place.
she was subject. I as artist.
The way it had been with Annabelle, he thought again. The way it should have been now, this time.