“You made love to me, and it seemed as if you liked it so much, you lost control a little bit. What’s so awful about that?”
“I wasn’t making love to you, Katie,” he snapped. He felt beleaguered and cornered. “I love you as a friend, but I wasn’t making love to you. That’s what’s wrong, if you’re so bent on knowing the truth of it. Now are you happy?”
Her face went rigid. Beneath the two spots of vivid color on her cheeks, she went pale.
“Get out of here,” she said in a low, dangerous tone.
Rill opened his mouth, wanting to take back his words. He felt as if he’d just reached across the bed and slapped her out of spite. Knowing he’d blown it, and that there was nothing else he could say or do at that moment to make Katie understand what he couldn’t comprehend himself, he stood and did precisely what she’d asked
him to do.
Eleven
Katie just sat there in the bed for five minutes after Rill walked down the stairs. She felt both overly aware of her body and distanced from it as well. It seemed that every nerve throbbed in a dull ache, as if Rill’s attack had come from pummeling fists over every square inch of skin and not from a dozen words.
Don’t be so dramatic, she thought irritably as she tossed aside the blanket and scurried out of the bed. He didn’t attack you. He just . . . just . . .
Told the truth.
It was the truth that was making her feel like she’d just received a beating, but that pain was 100 percent in her head. Rill had made her scream in pleasure. If she experienced some residual psychic pain following what had happened, surely she had only herself to blame.
Rill had warned her beforehand.
She grabbed some clean clothes and opened the dormer bedroom door. She paused at the top of the stairs, straining to hear where Rill was in the house. It was quieter than a grave down there.
She quickly showered, dressed and combed her hair. Much to her relief, she didn’t catch a glimpse of Rill when she made a dash out the front door. What she needed was some speed to sort things out in her cluttered head.
The days were growing shorter, Katie realized as she pulled out of the long driveway and onto the rural route. The narrow, black road surrounded by somber, towering trees, their vibrant colors washed out by the thinning light of the sinking sun, the seamless cool-blue sky overhead—all of it suited her dark, desperate mood.
I love you as a friend, but I wasn’t making love to you. That’s what’s wrong
The nerve endings beneath her skin seemed to throb feverishly with a dull ache at the memory.
She switched to the “manumatic” and got the Maserati into sixth gear on the straightaway portion of the slope down the hill. She drove on the twisting country roads without conscious thought, searching for stretches of road where she could feel the engine roaring at full throttle beneath her, where she could fly, unhindered by her doubts and insecurities.
It was twilight by the time she pulled into the river road where Errol lived and then turned down the long drive that led to his shack. An older-model but well-tended Honda Civic sat in the driveway. Olive answered the door with a cheerful smile. The older woman’s kindness sent a glimmer of warmth through the numb chill that had come over Katie as she tried to evade her demons on the twisting, tree-lined roads.
She sipped chamomile tea and chatted with Olive as Errol watched an old episode of Hogan’s Heroes on the black-and-white television that sat on the kitchen counter. Slowly, her confidence started to seep back into her spirit.
“I was wondering,” she began slowly as Olive poured some more hot water over her tea bag, “where you and Monty live? There’s something I’d like to ask him.”
Olive’s pale blue eyes widened in mild surprise. “You want to speak to Monty?”
Katie nodded.
“Well, he’s here. He’s down on Errol’s dock, fishing,” Olive explained, waving toward the kitchen door. “He always says they bite best at nightfall.”
There was barely enough light left in the sky for Katie to locate the dock. She tiptoed on the weatherworn boards as she made her way to the still figure of the man sitting in a lawn chair at the end of the dock. She supposed the cantankerous Monty would have no problem scolding her for scaring all the fish clear to Kentucky with her city ways, so she was extra careful in her approach.
Much to her surprise, he didn’t even glance around when she eased down on the dock next to him. Katie whispered.
“I’m sorry for . . .”
“Shhhhh,” he warned softly.
Katie gave him a glance and then peered into the wide, flowing river, trying to see what Monty was studying so intently. After several seconds of silence, during which Katie was starting to get impatient, Monty finally spoke.
“He’s gone,” he growled as he began to reel in his line. “Little bastard probably nibbled away all my bait and never touched the hook.”