Shadows at Sunset by Stuart Anne

Author:Stuart, Anne [Stuart, Anne]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Romance, Suspense, Fiction
ISBN: 9781460301708
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2012-09-17T07:00:00+00:00

12

Rachel-Ann hadn’t come home. Jilly lay facedown on her bed, wide-awake, listening. No sound of the omnipresent Weather Channel filtering through the walls, no footsteps racing up the front stairs in a panic. Rachel-Ann had been gone by the time Jilly got home, and she hadn’t returned.

The fact that Coltrane was missing, as well, shouldn’t have been a problem. Any day spent without having to face him was a blessing, particularly after last night. Why in God’s name had she let him kiss her? Why in God’s name had he done it? He had to have some ulterior motive—there was no way he was simply swept away by passion. He’d backed her up against the wall and kissed her, and what was far, far worse was that she’d kissed him back. If Rachel-Ann hadn’t interrupted them she would have taken him into this bed, and then she’d have no haven left.

No, if it hadn’t been Rachel-Ann then it would have been something else. She’d watched her sister and brother fill their lives with self-destructive mistakes. Alan was a big enough one to last her a lifetime—she wasn’t going to make a habit of sleeping with good-looking, heartless men who didn’t even want her. Who wanted her sister.

She rolled over onto her back. She couldn’t remember being jealous before. Not that she was jealous now—there was certainly nothing to be jealous of. When she found out that Rachel-Ann had been sleeping with Alan it had filled her with both rage and relief. Rage that Alan would betray her. Relief that she didn’t have to pretend any longer.

She’d never felt anger toward Rachel-Ann. Her sister harmed herself more than anyone else, and Alan had been a mistake from the very beginning, a delusion at best. Jilly should have known when the worry of leaving La Casa had been more overwhelming than her excitement of a marriage that it hadn’t been a match made in heaven. And Alan had never been that exciting.

She couldn’t stop thinking about sex, and it was all Coltrane’s fault. She’d never been prey to her hormones—she used to think Rachel-Ann had been overloaded with sexuality and she’d been short-changed. She’d had her share of crushes as a girl, dates as a teenager. She’d slept with the ones she thought she’d loved, the ones she should have wanted to sleep with. And none of it had ever made much of a difference except in her self-esteem.

At one point she’d even pondered whether she was gay. It was an entirely acceptable life-style, and it probably would have made Dean happy to know his sister chose it. But for some reason she couldn’t summon up even stray lustful feelings for another woman. Even if she preferred women socially, they just didn’t appeal to her as sex objects.

Neither did most men, leading her to the logical conclusion that maybe she was, if not frigid, perhaps a bit lukewarm. She and Alan certainly hadn’t caused any major conflagrations—she’d known all the right moves, made all the right noises, but what had started out as mildly pleasant soon turned into a chore.

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