A Profiler's Case for Seduction(68)
“Tell me about your relationship with Melinda,” he asked.
“We don’t really have one.” Dora remained tensely curled up in the opposite corner of the sofa, as if allowing herself to relax would bring about complete disaster. “She’s almost four years older than me and we were never close even as children. When she left Horn’s Gulf at eighteen she never looked back. I didn’t hear anything about her until she appeared in town to grab me by the arm and throw me in rehab.”
Her cheeks flushed with color and she drew in several deep breaths, allowing the pink to slowly ebb from her cheeks. “When I got here, she made it clear she wasn’t looking for a sisterly bond and I was just so grateful to be here I didn’t pursue one.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about your relationship with her? You knew I was investigating her kidnapping.”
Dora shrugged. “I also knew I couldn’t help you, that I didn’t know about what happened to Melinda. I’ve never told anyone that she’s my sister. I never wanted her to be embarrassed that her forty-year-old sister was finally getting her life together. The last thing I wanted to be was an embarrassment to the person who gave me a second chance at life.”
“Sounds to me like you deserved a do-over in life,” Mark said softly. He couldn’t get out of his head what she’d told him about her former life, coupled with what he’d discerned from his talk with her old schoolteacher and the new owner of the Daisy Café.
She frowned, her eyes the color of dark metal. “Melinda managed to get out. I managed to make bad choices. Despite the fact that my mother was a raging alcoholic, I somehow felt bound to stay in town and take care of her. I’d clean her up when she got sick, I’d sober her up to get her back to my father at the end of the night.”
She grabbed a bright orange throw pillow to her chest and wrapped her arms around it, her gaze downward as she continued. “I managed to hold things together through my miserable childhood. I even managed to survive the abusive marriage and divorce from Billy Cook. It was Jimmy Martin who was the straw that broke my back.”
“Tell me,” Mark said softly, and inched closer to her on the sofa.
She toyed with the fringe on the pillow and he noticed the faint tremble in her hand. “I loved Jimmy—at least I thought I was in love with him, and when we got married I thought he loved me. I truly believed he’d managed to overlook my reputation, my background, and saw the heart and soul of me shining through all the muck.”
Mark wanted to say something to ease the pain that sparked in her eyes, but he could tell by their unfocused glaze that she’d gone backward in time, apparently remembering things she’d tried hard to forget. Her fingers tightened on the fringe.
“The first year of our marriage I thought everything was perfect. Jimmy worked at the bank and I was a stay-at-home wife. I tried to do everything I could to make him happy. He came home to a clean house and a home-cooked meal each night. I was a willing and eager lover. I thought we were on our way to building a life together, becoming a family.”
She fell silent and there was a stillness about her as if she’d disappeared from this place and this time. Mark knew all about falling into the rabbit hole of his own mind and he sat patiently for what felt like forever before he gently called her name.
She jerked and glanced at him with embarrassment. “Sorry.” She drew a deep breath. “It was in the second year of our marriage that things started to go bad, or at least I started noticing things that bothered me. Jimmy never struck me—he never even showed that he had a temper—but he used words to chip away at my confidence. I’d get dressed to go out and he’d tell me it was a shame I had my mother’s taste in clothes or he’d mention that it wasn’t any wonder I was drawn to whore colors and gaudy jewelry. He never stopped reminding me of where I’d come from, that he was the only man in town who would marry Daisy’s daughter. I was just one step from a heathen, needing reminders about manners and why didn’t I know how to throw a successful cocktail party...and on...and on.”
Mark slid closer to her, close enough that he could smell both her wildflower scent and her sorrow. He wanted to touch her, but she remained in a defense position and he had a feeling any touch from him at that moment would be unwelcome.
“I tried. I tried to be everything he wanted, but one night as we were making love he whispered into my ear that I really was my mother’s daughter, just a whore with bad taste.”