After the Night Read Online Free Page B

be her brother, and she would be able to worship him up close, live in the same house with him. Those daydreams had always made her feel guilty about Pa, and then she would try to be extra nice to him to make up for it. Lately, however, she was fiercely glad that Guy wasn’t her father, because now she didn’t want Gray to be her brother.
    She wanted to marry him.
    This most private of her daydreams was so shocking that sometimes it startled her, that she would dare to even dream so high. A Rouillard, marry a Devlin? A Devlin set foot in that hundred-year-old mansion? All the Rouillard ancestors would rise up from their graves to drive out the intruder. The parish would be aghast.
    But still she dreamed. She dreamed of being dressed in white, of walking down the wide aisle of the church with Gray waiting for her at the altar, turning to watch her with those heavy-lidded dark eyes, the expression in them hot and wanting, and just for her. She dreamed of him sweeping her up in his arms and carrying her over the threshold – not at Rouillard House, she couldn’t imagine that, but somewhere else that was theirs alone, maybe a honeymoon cottage – to a big bed that awaited them. She imagined lying under him, her legs around him as she had seen Lindsey’s, imagined him moving, heard his seductive voice whispering French love words in her ear. She knew what men and women did together, knew where he would put his thing, even though she couldn’t imagine how it would feel. Jodie said that it felt wonderful, the best thing in the world…
    Scottie gave a sharp cry, jerking Faith from her daydream. She dropped the potato she had been dicing and jumped to her feet, because Scottie didn’t cry unless he was hurt. He was still standing at the screen, holding his finger. Faith picked him up and carried him to the table, where she sat down with him on her lap and examined his hand. There was a small, deep scratch on the tip of his index finger; probably he had raked his hand across a hole in the screen, and the torn wire had dug into his skin. A single drop of blood had welled in the tiny wound.
    "There, there, it’s all right," she soothed, hugging him and wiping away his tears. "I’ll put a Band-Aid on it and it’ll get well. You like Band-Aids."
    He did. Whenever he had a scrape that needed bandaging, she ended up plastering the things over his arms and legs, because he would keep nudging her until all the Band-Aids in the box had been used. She had learned to take most of the bandage strips out of the box and hide them, so that only two or three were there for him to see.
    She washed his finger and got the box down from the top shelf, where it was kept to keep him out of it. His round little face was glowing with delight and anticipation as he held out his stubby finger. Making a big production out of it, Faith applied the bandage to the wound.
    He leaned forward and peered into the open box, then grunted as he held out his other hand.
    "Is that one hurt, too? Poor hand!" She kissed the grubby little paw and applied a bandage to the back of it.
    He leaned over and looked into the box again, and grinned as he held up his right leg.
    "My goodness! You’re hurt all over!" she exclaimed, and bandaged his knee.
    He checked the box again, but it was now empty. Satisfied, he trotted back to the door, and Faith returned to fixing supper.
    With the long summer days, it was just twilight at eight-thirty, but by eight that evening Scottie was already tired and nodding off. Faith gave him a bath and put him to bed, her heart squeezing painfully as she stroked his hair. He was such a sweet little boy, oblivious to the health problems that would keep him from living to adulthood.
    At nine-thirty she heard Amos driving up, his old truck clanking and backfiring. She went to unlatch the screen and let him in. The stink of whiskey came in with him, a purulent, greenish yellow stench.
    He stumbled over the threshold, and righted