Silver Falls Read Online Free

to keep a bird alive, though David would smell a Big Mac on her breath and look troubled. David was a strictvegetarian, so strict he wouldn’t even kiss her when she ate meat. And she’d been eating a lot of meat lately. Maybe Stephen Henry had something fattening in his kitchen cabinets, though she doubted it. Maybe…
    â€œWhat are you doing, skulking around in the dark?”
    The voice came out of nowhere, and she barely managed to stifle a shriek as a tall figure emerged from the shadows. She hadn’t bothered to turn on the porch light, and she couldn’t see him clearly—she only knew she’d never met him before.
    He moved closer, and his face came into the light. Not a kind face—it was thin, with sharp cheekbones, hooded eyes and cool twist to the mouth. “You’re not sneaking a cigarette,” he said, “and as far as I can tell I’m the only one out prowling tonight, so you couldn’t be meeting a lover.” He looked at her, a long, assessing stare, and Rachel couldn’t rid herself of the thought that he was sizing her up and decided she wasn’t lover-material. “So why are you lurking outside Stephen Henry’s house? It is still his house, isn’t it?”
    â€œThey’ll have to use a crowbar to get him out,” she muttered. Even though the poet laureate of Silver Falls College had retired ten years ago, he always found an excuse not to vacate the impressive faculty housing that had always been his asdean of students. No matter how hard everyone, including his son, tried.
    The stranger laughed. “That sounds like him. So why are you hiding out here?”
    â€œHe’s doing a reading,” she said gloomily.
    He laughed again, and she got the impression he didn’t laugh often. “I don’t blame you. He goes on forever.” He paused, and Stephen Henry’s velvety tones seeped out of the old house. “You must be new here. Who are you, one of the faculty wives?”
    â€œWhy wouldn’t I be on the faculty myself?” she shot back, annoyed.
    â€œBecause you’re dressed too appropriately. Faculty can do what they want, the wives and husbands have to toe the line.”
    â€œThen who are you? A faculty husband? I’ve never seen you before.”
    He just looked at her. “Do I look like the kind of man who toes the line?” he said. He didn’t wait for her answer. “Is your husband in there? He isn’t going to like it that you skipped out on the old man.”
    â€œHe’s used to it.” She didn’t bother asking him how he knew she was married. She wore a ring, and he was the kind of man who noticed everything.
    She heard the phone ring inside the house, while her father-in-law simply raised his voice to be heard over it. A moment later even Stephen Henryshut up, and there was dead silence, followed by a buzz of conversation.
    â€œSounds like there’s something more exciting than a poetry reading going on,” the stranger said in a lazy voice. “Don’t you think you ought to go in and find your husband?”
    â€œWhat’s this obsession with my husband?”
    He leaned back against the iron fencing. “What’s this lack of interest in him on your part?” he said. “Why are you trading barbs with a stranger in the dark?”
    Because she felt alive for the first time in months. She was annoyed, stimulated, irritated and bizarrely happy. “I’m not,” she said, plastering the good wife smile on her face and turning toward the door. “I’m going to find him.”
    The touch of his hand was electrifying. It was light, just a brush against her arm, but the message was clear. “Don’t go back in,” he said. “If he made you wear that dress then he doesn’t deserve you.”
    She looked at him as he stood in the shadows, apart from the well-regulated life she’d chosen. Chosen for her