Taking A Chance (Rebels 0f Forbidden Lake Book 2)

by Elana Johnson

  He nodded to the court reporter, handed the photo back to the Sherriff, and looked at Devon again. “You may think you’ve committed no crime, sir. But I see things differently. You have no right to terrorize people and then claim you just wanted to talk.” He frowned at Devon. “Do not even think about putting a single toe out of line. We’re dismissed.”

  Everyone stood while the judge left, and relief very nearly made Allegra sag into her lawyer. Once the judge was gone, Jerrod straightened his papers and put them in his folder.

  Allegra turned to her friends on the bench behind her, realizing that Devon had approached her side of the courtroom.

  “Sir,” the Sherriff said from his position near the judge’s bench. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him start to approach, but Phoenix stepped in front of her and shoved Devon back.

  “Get out of here, man,” he said, almost yelling in the courtroom.

  “Phoenix,” she said amidst others saying, “Hey, now,” and Devon going, “I want him arrested.”

  “You want me arrested?” Phoenix yelled at him. “You’re pathetic, Devon. Go back to your bowling alley and leave Allegra alone.” He swung at him again, but the Sherriff caught his hand and pushed him back.

  “Enough,” the officer said. He turned his back on Phoenix and pressed him further back toward the plaintiff’s side of the courtroom. “Get control of your witness,” he said to Jerrod. “And you, Mister McKnight, you vacate the courtroom immediately.”

  Devon took a few seconds to straighten his tie and jacket before grabbing his folder and saying, “Put a leash on your animal,” to Allegra. Then he left the courtroom, as instructed.

  The tension, unfortunately, did not leave with him.

  Jerrod had his head bent together with Phoenix, but Allegra could only see red. Only hear Devon saying he wanted Phoenix arrested. He’d probably press charges.

  Put a leash on your animal.

  Allegra glared at Phoenix, who had the decency to look apologetic when their eyes met.

  “I’m—” he started.

  “Can we go?” she asked the Sherriff, and he nodded. She snatched up her jacket and strode toward the doors, Bea at her side.

  “Allegra,” Phoenix called after her, but she kept going. Of course, she was his ride back to his cabin, and she couldn’t really leave him here. But she just needed to be alone for a moment. She detoured into the ladies’ room, Bea right behind her. They barricaded themselves in the handicapped stall, and Allegra dabbed at her eyes.

  “Well, you got the restraining order,” Bea said, tucking Allegra’s hair behind her ear. “That’s good news.”

  She nodded. “Yep. Yes, it is.”

  “So I take it you’re seeing Phoenix Addler.” Bea wasn’t asking, and Allegra hadn’t exactly tried to hide their relationship.

  “Yeah, I see him,” she said. “We don’t go out or anything.”

  “Have you been staying with him?”

  She nodded again, a fresh wave of emotion hitting her. She wasn’t sure why she was crying, only that it was the only release her body had at the moment.

  “He seems nice,” Bea said.

  Allegra gave a short, barking laugh. “He just pushed a man and insulted him.” But that wasn’t what bothered her.

  “Yeah, but before that.”

  Allegra blinked, wiped her eyes, and shook out her hair. “I’m okay. Really. How are the cats? I’m so sorry you’ve had them for so long. Thank you so much for taking them in.”

  Bea smiled at her, a soft gesture full of friendship. “I kind of like their company.”

  “Does Acorn ever come out from under the couch?”

  “Oh, heavens no.” Bea laughed. “But at my place, it’s the entertainment center she hides behind.” She slung her arm around Allegra’s shoulders and opened the stall door. “Let’s go give your boyfriend a piece of our minds.”

  Allegra found herself laughing, though Bea wasn’t far off from what she wanted to do. What she would do, once she and Phoenix made it back to that cabin where no one could hear her yell at him.

  Chapter Eleven

  Phoenix stayed silent on the way out to his cabin. He knew he shouldn’t say anything, that Allegra was basically a volcano waiting to explode. She drove, and he stared out the window, wondering what had come over him in the courtroom.

  When Kathy had first left, he’d seen a counselor a few times. But she wanted him to talk about his feelings all the time, and he found swinging an axe worked just as well and cost far less than therapy.

  So he’d stopped going.

  He hadn’t been over to his wood-cutting job in a couple of weeks due to the weather, and he could probably swing an axe really hard right now. Really work out his anger and his other emotions.

  His other emotions.

  Phoenix almost scoffed out loud. He couldn’t even untangle his other emotions at the moment. Everything felt mashed together, and his outburst in the courtroom had proven why he didn’t go to town anymore.

  He hated the crowds of people. Hated the noise, the smells, the arrogance of Devon McKnight.

  Allegra pulled up to his cabin and turned to go under the carport he’d erected weeks ago. It provided some protection from the elements as well as concealed her car from anyone on the State Forest side of the fence. That way, if Devon came looking, he wouldn’t be able to see Allegra’s car.

  And now he couldn’t come looking anyway.

  She put the car in park but didn’t get out. Phoenix did, because her two-seat coupe was way too small for him at the moment. He didn’t go toward the cabin door either, though he heard Dozer barking inside.

  “Where are you going?” Allegra called after him.

  “Gotta check something,” he said without looking back.

  “Oh, no, you don’t,” she said, stomping after him. She ran to catch him, and he glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. “What was that back there? Huh?” She darted in front of him and stopped, almost daring him to plow her over.

  He didn’t, because he was already embarrassed by his behavior in the courthouse. “I don’t know,” he said. “I lost my temper.”

  “I’ll say you did.” Her blue eyes flashed with hot flames. “I don’t need you to fight my battles for me.”

  “I know that.” Boy, did he know that.

  “I am not weak, or helpless, or any of the things you think I am.”

  “I don’t think you’re any of those things.” His jaw tightened as he clenched his teeth together.

  “Yes.” She nodded, refusing to be placated. “You always have. Making me stay with you. Having your sister bring my things out to me.”

  “Whoa, wait.” Phoenix held up both hands in a universal sign of peace. “Making you stay with me? I didn’t make you stay. I offered you a safe place with someone who could probably intimidate the man who chased you through the woods in a blizzard. I didn’t tie you up.”

  Even if he’d wanted to. Even if there may have been a little rope in his fantasies. He hadn’t acted on any of those, and he hadn’t told her any of them. A man was allowed to dream, wasn’t he?

  Allegra folded her arms but didn’t argue.

  “And I had Mia bring your stuff to you so you’d feel more welcome in the cabin,” he said, his chest feeling like someone had poured gelatin inside it, making all his organs wobble and jiggle. “I wanted things to be easy for you. I order everything you ask me to at the grocery store, and I do all of that to make your life easier. Not because you’re not capable of doing those things.”

  He stepped around her and continued toward the gate to make sure the trip-wire alarm he’d put on it was still functioning. He wanted to know if someone came through that gate, period.

  “So you might consider saying thank you instead of making it sound like I’ve kept you prisoner in some remote cabin in the backwoods.” He continued to walk away, his boots making slapping sounds on the hard ground.

  He heard her footsteps as she once again ran to
catch him. She slowed to walk beside him, and said, “Thank you, Phoenix.”

  “You’re welcome.” He arrived at the gate and crouched to check the system he’d rigged. It looked right, and another layer of relief fell on top of the other precautions they’d taken. He straightened and looked at Allegra. “I’m sorry for freaking out in the courtroom. I saw him coming toward you, and I just…lost my mind.” He reached for her hands and took both of them in his.

  Everything softened inside him, and he wanted her to know that the things he felt for her weren’t borne from anger or frustration.

  “Why have you done all of this for me?” she asked. “Giving me a place to stay—though that couch is not all that comfortable, I will say—ordering all the food I request, coming to town when you haven’t in so long….” She let her words trail off, and she wouldn’t look up at him.

  “Really?” he asked. “You have to ask why?” He bent his head and kissed her, probably too roughly, but she went along with him. He dropped his lips to her neck, glad when she clung to his shoulders in that needful way she had.

  “I did all of that for you,” he whispered between kisses. “Because I’m falling in love with you.”

  Allegra sucked in a breath, and Phoenix took the opportunity to kiss her again, pouring out all those tangled, knotted emotions he had inside into every stroke of his mouth against hers. And he couldn’t help thinking that maybe he’d found a less back-breaking way to release everything he normally kept bottled up tight.

  His phone rang in his pocket, and he broke the kiss to look at it. “It’s Rick,” he said when he saw his boss’s name on the screen. “I’ll just be a sec.” He answered the phone at the same time he stepped away from Allegra, actually thankful for the distraction.

  “Things are finally dry up here,” Rick said. “You want to come in?”

  “Yeah,” Phoenix said. He’d taken the day off from his forestry job for the hearing, so he had the whole afternoon off. “I’ll be out there as soon as I can find a ride.” He hung up and turned back to Allegra, who was studying the padlock on the gate.

  Phoenix was well aware of the confessions he’d uttered, and he was hyper-sensitive to the fact that she hadn’t repeated any sentiments back to him. But she kissed him like she sure did like him, and he didn’t need the pretty words to go along with it.

  “This lock is new,” she said, glancing at him. “It wasn’t here the night I came through this gate.”

  “Nope,” he said. “I put that there when Mia brought the supplies out to us.”

  Allegra turned toward him, all the pretty words she could say streaming from the love he saw in her eyes. “Thank you, Phoenix.” She stepped into his arms and pressed her forehead to his collarbone.

  “You’re welcome, sweetheart,” he said.

  “You have to go to work?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Chopping wood. My lumberjack job. How are you feeling? Want me to take you into your apartment for a while? I could pick you up on the way back.”

  She smiled up at him. “Yeah, sure. I think I’d like that.”

  “So I can take your car? Remember how I don’t have one?”

  She giggled and pushed her hands up into his hair. “I remember, mountain man. I remember.” She tipped up onto her toes and kissed him, this time with much less urgency, less need, but way more passion. More love. More tenderness.

  Phoenix wanted both kinds of love from her, and he responded with the same gentleness and care that she’d set. “Come on,” he said, breaking their connection and taking her hand in his. “You have some squash-cats to go visit.”

  * * *

  A week passed, and Allegra decided she should go back to her own apartment. Phoenix really didn’t like the idea, but his mother would be horrified if she knew he was living with his girlfriend.

  Besides, the couch was lumpy and not very comfortable. He knew, because though the weather had started to warm slightly, he’d taken to sleeping where Allegra once had. The powdery scent of her skin and the floral scent of her hair had somehow gotten stuck in the upholstery, and when he laid where she used to, he found he missed her less.

  She still came out to the cabin quite often, especially on days when she was working out in the forest anyway. He always made sure he had dinner on, just in case she stopped by.

  His thoughts had started down paths where he’d borrow a truck from the orchard and go into town to see her. Maybe check out her apartment. Meet the four cats she seemed to love so much.

  But he never asked her, and she didn’t bring it up either. For now, when she stopped by, the secrecy of their previous arrangement roared back to life. She became his secret guest again, and he sure did like that.

  He thought about telling Jon about Allegra, but it had never come up in their quick conversations. His brother came out to the cabin often too, and it had been sheer luck that he hadn’t run into Allegra yet.

  Or the fact that Jon had been very busy perpetuating his own secret relationship with his professor. Phoenix had listened as Jon talked, as the weeks rolled by, as he thought about Allegra and if she was really satisfied with their relationship.

  Surely she wouldn’t continue to like him if he insisted she come to him all the time. He wasn’t an expert on women by any means, but he knew they liked to be taken care of from time to time.

  He’d been very careful with Allegra since the hearing, barely pouring her a cup of coffee when she stopped by. He didn’t want her to think he found her incapable of anything, because the fact was, she was one of the strongest women he knew.

  Jon came out to the cabin one day and said Cassie had broken up with him, and Phoenix had listened to his brother’s sad tale for an hour while Allegra hung out in the bedroom. He felt bad for Jon, especially because he’d really seemed to be in love with the professor.

  But when he’d gone, Phoenix had tiptoed down the hall like he was about to do something wrong, laughed quietly with Allegra, and kissed her until they were both breathless.

  Now, nearing the middle of April, the cherry blossoms had just started to come on, and Phoenix had just checked the gate again to make sure the alarm and the lock were still in place. They were. Though Allegra didn’t stay with him anymore, he wanted everything to be safe and secure if she did.

  In fact, when he returned to the cabin, he caught sight of the little white coupe she drove. His heart thundered in his chest, and he increased his pace to get back to the house faster.

  “Hey,” he said when he went inside and found her feeding Sally and Dozer turkey from the sub sandwich in her hand.

  Her face lit up when she looked at him, and he swept her right into his arms, knowing full-well that he was in love with this woman. He kissed her like he hadn’t just seen her the previous evening, and she giggled against his lips.

  “Did you bring me a sandwich?” he asked, his voice low.

  “In the fridge,” Allegra said.

  “I have some of that hummus you like,” he said, stepping over to the fridge to get his food out. Dozer barked and started for the front door.

  Phoenix’s gaze flew that way, and then he nudged Allegra toward the back door. “It’s Jon. Go.”

  She slipped out the back door at the same time Jon said, “Knock, knock,” and entered the cabin through the front door.

  “Hey,” Phoenix practically yelled, his adrenaline firing on a dozen cylinders. He tucked his shirt back into his pants and swiped the wrapper from Allegra’s sandwich off the counter. Hopefully, in Jon’s weakened emotional state over the break-up, he wouldn’t notice.

  “How’s the new cabin going?” Phoenix asked, yanking open the fridge and stuffing the wrapper inside. He saw the sandwich Allegra had bought for him, but bypassed it in favor of a couple of cans of soda.

  “Good enough,” Jon said. “I just came from the site. I’ve got the foundation and framework done. It’ll be ready by the tourist season.” He accepted the can of soda from Phoenix and sank onto a barstool. So he’
d be staying a while, and Phoenix cut a glance toward the back door. If Allegra couldn’t come back in, where would she go? Would she leave?

  Phoenix really didn’t want her to leave, not when he was gearing up to ask her about important things. Marriage things.

  “I’m not sure why Dad needs another cabin,” Jon continued. “We have thirty already.”

  “Well, it’s one more, and that’s another couple hundred dollars per night.” Phoenix joined him at the other end of the bar, his nerves almost shot and this visit had just started. “Talk to Cassie?”

  “Nope.” Jon popped the P on the word and asked, “You seeing anyone?”

  Phoenix laughed, maybe a little too long and a little too loud. “Are you serious?”

  Jon shook his head, letting a smile drift across his mouth. “I guess not. Where would you meet someone, right? You never go anywhere.”

  “Hey, I go to work,” he said, wondering why he didn’t just tell Jon about Allegra. Bring her in and introduce her.

  “Name the last woman you talked to.”

  “Mom,” Phoenix said as Jon qualified his demand with, “That you aren’t related to.”

  They laughed again, and Jon stared down at his open soda can. “I miss her so much.”

  “You should just go over to her house. You know where she lives.”

  “No, I’m not doing that again.”

  “Hang in there, bro,” Phoenix said. “Even the heart heals with time.”

  “Yeah?” Jon asked. “Is yours almost whole then?”

  Phoenix shrugged and lifted his drink to his lips, his silence probably the answer Jon needed. But Phoenix searched for the hole Kathy had left in his life, and he couldn’t find it. He smiled to himself and determined that he needed to get his brother out of his house, pronto.

  “Are you going to pass your class?” Phoenix asked. “You’re not going anymore, right?”

  “I still have an A,” Jon said.

  Phoenix got up and clapped Jon on the back, intending to get into the bedroom and get the window open so Allegra could climb inside. “Hang in there. You get up and you go to work and you talk to someone. It gets better.”