The log split with a satisfying crack. He picked up one of the split halves and made short work of it, cutting it into smaller pieces. Each swing of the ax, each grunt of effort, the sweat that beaded on his forehead and stung his eyes, that dampened his shirt, the screaming protest of burning muscles… it was all good because at least it took his mind off a certain flaxen haired, green eyed beauty with the petite, heart shaped face of an angel. She had the sensual body of a goddess, delicious curves that begged to be touched and explored.
Damn it!
On his next swing, the ax glanced off the log and bounced off to the side, nearly hitting Jason’s shin in the process. He stopped, his chest heaving with effort.
What the hell am I doing out here, nearly cutting off my leg? Anyone would think he had never seen a beautiful woman before. His body, which was stiff and achy in exactly the wrong spots, his cock included in that number, reacted like he hadn’t. It’s been too long. I’ve been out here far too long.
Jason threw the ax aside with a grunt of disgust. He made his way through the wood, traversing a well-worn path through the trees and underbrush, shrubs and moss, down to the creek. He broke through the clearing, which gave way suddenly, without warning, to steep mossy banks, sharp rocky ledges and a swiftly flowing creek. The crystal clear creek wasn’t more than ten feet wide, but it was deceptively deep and the current was fast flowing, especially in the spring.
Now that summer was in its height, the water was less swollen. It meandered now, rather than roaring its way through the land.
He stooped at the side of the creek and dipped his hands in. Though it was mid-July, the water was still ice cold. His fingers quickly grew numb. He cupped his hands and splashed the water onto his heated face. The ice cold shock re-balanced his mind.
Why am I worried? She’ll be gone soon enough. She’ll pack her bags. She’s not cut out for this. For any of it. I don’t have to drive her away with sullen silences or too many chores. She belongs in the city. Soon enough she’ll see she’s made a mistake and leave.
It shouldn’t have, but it felt like a monumental loss.
His groan of annoyance echoed through the clearing. Jason cut back through the woods, back in the direction of the cabin. He’d been gone long enough. Hopefully she hadn’t managed to burn the place down.
As he walked through the front door, the smell of burning coffee did indeed assault him, but so too did the heavenly scent of frying bacon and fresh cooked eggs.
He sauntered into the kitchen, aware that his boots left muddy tracks after his wet trek down to the creek and back. He pulled out a kitchen chair and sat, silently.
His new employee rushed around the kitchen, a moving blur of sensuality, tempting him with every single movement she made. A dip at the waist showed off her curvy ass, fitted in jeans so tight they could have been painted on. She attended to the frying pan, flipping the bacon and her body swayed melodically, like she was dancing. Her breasts, full, lush breasts, strained at her blouse as she bent over to grab something out of the fridge.
She finally whirled and caught him staring at her. “The coffee’s burned,” he announced, like an asshole.
“Yes,” she said, obviously flustered. Her green eyes, eyes the color of the grass right by the creek, lush and ripe and new, sparked with annoyance. “I’m sorry, I’ll get it right next time. I’m just not used to using something that brews over the stove. I think the fire was too hot…” Pink lips pursed, waiting for him to berate her further.
He just shrugged. He was privately impressed that she’d been able to accomplish half of what she had in the hour he’d been gone. The stove had already been lit though. If he was a betting man he would wager against her getting it going in the morning.
“So…” Amanda set a chipped plate down in front of him. The china wasn’t fancy. The plates, cups, saucers, bowls, pots and pans and utensils had all been there when he bought the place. He hadn’t brought anything of his own. Not even his clothes. Those he’d purchased after, in Dinane, a small town half an hour down the road, in the exact opposite direction of Boulder.
Jason glanced down at the plate then back up at her face. Apparently that was the wrong thing to do. Her eyes flitted away quickly and twin spots of bright pink blossomed on delicate, alabaster cheeks. She wasn’t even tanned. Which meant she spent absolutely no time at all out in the sun.
“I was wondering what your name is. You never told me.”
“Jason,” he finally said, after a long pause which he noticed made her uncomfortable.
“Oh.”
She said nothing else, just placed a mug, the sugar bowl and the carton of cream on the table in front of him. She served up the bacon and eggs shortly after. He stared down at his plate. The burnt coffee she filled his mug with was thick and dark. Probably palatable with enough sugar and cream.
He caught her, ready to leave the kitchen a minute later. “What are you doing? Aren’t you going to eat breakfast?”
Amanda turned, slowly, blushing again. She didn’t meet his gaze. Instead she focused over his shoulder, out the window. “I already ate before I came. Thanks though.”
“You don’t need to thank me.” He picked up a forkful of eggs and rammed them into his mouth. God, he was starving. He hadn’t tasted anything so delicious in a long time. He pointed out that she had burned the coffee because he was in a surly state and needed to focus on her flaws rather than her more beautiful assets. He himself couldn’t count how many times he’d burned coffee, or anything else. The fact was that he was a shit cook. “This is part of your job, remember? Room and board?” He chewed with his mouth half full.
“Yah,” she responded quietly. She stood in the entrance to the kitchen, looking like she wasn’t quite sure what he wanted her to do.
Didn’t that make two of them? He had no idea either. “There are sheets in the linen closet down the hall. You can use some to make up your bed. You probably want to spend the better part of today in your own cabin. It hasn’t been used in quite a while. I imagine the mice and the spiders will just about have taken over by now.”
She gulped audibly and he had to grin. God, she was a city girl through and through. “If you want to wash anything, I’ll have to show you how to use the portable washer. That is, unless you want to use the creek and the line. That works just as good. There’s a well right beside the cabin. You can either use the hand pump or you can take the cover off and there’s a bucket you can put down. If you choose that option, you might be there for a good long while. It’s a deep well.”
“Uh… alright.”
Jason nodded. He waited for her to beat a hard path out of there, but she didn’t move. He glanced up, right into those mossy green eyes. They cut straight through him, straight through to the quick of him, to the sensitive, tender part that still felt something. His cock, which so far had obeyed since the cold dousing he’d given his face by the creek, jumped to life. It ground hard against the fly of his jeans and he barely stifled a groan.
“So you paint?” He asked gruffly, his voice a hell of a lot harsher than he intended.
“Yes,” she answered softly. She looked away again, turning her gaze back out the window.
“Are you good?”
“I… I don’t know. I wouldn’t necessarily say so, compared to others.”
“What good is it then? If you’re not that good? Or are you just being modest?”
Amanda’s hands, those delicate, pale, flawless hands that hadn’t seen a day’s hard work in years, if ever, twisted in front of her waist. “I don’t know.” She still didn’t look at him. “I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. You may like it, you may not. I suppose that would determine, for you, whether I was good or not.”
“You know, not everything has to be politically correct.” He jammed a forkful of eggs into his mouth before reaching down and picking up a strip of bacon. God, he hadn’t said so many words in a very, very long time. It was like they had built up inside of him,
ready to explode at any given second.
“Politically correct?” One blonde brow arched in question.
“You can just say yes, I’m good. Or go fuck yourself, Jason. Or you don’t look like the kind of guy who could tell the difference anyway. Any of that would suit me just fine.”
She made a choking noise, a little strangled whimper in the back of her throat. It sounded very much like what would have been pulled from the depths of her soul in the heat of passion. The hair rose on the back of Jason’s arms. Fuck. I have to get out of here.
“Alright. Any of those then. Thanks for the instruction.”
“Just manage not to burn anything down while I’m gone.”
“Gone?”
“Yah. I’m going into town.”
“Now? To Boulder?”
“Now. There are other places on earth. There’s a small town not far. I want to get some supplies…”
“Alright.”
“I won’t be back before dark.”
She glanced towards the window and he could see her, calculating the long hours without him to help her if she was in trouble. Dark meant late. Nine or ten. What the hell was he going to do until then?
“Okay.”
“Don’t drown yourself. Don’t hurt yourself. Don’t burn anything down. You have a cell?”
“Everyone has a phone.”
“Use it if you need to. I’d prefer you didn’t, but that’s just me. I hate the things. Only turn mine on for emergencies and reception is spotty here anyway.” He scraped his plate clean, pushed it away and shoved back his chair.
Amanda stepped back to let him pass, silently by. He had a pretty good notion that his cabin would be spotless when he got back. What else would she do with the entire afternoon and evening? Paint? Maybe. Maybe she’d be useless as a housekeeper and he could always fire her. That is, if she was still there when he got back.
He slammed his way outside and into his old, beat up pick up. Luckily she’d parked her sleek, black sedan out of the way so he could still get down the drive without telling her to move her car.
He glanced back in the rear view mirror just once as he sped away. He didn’t see her. She hadn’t come out to stand on the porch and watch him go.
Jason didn’t feel an ounce of relief until he was off the dirt road that led to his property, out of the woods, down the gravel road and onto the highway. He just needed to get away, cool his head, give himself a chance to think rationally. He didn’t know what the hell was going on. His body shamed him. Like he couldn’t control himself. He was thirty-five fucking years old and he was acting like a thirteen year old boy who had just discovered his cock was for more than just taking a piss.
He reached over and cranked down the window. The warm summer air rushed into the truck and ruffled his hair. It provided no cooling relief, but it did refresh his lungs when he breathed in the mountain scented, pine crisp fragrance.
Yes, maybe Amanda would be gone when he got back. One could always hope. He just hated how, after so much time alone, that hope felt far hollower than it should have.
Chapter 5
A New Day
The first rays of dawn, gray and indistinct, filtered through the small window above the twin sized bed. The light gradually grew stronger, until reds and pinks reflected on the brass headboard. Dust motes danced in the beams of sun.
Amanda shifted and stretched. The small bed wasn’t new or comfortable. The mattress was harder than a stone slab. Her pillow was lumpy and smelled of mold or mildew. Maybe both.
She’d done her best to clean up the tiny cabin the day before. One hard lesson she’d learned- it took a heck of a long time to build a fire just to heat a pot of water. Jason was also woefully low on cleaning supplies. She hoped, on what seemed like his impromptu trip into town the day before, that he had procured some.
Her gaze traveled up to the ceiling. The open beams had been covered in cobwebs. She’d done away with them first, but she realized she’d missed a couple. She shivered, hoping that no nocturnal, eight legged creatures had visited her bed in the night.
Amanda threw back the quilt. It was far too early to get up but sleep was elusive. There was a small dresser, ancient looking, the kind from the turn of the century, in the room. The mirror was faded and dappled with age spots but it was sturdy enough. She’d unpacked her clothes into it the previous afternoon.
She dressed in silence, slipping on a long black maxi skirt, a tight fitting black tank top and a huge knit sweater. It was cool in the cabin at the start of the day, with no fire going.
The rest of the cabin was just one room. A small kitchen area with a portable cabinet like what Jason had, was set up off to the side. There was a wood burning stove, but it was nothing like the one in the larger cabin. It was just the actual stove part for wood and it had a couple burners on top. No ovens. A tiny table with two handmade chairs was neatly placed in one corner and an older style sofa, the kind from the seventies, that burned yellow color, covered with a patchwork quilt, stood off to the other side of the room. A huge window let in lots of light. It made the place feel homey.
Red and gold hues streamed into the cabin. It was utterly beautiful, to look out the window and see nothing but trees and forest. The gentle sway of the wind blowing around the tiny cabin was the only source of noise other than the sweet calls of morning birds.
It was a big change from being in the city. Amanda loved the quiet and the stillness.
She’d set up her easel in one corner of the cabin, the only free corner left, closest to the window. Her paints were placed underneath, in a box. A stack of canvases rested against the gray slab walls.
She thought about trying to paint, but dismissed the idea in favor of a bath. The small tin tub for bathing was currently tucked under the kitchen table. It truly was small. She wasn’t a large human and she’d still have to fold all her limbs up just to fit in it.
The real turn off was the hand pump outside. Amanda’s arm still ached from using it the day before. To heat the water she’d have to start a fire which meant gathering wood. She didn’t have hours to waste before she’d have to get over to the other cabin to start breakfast.
She wasn’t sure when Jason wanted it. He hadn’t said. He hadn’t given her much instruction at all other than where to find things.
Just the thought of seeing him made her blood run hot. Her dreams the night before were punctuated with his face, and even worse, his body. His hands on her skin. It hadn’t even been overtly sexual. He’d been clothed from the waist down and she’d had on a sun dress. He’d ran his hand over her arm, caressing her skin with those rough palms.
She shivered violently and tried to ignore the heady, raw sensation that spooled in her belly and the dampness that gathered between her legs. She had no right to think of him that way. Not after she was fresh out of a breakup that she hadn’t even seen coming.
Phil’s final accusations ripped through her head. Infertile. Barren. Liar. Maybe the doctor was wrong. Maybe there was a problem with her. Just because they couldn’t find a reason she couldn’t conceive didn’t mean there wasn’t one. Maybe Phil was justified in kicking her out.
The thoughts stung and she didn’t want to think about it. Instead, Amanda made a decision to find the creek. It couldn’t be that hard. She could hear it in the distance, or at least, she thought she could the day before. Maybe she’d take a swim there instead of spending a ridiculous amount of time filling the tub to bathe. At the moment it seemed like the more rational option. At least the cold would make her forget all about Phil and all about the unsettling dreams that plagued her throughout the night.
The walk through the woods was exactly what Amanda needed. She’d never really understood the allure of camping, but she got it now. The soft scent of pines, the crisp Colorado morning air, the crunchy, dewy forest floor, it was all like a dream, a world she didn’t know she wanted to be a part of until that moment.
She found the creek. Or rather, it found
her. She’d found a path right off to the side of the cabin and followed it. Eventually the woods gave way to a clearing. The creek glistened in the early morning sunlight, pristine and inviting.
Amanda was about to step out of the woods when a ripple appeared at the top of the creek. She was shocked and stumbled back when a dark object burst through the surface.
She whirled, thinking it was some kind of wild animal, maybe even a bear. She took cover behind the thickest, tallest tree and eventually peaked around.
She let out a small sigh of relief when she realized it was only Jason swimming, not a bear at all. That relief quickly turned to something else, something far more dangerous than any bear. A tight heat built in her chest and closed up her throat as she watched, covertly, hidden behind the tree.
Jason’s strong arms stroked the surface. He cut through the water deftly, beautifully, as though he was some sea creature born to it. If he was cold, he didn’t show it. He swam the length of the creek, almost out of sight, then turned and she watched him make his way back.
I should leave. This isn’t right.
She was about to turn and go, she truly was, when Jason stopped. He turned towards the woods. She pressed her back against the tree trunk for a second, but then he glanced away. She watched in utter rapt fascination as his feet found the bottom and he waded towards the shore.
Water sluiced off his hair and beaded in silvery trails over powerful muscles. His shoulders rippled with power, his pecs and his chest… god, he might have been carved from one of those mountains in the distance. He looked as stately and ancient as any of the old trees in his woods. The sun or the water’s cold turned his bronzed skin a shade of pink. Water clung to the smattering of dark hair that covered his pecs. It trailed off and resumed lower, under his chiseled abs, just below his navel.
It wasn’t even the defined muscles, the godlike physique or the immediate, intense, hard wave of lust that washed over her that drew and held her stare.
It was the tattoos. They were everywhere. Scrolling black ink covered both arms, the designs impossible to make out from the distance, but they looked to be skillfully done sleeves. There was something written across his chest, but he turned then, and she couldn’t read it.
The Cabin Escape: Back On Fever Mountain 1 Page 3