by BJ Wane
It was best not to involve himself with Lillian’s troubles other than to get her well enough to send her on her way to wherever she was headed in a few days.
Chapter 3
“The storm has passed, but I told Sheriff Monroe to put digging your car out as low priority.” Lillian picked up her plate and stood, her mouth tightening with pique as she flicked Mitchell an irritated look. He held up a hand to ward off her complaint. “We’re both fine here for another twenty-four hours, and even longer if necessary. There are others in worse straits, including livestock that local ranchers could use a helping hand in getting to.”
Her shoulders slumped as she carried her empty dish to the sink. He liked she didn’t expect him to clean up after her.
“You’re right. Even though this is my first winter storm outside of the city, I should have realized the efforts it takes to get to people who are so spread out.” She rinsed her plate and turned to lean against the counter. “I missed the turnoff to Billings, where I planned to stop. Where is this Willow Springs you mentioned?”
“Not far, closer than Billings from here. Hailing from Denver, it took me some time to get used to the small-town vibes, but now I like it. If you’re in no hurry, you should stay a few days to rest up and let yourself heal.”
A sorrowful spasm crossed her face before she averted her head toward the snow-covered window. “I might, seeing as I’m not headed anywhere in particular. I wish I had my paints,” she murmured with a soft sigh.
“You’re an artist? I wondered when I saw the canvases in the back of your car.” Mitchell walked over to a cupboard to her left and retrieved a notebook of unlined, blank sheets. His arm brushed hers as he lowered it and handed her the tablet. “You can have this to sketch in, if you want. It’ll give you something to do while I go out and clear the window and get more wood. There should be some pencils or pens in that drawer.” He nodded to the end drawer along the counter.
For the first time, her eyes shone with gratitude and pleasure as she took the simple offering, careful not to let their hands touch. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. I want to check your ribs before I go out.” Michell wiggled his fingers in an upward motion, signaling for her to lift her sweater. This time, her deep purple gaze lit with amusement.
“Men usually don’t insist on me making it easy for them to get under my clothes.”
His mouth twitched, enjoying her humor. It was so much better than her sniping or sadness. “I’m not most men and I’m checking you out as a doctor, not a lover.”
She set the tablet on the counter and lifted her sweater, her eyes on his face as she smirked, “So you’re not imagining what I look like without my bra right now?”
Sliding his eyes down, he visually caressed her white satin-covered breasts long enough to watch her nipples pucker in response. “About as much as you’re not imagining me touching you.” Her eyes flashed and she started to lower her top. Apparently she could dish it out but had trouble taking it. Or maybe she was fighting her response as hard as he was struggling to suppress the growing need to ease the pain reflected on her face with something pleasurable. He stopped her by reaching out and running his fingers over her bruised ribs. “Relax. It’s just a little harmless banter to break up the tedium.”
Lillian sucked in a deep breath as he lightly probed her black and blue ribcage. “Do you always blow so hot and cold? One minute you’re the nice, concerned doctor, the next a put-upon host and now the congenial acquaintance.”
“I could say the same about you, pet,” he answered absently as he tried to palpate her ribs without causing her too much discomfort. When he realized he let slip with another nickname, he glanced at her face, lifting one brow at her silence.
After a moment, she shrugged, saying, “Just don’t call me baby.”
“Deal. One to ten, how sore are you?”
“Maybe a four or five. I’m fine.”
He lowered his hand, replying, “You will be in a few weeks. Until then, no lifting or straining. I have aspirin, if you need it.” He plucked it out of an upper cabinet and set the bottle on the counter and then strode toward the door to shrug into his coat. “This will take a while, so rest and amuse yourself until I come back in.” Snatching up his gloves, he stepped out into bright sunshine but frigid cold air, wondering at the urge to put space between them.
Lillian scowled at the closed door. Mitchell’s parting comment had sounded more like an order than a suggestion, his clipped tone stirring up her resentment of this whole situation. When she’d teased him about getting under her clothes, she’d done so to throw him off guard, the same as her lightning quick, warm responses to his innocent touches had flustered her. The same desperate impulse to drive away and keep on going that had gripped her when she’d stumbled out of Brad’s house returned to plague her. Only she was as stuck here, with no way out as much as she had been trapped for the previous month into staying with Brad.
Liana’s smiling face popped up into Lillian’s head as she remembered their laughter as they’d tossed tinsel they’d plucked off their Christmas tree onto each other. That was the last time she’d heard Liana’s voice. A week later, Lillian had gotten the phone call from her sister’s boss telling her she’d collapsed at work and was en route to the hospital.
Blinking back tears, Lillian sat at the table and started sketching the scene in her head. During her two-week vigilance at the hospital, she’d passed the time by drawing childhood memories of the two of them, thinking they might help Liana heal when she awoke. After her twin had been moved to the care home and Brad blackmailed Lillian with threats to her beloved sister, she’d been too distraught and then too angry with him and fate to sketch any more memories.
It had been a grave mistake to let herself lean on Brad right after Liana had collapsed. She’d broken up with him because of his high-handed, possessive manner and attempts to control her, but the shock and despair of her sister’s condition had rendered her helpless to cope alone. With no other family, Brad had taken advantage of her grief and uncertainty and then revealed the true depth of his obsession with her when she’d backed away. But every snide, cutting remark, every punch, arm twist, kick and unwanted fuck had been worth it to ensure Liana didn’t suffer at his hands. Lillian still shuddered when she recalled the things he’d said he could do to her, things sure to cause tremendous pain without anyone being the wiser.
A scraping sound drew her eyes to the window as she finished a sketch of Liana reaching to place the star on a Christmas tree. She watched the snow fall away from the window, one scrape from top to bottom at a time, until enough cleared she could see Mitchell. A black Stetson covered his head and a scarf tucked around his neck was stretched over his mouth and nose, but there was no mistaking that unnerving, penetrating gaze zeroing in on her through the cleared glass. She wanted to look away, to hide from whatever he was trying to calculate from her expression but refused to back down.
And then his head moved in an almost imperceptible nod, as if he’d been checking up on her and affirmed she was doing his bidding by resting and drawing. She slid her eyes away from the window, a curl of resentment forming a knot in her stomach. He’s a doctor, I should cut him some slack. Maybe she would if she hadn’t been forced to endure another doctor’s insufferable dictates for weeks. Mitchell’s tendency to order instead of ask might stem from medical concern, but she didn’t care. The part of her that still trembled whenever she thought of Brad’s retribution when she didn’t meet his demands insisted she retaliate.
With no thought in mind except to venture outside in a small show of rebellion, Lillian tried not to think about her aching face and ribs as she tugged on her boots after Mitchell moved away from the window. Snatching her coat off the rack, she buttoned up and pulled on her gloves, figuring she wouldn’t mind if the cold air numbed her face. Opening the door, she shielded her eyes against the glare of bright sunshine bouncing off a field of winter white.
The sou
nd of an ax cutting through wood resonated from around the side and Lillian trudged through several feet of snow to spy on her host, admiring the glistening icicles dangling from frozen tree limbs. Peeking around the corner, she spotted Mitchell, now coatless, lifting an ax above his head and bringing it down in the center of a propped-up log, his strong swing splitting the wood in two. Okay, he is worth staring at, she admitted as his shoulder and back muscles bunched under the brown flannel shirt. Snug jeans emphasized the clench of taut buttocks as he replaced the split pieces with another hefty log. He was just as eye-catching now as last night when she’d seen his naked body silhouetted by the glowing fire. She might have been groggy with lingering exhaustion, but she’d been awake enough to appreciate the mouthwatering, pussy spasming view.
Lillian shook her head, admitting he was right; her thoughts about him jumped back and forth as much as his treatment of her. For two days, ever since she’d fled Brad’s house, got in her car and just drove, she’d been operating on remote control. She still had no destination in mind for when she left here and didn’t want to think ahead to the bleak future without Liana. Living for the moment was all she cared to do right now, and the sudden urge to have some fun with the good doctor took hold.
Squatting down, she scooped up a wad of snow and formed a snowball, intent on showing Mitchell she was perfectly capable of deciding how much rest or inactivity she could handle. She was bruised and sore, nothing she didn’t have experience with even if this was the first time Brad had unleashed such uncontrolled anger on her and aimed for her ribs and face. She hoped the gash on his head she’d inflicted pained him as much as what she suffered.
Taking aim, she let loose with the snowball, wincing at the pull around her upper torso. The extra discomfort was worth it when Mitchell spun around in surprise and glared at her.
“Knock it off, Lillian,” he growled as she scooped up another wad of snow in her gloved hands. “You’re supposed to be resting.”
“I don’t need to rest. I slept twelve hours between yesterday and this morning.” She shivered as he fisted his hands on those lean hips and his hazel eyes darkened to almost solid brown. She was learning to detect his mood by the color of his eyes and that look was becoming familiar, as was her heated response to his deep, demanding tone.
“I think I’m better qualified to know what you need to do. Now put that down and get back inside,” he ordered.
Oh, no, neither that dictate nor her body’s strange reaction was acceptable, leaving her only one way to retaliate. “Tsk, tsk, Doc, you’re getting bossy again.” Lobbing the snowball, she hit him in the chest. The disbelief on his face was comical until he came toward her with stealthy purpose.
Sparring with Mitchell helped keep her mind off her plight better than anything else thus far. Laughing, she held out a hand, as if that would hold him back. “You have to be nice, I’m hurt, remember?”
“You just said you were fine,” he reminded her in a voice soft as silk, moving through the knee-high pileup much faster and easier than she.
Lillian backed away with a shiver, her pulse leaping as he closed the distance between them before she could reach the door. In her clumsy haste, she lost her footing and went down, the snow softening her fall but chilling her to the bone as the back of her bare head dampened. Mitchell came down on top of her, bracing on his arms, a small grin replacing the stern slash of his mouth.
“Serves you right for disobeying me.”
Lillian’s breath stalled and her heart thudded against her chest as Mitchell’s face looming above her blurred into Brad’s, his words hurling her back to the last time Brad’s threats forced her to endure his possession. For a few seconds, the same sense of humiliation, throat-tightening despair and white-hot fury clouded her mind. Refusing to give in to the panicked distress threatening her composure, she snapped back as quickly as she’d tumbled down that rabbit hole, Mitchell’s whiplash voice helping her to refocus on the present.
“Lillian!”
Getting to his feet, Mitchell throttled back his volatile reaction to seeing Lillian’s face go chalk-white and her eyes glaze with such a look of torment he could feel her distress. She rallied as fast as she’d shaken him with the knowledge that bastard had done more than strike her. She started to get up and he held out his hand. “Give me your hand.”
“I don’t need help.”
“Damn it.” Grasping her arms, he lifted her up, his efforts earning him a glare out of those dark eyes. “Yes, you do, whether you want to admit it or not.” As much as her intrusion on his privacy frustrated him, he once again found himself admiring her gumption as she shoved back whatever memory he’d triggered that had wiped the mirth off her face.
Lillian pulled away and he released her, his own thoughts as jumbled as hers appeared to be. Mitchell didn’t want to involve himself in whatever trouble she was running from but couldn’t deny the desire to see her face infused with pleasure just once before they went their separate ways. It wouldn’t change the harm done to her, but it sure as hell would make him feel better, and her too for a short time.
“I think I’ll listen to you and get back inside.”
With some difficulty, he refrained from telling her to sit in front of the fire until her hair dried. “I’ll be in shortly.” He waited until the door closed behind her to retrieve his coat and gather up an armful of chopped wood.
Mitchell had been reminiscing about the long weekends he and Abbie had enjoyed at their mountain cabin back in Colorado when Lillian startled him with that first snowball. The unexpected cold splat jerked him back from the heated memory of restraining his naked wife to a tree one summer afternoon in the secluded copse of their private retreat and the way her soft cries would echo on the fresh mountain air. Lillian’s amused defiance when he’d ordered her to stop and go back inside had shaken loose his ire, the impish look on her face and sparking in her eyes preferable to the desolation, pain or simmering anger she’d been portraying.
Too bad his attempt to playfully show her who held the upper hand had triggered a memory that wiped off her engaging smile. He craved five minutes with the man who had tormented her, the strangling tentacles of his rage on her behalf unlike anything he’d experienced before. The cases of abuse that had come through the trauma center in Denver had stirred his pity and anger, but Lillian’s grit and determination in the wake of her trauma punched both those emotions up a notch. Considering that, he thought it was a good thing they would go their separate ways tomorrow.
Mitchell used his elbow to unlatch the door and shoved it open with his shoulder. Kicking it shut behind him, he turned with his load toward the fireplace and saw Lillian sitting on the hearth, the soft amber glow from the sizzling embers highlighting the dark burgundy of her shoulder-length hair. At least the stirring of lust he felt when she lifted her head and gave him a bland look was a familiar reaction he could accept much easier than what her expression lying under him in the snow had conjured up.
Dropping the logs except the bottom two into the bin, he said, “If you’ll move aside for a minute, I’ll stoke the fire.”
“Sure. My hair’s dry, so I don’t need to sit this close anymore. Do you mind if I raid your food supply and come up with something for dinner? It would give me something to do.”
“Knock yourself out, but I only stock the basics, some frozen hamburger and canned goods.”
He listened to her rummaging as he got the fire up and going again and then spotted the notebook he gave her sitting on the end of the hearth. Picking it up, he flipped through it, gazing at the three pictures drawn with a talented hand. The woman in all three appeared to be Lillian until he looked closer at the details of her face. The nose was slightly off with a small bump, the eyes were the same oval shape but Lillian’s lower lip was fuller than the woman in the pictures, and this woman’s hair curled under her chin instead of hanging down her back.
Because of the resemblance, he assumed the drawing depicted a family member.
“Who is this?” He held up the top sketch as she peered around from searching an upper cupboard.
Lillian’s slender body went rigid, her jaw tightening and her eyes filling with sorrow and then narrowing to slits. He stayed patient while waiting for her to answer, which she did after several moments of tense silence between them.
“My twin sister. Does chili work for you?” She turned away from him and lifted down two cans of beans.
“Sounds good. You’re an excellent artist. Will your supplies be okay sitting out there in these temperatures?”
“No. I’ll have to replace my paints. I need a big pot.”
Setting the tablet on the table, he walked over and pulled a large pan from under the sink and placed it on the burner before getting nosy again. “What happened to her?”
“She died,” Lillian returned, her clipped voice conveying both grief and anger. “Unless you want to chop onion, leave me alone to get this going.”
“I’ll pass. That way you can blame your tears on the vegetable.”
Lillian blinked away the watery sheen in her eyes, gritting her teeth to keep from railing at him and his inquisitiveness. She owed him for helping her, but not enough to give him more details about the circumstances leading up to Liana’s passing. She didn’t need anyone judging her for giving in to Brad’s blackmail.
They settled into a companionable silence with him relaxing in the recliner with a book while she browned hamburger with onions and then stirred in the beans. As it simmered, she returned to the table to sketch another picture, this one of Mitchell with the glow of the blazing fire behind him. If she had her colored drawing pencils, she would shade the right side of his rugged face with a yellow tint. She eyed the mix of grey and black coloring of his hair and goatee, wondering about his age. The small lines fanning out from the corners of his eyes could be from squinting against the sun since she doubted they were laugh lines. She’d caught the same bleakness crossing his face she’d lived with since losing her twin but didn’t care to delve into his personal issues any more than she wanted him inquiring about hers.