Mountain Man's Bride

by Lauren Wood

  “You gave me time all right Fran. You gave me a long time when you didn’t even come and see me.”

  He was still on that, but I didn’t know what to say. I would have thought that he would get it. He wasn’t dense, but there was something not connecting in his mind. It worried me that he was stuck on all of that. I hadn’t gone to see him because of the look in his eyes that he had right now. I knew I was doomed, I just knew it.

  “I said I am sorry Caspien. What more do you want from me?”

  It was a question that he wasn’t prepared for and for a moment I would have thought that he legitimately didn’t know what he wanted. Cass had a look in his eyes that told me whatever it was it wasn’t going to be good. That was all that I knew.

  “I want you to feel how I felt Fran.”

  “You already hurt Lucas, what more do you want?”

  “Lucas was just touching on the wrong girl. That had nothing to do with you. It had to do with me and him. I am not worried about what you think about that. Lucas was necessary and you should learn to stay away from people if you care about them.”

  As he said the words, he was making himself mad. He didn’t like the idea of me with anyone else, but he didn’t seem to want to be around me either. The man was full of contradictions that wouldn’t have bothered me. Except that he was mad and all of that anger was directed at me. It was a lot to take.

  “Please Cass, you have to understand. It wasn’t like you are making it sound. I did what I thought I had to do. You were out of control. It wasn’t you. It was the drugs. I know that, but that doesn’t change the fact that I know you will hurt me when you are like that.”

  “I will hurt you sober too. I think you know that as well Fran.”

  His reminder didn’t put a smile on my face, far from it. I wanted to yell at him and tell him that he was just being crazy, but that didn’t seem to be a good idea. Not when he was so convinced that it was all my fault. Cass never wanted to take any blame and this was a situation that was no different. The price was going to be different, but Cass not wanting to cop to anything that he does was just another day for him.

  “Well then do it. I am not going to be able to stop you Cass. I never was. You were always stronger and you just don’t care.”

  “I thought that was what you liked about me.”

  “It was, but I wanted you to care about me. When you started doing that Cass, I was just like all of the rest of the people. I have to move on and I know that you aren’t going to let me, so you just do what you have to do.”

  He shook his head and hissed at me. I was sitting down by the window and I looked outside at the swamp around me. There was nowhere to go. This was going to be the last place I seen and this view may be my last. In my mind, it was already happening and there was nothing that I could do about it. There really wasn’t.

  “You disappoint me Fran. I always thought I would get more out of you then this. You were a ride or die kind of girl, now look at you.”

  “All the time with you did this. I should have left a long time ago.”

  Now he was laughing and his dark eyes had darkened even further and I was worried. I was worried about what was going to happen next. I had asked for it and now I was going to get it. Maybe I should have kept my mouth shut to give myself more time.

  Chapter 12

  Lucas

  “What do you think they are doing in there? I bet he is about to tap that ass. I saw her before, that bitch is hot. They had her on the television, looking for her whereabouts to answer some questions.”

  I shrugged and moved a little closer to see into the tiny shack in the middle of nowhere. The last thing I wanted to do was think about that. I had been asked several times what was next and what should we do now, but I didn’t know either. I knew that Fran was in there because I had seen her momentarily by the window. Caspien was right behind her and they appeared to be alone.

  It was a risk either way. We could wait until nightfall and go in with a little bit of cover and surprise. But I didn’t want to wait. She was in there with that mad man and the idea of what he was doing to her was eating me up inside. The fact that David kept asking questions that I didn’t know answers to was hard to deal with as well.

  “I don’t know. We need to wait for Billy and then we are going in, whether they are here or not.” I wasn’t going to wait any longer. It felt like every minute that we waited, was another moment that Fran could be in danger.

  “Billy will be here in five.”

  Five minutes sounded like a long time and I was itching to go in guns blazing right now. I would have if it wasn’t for the fact that I knew he was going to use her to get out of it. A man like Cass didn’t love her. He would use her to get what he wanted and to get away. I couldn’t let that happen. I couldn’t let a man like that walk around another moment.

  It took forever for the other man to get there, but he was bringing me what I needed. Going in with guns and yelling was only going to end with Fran getting hurt or worse. I wanted Caspien dead and I was going to make sure that happened, but not at the expense of Fran, that I couldn’t do. I didn’t want to either.

  So I took one of the white canisters that he had brought with him and waited for the other two men to get in position. I liked the way that Caspien had taken us on all sides, forcing us out through a choke point. It was a good strategy, one that I was going to use now. I was going to make him come out and then like his plan for us, I was going to take him out. I hoped that the gas would make him so disoriented that he wouldn’t be able to hold onto Fran as tightly. That was the plan anyways.

  I heard the soft whistle from Billy and I knew that he was where he was supposed to be. Before I moved another inch, I said a prayer. It was something that I hadn’t done in a long time and it wasn’t for me or for my men. I wanted us all to be safe, but the fact of it all was that I was praying for Fran. I wanted her to be okay.

  The time was upon us and I threw the canister into the window hard. It crashed against the glass and started spewing white smoke into the house. I heard glass breaking on the other sides that Billy and David were on. Soon the whole house was smoking and I trained my gun to the front. I moved closer so that I could get a hold of her before Caspein did. I should have known that it wouldn’t be that easy though, nothing ever was.

  Caspien was better adjusted to the gas then I would have thought. It was stinging my eyes just being close to the house. I could see that his eyes were burning and tears were pouring down his face, but that didn’t seem to stop him at all. It certainly didn’t stop him from having a grip on the woman I was there for.

  Fran was crying and she was being held from behind by Caspien. He was using her as a human shield, something I had known that he would do, even if I had hoped that he wouldn’t. I had hoped that the man would be a man, but I should have known better.

  “Let her go.”

  He shook his head and I let him get a minute to adjust his eyes. He wanted to see who it was that was doing this to him. It was a luxury that I was not afforded, but I wanted him to know who I was. I wanted him to know that it was me who was going to ruin it for him. I was going to be the man that took his life.

  “You, you are still alive?” Caspien sounded disappointed and I couldn’t help but smile. It wasn’t the first time that a man had tried to kill me and not succeeded. Better men had tried in more straight up ways and I was still here. They were not. I don’t care who he is and what he thinks is going to happen, it wasn’t going to happen the way he wanted it to. It was going to happen how it was meant to. I was going to get the girl and all Caspien was going to get was a bullet in the head. That was what he deserved.

  The man had a hold on Fran that made it impossible to do anything. The gun was pointed at her head and I had no thought that he wouldn’t pull the trigger. He was a man that would do anything to save his own ass, eve hide behind a woman. It didn’t make sense to me. At all.

  “Lucas?”

  The second
voice was Fran and now she was seeing me as well. She looked confused and relieved all at the same time. “I thought you were dead?”

  “No, he tried baby. I told you I would keep you safe. All you had to do was trust me Fran.”

  Caspien didn’t like us talking and told the woman in his arms to shut up. I could see his fingers digging into her shoulder and I hated the way she cried out. It wasn’t the way a woman should make that noise. The only way I wanted her to scream was in ecstasy. Fran was in nothing but pain and even though Boris had told me how brave she was, Fran was shaking and it was clear that she was in over her head.

  “Let her go Caspien and I will make this quick. Don’t and I will show you how much patience I really have for men like you.”

  “You are overestimating your position Lucas. You seem to think that I give a damn about her. I will kill her before I kill you and you will do nothing about it because you actually care for her. How sweet. It will be your downfall. Women are always the wrong weakness to have.”

  What he said was true about me caring. To hell with me, but I did care. I don’t know why I cared so much, but just seeing her touched by him in such a way enraged me to no end.

  “Let her go Caspien. This is the last time that I am going to tell you.”

  The man was obviously not paying attention. I don’t know what he thought he was going to do, but it was clear to me that he wasn’t worried about what I was going to do. He thought that he had everything under control. I couldn’t wait to see his face when he realized that it wasn’t the way it was. There was not going to be a way for him to get away from me, not this time. I wasn’t going to let it happen. He had started this war, but I was going to make sure that I was the one that finished it.

  I was trying to think of what to do. Billy and David were coming up from the other side, but they knew that they were not to shoot. Not only did I not want something to happen to Fran, I wanted to be the one that ended Cass. It was a personal thing that needed a personal touch.

  I didn’t get time to come up with something else. Fran stomped down on the man’s foot and while he was hollering out in pain, I shot. Fran had moved out of the way quickly. She wasn’t going to wait for me to give up the gun and it worked. Caspien didn’t even get a shot out before he was hitting the ground. I don’t know what I expected from Fran, maybe that she would cry or scream even. But nothing came out of here. Instead she just looked at the lifeless body for several moments like she couldn’t take her eyes from him.

  “Are you okay Fran?”

  Her eyes were red and there were bruises on her arms that were fresh. She also had some marks on her face and that made me livid. If I could have brought him back to life, just so that I could kill him again, I think I would have. That was how much I hated the man and how much I hated to see her hurt in any way.

  I didn’t think about it before I stopped in front of her and pulled her towards me just like I had before. It was all I could think to do and I needed to feel her body against me. I just wanted to put my arms around her and to feel, know that she was okay. Fran was shaking in my arms and it wasn’t long before she was pushing back against my chest. Her eyes were sparkling with emotions and she sighed up at me. “You are the last person I thought I would see Lucas.”

  “I told you I would do what I can to keep you safe. You should have come with me Fran. I hate that this happened.” I tried to calm her down, touching her face and kissing her lips for just a moment before I heard her sigh. Her eyes closed and she smiled before she opened them again.

  What are you doing here Lucas? I thought…Cass told me that he had killed you. I didn’t want to believe it, but Cass was so sure.”

  “He tried, but it will take more than a few bottles coming through my windows to do it. He burnt the house down, but that doesn’t matter now. All that matters Fran, is that you are okay and you are back in my arms where you belong.”

  “This is a bit much, don’t you think?”

  I didn’t follow and I asked her what she meant by that. I had just saved her. Was that bit too much?

  “Well I know that you wanted to go out with me Lucas, I just didn’t know that you would go to all of these lengths to do it. I didn’t know that you were so committed.”

  “Hard to say no now, isn’t it?”

  She looked to the man lying on the rotten wood of the porch. She hadn’t wanted it to come to this, but she had to know that it had to be this way. Fran didn’t seem too bothered by it. “Yeah I guess it is.”

  “So are you going to go out with me on a date or are we destined to only meet in bathrooms and old shacks?”

  There was laughter and chuckles behind me and I knew that it was my men. I would have been embarrassed to be caught in such a vulnerable position, but I couldn’t help it, hell I didn’t want to. I had done this for her, far more than I had done it for me. It was Fran that had made it all happen and it was Fran that I was kept up thinking about all night. It wasn’t going to be easy and I knew it was going to be complicated, but I was going to have to be okay with that.

  Fran was worth the wait. There was no way that I was going to jump on her now like I wanted to. It was impossible with what she had been through. My mind knew that, but my body didn’t care.

  Chapter 13

  Fran

  It had been a crazy week. After what happened at the cabin, there was a big part of me that just wanted to leave the city behind and all of the craziness that had happened there. I was tired of the drama, but there was no reason to run now. Lucas had taken care of all of that for me and for that I was thankful. We had talked a couple of times, but it was hard to. Every time I talked to him I was reminded of that day and it wasn’t a memory that I wanted to really hold onto.

  I was back at Stephanie’s visiting and she was just happy to have Caspien gone as well. I still felt bad that I had dragged her into this, but she was forgiving and I couldn’t have asked for anything more. After everything that the two of us had gone through, I couldn’t have bared it if we had gotten into it again. I needed my friend and I think in a way she needed me. Having Cass in our lives was hard to get over and it was just taking time. Time that Lucas didn’t want to take. He called every day to see if I was ready to go out with him, I still wasn’t. I didn’t know if I ever would be. While Lucas was so different than Cass, there were still similarities that were hard to ignore.

  The phone rang and I stared at it. I knew who it was before I even looked at the phone. He always called me about the same time and when I saw the time, I picked up the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “You actually picked up today.”

  “You are persistent Lucas.”

  “I was promised a date and then you have ignored me since I dropped you off at her friend’s place.”

  How was it that he didn’t understand why? It had been too much, all of it had been just too much and Lucas acted like he was not at fault. He wasn’t involved with what had happened, but Lucas was too much like Caspien to forget that point. I didn’t want to go down that road again. I had learned a lesson if nothing else.

  Now that I was staying in Cass’ house, it made me realize even more. I would find caches of money and drugs periodically. Several times just this week I had found things. There was no telling what more was here. I had a feeling that Lucas was no better. I had been in that life for a long time and I didn’t want to continue on in that way. This was my warning and in a way I felt like it was my last chance.

  “I don’t know what to say Lucas. I don’t think that it would be a good idea to go out. You and I want two very different things. When I get around you, I don’t think straight and I can’t do that right now.”

  I could see his eyes smoldering in my mind. He would be angry, something that I made him on a daily basis, whether I answered the phone or not.

  “I just want you Fran. That is all I know and I went through a lot to get you. I am not going to just let this go. I can’t.”

  It sou
nded good, it always did because he had a way of saying the sweetest things, but it didn’t change anything. I was trying to live a clean life and he was making it hard to do that. I missed the rush of adrenaline, but there was a downside. I had been acutely reminded of that downside with Cass last week.

  “We don’t even know each other Lucas.”

  “I’ve been trying to get to know you. You are a hard woman to get to know. If I was a lesser man, I would have given up with all of the rebuffs that you have thrown my way.”

  If he was smart he would have. “What do you want Lucas? I won’t ever say anything about what happened at Cass’ shack. You saved my life and I will never forget that, but I don’t know where that leaves us.”

  “I am not worried about you talking Fran. Why would I be? This has nothing to do with that. This has to do with me and you. It just feels right, doesn’t it? When you are in my arms, it just feels right.”

  I know that it felt some kind of way, but right may not have been how I would have categorized it. It was scary and I didn’t know what was going to happen next. There was something in the air when I was with him, something that made me tremble inside when he was so close. I don’t know what it was, but never had I thought right. When I was around Lucas I had fever and chills, all at the same time. How could that be right?

  “I don’t know what I feel Lucas.”

  “You promised to go out with me Fran and I am going to hold you to it.”

  I did and I was the type of person that needed to keep my word. I wouldn’t feel right if I said I was going to do something and I just didn’t. It was not right and I knew that.

  “I did say that Lucas.”

  “Well might as well get it over with then.”

  Being with him was hard on me and even though I liked him, I did want to get it over with. I was just afraid of what would happen after the date. I was attracted to him, had been since I met him and I had a feeling that I was going to find it impossible to tell him no. I didn’t want to, even now on the phone. His silky voice was hard to deny and once he was looking at me with those blue eyes that clouded over with a storm, I wouldn’t be able to think straight. That is how it always went and Lucas was a man that got what he wanted.