by Lily White
Lowering myself to the ground, I tilted my face up into the scant amount of sunlight that remained. The day had been hot, but late afternoon had dragged with it a touch of the cooler weather that was approaching.
My eyes hadn’t been closed for more than a minute before I heard something walking around in the woods behind me. Pushing up to rest on my elbows, I squinted my eyes against the shadows, instinct chasing a warning along my spine as I scanned for even the smallest movement.
Dead leaves swirled in a gust of wind. A thick shadow moved from left to right. The hair on my nape stood on end.
Pushing up until I was crouched on the ground, I continued to peer out. My voice low, I warned, “I don’t know what’s out there, but I see you.”
I didn’t know if it was an animal or a man, and I hoped the fact that I’d spoken out loud would chase either option away. Nothing skittered off at the sound of my voice. The tension ratcheted higher.
Pushing up to my feet, I crept forward, my unblinking eyes taking in every detail I could distinguish from the swirl of decaying leaves and rattle of thin branches that hung low enough to slap the ground.
My body crossed the threshold of the woods, the sunlight fading at my back as I pushed forward, my hand finding and settling on something warm and hard. A gasp of breath flew over my lips when I looked up into the eyes that watched me.
A large hand wrapped over my mouth preventing the scream that would have torn from my lips, but remained trapped in my throat instead.
“Don’t scream. It’s just me.”
I didn’t recognize the hiss of the whispered words, but I knew the earthy scent that wafted past my nose. Alarm instantly tightened my shoulders. Had it been anybody else, I would have fought and struggled. But not him. Not my secret.
Lips grazed my ear as the man bent over my tiny frame to ask, “If I let you go, do you promise not to scream?”
Nodding my head, I thought of all the women I’d heard scream when they understood their fate. It was too late for those women, but not too late for me. However, I didn’t fear this man like the women had feared my family…I just wasn’t sure why. Perhaps my fantasies had led to stupidity, but I liked him more now that I’d had a chance to build a fantasy about him, even more than I had on the afternoon we first met.
His hand released my mouth and I backed up a step to look him in the eyes, disapproval pulling my lips into a thin line.
“What are you doing here? This is private property, Elliot. My family is home and if they knew you were out here…”
“I got lost,” he explained, although I didn’t understand how that was possible. The only adjoining property was another abandoned farm. He had just as much business there as he did on my land.
Fear drove a sharp line across my abdomen, my interest in this man cut through by the weight of the question he’d asked me before we parted ways the last time we met. Craning my neck to look behind me, I wondered if I shouldn’t run as fast as my feet would carry me. Did he know that his son had been at this house all those years ago?
“I’m thinking of buying the farm next to yours. I decided to explore around, but I think I took a wrong turn.”
Each word he spoke settled my shoulders a touch more. I wasn’t sure if the relief I felt was in the explanation itself, or the hope I had that it was true.
Returning my gaze to his face, I felt a flutter in my belly. He was so beautiful. Even if he was dangerous.
Keeping my voice low so that it wouldn’t travel on the winds that continued nipping at my cheeks, I blinked a time or two before answering, “I don’t think you should explore if you don’t know how to keep yourself from getting lost.”
What was wrong with this man? First, he didn’t know how to fix his truck, and now he couldn’t find his way through the woods if someone had drawn him a map. From what he’d told me, he wasn’t new to the area. I couldn’t understand why he wasn’t like every other person I knew around here. Not that I knew many, and that realization made me pause.
Perhaps I was comparing Elliot to the only men I really knew, and it wasn’t a fair comparison. My father and brothers could live off the land. They could strip an engine and piece it back together faster than most people could watch their favorite movie. But those were the skills required by people who had good reason to live off the grid. Elliot must not have much to hide if he was so dependent on civilization to survive.
Relaxing even more at that thought, my stomach fluttered again. Elliot wasn’t like the men that raised me, and my curiosity was piqued by that clear fact.
Questions continued flooding my head despite the attraction I felt for him. I wasn’t dumb enough to instantly believe everything he said, even if I wanted to.
Narrowing my green eyes on him, I asked, “Why didn’t you show yourself when I called out?”
A sheepish grin played over his lips, his hand reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. And damn if those dimples in his cheeks didn’t make me want to smile right along with him. “You want the honest truth?”
My eyes widened. “Yeah. What else would I want?”
His shoulders shook with quiet laughter. “It was a rhetorical question.”
“So then give me your rhetorical answer.”
His brow furrowed at my words. “No, that’s not -” Shaking his head, he didn’t finish the comment, choosing instead to finally tell me what he was doing lurking around like a creep.
“I didn’t want to scare you,” he explained, a note of embarrassment on his voice. “And I didn’t want to be rescued by a girl.”
“Woman,” I insisted. “I’m eighteen.”
His eyes peered down at me, the corner of his lips twisting into a condescending grin that made me want to slap the expression off his handsome face. I was sick and tired of people viewing me as a child. I hadn’t been a child since the day I learned how my family made their money.
“You’ll have to forgive me, sweetheart, but it’s hard for me to look at you and not see a child.”
My face twisted in anger. “I’m not the one lost in the woods, now am I?”
He laughed, the sound warm and soft against my senses. I wanted to stay mad, but couldn’t stop myself from drawing closer to a man that had dug himself into my thoughts little by little since the time we first met.
“I guess you have me there.” Twisting his body around, he looked in the direction of the adjacent farm. “It’s getting late. I should probably get back before the sun sets fully.”
“How are you going to find your way?” I wouldn’t admit it openly, but I liked the feeling of superiority. It wasn’t often I knew more than the people around me.
My brothers had gone to school when my mom was alive, but I hadn’t been given that option. We moved around too much and, most likely, my father was afraid I’d say the wrong thing around other kids and adults. He’d attempted to homeschool me, but that went as far as engines and survival skills. I knew how to read, I knew math, I knew enough to live off the land, but I wasn’t book smart. Judging by the way I was still standing there with a man I knew to avoid, I wasn’t the best student in common sense either.
But I had a leg up with Elliot at the moment. I knew how to get to the farm, and he was stuck unless I decided to help him. It made me proud enough to preen where I stood.
“I can walk you back.”
His fingers worked over his neck again, the movement causing his bicep to flex beneath the short sleeve of his grey shirt. I admired the view, my eyes chasing the lines of quiet strength beneath his tan skin.
“No. I don’t think so. The sun will be down by the time you can turn around and come back. I don’t want you hiking around in these woods at night. There’s no telling what can happen to you.”
Canting my head to the side, I didn’t know whether to feel special because he wanted to protect me, or angry because he thought I couldn’t take care of myself. Giving it a moment’s thought, I decided to meet the two in the middle.
“
I appreciate the concern, but I’ve been hiking these woods during the day and night for as long as I can remember. And if you want to make it back to the other side before the sun sets, it’s best we get moving now.”
His eyebrows shot up to his tousled hairline, and I had to suppress a laugh.
With a sly smile pulling at his lips, his rugged accent was thick when he answered, “Well, in that case, show me the way.”
Rolling my shoulders back with the pride I felt, I stared at Elliot and hoped I was right about him. He didn’t seem like the type of men I lived with, but I still knew there was danger about him, both physical and otherwise. It might be the dumbest decision I’d made in my life, but I walked out in front of him to lead him through the woods.
Heavy steps sounded behind me for another ten minutes. I hated the silence between us, hated that I was missing an opportunity to learn about a person whose face invaded my dreams.
Unable to keep quiet any longer, I twisted my body to look back at him, damn near tripping over a tree root in the process.
“Is that why you were out here the other day? Because you were looking to buy the farm?”
He didn’t answer immediately. Tossing him another sidelong glance, I wondered what was on his mind that kept him so silent.
“Yeah, actually,” he finally said, his voice distant and cold. “I drove right past it the first time, which is why I ended up in front of your place.”
Nodding my head, I stepped around a large rock, my skin crawling when I saw the large spider that skittered beneath it.
“Why did you run away from me the other day?”
My body flinched at the question, even more than it had at the spider.
Instinct kicked in, the lies that rolled so easily off my tongue filling my mind, just waiting to be spoken. Drilling me had been my brother’s job, and Finn took the task seriously. I wouldn’t slip, wouldn’t accidentally allow the truth to leak out with the excuses I’d been trained to give.
“Your truck was fixed and my family was on their way home. I didn’t want to be seen with you. They’re protective.”
His silence bothered me, the way he seemed to dissect every word in his quest to know what I knew. It was a result of my bad judgment, the simple fact that I couldn’t run this time without confirming I had something to hide. How I’d ended up here with this man in this place: it was a consequence of my heart having become so lonely I would risk everything for just a moment to pretend I could have something real.
“I thought you said they were home. Now you’re telling me they weren’t?”
I wasn’t a stupid girl, and I wasn’t falling for his surprise at learning I’d been alone that day. My father and brothers had seen Elliot on the road. It was almost certain he’d seen them as well. He shouldn’t be this shocked to discover I’d lied.
“I was home alone. Telling you that would have been stupid, don’t you think? You could have done anything you wanted.”
“I could do that now, couldn’t I?”
Spinning to face him, I stopped short, my eyes locking to his with hesitation tracing my spine. It wasn’t that I couldn’t outrun him, especially here where every path looked like another. If nothing else, I could get him so scrambled and lost that I could sneak home without worry of him finding me again.
What had once been inviting was now set in a stern line. His mouth gave away his feelings more than his eyes. But at the moment I found the resolve to let this fantasy go to run back into the arms of a family that would kill to protect me, Elliot smiled.
“Not that I would do anything. I’m just saying that you’ve put yourself in a position where I could do something. It doesn’t make sense. Why protect yourself then, only to leave yourself open and vulnerable now?”
Vulnerable. Yes, I had left myself open to a certain extent, but not in the way he thought. I believed I knew enough about Elliot to be certain that I could outmaneuver him in these woods. This wasn’t the first time he’d come to me for help. But that didn’t mean I was entirely safe.
Not entirely.
My heart was a different vulnerability altogether.
While my mind had been tripping over that thought, Elliot snuck closer, and by the time I realized my mistake, his warm, strong hands had wrapped around my shoulders to hold me in place. Tipping my head up to look at him, the breath was forced from my lungs.
Sharp, grey eyes stared down at me, his arrogant mouth crooked in such a way that his bottom lip pushed out until it was practically impossible not to want to know what it felt like against my own. The shadow of stubble defined the line of his strong jaw, and his hair was just messy enough to force my hands into fists to keep from reaching up to run my fingers through it. A jolt of need shot through me, the same jolt I felt in the moments I’d allowed myself to feel what the characters in the books I’d read had been feeling.
“You’re a surprising person, Maggie. And it’s not often that I find myself surprised. I’ve lived a long life. A hard one at that. And then you come along and make me wonder.”
Wonder what? I thought. Worrying the back of my lip between my teeth, I focused on controlling the rate of my breath. There wasn’t much I could do about my heart thumping painfully quick behind my ribs, and I hoped like hell he didn’t notice how shaky I’d become in his presence. It was ridiculous to feel this way about a man I barely knew, but it was the first time I’d been this close to someone other than my family or their friends.
Releasing one of my shoulders, he gripped my chin between his finger and thumb, tipping my head up even more. Tension was a vice grip on my spine as his eyes bore down to search my face for every secret I had to hide.
With a voice as soft as the wind that played my hair across my back, he said, “We should get going.” There was a grittiness to his words that made my legs weak beneath me.
Despite what he’d said, neither of us moved to take another step, both frozen in a moment where I wanted him to kiss me.
Knowing nothing about him didn’t stop me from wanting him, and the danger that he wore only made me want him more. He was off limits, I reminded myself, but it wasn’t enough to force me away, to break whatever hypnotic spell he’d wrapped around me with nothing more than the feel of his heat against my skin.
“You’re shaking.”
My voice came out softer than I’d wanted, and the reason behind that velvet touch to my words concerned me. Maggie wasn’t a person I should show kindness. She held a secret behind those startled green eyes - a secret that had kept me imprisoned in my own shame, regret and pain for fourteen long years.
Dressed in nothing more than a thin, cotton sundress that showed off her shoulders and gave just a hint of what was hidden beneath the light blue colored fabric, Maggie stared up at me with fear and something else. Excitement, maybe? Or promise?
Many women had looked at me with that same promise in their eyes, but none of them, since Katelyn, had caused a shot of interest to tear through me as a result. Shaking off that inkling of desire, I pulled my hands from Maggie’s skin, stepping back quickly to place distance between myself and a girl I had no business wanting.
She was nothing more than the key to my revenge, the weak link that would allow me access to the men I blamed for everything that had gone wrong in my life. My plan to use her hadn’t formed until I pulled my truck up to the abandoned property next to the Crow farm. It had been the best option – at least until this moment when I was staring down at a girl that pulled at something inside me I thought had long been dead.
Maggie was impressive. I could tell she wasn’t the brightest woman I’d run across, not in the typical estimation of intelligence. She wasn’t Katelyn with her perfect grades in school and offers for college that she’d turned down regardless of my protests. But I had no doubt this girl could survive the worst of circumstances.
Despite her short stature, despite the way she trembled even more after I pointed out her reaction, she continued to glare up at me with no reserv
ations. Most women take their peek and look away. They’re too shy to openly want something. But not Maggie. This girl had strength in her spirit - strength and the damn misfortune of being a Crow.
“It’s getting cold,” she explained, as if there weren’t so many holes in that excuse the wind could tear right through it.
I hated this. With every fiber of my being, I hated what I had to do. But that’s the thing with revenge. A man was willing to do whatever it took - hurt whoever it took - just to see that particular deadly sin to its end.
Stepping closer, I dropped my head to the side, my eyes trailing along every curve of her body without guilt or remorse. “Well, I can’t let you be cold, Darlin’. Not when it’s my lost ass you ran out here to save. Tell me what I can do to help you.”
For every step I took forward, Maggie took one back. The distance she kept between us didn’t escape my notice, and my smile pulled wider as a result.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, but the hitch in her voice told me she wasn’t as fine as she’d like me to believe.
“You don’t look fine.” Throwing as much charm as I could manage into the words, I closed the distance until she was backed up against a tree. My chest barely brushed hers as I stared down at the trembling form of her body. Reaching out, I swept my finger beneath the thin strap of her dress, tugging it to slide off her shoulder as the tip of my finger traced her skin. “Let me help you.”
Her mouth opened slightly, her chest rising and falling with shallow, rapid breath. “Slipping off my sleeve certainly isn’t going to help.”
“Well,” I grinned, “Then allow me to slip off mine.”
“What?”
The question had barely left her mouth before I tugged at my back collar and pulled the t-shirt from my body to hand to her. “Take this.” Shoving the soft material into her hand, I smiled. “It should cover you better than what you’re already wearing.”
Her eyes widened and trailed slow paths over the lines of muscle that hugged my frame. I’ve always been a strong man. The military only served to strengthen my physique, the packs I carried and the miles I’d run sculpting my body until it was a finely tuned machine. Coming home from the war hadn’t done anything to diminish my build, not when I was constantly working it turning wrenches for Henry, or running miles down the road just to escape the pain of losing my family.