“Yeah and about two other spots I can see,” he smiled mirthlessly, pointing to her thigh.
There was a long thin tear in her jeans just above her knee. Dark red blood stained the denim, and she could see her torn flesh through the gash in the material. One she realized the cut was there, Alessia could swear she could now feel the stinging pain of a cut. Lifting up her shirt partially, Jax scooted his chair closer as he leaned into view yet another gash on her hip just above her jean’s waistband. With her lips tightly sealed together, Alessia couldn’t help the small sound of pain that escaped her throat as he prodded gently at the wound with peroxide.
“Mmm,” he grumbled at her whimper. “That’s what happens when I find you nearly unconscious in a bed of nails and screws.”
Taping a large square bandage to her hip, Jax leaned back in his seat and eyed her leg.
“This one looks like it’s bleeding the most,” coolly, he grabbed her by the knee, the hot warmth of his hand immediately searing through the denim. Pulling her leg toward him, Jax set it partially over his lap as he gently pried apart the material to see better. “We are going to have to slide down your jeans in order for me to get to it.”
Alessia flinched, accidentally bucking her leg on his thigh. The brief look of surprise on Jax’s face quickly mutated to anger.
"Are you serious right now?" His deep voice felt like a thundering drum. "Tell me, Alessia, just what do I have to do to convince you that I'm not some rapist?"
Guilt lanced through her at the accusation. Sitting up, she opened her mouth to try and explain.
“Listen carefully,” Jax’s hand on her knee tightened. “I’m not that asshole you’re running from or anyone else who hurt you. So, stop treating me like a fucking predator.”
Shaking her head, she tried to explain. “I’m sorry, I just…”
Holding up his hand, he cut her off. “Save it.” Gesturing to her jeans, he gave her an expectant look. “Just make it so I can get to the cut, so you can stop bleeding on my couch,” he added coldly.
There was no trace of warmth and Jax’s eyes, just disgusted anger. A familiar sense of emptiness spread throughout her body, a feeling she hadn’t felt since back in that trailer park. Avoiding his eyes, she concentrated on unbuttoning and sliding down her pants. Bunching the material past her knees, she had to bite her tongue when Jax grabbed the material. Effortlessly, he slid the jeans off her legs and tossed them on the armrest.
Doing her best to discreetly hide her underwear with her hands, she ignored the goosebumps rising on her skin as he picked up her leg and set it back on his lap. Never in her life has she felt more self-conscious than this moment. All Jax had to do was move those obsidian eyes up just a few inches up her legs and he would see her green underwear and chubby thighs. Clasping her hands firmly together over the apex of her thighs, she forced herself to focus on the stinging pain of the cut instead of the movement of his hand on her bare flesh.
Eventually, the weight of the silence between them became too much. "Tomorrow, I will go out first thing and fix the shelf in the scattered parts," she vowed.
Wrapping the gauze around her now clean-cut, Jax didn't look up as he answered. "Don't worry about it, I'll do it."
His tone was even almost flat. It scared her. It scared her worse than his anger, he sounded tired—tired of her.
“At least let me make dinner tonight,” she tried, hoping it didn’t sound like she was begging, though in a way she supposed she was.
Taking a final glance at his handiwork, Jax finally looked up at her. “Just relax, I’ll make dinner.”
His eyes felt obligatory, and his voice sounded mechanical. The ache in her chest felt as if it was being ripped open, the emptiness that had been forming inside spread through her like a plague. Teary-eyed, she watched him walk away with his medical kit and the chair in one hand. She was making this man's quiet, peaceful life a living hell she realized. The bad luck that seemed to overshadow her world was now casting its gloom onto his — a man who only tried to help her.
Hiding her face when he turned back to her, Alessia just nodded when he told her he was going back out. Waiting to hear his boots go down the porch stairs, Alessia got up and limped to the bathroom. Bracing herself against the porcelain sink, she looked in the mirror. A small band-aid Jax had placed covered up some of the cut at her hairline, the rest was just a thin streak of dried blood lost in the thickness of her hair. She didn’t bother looking at the other two cuts, she didn’t care.
She didn't care about anything, actually. The feeling of being lost in the middle of a storm permeated her very being. When did he get like this? What wrong path did she go down? Alessia could clearly remember the day she confessed to her ex a year ago about the situation in her household. She expected, hoped even, for his outrage, or for him to put a loving arm around her shoulder and tell her everything would be all right. But he said and did nothing, he just sat on the couch and gave her an uncomfortable look as if preparing himself for the other shoe to drop. She ignored the signs and pressed further. Signs that in hindsight, were very obvious to her now. Summoning up the courage to ask him to let her stay, that was the first time she experienced that "look”. That worn, tired look filled with discomfort. When her ex broke up with her, he told her it was because he couldn’t love her as much as she loved him and it made him feel guilty.
He was lying.
The truth was, he was tired of her “personal issues,” as he once referred to them, he didn’t want to carry the weight of her problems plus his. After that, it seemed that daunting, tired expression followed her to anyone and everyone she was close to, spreading like a virus. From her ex, it spread to her friends, traveling to her mother, to finally anyone who listened to her problems. After a while, she just stopped talking about her problems.
Jax’s eyes held that same look earlier. He was getting tired of her issues, tired of dealing with her altogether.
It was time to go.
Chapter 10
Revving the engine to his four-wheeler, Jax pushed the machine up and over a small hill, dragging behind him the small attached trailer of cut wood. When he left the cabin that morning the sun was just coming up through the trees, spilling golden light over the forest but offering little to no warmth. Today the wind was strong and cold enough to force him to wear gloves and a cap.
Waking up that early had been a calculated move on his part, he needed time away from those ever-watchful catlike eyes. When he found her lying on the ground hurt and bleeding, he was livid. Livid that he didn't warn her about the loose shelf and angry with her for forcing him to feel a level of fear he hadn't felt in years. He was lucky he was still in hearing distance of the toolshed to respond. He called out her name to see what was wrong when he heard the crash. When he didn’t hear anything back, his stomach dropped.
Anger had always been his first emotion to turn to. From the football field to the battlefield, every one from his high school coach to his sergeant taught him to use his quick temper to his advantage. In high school, his coach used to tell him that his anger was his fuel, it made him faster, stronger, and proficient. The volatile emotion had been his edge during impossible times in his military career, giving him the needed strength to pull him out of nearly any situation. Years of relying on one emotion came rushing back to him when he found Alessia lying injured on the floor of his toolshed.
It was her hurt expression that he couldn’t stop thinking about now. He wanted to create some distance between them, to put a wall in their relationship that would constantly warn him about the line he shouldn’t cross. But seeing the pained look in her eyes every time he snapped at her was killing him. He wanted distance, but not like this. Watching the confident spark that usually lit her beautiful brown eyes die in a sea of pain was like a slow death.
Stopping his four-wheeler next to his truck, Jax let his head hang back with a sigh. He had to fix this rift between them.
Opening the screen door, he paused.
A million thoughts rushed through his head on what to say and how to say it. Nothing sounded good. If he was being completely honest with himself, a large part of him hoped that she would just be her normal smiling self and they could just move on from this moment without discussion. It was the image of her back to him, curled up on the loft when he came back inside yesterday that haunted him, however. She had gone to bed without eating and without another word. There was no easy way out of this, he sighed, he was going to have to face this problem he created.
Stepping through the threshold, Jax froze with his hand still on the open-door handle. The cabin was empty. The welcoming warmth he had grown accustomed to in the past month or so had completely vanished. Looking up, he saw the thin white futon she used for the loft neatly rolled back up just as it was before. Her giant mustard-colored bag she stored in the corner—gone. With a quick searching gaze, Jax spotted the note lying near the sink. Like flint hitting steel, a simmering rage sparked to life in his gut as he stepped forward, grabbing the paper.
“Thank you, Jax. Thank you for everything you have done for me. No one’s ever been as generous as you have been. But I think it will be best if I leave, though. It isn’t fair for me to disrupt your peaceful life any further. I’m sorry for all the trouble I’ve caused and thank you again.
Goodbye.”
His peaceful life, Jax nearly barked with laughter. The moment he met Alessia, his "peaceful life” had been turned on its side. There was no going back now and there certainly weren’t going to be any goodbyes, not like this.
~*~
Instead of walking towards Gaulding, Alessia had taken the highway east, back in the direction she initially came. Readjusting the bag strap on her shoulder, Alessia grimaced, the bag felt heavier than the last time she wore it.
Staying along the natural ditch that ran along the asphalt road, Alessia had to resist from turning to look back at every sound of a car that passed by. It was beyond foolish to hope to see Jax’s familiar truck come racing down the road towards her.
That isn’t going to happen, so stop imagining it, she mentally yelled at herself.
When Jax finally stepped out of the cabin that morning, she made sure she wasn't long behind. Dressing quickly, Alessia layered on every warm piece of clothing she had for the journey. The only thing she took her time on was the note. All night she rehearsed and revised the note in her head. There were so many things she wanted to say, and so much she ended up leaving out. Wiping the tears from her face, she tried to commit to memory every detail of the cabin before closing the door.
She had been walking for nearly three hours, and her leg was throbbing. The cut on her thigh was beginning to hurt with every movement. Eventually, the pain became too much. Walking further away from the road, she leaned against a tree. Wow, this is pathetic, she thought. It hadn’t even been half a day and she was already like this. It probably should have been given at least a week to heal, but she couldn’t take that risk. She had to go.
A squealing car passed by where she was standing. Loud and screeching the beat-up car disturbed the scenic mountain road so much Alessia couldn’t help but stare after it. Watching it noisily descend the hill, she stared perplexed as its brake lights flashed at the bridge about a half-mile down. Pulling to a crawl along the bridge, the car steered close to the thick cement guard wall. Squinting, Alessia watched as a hand popped out of the window with something in its hand. Tossing something over the side of the bridge, the car’s brake lights disappeared and the car pulled away with a louder squeal.
“Who litters in the woods?” A bunch of losers that’s who, she answered herself. It would have been less work just throwing it away when they got to their destination.
Feeling as rested as she was going to get, she began walking again. After a while, she came to the bridge. Nosily, she peered over the guardrail to see what was thrown away. Below her was a narrow creek, the water trailing across the rocks was so clear, she was positive it was ice-cold. A little further down the stream, she spotted the gray item that was tossed out the window. It was a plastic bag. The bag was tied at the top and appeared full. Caught on a rock, the bag bobbed up and down against the choppy current.
Turning back towards the road, Alessia took a few steps forward before looking back to the bag one more time. Was the bag bobbing in the water or was the bag moving on its own? She stared at its movements for a few more seconds. The bag made a crinkling sound.
Alarmed, Alessia rushed back to the side of the bridge off the road and dropped her bag to the ground. Navigating the steep embankment, Alessia let out a clipped cry as she tripped and slid on her butt the rest of the way down. Ignoring the dirt on her jeans and the throbbing in her leg, Alessia half ran half limped to the edge of the stream.
The crinkling sounds of the bag increased.
There was definitely something alive in the bag!
Bending down, Alessia bit her lip as she picked up the bag. Something small and dark darted around in the bag, causing her to nearly drop it in the scream.
“Please don’t be a rat or a snake,” she whined as she carefully untied it and looked inside. “Oh my God,” she squealed, reaching into the bag and grabbing the furry black ball of heat with one hand.
“meow.”
Staring back at her was a tiny pair of ice gray eyes set amongst soft midnight black fur.
“Oh, my goodness,” she cooed, bringing the tiny thing close to her breasts. She could feel that some of the ice-cold stream water had gotten on him from the bag. Shivering and mewling desperately, he looked around in her hands.
“You poor thing,” lifting him up, she inspected the kitten's tiny body for any signs of injuries. "Those evil bastards, how could they treat you like that? You don't seem to be injured, though," she informed him and herself aloud.
The kitten just mewed harder. Cuddling him closer, Alessia walked back to the embankment she slid down. The climb would take both of her hands to get back up. Looking back down to the kitten's wide eyes, she contemplated putting him in her coat temporarily.
“Would you get too scared if I zip you up in my coat for a few minutes?” She asked aloud.
Looking down and under the bridge’s tunnel, she considered finding another way up. Above her, on the bridge, she heard a car door slam shut.
“Alessia!” The booming voice yelling her name shocked and elated her all at once.
Stepping back to see up towards the bridge, she saw Jax leaning overlooking around until he spotted her. Some of the elation she initially felt died a bit when she saw his furious face.
“What the hell were you doing?” Coming around the side of the embankment where she fell down earlier, he knelt to one knee and extended his hand. “Come here.”
It wasn’t a request, it was in order.
Cupping the kitten tighter to her chest with one hand, she stepped up as far she could on the embankment and reached out for Jax’s hand. Enclosing his fingers around her hand, Alessia immediately felt his strength take over. With one easy pull, she glided up the sloped embankment and back up to the road.
"What the hell are you doing down there?!" His eyes were scanning her as if inspecting her for injuries, much like she did the kitten moments ago. With widening surprise, his eyes stopped on the black kitten in her hands.
“I was rescuing this kitten and I got stuck down there,” as soon as the words were out of her mouth, she regretted it. Great, she has been gone for only a couple of hours and he now knows she already somehow managed to get stuck in a creek. Deflecting, she threw his question back at him. “What are you doing out here?”
“I saw your note and came to talk some sense into you. Then I saw this.” Gesturing to the bridge where her bag sat near the road with an angry sweep of his hand.
There was a frantic energy to him that Alessia had never seen before. Suspiciously, she gave him an assessing stare pinning him to the spot. “And just what did you think this was?”
For the first time, she wa
tched a note of uncertainty pass through his normally austere gaze.
“My God,” she smiled as the dawning realization overtook her. “Did you think I hurled my body over that incredibly dinky bridge to somehow kill myself over the sadness of leaving you?”
“That’s not what I…” he began, scratching at his beard.
“meow.”
They both looked down to the kitten she had been stroking, who stared back at both of them with wide-eyed confusion.
"Okay, where exactly did the cat come from again?" One eyebrow lifted questioningly. Reaching out, he stroked the kitten gently behind his ears, completely unperturbed by the close proximity of his hand near her chest.
Alessia forced herself to act as aloof as he was acting. “When I was walking, I saw a car slow down and throw a plastic bag out their window and over the bridge.” Holding up the kitty higher for him to see. “Thankfully, I was curious and looked over the bridge and noticed the bag was moving.”
At All Cost: A Mountain Man Romance Page 8