Page 3 of Bound and Branded

I scowl. “He’s my father. I know he’s not good with money, but I do a good job of managing this place, and we have enough.”

“You don’t,” he says. “You, Avery Carmichael, are fucked.”

The words are hard, crude and unforgiving and I find myself having to tamp down my physical reaction to them.

“Explain,” I say.

“He owes people a lot of money and he hasn’t been paying your mortgage. You’re one more bad bet away from losing this place entirely. And not to me, to people who will put you out on the street.”

I feel the blood drain from my face. “That’s not true.”

“It is.” He laughs. “You like to think of me as a villain, but have you forgotten that I let you off the hook when you tried to burn my barn down?”

The one bad thing I ever did and he has to throw it back in my face and try to make me grateful for it.

“I haven’t forgotten that you deserved it,” I say.

“I could’ve called the police on you.”

“You’re welcome to do it now. I’ll confess.”

“No thanks. I don’t have the appetite for it.”

“Are you trying to act like you’re being a hero?”

“No,” he says. “I’m not being a hero. Though, whether you believe it or not, I actually like your father. And I don’t have any desire to see the two of you out on the street. Even though you’ve been a pain in my ass ever since I moved up here.”

“Then why are you doing this?” I ask.

“It’s a good goddamned question, Avery. Maybe because you’re my neighbors, and have been for five years, and it’s about the longest I’ve ever had neighbors.” He looks at me, and my whole body feels warm. “Come over tomorrow morning. We’ll have a talk.”

“I don’t want to talk to you.”

“The fact that you’re standing out here running your mouth seems to suggest otherwise.”

“I don’t?—”

“Quiet,” he says. “I’m done with it. I’m done with your attitude, I’m done with you. Go inside. Come up to my place tomorrow, and we’ll talk.”

Something in me goes quiet, and I want to resist it. All of it. I feel myself pushing back against the need rising up inside of me to obey him.

I have to keep this sexual psychosis contained.

There’s a place for it, and it’s not here, not with him.

“Go inside. Be a good girl.”

It’s like an arrow straight between my legs. Right where I feel myself starting to ache when I look at him. I tell myself that I’m only obeying him because that’s the actual surprise. That I’d do what he said instead of arguing, and I’d rather surprise him.

Then I go upstairs without speaking to my father and slam the door shut behind me.

I spend the whole rest of the night going over every problematic interaction I’ve ever had with him.

Caleb Flynn.

He’s from here, originally. Though, I don’t remember him from before. Probably because he’s somewhere around fifteen years older than me, so I have no reason to. A foster kid, who went off and got rich doing something with luxury resort development. He’s a billionaire. Came back and bought land looking over the town to make a point, I would think.

He moved into that big house on the hill. Then my dad sold him half our ranch. He put Dad under a lot of pressure and my mom had just left for the third and final time so it was a rough run of luck for us.

---