Page 7 of Puck Love

My head aches.I groan, and the throbbing is enough to make me want to just fall back into the pillows and soft flannelette sheets and sleep allday.

Wait, what?Flannelette?

My eyes spring open, and I sit bolt upright in bed. It appears that I’ve traded places with a lumberjack because the log cabin walls, rustic four-poster bed and roaring fireplace in the corner tell me I’m not in Kansasanymore.

I remember driving away from Calgary like a maniac, wielding a couple of candy bars and a bottle of whiskey. I remember snow, mountains, and turning off the highway because the sign for the Fairmont Hotel looked as inviting a place as any to rest my head, and really, what the hell else could I do? I may have wanted a little time out from life, but I had no intention of freezing to death in the Canadian wilderness. I had no desire to wake in a lumberjack’s cabin either, but here Iam.

I glance around the room, suppressing a shudder, and then I check the ring finger of my left hand to make sure I didn’t marry some damn tree-tapping Canadian redneck asshole, because clearly there is no other explanation for waking up in a place as country as this. And I’m from Nashville, so I knowcountry.

I press my hand to my temple. It stings, and I throw the covers back.Holy shit. Where the hell are my clothes?Oh my god, why am I naked? I pull the sheet from the bed and wrap it around me like a toga, then I run for the bathroom, or what I hope is the bathroom because I’m about to puke all over itregardless.

When I’m done praising the porcelain gods, I slowly get to my feet and glance in themirror.

“Jesus Christ,” I shout, when I realize the oval mirror above the sink is wreathed in deer antlers, as if it is a perfectly acceptable design fixture. I think I saw a B-grade Paris Hilton movie like this once. I shudder and look at the wound on my forehead. It’s a scratch, really. A little bruised and there’s a bit of a lump, but it feels a lot worse than it looks. Someone has been nice enough to cover it with a butterfly bandage, so I guess they didn’t want me to bleed to death in my sleep. That’s something, atleast.

I need to find my clothes and get the hell out of here. I have no idea where I’ll go, but I can’t stayhere.

From outside, a car engine roars, and I glance around for anything to use as a weapon. The cabinets are empty, save for an electric razor resting in a cradle, a heap of pain meds, and some topical ointment for sore muscles. I pick up the razor and turn it on. It looks like some space-age implement from the set of a sci-fi film. There are no sharp blades—just three rounded heads.Shit. What kind of metrosexual, mountain-man serial-killer owns thishouse?

As quietly as I can, I close the bathroom door, but it’s one of those heavy sliding barn doors that makes a godawful racket when it moves, and it doesn’t even have a damn lock. Two sets of feet thunder through the house toward me. I lift the hem of my sheet dress and tie it off in a knot so that I don’t trip, and I throw myself against the door to barricade it. Within seconds, the bedroom door is beingopened.

“Where is she?” says a muffledvoice.

“I don’t know.” This one is clearer, probably the leader. “Bathroom,maybe?”

“Can we eat? I’mstarving.”

“Give me a minute,” the leader says. He’s closer now, probably on the other side of the door. “I want to check on our little hostagefirst.”

Hostage?

I squeeze the razor so tightly my knuckles turn white. And then the door is being slid back and I have no choice but to charge. I let out a battle cry and slam into a wall of muscle, taking him down to the ground with the buzzing razor at histhroat.

“Ah, Jesus. Fuck! Why does everyone go for the goddamnshoulder?”

I straddle him and thrust the razor into his beard at the base of his neck, cutting off a portion of hair whilst screaming, “You’ll never take mealive.”

I stare down into a handsome face. Really handsome—this guy is not your average mountain man. There’s something familiar about him, too, but I can’t place it. Blue eyes stare up at me, and they’re full of … laughter? This bastard is laughing atme.

“What did you say?” Dimples pop out of his cheeks. One second he’s laughing at me, the next …bam… dimples, and my ovaries are gone, vanished, exploded into a fiery mess of ash and debris. Which is a shame, really. Because we’d make some really cute babies. Holy shit.How much did Idrink?

“Are you laughing at me?” I straighten. He chokes back another dark chuckle. “Oh my god, you’re laughing atme.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sure you’re really scary to everyoneelse.”

“To everyone else? Exactly how many men do you think I get kidnappedby?”

“Kidnapped?” He wraps his big hand around my small one and eases the razor out of my grasp. He switches it off and throws it across the room. It scatters under the bed, out of reach. “I’m not sure. That’s not exactly what thisis.”

“Well what would you callit?”

“Foreplay, maybe? You are straddling me in nothing but a bedsheet, and I’m er … up for the challenge, shall wesay?”

“Eww, gross,” the other man says from the doorway, but I’m not willing to take my gaze off dimples for a singlesecond.

I narrow my eyes. “I thought that was your beltbuckle.”

He just grins and flexes his hips, and I feel the full length of him pressed against me. My mouth drops open.Definitely bigger than a belt buckle. I scramble off his lap and scamper across the room on all fours, grabbing a throw rug off a chair by the fireplace and covering my body with it. “Ohgod.”

---