Page 11 of The Mountain Man's Retribution

The woman sits back, face gripped by terror. Suddenly, a glint of anger overtakes her desperation. Like a lit fuse signaling a chain of events, it transforms her face. One spark ignites her resolve. “No, I won’t go.”

“Woman,” I growl, scrubbing my eyes with the heels of my hands. Frustration seizes me.

How do I make her understand? How do I make her see that town is her salvation?

Sitting ramrod straight, her face impassive and her lips firm, she repeats, “No. I’m not ready for town. If you don’t want me here, I’ll go. I refuse to live in terror any longer, though. I refuse to beg for crumbs of mercy, so few and far between. What I said a moment ago, that I’ll do whatever you want is a lie. It’s all I’ve ever known. The words a habit. But, in truth, I’m done with blindly appeasing others. Like a snake’s skin shed during my escape. Now, will you be a man of your word and uphold our original deal? Room and board as your homesteading partner? Or shall I leave?”

Fawn makes it sound so simple. Like we can easily coexist as man and woman in this small cabin. But temptation lingers everywhere, exacerbated by her beauty, my years of self-deprivation, and our different expectations for modesty. “You would do better in town, Fawn. There, you can sort out your identity and past without relying on any one person. Don’t you see?”

“So, you would put my happiness before your own?” she asks, knitting her forehead and biting her thick bottom lip.

“Always,” I grumble, staring at the ground as electricity arcs in the air between us. Never have I felt such intense chemistry—the last thing my greedy flesh needs. My dick throbs, my balls tingling. “You must go to town,” I urge.

But her face firms, resolve in her gaze. “No,” she says, pressing her pretty cherry-stained lips together. “I must do what I need to, when I need to. For the first time in my life. Right now, that feels like staying here with you, existing for a time in the half-world between the backwoods and town. But if I’m notwelcome here, I’ll go. And I’ll return these clothes later, once I have my life better straightened out.”

Staring at her long and hard, scrutinizing her porcelain face, her thick brown eyebrows, her mane of hair that I want to bury my head in, her excruciatingly sculpted lips that I long to taste. I cannot make her go into town, though every part of my brain cries out the necessity of it.

Standing up quickly, I adjust my cock as her eyes go boldly to the hard bulge, her cheeks darkening. “Then, no more undressing in front of me. You understand? I’m not like Big Man, and I don’t want to watch. I want to respect you.”

Her eyes round, and she quirks her mouth, nodding.

“Now, I have more wood to chop. Please, make yourself at home.”

“But my chores?” she asks.

I look around, shaking my head. “Dishes, cleaning, weeding, gathering eggs. Like we discussed.” I head for the door without looking back, needing a break from this magnetic woman and the desire exploding inside of me.

I spend the remaining hours of sunlight chopping every piece of wood I can find, every branch, until the stack along the side of the house is huge. The hot sky darkens mercifully above me as I work, bare-chested and driven by the need to distract and exhaust myself.

I feel her eyes on me, through one of the cabin’s windows, with a tempting urgency in her gaze. I could take her, make her mine. Maybe even make her happy. But the discrepancy between her innocence and my worldliness is monumental. It sickens me to think about exploiting her in her naive state. Especially after all she’s endured.

She should go to town. That’s the bottom line. But do I drag her there kicking and screaming? Piling a tepee of firewood in the rock circle out back where I do control burns and keep fireswhen the weather’s nice, I set her clothes on fire, filthy beyond cleaning.

As the flames lick higher and higher, straining towards the sky, Fawn sprints toward me, her stockinged feet thudding along the ground as she screams, “No. My pages!”

She looks ready to dive into the fire. I grab her at the last second, pulling her back. Her ass slides over my cock, and I’m back to the sheer torture of her presence, wrapping my arms tightly around her torso, uncertain of what she intends to do. She melts against me resignedly as my dick digs into the small of her back. Her shoulders shake as she watches the flames.

“What are you doing?” I scold, pressing her desperately against me and burying my face in her silky locks. “You can’t go near the fire. You know better.”

“I do,” she sobs, tears rolling off her nose and chin onto my straining forearms. She feels too good in my naked arms. Like she’s meant to fill them.

“My pages.” She shudders as I tentatively let go with one hand, holding her tighter with the other as I rifle through my pocket, producing the folded pages.

“Your clothes were filthy, Fawn, beyond cleaning or repair. But I’m sorry. I should have asked first.”

“Burning the clothes is fine,” she says, eyeing the folded pages. “I want to burn my memories of Big Man, his cabin, and his sons in the fire, too,” she whispers, her voice tight.

“Then, let us do it together, now, Fawn. We’ll burn your past and mine, too, as we watch these flames,” I say gravely, kicking myself for taking the impetus for this from her.

“What do you want to burn in the fire?” she asks, eyeing me curiously as I continue to hold her tightly against me, though there’s no longer any need.

“My childhood. My life before I came to the mountain.”

Fawn chuckles. “Then, we are opposites. I’m burning my life on the mountain, and you’re burning yours from before.”

I nod. “The pain, the affectionless upbringing, the superficiality, commercialism, materialism, betrayal, and heartache.” I stare at the golden dancing flames transfixed. Teasing, I whisper against the shell of her ear, “Is there room for all of that in your fire?”

Her hand comes up unexpectedly, palming my cheek and running her fingertips through my beard as her face calms and relaxes. My shoulders and jaw follow suit as I realize how tense I’ve been all afternoon.

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