Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 89093 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89093 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
When my violence fails to slow him down, I toss out threats that aren’t technically mine to issue. “This land is owned by the Lancasters. They don’t take kindly to trespassers.” My last word leaves my body with a grunt when he walks us into the steam-filled room. I’m not just stunned by his lack of concern about my beatdown, I’m shocked by the faint memories creeping into my head.
I could swear on my grandmother’s grave that we’ve done this before, but instead of me being tossed over the stranger’s shoulder, he carried me in his arms like a groom would a bride over the threshold.
My breathing staggers when my eyes scan of the bathroom fills my head with more hazy memories. They match the movements the stranger makes while removing the shirt I’m wearing as a dress, but back then, not a single protest spilled from my mouth.
Since I’m conscious this time around, the instant his hand grabs the waistband of my panties, objections fire from my mouth hard and fast. “Whoa, whoa, whoa.”
I didn’t say they were good objections.
My head is far too woozy for that.
Either deaf or ignorant, the stranger slips my panties off in one fell swoop, distributes my weight to his left side, then heads for a shower cubicle that looks as organically sourced as the rest of the cabin. The ‘tiles’ lining the walls are shavings of rock and shrubbery on a compact bed of dirt is the floor.
When he switches on a ‘faucet’ at the side of the cubicle, I make myself one with the hairs stretched across his pecs. It’s below freezing outside, and with no modern appliances in sight, I anticipate the water to be as bitterly cold as the snowy ground that almost killed me last night.
It isn’t, but since my focus is on another damning revelation, I don’t take the time to appreciate how pleasant it is.
According to the date on my work phone, my accident wasn’t last night. It was three nights ago, so the familiarity of an often-understated task shouldn’t be surprising. Nurses bathe their patients all the time. It’s a necessary part of their recovery, and more times than not, the most healing.
You feel icky after an accident, so if a nurse washes away some of the murkiness before waking you, more times than not, the recovery time is significantly reduced.
It was for me when I was blasted across a swampy woodland by a furious explosion. From the medical records I read, I had mud from the roots of my hair to the tips of my toes. It was lodged so far in my ears, preliminary results indicated my hearing had been irreparably damaged by the blast. Mercifully, after multiple ENT appointments and a simple procedure, my hearing returned stronger than ever.
I stop reminiscing on what I thought would be the worst couple of weeks of my life when a screen of red hinders my vision. The mixing of the water from the rain-simulated showerhead above me and the deer’s blood is a quick reminder that I’m not bathing in the natural spring a couple of miles south of Ravenshoe. Nor is the goop on my face a mask. It is the blood of a dead animal—the same species I almost died trying to save.
With bile racing up my esophagus and my brain only seeking solutions instead of explanations, I scrub at my cheeks like a blood-red cleanser is part of my daily facial care regime while acting oblivious to the fact I’m being held under the water by a man with no name.
Once I’m confident every drop of the deer’s blood has been removed from my face and neck, I shift my focus to my collarbone and chest. I grope my breasts more eagerly than Cedric ever did when something brushes my backside two chest strokes later. It’s neither of the stranger’s hands. One is curled around my knees, and the other is bracing my back.
After hiding my puckered nipples, I slowly raise my eyes to the stranger’s face. I’ve studied the human anatomy for years, and although my personal research on this particular region of the male body could be counted on one hand, I’m confident I know the identity of the object jabbing me in the backside.
The unease bombarding me from all sides should have my eyes immediately locking with the stranger, but I drift them over his matted beard, plump lips, and undeniably straight nose before locking them with his baby blues that seem familiar even with them being full of anger.
“I’m engaged,” I mumble when his eyes eventually float from my now-covered breasts to my face. “Do you know what that means? I belong to another man. I was visiting him before my accident. His family owns this mounta—”
Oomph.
The air his needy gaze forced into my lungs rushes out in a hurry when he pulls his hands out from underneath me. My ego gets more bruised than my backside, thanks to the leaf filtration system responsible for directing the shower’s water into buckets wedged under a tiny opening carved out of the logs that line the cabin.