A Night by my Fire Read online

  “Yes.”

  River walked up, waited for him to hold plank, and sat right across his shoulder blades. When he immediately started right where he left off, she started to laugh. “I didn’t really believe you.”

  She was about to hop off, to leave him to continue, but he barked, “Remain where you are.”

  It’s not like she had anything better to do. “Are you going to bench press me next?”

  In a grunt, he answered, “You are too light to offer sufficient resistance.”

  Having to brace to keep in place, her hands felt what made him bigger than a grizzly bear beneath his shirt. He was a rock, inhuman, everything bulging under her palm. “Just watching you do this is making me extra sore.”

  Freezing mere inches from the ground, Stephen turned his head to cut a glance at the woman from the corner of his eye. “Due to the storm, there has been little need for you to perform physical labor. You have no call to be sore.”

  “Pffft,” River cocked her chin at the couch. “You’ve been sleeping on my bed for six nights now. The chair is not nearly so comfortable.”

  He started to stand, River toppling unexpectedly, only to yip when he moved with inhuman quickness, twisting her arms over her breasts. He spun her around, and yanked her back up against his chest. One good jolt and the bones in her spine popped, the startled woman squealing.

  She just hung like a wet noodle, as if unsure her legs would work.

  “Is that not better?”

  She managed to squeak, “Umm...Yeah.” When her feet found the floor, and over-huge python arms let her go, she added, “A little warning would have been nice.”

  Stephen frowned, watching River plop belly down on the couch. “You would have tensed, making the adjustment less effective.”

  “It was effective. I feel like everything went cockeyed.”

  Beefy fingers flipped up the hem of her sweater before River realized what he was doing. When she cursed and tried to shuffle off, a flat palm pressed her into the cushions. Thumb and forefinger pinched down her bared spine. “Everything is in alignment. It feels unnatural because you are unaccustomed to proper spinal positioning.”

  “Stop poking at me, jerk!”

  He ignored her complaint and did as he pleased. “Hold still.”

  The pad of a thumb dug in from the base of her neck and drew down the left side of her spine. A jump of muscle, another yelp, and the tension was forced off. He even managed to draw out an agitated sigh. The process was repeated on the other side.

  Kneading the way that best alleviated discomfort, he found her squirming less and settling more. A shoulder was cupped, drawn up so the blade projected and he could reach the smaller muscle groups beneath it. She held still and allowed it, going so far as to stifle a groan when he forced a knot to release.

  The more he touched, the less clinical it became, there was too much to learn from such a grand amount of exposed flesh. He was correct about her athleticism, though he assumed her physique came from hiking and the necessary labor of survival in the wilds, not organized exercise. But it wasn’t her musculature that had his eye. The entirety of her exposed back was painted, a tattoo alive with the movement of gentle muscle under vivid skin. He traced it with his fingers, the design complicated, created by a master of both flow and color, absorbing the hours upon hours she’d submitted to a needle, to pain, for a thing of such beauty.

  A rising phoenix and the flowering branches of a tree embedded in the totality of the design. It extended beyond where faded jeans covered hips and buttocks, above the bunched up fabric of her ugly sweater.

  The portrait was breathtaking, the subject unique.

  It wrapped her side, asymmetrical, and he needed to know what remained hidden. But when he tried to turn her to see it, she pulled down her sweater and began to sit up.

  Stephen wanted her back as she was. “I am not finished.”

  “Look, a lot of people get the wrong idea when they see the tattoo. It doesn’t mean you can touch me.”

  He didn’t understand. “My back is also marked.”

  “Oh yeah?” River was uncomfortable, sitting back into the cushion while the man continued to hover too near. “Let me guess, a tribal tattoo or your name in script? The same ugly smear every meathead wears.”

  “No.” Stephen stood and moved the short distance to continue his exercise, no longer in a pleasing mood.

  The atmosphere was awkward, River irritated he’d walked away. “Well, what is it?”

  Making no effort to answer, no longer looking at her as he strengthened his body, Stephen went back to his endless push-ups.

  She wasn’t having it. Their fights always ended with a clear winner—her. Silence was not an option. Rolling from the couch, she walked right over and did to him what he’d done to her, flipping up his thermal to see what she’d missed when she’d stripped his lake sodden clothes.

  “Oh... my... god...” The words were hardly a breath.

  Every muscle on the man flexed, his back rippling as she gaped. He bore the long crisscross scars of a whipping—many, many scars from his shoulders to his lower back.

  She didn’t quite understand it, but she felt terrible. “I’m sorry.”

  Popping to his knees, glowering at her as if he might strike should she misstep, he hissed, “Why should you apologize?”

  “Does it hurt?”

  A fist flew out so quickly River never even saw him grab her shirt, only felt him yank her down so they were eye level. “I have risen above such mediocrity as infirmity and pain.”

  “So I see...” Half kneeling, half hanging by the grip he had on her clothes, River deadpanned.

  It was an animal noise. “Pitying me would be your last mistake.”

  “Pitying you is what saved your life.” Her hands went to his chest, to push just enough to make a point, she wanted him to let go. “Or did you forget? I pulled you from the lake, got the water from your lungs. I breathed for you.”

  “What did it feel like?”

  The suddenness of his question, the instant shifted tenor of his speech unbalanced her. Unsure what he was asking she muttered, “The water—”

  “When you breathed for me.” Correcting her, Stephen hardened his phrasing again, “What did that feel like?”

  Her eyes went to a pretty mouth that did not belong to such a hard man. “Perhaps... like an awkward kiss.”

  By the grip on her sweater he pulled her a little nearer. “What if it wasn’t an awkward kiss. What does that feel like?”

  Swallowing, watching his unusually open expression, or at least what she could make out of the clenched jaw and tight brow, she was unsure how to answer. “Ummm... fuck... that entirely depends on the participants and the goal.”

  Stephen spoke the words slowly, “What if the goal was pleasure?”

  River colored a little, hearing something in the statement she’d missed before.

  When she didn’t offer the reply he was pressing for, Stephen grunted, “Well?”

  She had to say something. “You want me to kiss you...”

  The man nodded.

  Black eyes looked to his lips.

  He seized her action as acquiescence, Stephen using his free hand to immediately pull her closer. His mouth was on hers before River could really grasp how far the situation had snowballed. He pressed in so hard her neck gave. Trying to steady herself, she grabbed broad shoulders, River only making it so far as to jump when he tasted the seam of her lips and garbled her squeak. The kiss was entirely one-sided, ending almost as quickly, and abruptly, as it began.

  Stephen felt failure when she tensed. The second he could find the means to speak, he argued, “You didn’t kiss me back.”

  Really? “You didn’t give me a chance to!”

  Irritated that the woman always snarled, Stephen sucked in another breath, and glared.

  So very tempted to pop him right in the mouth, River curled her lip, leaned forward, and gave the obnoxious intruder his firs
t real kiss. It was soft, the way she ran her lips over the beauty of his. A full lower lip was sucked into her mouth, one tiny swipe of her tongue teasing the flesh before she nipped and let go.

  He stared, severely disappointed she’d stopped when River untangled his slack fingers from her sweater, murmuring, “That is what a kiss feels like.”

  Rubbing his lips, he sat silent while River grabbed her coat and went out into the storm.

  Encased by the zipper of his cargo pants was something aching, something foreign.

  Standing so as not to put more pressure on his cock, Stephen looked at the door, annoyed she had left just as his body responded and progress could have been made. In the freezing cold of her bathroom, he reached into his pants, withdrawing pulsing flesh that had not known attention in almost a decade. Thinking of how soft her skin had felt, how strange her lips had tasted, he pumped his fist.

  Imagining that same mouth on him again, Stephen came, the strength of the orgasm uncomfortable.

  * * *

  It would have been easier had she not heard him, the grunts and groans, the obvious noises of the stranger jacking off. But she had. He’d been loud enough she’d heard him over the storm and hated herself for edging nearer.

  All that ferocity had been... hot.

  Hot wrapped up in nut job.

  She’d left the room because things had gotten out of hand, and as usual, they were not communicating on the same level. In all fairness, River had never thought he would actually kiss her—not after days of finding disgust in his eyes. The man who could do a thousand push-ups but had never kissed a woman.

  River wasn’t sure if that made her more comfortable, or less.

  And now he was grunting in her bathroom, and her ear was to the wall.

  That’s it. She was a total pervert.

  River thanked God it was below freezing, and thanked him again when the man groaned his release thinking that was the end of it... then cursed herself for listening on to enjoy the extension of his moans. It wasn’t cold enough anywhere for any woman to not get a little turned on by something so base.

  Six days trapped in a room was making her crazy. As he was already crazy, he seemed totally unaffected. It wasn’t fair.

  Her bad judgment aside, she would have to go back in there.

  Everything would be fine, River told herself, letting the cold work on her further.

  It would have been fine too, just peachy, except when she opened the door, he was waiting for her, his top half totally bare.

  He barked when she halted, “Why did you not retrieve a bucket of snow?”

  River just stared, forcing herself to only look at his eyes, acting just as stupidly as he had only twenty minutes prior.

  Annoyed, he reached past her to grab the empty bucket. Even stepping into the frigid night to fill it and stomp back inside while she crushed herself to the doorframe to stay out of the way.

  The beast disappeared back into the bathroom to bathe accumulated sweat away with the powder, leaving River to clean up all the snow she’d let blow into the house.

  When it was done, she went to her chair and felt her back begin to ache again. Darting glances to the still vacant couch, frustrated and vengeful toward the jerk who’d put her in a constant state of tension, she slipped from the recliner and reclaimed her bed.

  He didn’t want pity? Well, his ass could sleep on the floor.

  The cushions didn’t smell right, or the pillow. They smelled of a man with more physical definition than a Greek god and the personality of mud... mud with very pretty lips she had kissed because she was foolish enough to rise to a taunt.

  Mud that threatened subtly and often to murder her.

  Mud that was coming back into the room, grunting to see her in the sleeping place of honor.

  Eyes still closed, speaking into the pillow, River grumbled, “If you think I am moving from this couch after you fixed my back, you’re stupider than you look.”

  Stephen settled on the rug. “Your contrary behavior is predictable. Ascertaining the pattern was simple.”

  Turning her head so she might grin down at the man, River cooed, ready to make him as uncomfortable as he made her, “Disappointed I didn’t swoon like the maiden in the book?”

  Arm behind his head, he replied to the ceiling, “I heard you outside.”

  He wasn’t supposed to have answered that way. “Yeah, well I heard you inside.”

  Those odd, observant eyes darted right to hers. “You enjoyed it, knowing I imagined fucking you, just as I enjoyed knowing you were listening.”

  River was not sure what shocked her more, the bluntness of his declaration or the fact the oversized cretin had used foul language. “You... you can’t say things like that.”

  And now she found she could not look him in the eye. In fact, in his presence she’d actually demurred.

  To make his point and seal his victory, the stranger affirmed, “I can.”

  Chapter Seven

  River woke cautious, the same way condemned men, those who had begun to comprehend the new darkness they lived in, woke. It was that in-between place of disbelief—that place where things could not possibly be as they seemed—where one thought memory was all some grand ruse.

  Stephen almost imagined she could smell her fate in the air… or maybe she could hear it now that the wind had died down.

  When River uncurled from the ball she’d slept in, back cracking as the female groaned, she too seemed to notice a palpable change. Wiping the back of her hand under her nose, she looked to Stephen… utterly confused.

  “What are you looking at?”

  He’d waited. He’d watched for hours, as the woman slept far too much. “I’m looking at you.”

  Something buzzed far more than his general nearness, and River was determined to unsettle things back to their grating status quo. She purred at him, eager to earn his irritation, “Planning to finally thank me?”

  “Yes.”

  These new, uncustomary answers were setting her off-balance, altering what had been days’ long tension to replace it with uneasy familiarity. “Then get to it, you ungrateful dick.”

  Something was going on in that mind of his. “You saved my life.”

  “I did.”

  “You dragged me up a mountain.”

  “That too,” River confirmed.

  “And treated my wounds, my illness. You fed me.”

  “You brought in wood. You cooked. You’ve carried your reasonable share of the burden considering your injury.”

  “You won’t last in this world, River.”

  And suddenly it all seemed more amusing than supernatural. She glowed, her smile one-hundred percent genuine. “Between the two of us, Prince Charming, you are the one who is hopelessly doomed. But there is something about you, so I’m going to give you a hint.” The shine of obsidian eyes dimmed. Her smile wavered. “There’s a lot more to the world than what you know. Seek things that make you uncomfortable, that challenge you, and you’ll see I’m right.”

  All through her lesson, Stephen’s eyes had grown fiercer as if to scream that she was the one who needed to learn. “You need to put a lock on your door. Men are dangerous.”

  Something else was going on. River cocked her head, asking, “What of women?”

  “There is no other woman I know more dangerous to me than you.”

  “Why?” She shook her head, disappointed but unsure why. River stood, went to the well-worn maps and guides, pulling them from the shelf to throw at the titan’s feet. “Leave. Get out. The storm is breaking.” She pulled blankets from the sofa, tribal blankets her grandmother had woven. “Wrap in these and go.”

  “Have you no compass?”

  Stalking toward another shelf, River dug through some accumulated junk. An instant later, she pitched black plastic toward her guest. He caught it so fast, so flawlessly, she faltered. The way he stared, how he didn’t get angry, only inspired more rage. Reaching into a carved wooden box, she pulled
out a wad of small bills and threw those at his feet, tossing it in a way the bastard could not catch it with all his skills for quickness, could not do anything but watch currency scatter and flutter down.

  River went nearer the door, pulling on her jacket, grabbing her pack and rifle, and reaching for snow shoes.

  “It is painfully obvious you flee this dwelling every time you grow uneasy. ‘Seek things that make you uncomfortable, that challenge you, and you’ll see I’m right’.”

  “Throwing my words in my face? That’s the best you got? Come on, stranger, I prefer your ignorant ravings and silly assumptions.” She didn’t even look to see what his response might be. The door shut, River turning to explain herself through the wooden barrier for reasons she couldn’t quite grasp, “I’m out of fresh meat and we’re not the only animals on this mountain that have been trapped in their dens, eager for a break in the weather.”

  ***

  When she returned, having used up all the short daylight gathering more rabbits than one woman could eat, she was hardly through the door before Stephen was on her. The rifle was ripped away, slid out of reach, her snow laden jacket pulled off flailing limbs so quickly she hardly knew what hit her. Hand to her throat, he pressed her back against the shutting door, his arm long enough River could do little more than hiss and thrash, unable to reach the man with clawing fingers.

  He growled, “Do you understand now?” He wasn’t hurting her, not really, but there was no way she could move from his control. He seemed so level, so unaffected by the fact he had her life in his hands. “Men are dangerous. Do not pull them from lakes.”

  Swallowing under the constriction, River tried not to let her eyes water. “I get it. You wanted to die. Because you’re terrified, and you’re in pain.”

  His voice almost broke. Not in tears, or in pain, but in utter puzzlement. “Why do you refuse to learn?”

  River countered, “Why are you still here? You think I don’t know that you’ve studied the trail guides, my maps? I spent hours in a bathroom colder than a witch’s tit so you could find your way. LEAVE!”

  Stephen dragged her to the fire, ignoring the dead rabbits she dropped, ignoring that she was practically chewing on his wrist. Atop the rug, he forced her down, pinning her hips and watching until she grasped what was coming.