Chapter 12
12
MARI
Miller’s good humor lasted half the lifespan of the bruises I incurred from my first training session. By the time the week ended, tender spots covered my body like he’d used a meat hammer instead of his feet and fists. Alan spent his nights applying cream to and helping me work out stiff joints. I knew from the looks he exchanged with Robe in silent conversation above my head that he worried the training damaged me too much.
The simple truth they both ignored was that I enjoyed the physical activity.
Moreover, I enjoyed the power working on my body developed in me, the confidence that I wouldn’t be a useless victim ever again.
Robe gave me the few cheap and somewhat pathetic kicks I aimed at his thigh with the intent of bruising his ego and only succeeded in deflating my own. Miller built my limits, adding to my repertoire of attack and defensive moves, and trained my mind and my body to react in a specific manner.
Anything was better than panic.
The aching muscles and tender spots remained my badges of honor, and when I didn’t complain or say anything, neither did the boys.
Miller watched me each day, the distrust in his demeanor reducing with each drop of sweat I left in the clearing, my essence mingling with theirs on the ancient mountain range they called home.
Scuffing my socked feet on the floor, I procrastinated against opening the cabin door to let the still-frigid air inside, my toes curling within their warm confines.
Behind me, Alan snickered. I could feel Robe rolling his eyes.
And I could have happily stayed there all morning, facing a closed door in a warm house heated by the bodies of five enormous mountain men.
Until a single whisper behind me took my choice away. “ Wuss. ”
Chin in the air, I gripped the handle of the door, preparing to face another morning practice with Miller in icy mountain air that left me cold until I curled into Robe’s arms in his bed again each night, and tugged the door open.
Arctic air blasted in my face as I shoved my feet forward and yanked the door closed behind me, but a much larger frame obliterated Miller’s expected form.
“Morning.” Jon watched me with an open face. Unlike the rest of the members of Robe’s household, Jon held nothing back. His expressions reflected exactly what he felt at heart level, and warmth, both the temperature sort and compassion based, rolled from him like a tangible thing. The huge man rocked from foot to foot, a fine blush rising above the edges of his shaggy beard. “I’m taking on your training today. Wanna go for a walk?” He gave me a shifty sort of smile and jerked his head toward a trail I never used that meandered into the trees north of the house.
“Uh, sure.” I offered a wonky smile, resisting the urge to look back over my shoulder, but I’d already closed the door behind me, so I wouldn’t be able to see Robe anyway.
Telling myself that I trusted him like I did the others, I took the hand Jon stretched out. His roughened fingers, thicker than the ones on Robe’s massive mitt, closed around mine. He didn’t dwarf my smaller form; he obliterated me.
But as with many giants of men, at least in the physical sense, Jon appeared to be a great big teddy bear, cuddly and protective. I didn’t doubt that he could rock an apron and cook up barbeque to match Alan’s flair at the bar. Because houses had bars.
I rolled my eyes. Only Robe, honestly. That man created the limit.
“I wanted to show you a bit of the mountain now that it’s less vicious out,” Jon called over his shoulder as he towed me into the tree line that closed off any visual of the house.
As happened each time I stepped into the forest, my breath shortened. I snapped twigs that grew at odd angles out of the giant trunks we passed, recalling the bite of every stick and ice-laden foliage I ruined in my headlong dash from hell.
Breath hovered at my lips, but my throat remained a vacuum, and every major function in my body stalled for a black-edged moment. I gripped Jon’s hand too tight, pulling him back.
“Stop.” I gaped like a fish out of water, desperate and in need of the cabin’s close walls and population to block out the memories that swarmed me.
Why am I not like this with Robe?
Able to call for help, touch him when I needed him. But I couldn’t. It was like a physical barrier stood between us, waiting for one of us to shatter it, when neither of us could.
Or would.
Not like with Jon, where everything started easy. Too easy, because I let my guard down for a single second when I begged for his help and the reaching hands from my memory of that day swarmed back, obliterating everything?—
The forest. The peace I garnered. My safety net. Jon.
A moment where light faded around me, and I sank?—
Hard, warm arms wrapped around me, catching me before I hit the ground that wavered beneath my feet. Hard, like Robe. Warm, like the cabin’s interior. I leaned my cheek against Jon’s enormous pec and listened to his heartbeat thump away, so close and reassuring.
“It’s all right, honey. I’ve got you.” Jon repeated the words over and over like a mantra that came paired with a bonus wall of impenetrability.
Warm, like mountain sun on a clear spring morning.
Hard, like a huntsman. No, a tin man. The man who couldn’t share his heart because he’d forgotten he had one.
Pleased with the analogy, I labeled Jon for something to do while my feet found their bones and I supported myself again.
I emerged for air, sucking in the mix of cinnamon and morning sun that lanced off his body. “You’re like a big stuffie,” I muttered, turning my face into his chest and pressing my lips against his sternum.
My mind froze while I stood there, kissing his—rather massive and very impressive—chest.
Way to go, Mari. Kiss random chests because they smell and feel nice. That’s the way to live in a cabin full of men.
“Uh….” I scrambled for something to say, trying to extract myself at speed while going slow enough to cover my faux pas.
“Take it easy, Mari,” Jon commanded.
I reacted to his tone, easing my way backward as he steadied me with a dipped brow over hazel eyes shot with sunlight and cypress. “A step at a time. I know it’s been a while now, but that’s one hell of a trauma. My fault for dragging you into a section of the woods you don’t know. Yet,” he added, like his choice of words contained a hidden meaning.
Was it that simple? I could waltz around with Robe and let him leave me alone with Miller. The stockier man and I had developed a fragile rapport over the last week based on the number of bruises I accrued every session without complaint. Each aching muscle appeased my relentless taskmaster in working off some debt or sin I’d garnered alongside my scars. Every time my ass hit the deck, my throbbing rump earned me a fraction of his trust.
I hadn’t realized how much I craved that until he failed to mask his emotion for a scant second one session. Brief, but that longing for more was there. To be … needed . Wanted. No matter how hard he worked me after that, Miller couldn’t steal that knowledge back from me.
Jon, on the other hand, gave trust far more freely, his hurts displayed in place of his heart like a banner across his broad chest.
“No, not—wait. Yet?” I pressed my lips into a line, but they twitched despite my determination. “What’s up your sleeve, Jon?”
The big man laughed, catching my hand again and closing his fingers around mine in a fierce grip when I tugged at his hold, my feet skidding over last season’s slushy mulch. “Nuh-uh. You stay put, girl, right next to me. No wandering off, no getting lost. No freaking out… again.” He sent me a meaningful sideways look.
“Otherwise, Robe will hand you your ass. Yeah, I know what a grump he is,” I muttered to my shoes, the embarrassment of almost passing out on his best friend sinking in. “I’m so sorry,” I offered in a quiet, muted voice, unwilling to disturb the growing silence around us.
Where were the birds when I needed a cacophony or rent-a-crowd on cue? Oh, that’s right, freezing their feathers off, or warm in their nests.
“Don’t apologize, Mari. I’ve known too many women who say ‘sorry’ over and over again because they’ve been broken and beaten and it’s all they know. I can’t believe that of you. You’re stronger than he is.”
“Robe?” My brow furrowed as I halted, looking up at Jon.
“Him too. But I meant—” He cleared his throat. “I meant those who attacked you. This forest isn’t your enemy. I’m determined that by the time we’re done, you’ll be able to survive out here for days if need be. Weeks, if you have the right kit and can find shelter, which, after today, you’ll be able to do.”
“I will?” I echoed. “Are we orienteering?”
“Damn right.”
I grinned as Jon showed me the smallest foods to be found in the harshest of seasons. How to find north beneath an entwined canopy, what tracks and scat meant, where to locate water. The information swirled around my head, but this was survivalism at its best, and I would learn, damnit. And so I listened, and remembered, and watched.
“Here. Wild strawberry.” Jon crouched to dig at the slush-laden ground. I had no idea why he chose to scrabble about there, but he clearly had a plan as he proudly exposed a dead-looking, leafless root thing. He held out a crunched-up leaf from last season, frostbitten on the edge, and at my confused look, he then produced a more recognizable fruit from his pocket with a sigh. “Here you go, city girl. I went shopping earlier. Just for you.”
Strawberries weren’t the only thing hidden in his Mary Poppin-esque pockets. After ingesting blueberries and a stunted blackberry I suspected came from an actual, out-of-season, berry-bearing forest bush without being poisoned, I popped the fruit into my mouth and moaned out loud. “Oh, wow. That’s so sweet. Have you thought of making a hydroponics shed? Something solar powered so you can grow these all year round?” We both knew Alan was the only one who left the cabin at any regular interval, and maybe Will, though I got the impression he had less freedom than he wanted.
“Not a bad idea, honey. Bring that up with our resident chemist.” He smiled at my confused look. “Alan.” So I guessed right. “And yes, they’re some of the best you’ll find. But the fruit isn’t the only useful thing.” He held out a handful of broad dark green leaves before he shoved them back into the coat pocket they came from. “You won’t find many of these about yet, but a few more weeks and you’d be able to pick a decent amount.”
“Are you going to ward off a tribe of zombie beavers with that?” I asked, still savoring the berry.
Jon’s laugh kept me going for a few more steps, but my legs felt like they were going to fall off after the number of miles we’d traveled. He managed to reduce my fear of the dark spaces between trees with his passion about the mountainside.
That, and the fact that we hadn’t been attacked or poisoned.
“You know, if I picked a berry on my own, I’d die,” I pointed out. “I can poison myself with non-expired milk in my own kitchen.” The thought of my apartment sent my stomach into a tumble. I gripped the tree next to me that turned out to be Jon’s bicep.
“You okay there, Mari?” he asked, his attention on me though he kept his tone light. “Dried strawberry leaves create a solid base for a vitamin C shot in tea. Alan makes it back home,” he murmured, stressing the last word.
His point drove my thoughts into a spiral I couldn’t escape.
“Jon, am I…? Can I…?” I couldn’t complete the thought.
I’d been asking Robe if I could leave, but his reply remained the same every time: “Heal, and we’ll talk.”
But healing took time, and talking didn’t seem as scary as it had before. The Great Lump still wouldn’t answer my questions, though, despite my poking. I pursed my lips, tossing up the chances of getting information out of Jon, but I got the impression he’d be even worse than Robe.
Jon’s gentle eyes watched me, and I forced a smile I didn’t feel, unable to escape the nausea in my stomach. I needed a distraction….
“Tell me about how you got here. You and Robe and everyone.”
Jon arched an eyebrow. “He hasn’t told you?”
No need to ask which he Jon meant.
“No.”
“Stay long enough and you’ll be able to pick these on your own.” Jon piled a small pyramid of shop-bought strawberries into my palm and started to walk while I picked at my treasure trove. The explosion of flavors in my mouth floored me, and I moaned my answer with my typical inappropriate timing.
“A local… politician murdered my wife.” Jon’s hand found my free one and squeezed hard.
“Oh, God. I’m so sorry?—”
“Robe saved my ass from offing myself and brought me back here. I’ve helped him ever since. Miller followed along as always, brought back from his sojourn in the military. Will arrived a bit after, and then we… found Alan.”
“You make him sound lost.”
“We were all lost, Mari. Robe gave us a home.” He squeezed my fingers in a tender touch this time.
“How long have you all been here?” It must have been quite a while, as he talked about his wife with an ease I didn’t understand. “I can’t imagine the horror.”
“Nor do I want to again.”
“I’m so sorry for asking.”
“It’s fine.” He paused long enough for the forest sounds to fill his silence. “Seven years. Me, at least. Miller and Robe have been here longer. Alan and Will less. But it’s been seven years since I lost her.” His voice grew ragged with suppressed emotion.
My tin man.
I closed my eyes, my tears coming for him, what he’d lost. Who. Warmth brushed beneath my lashes as his roughened thumbs swiped the salt away.
“Don’t cry for me, Mari,” Jon said in his gentle tone. “My life was forfeit long ago. Let us give you what we can now.” His touch lingered and then dropped, leaving the ghost of my tears whispering in its wake.
My next breath sucked in as ragged as his, and I began to understand the value of the forest’s silence as we walked, its weight no longer suppressing but a comfort, until my questions bubbled over, unable to be held in any longer.
“What about Robe? And Miller?” And Will? The kid with sunshine in his eyes. Hell, what had the world done to these men who just wanted to survive and protect?
And fight.
Because they all had some darker aspect etched into their souls. Damaged. Broken.
Like me.
“Authorities accused Robe of murdering a superior officer and his aide, among other things. Miller backed his claim to innocence, the steadfast little shit. They both ended up out of the military, leaving quietly under their own steam when the required evidence didn’t come to light despite the power backing it. Otherwise, they’d be incarcerated—or dead.”
“He—” My voice caught on the first word. “Robe killed someone?”
Jon paused and looked back at me. “What did I just say, Mari?”
I thought back. “That he’s innocent?” Breath sucked into the void of my lungs.
“That he’s innocent.” Jon nodded once.
“So he didn’t do it.” I let my breath out.
“He did it.”
My breath stalled. “What?”
“He killed them both, Mari. They had a local girl on the floor of a tent, kept there for God knows how long. Half starved, naked, and filthy. His boss and his little groupie liked to traffic women. Robe lost his shit, as you do.” Jon resumed walking, his shoulders a tight line.
“As you do.” Conversation closed, then. I worked my screaming thighs hard to catch up to the mountain attached to my hand. “Jon… what happened to the girl?”
“I don’t know. None of us do. They carted Robe away and locked him up until Miller rode to the rescue and brought him back to home soil.”
“Which is why he has to hide. They both do.” I swallowed, tears pricking the corners of my eyes. “He has a sister. Any other family? Has he ever been back to… where does he call home?”
Jon paused midstep. “No.”
Robe’s life had been ripped away, and despite the injustice that would have crippled a weaker man, he made a home for those like him. Broken, unwanted.
A single tear cascaded down my cheek.
Jon twisted when my feet stayed planted where they were. My mouth opened a few times, but nothing came out.
“It’s all right, Mari.”
“It’s not all right . How can he be as strong as he is?”
Jon’s beard twitched. “Because he’s a stubborn asshole.”
“I thought the same earlier.” I hiccupped, my heart breaking.
A calloused thumb grazed my cheek, sweeping my sorrow aside. “And because he’s fierce, loyal to a fault, and wants to save the world like some comic-book-worthy superhero. He’ll protect you, Mari. We all will.”
“But you can’t go home.”
Jon stilled. “He is our home.”
For a while, the sound of our boots crunching through the underbrush and my short breaths filled the forest as I cried in silence for the horrors they’d suffered. I hadn’t even gotten to Will’s story, but something told me trauma filled his past too.
Robe collected people like himself. Jon was stubborn but had a gentle side. Miller was gruff but loyal.
Jon walked me through identifying a few edible barks, picked out wintergreen and stored some of that, too, and then showed me habitual nesting sites to source eggs. I followed in his footsteps, letting his love of the forest settle over the grief overflowing my heart for them all. But I learned more about Jon too.
How much he loved the forest, what he knew about the area around the house. Why he ran through the trees early in the morning. Why he stayed with Robe.
Why he didn’t leave.
“You loved her.” I didn’t bother phrasing it as a question. He hadn’t wanted to talk about it, but the ghost of his wife hovered in the back of his attentive gaze every time he looked at me.
“With all my heart. I thought it broke, you know. Shattered into a million worthless pieces.” He looked straight at me, leaving my heart thundering in my chest. “Until you arrived.”
“You’re not worthless. And you don’t know me.” The words fell out as I processed his response. “Wait, you mean like a… a… ward, or a friend or a niece or something. Right?” I swallowed hard, desperate for that nod, because the dark intent in his eyes said otherwise.
I couldn’t be the feature of a man’s wet dreams when I sort of suspected—okay, that was me lying to myself head-on—when I knew I belonged with Robe. Alan… he was a different beast. Literally. But Jon was his own person. He was Robe’s best friend. And I was meant to be with Robe. My head knew it. My heart knew it. Having his best friend want me, even when I felt so safe in his arms, presented a huge problem. No, I’d read the whole situation wrong.
What sort of an insensitive, narcissistic bitch thinks like that?
“We share every important moment, Mari.”
Robe’s words from before dropped me into a spiral of my own making while Jon hauled me out, giving me a free pass.
“Yeah, sure. Like a niece.” Jon huffed a cloud of condensation that hovered between us, obscuring my vision for a moment. “C’mon. I wanna show you how to build a shelter in winter.”
“I’d freeze to death first. Not like I’ll be here for the next one, you know. I have to go home sometime,” I said reasonably.
Or maybe totally unreasonably, as his broad back stopped halfway up an incline. I pulled up a breath shy of plowing straight into his hard-as-nails ass. I knew it was tight and hard because, like a prepubescent kid in a movie, my progress ended on a sudden halt. I tumbled toes over teakettle, but instead of grabbing handfuls of breasts, I got ass.
A whole lotta fine, hard ass.
Damn, he’d be good in bed.
If I’d learned anything about a man’s physique, it meant that a solid, warm chest meant unconditional love. A neat, hard ass, on the other hand, made for an excellent, long-lasting lover.
I swallowed, prying my fingers free as Jon— Robe’s best friend , I kept reminding myself—turned to face me.
“I’m so sorry,” I stammered. “I?—”
“Why don’t you go first?” Jon offered, standing aside to clear the path. “I promise I won’t go head over tails like you just did.”
“Um, of course,” I whispered weakly, trying not to imagine him without clothes in bed with Robe—and me.
I squeezed my eyes shut and edged past him.
A threesome, Mari? After the bathroom incident with Alan? Are you shitting me?
Where the hell was my head at? Left up a mountain man’s tight behind, for one thing.
We made a wide circuit that took us first north and then farther along the ridgeline, but Jon assured me we’d still be in time for whatever was being cooked back at the cabin that would slip inside the frozen barrier of my senses and send my stomach rumbling.
At a rocky outcrop, a glimpse of an imposing fortresslike building sent my blood thrumming too fast through my veins, overheating me and freezing me all at once. I stumbled over my own feet, wondering if Jon had done it on purpose, but as I’d kept my mouth shut about Gideon’s identity for self-preservation, how would he know?
Because there’s no one else out here, Mari.
Of course they knew. But I couldn’t bring myself to talk about it.
Jon caught me as I wavered on the edge of the path, my gaze fixed firmly ahead, my attention on the monstrosity behind me and who resided within those granite walls. Hell, even the building looked lifeless and overcast, a vacant castle on the hill.
A hand between my shoulder blades steadied me and propelled me forward all at once.
“The tree line is safest,” Jon explained conversationally while my emotions swirled in an uncontrolled maelstrom. “Winds can kick up fast, and they pummel the cliff face. Stay within the forest. It’s warmer, and you’re less… exposed there.”
I nodded and said nothing.
The mantle of silence seemed more comfortable this time. Jon’s presence at my back remained a sturdy shield between me and Gideon’s shade that followed me into the trees. Jon gave a murmured direction where the path split, crouching to show me tracks, and directed me how to look between the trees rather than at them.
The knowledge eked out an extra degree of power, building my confidence with every mile. I smiled for the first time in hours, nibbling my last strawberry as each step became less torturous.
And all the while, I thought about the boys and how they behaved.
Robe, the consummate protector/provider.
Alan, the comic relief with way too much heart—and other skills that heated my body.
Jon, the mountain of a man who found passion in the oddest places and was all the more lovable for it.
Miller, whose snarky, grumpy methods earned the results Robe needed. Fixing what Robe couldn’t while always having his back. Ah, the wingman.
Will—
I stopped.
“Robe’s sending me around the group, isn’t he?” I asked without any other brain function firing whatsoever. I might have thought the comment through a little harder. I persisted anyway. “Isn’t he?”
“We all want to get to know you, Mari,” Jon hedged, though his stance shouted stubborn asshat all the way.
It suited him.
“Why does he want me to get to know everyone? I’m going home soon.” I pushed back the fear that started to fray the edges of my consciousness. “Jon, stop.” I tugged at the hand he’d refused to release for the better part of the day.
“Because—” Jon gripped my hand tight and pulled me an inch closer to him. I shivered, gooseflesh rising beneath the long-sleeved thermal top I’d become accustomed to wearing. “We need to get back. Light’s failing.”
He pushed past me, releasing my hand, and strode forward. I hurried to catch up, unable to keep pace with his longer legs that ate up the miles. My breath came in short pants that left me unable to think about anything more than powering on behind him.
“Jon—” I gasped as the trees thinned.
The cabin sat in its usual place in the center of the small clearing. It was a relief that the forest hadn’t swallowed our home in our absence.
Jon turned back, his brow furrowed as he took in my state. “I went too fast. I’m sorry, Mari. I’m not used to company.”
“It’s okay. I wanted to say thank you before we went inside. Before….”
Before there are other people between us. A full day with Jon had increased my comfort level, and I knew I’d trust him if the world came crashing down around us.
He offered me a strained smile, his gaze sweeping over me, less checking me out than making sure I hadn’t fallen apart in the last few hours.
Alan whistled from the balcony, wearing his fluffiest apron, and catcalled, but my attention remained on Jon’s broad back as I followed him into the cabin. The inside of the house was steaming in comparison to the sharp mountain air.
“Have a shower, Mari. It’ll regulate your core temp.” Alan flicked my nose as I passed him. “Then it’s dinner in your room tonight.”
“In the bedroom?” The room that belonged to someone else. Not me.
“Yes.”
“I can’t join you?” I frowned.
Robe had sent me out with his friends each day, and now I couldn’t eat with them, pushed away like a prisoner.
Friendzone status revoked.
I swallowed around a lump in my throat that refused to be dislodged while Alan observed me with pity in his gaze. I hated it and folded my arms. If they were stubborn, I’d match them.
“I’d like to eat with you.” All of you. Please. I wanted to beg but kept my gaze fixed on Alan, too scared to look around the room or risk being denied by someone else.
Alan’s mouth opened, but a different voice answered me.
“No.”
I blinked, frozen to the spot in panic as tears welled. “Why not?” I whispered, already knowing the answer. Robe’s select few didn’t include me. What he gave to these men, he could strip away from me just as fast.
“Because we have work.” The finality in his tone etched a strike through my heart.
“Fine,” I snapped with the last of my energy and shoved past Jon, unable to deal with Robe’s warmth at my back, the pity in Alan’s eyes, and a fresh, shattered heart.
Someone might have called my name, or maybe I imagined it and they watched me go in silence. Worse, maybe they didn’t watch me at all because my presence counted as temporary at best.
Why am I fighting for permanency when I’m supposed to leave soon?
It wasn’t until I peeled sweat-laden material from my skin and stood under a scalding hot shower, going back over the moment we’d returned to the cabin, that I realized I’d called it home in my head when we arrived in the clearing.
And that made my enforced isolation so much worse.