2. CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER TWO
FREYA
The house is perfectly silent. Outside, I catch a hint of conversation as I leave the bathroom. I’m showered, my hair braided to protect my curls, my face slathered with cold cream. Barefoot, I creep over to the triple floor-to-ceiling windows and look down over the yard.
My husband and eldest son stand in the lawn. Two cherry tipped cigarettes glitter in the dark. Instinctively, I frown. They don’t smoke much because they know I don’t like it, but now and then, when the horses and cows are sleeping and the day is done, they’ll loiter on the porch together and break open a pack.
Lighters flick, a breeze that smells of summer nights making them dance. They blow smoke up into the stars. It’s free, the way I am.
I might not like the smoking, but I love seeing them talking together. This is all I wanted—to define my world, to live at peace. Deacon got everything he ever wanted too. Now, I get to watch him laugh and talk with his son, shooting the shit without a worry in the world.
Tomorrow, they’ll rise and work the land. We take care of it and it takes care of us, just like Deacon and I. Then, after dinner, I’ll see a glimpse of them through the window again, talking under the dark sky.
We made this world together, and it’s sweet and slow and perfect.
I peel myself from the window and go upstairs to my attic room. Over the years, Deacon has added more shelving to the walls. He tore up the flooring once for me, but then I decided I didn’t like the replacement tiles I picked and wanted the original boards back. I apologized profusely. He just shook his head, standing in a pile of flooring, and said that’s alright, sweetheart. I just want you to have what you want.
Now, it’s back to fern green boards, sanded to silk, painted by hand. Laid over them is a braided rug Ginny and I made during one of my pregnancies. A lot of this work was done while pregnant. The vines and flowers painted on the baseboards and around the windows. The knitted lace that drapes over the collection cases. The hand sewn curtains.
Deacon made sure I had help when the boys were little. Janie, Bittern’s wife, was a big part of my support system. I never had hard pregnancies, but I carried low and had trouble walking as the months progressed. As much as I love the boys and didn’t mind being pregnant, it was an unexpected relief when Deacon got snipped. We’ve never been good at not making babies.
Now, I have all these things to remind me of the last seventeen years—not just making a family with him, but the little bits and pieces I brought with me from Appalachia. My love for the woods, the mountains. My insects, my books, my stories I’ve been writing down in the notebooks he gave me.
Downstairs, I hear a faint click, and I cock my head towards the stairs. The distant sound of Slate walking down the hall appears and disappears. It’s replaced by Deacon making his rounds, shutting down the lights and locking doors.
My heart picks up. It always does when I know we’re about to be alone together. I was going to pick out a book to read tonight, but now that I’m listening to my husband’s boots make their way around the house, I’m thinking I’d like to do something else. Quickly, I move down the attic steps and head to our bedroom.
Inside, I slip my dressing gown off. Underneath, I’m in the same slip I’ve been wearing for years. He bought it for me a little while after our wedding. Every time it wears out, he just buys me another from the boutique in Knifley.
It’s cotton, lined with lace. Fern green.
The door opens. I scramble onto the bed, patting the comforter over my lap. He steps in, taking off his hat and hanging it on the wall. There’s a little mat and a chair for his outside things. Silently, with my chin rested on my knees, I watch him take his boots off.
“You tired?” he asks, glancing up.
I shake my head. God, he’s good looking, all salt and peppery. Deacon is seventeen years older than he was when I met him, but he’s as handsome as ever. I think it’s always being on the move that keeps him young. He thinks it’s all the sex. Maybe we’re both right.
He’s got gray, but it’s hard to see because he keeps his hair buzzed. There are faint lines around his eyes and mouth. When his face is still, I have to lean in close to see them. When he smiles, it’s like little pathways right to my heart.
“You come here,” I say.
He comes around my side of the bed, and I lean in to kiss him. My nose wrinkles.
“You could do with a shower,” I whisper.
He cocks his head, looking up at me with those dark puppy eyes. “Love me anyway?”
I smile, letting him kiss me hard. He smells like dust and sweat; a long day in the sun. Drawing back, he touches my face, playing with a curl by my temple. His gaze is so soft, like velvet. All these years of looking at gentle eyes on a harsh face, and it still entrances me.
“What were you and Slate talking about?” I ask.
He sighs, standing and heading to the bathroom doorway. He’s unbuttoning his shirt as he goes, and it’s a bit distracting.
“Girl stuff,” he says.
“What?”
“Like dating and so on,” he says, tossing the shirt in the basket.
I sit up straighter. “Does he have a girlfriend?”
He gives me a look. “Not that I know of.”
I narrow my eyes. He’s deliberately not telling me, which I understand but don’t like. Deep down, I still worry about my boys. They’re good young men, but they can be wild cards. And the unrestrained blood in their veins, direct from their father, keeps me second guessing.
“Did…he do something?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “No, he was just asking about it—what I was like when I was his age in that specific area.”
“Oh no.”
He gives me a look. “Hey now, I was a virgin when I was seventeen. It wasn’t till later that all…the stuff happened. Anyway, I’m honest with him about this shit. Doesn’t do kids any good to lie to them, won’t prepare them for the world.”
I nod. Deacon is straightforward with everybody. Sometimes, that means I need to intervene and reassure my sons after he drops a hard truth on them. But he’s right. They do need to be tough, and his way of toughening them up is so much better than the cruelty I was raised on.
He strips off his belt. I drop my eyes.
We both pause as tension crackles. His head cocks.
“You want the whole deal tonight, sweetheart, or you want it nice and simple?” he says.
I really can’t go wrong here. With Deacon, nice and simple still makes me come so hard, I see stars popping on the ceiling. He’s all in or not at all.
“I don’t care,” I say, snuggling down under the covers. “I just want it.”
He unzips his pants. “You stay put while I get all the dirt off me.”
Sleepily, I listen to him shower. Then, he’s sliding under the covers with me, his big body easing over mine. My palms skim over the familiar patterns of his tattoos, slightly raised. He’s still hard-packed with muscle. Every inch of it is so familiar, so beloved.
He melds into me, kissing up my neck. My calves curl around his lower back. Our breaths catch as he slides in.
I’m anchored.
“Fuck, this pussy is good,” he murmurs, face still in my neck.
I smile, hand sliding up to the back of his head. He draws back, propping himself on his elbow. The bicep beside my head is mesmerizing, swirled with ink, tense with lean muscle. Euphoric, I turn and nip at it, eliciting that crooked smirk from him.
His hips pick up. My head tilts back, his warm skin against my cheek. His lashes flicker, and his hand comes up to pull the strap of my slip down, exposing my breast.
His head lowers, eyes looking up at me as he takes my nipple in his mouth. Deep inside me, his cock twitches. Pleasure tingles through my body like a shot of moonshine.
“Oh God,” I breathe.
He grazes my nipple with his teeth. “Beg for it, sweetheart.”
He’s got that look in his eyes, the distracted one, and I know all he can think about is drawing his hips out and railing them back in. Despite what he said earlier, I know he wants it hard and dirty. Heat flooding my hips, I push up against him and rock.
“Fuck me, daddy,” I gasp. “Make it rough.”
He groans, nipping my breast. Then, he withdraws, and I watch him go to the locked chest at the end of the bed. It clicks open, and he bends, picking up a long metal rod with two hooks at the end, a pair of leather loops attached to each one.
Heat trickles down to my toes. He circles the bed, but not before grabbing a velvet bag and dropping it beside me.
“Lay on your back with your thighs spread,” he orders, voice low. “Sideways on the bed.”
Obediently, I shift over until I’m in the right spot, him towering over me. He touches the back of my thigh, stroking down to my calf. Rough, familiar skin. He wraps his fist around my ankle and puts it in the cuff.
“Reach down,” he says. “Spread that pretty cunt and fuck yourself with your fingers while I finish cuffing you.”
Heat explodes in my face, rendering me helpless for a second. I should be used to how filthy he is, but sometimes, it catches me off guard. And the way he says these things, face stern, is just too much.
His brow crooks, telling me I need to hurry up and obey. I run my fingers down my stomach to my sex, using them to spread myself open. My pussy is soaked from desire, from having his cock inside. Pleasure shocks me, less from my touch and more from the euphoria of having him watch me with that heady look in his eyes.
He picks up my other ankle. I slide two fingers into my pussy.
“Fuck yourself,” he whispers hoarsely.
I find that spot where he touches me and start stroking it. His eyes flash as he wraps the leather around my ankle and secures it. Slowly, gathering momentum, I fuck my fingers in, almost out, again and again, waiting for him to say he’s satisfied.
Pleasure sparks. I love it when he watches me, head cocked, eyes reflecting the low light.
He bends, bracing himself on the bed, hands on either side of my legs.
“Take your fingers out.”
Breath caught, I obey.
“Put them in my mouth,” he says. “And address me properly.”
“Yes, daddy,” I whisper, lifting my fingers. My eyes roll back when I feel his mouth on my skin, his tongue curling the way it does on my pussy. Then, he’s gone, and I snap my gaze down to find him taking something from the velvet bag.
The light glints on it. He spits into his hand and a button clicks. Then, he’s pushing an oval vibrator deep into my pussy, making my hips rise off the bed. He dips down, putting the spreader bar behind his head, and starts eating me out like I’m his last meal.
My vision flashes, my body writhes.
I guess he’s not going easy on me tonight after all.