Chapter 17
Silver Creek was smaller than Hillside, but otherwise similar. As Asha walked through the fortified gate, she noted that there seemed to be a lot of sheep grazing in small pens, and outside the walls, fields of flax blew gently in the breeze on small farms.
“It’s where most of our textiles come from,” Cade confirmed. “Mostly wool and linen, but some others too. They grow some food as well, though not as much as Hillside.”
And just like at Hillside, Asha knew, the gang took a large cut of everything that this settlement produced. She still didn’t feel good about it, but she was learning that given enough time, you could get used to anything. Even injustice. Especially when survival was on the line.
The villagers seemed to respect Cade, just as the Hillside residents had, even though they still treated the Blackguard with the same deference and wariness.
Asha couldn’t blame them. Though no one seemed to be starving here, Silver Creek showed the same signs of poverty as Hillside: everyone was thin and weary-looking, missing teeth and hair, and drug use was open and rampant.
Flophouses were openly advertised on one of the main streets, and there was a woman behind a stall that allowed one to barter their hair for food, medicine, and supplies.
They had a smaller market square than Hillside, and Asha spotted the platform where the slave market usually took place.
Mercifully, it was empty. She didn’t know how she’d handle seeing another one full.
Cade caught her looking at it and enveloped her hand with his, leading her away.
Likely to distract her, he took her to a fruit cart, where a smiling man—one of the only genuinely happy-looking people she’d seen—offered her a fresh peach.
“A gift for the lady,” he insisted, pressing it into Asha’s hand.
The first bite was so sweet and refreshing that Asha wanted to cry.
It’d been a long time since she’d had fresh fruit, and the peach was so perfectly ripe that juice dripped down her chin.
She relished eating it, and Cade watched her with amusement, though there was also something like heat in his eyes. She pretended not to notice.
Cade showed her to the captain’s quarters, which was a small, one-room cottage similar to the one in Hillside.
Inside, there was a double bed, a bookcase, a washstand, and a fireplace.
There was a small yard out back, and predictably, Cade had set it up with targets for practice and a pull-up bar.
This man cares more about fitness than I’ve cared about anything, ever.
Asha flopped onto the bed, grateful to get off her ankle, which still ached.
“Rest that ankle,” Cade said, echoing her thoughts.
He walked to the bookcase, which was mostly empty except for a handful of slim volumes.
He gathered the books and dropped them onto the bed beside her.
“I keep a few books here to pass the time.” He headed back toward the door.
“I have to take care of the rents. Will you be alright here until I get back? The door locks, and I won’t go far. ”
She nodded. “Hurry back.”
His grin was a little too smug. “I will. Don’t miss me too much.”
“Don’t worry,” she said breezily. “I’ll just ask Leo to come entertain me in the meantime.”
“Like hell, you will,” he growled, but he was smiling. “I’ll throw you over my shoulder, caveman-style, if it comes to that.”
Asha gave him a token eyeroll, refusing to admit how much she liked that image at the moment.
After he left, she curled up on the bed and fell asleep, even though it was only early evening.
Nonetheless, the trip had been tiring, and she was under Leo’s orders to rest her ankle now that they’d arrived.
When she awoke, the sun was low in the sky, and Cade had still not returned.
She stretched, yawning, and decided to go into the yard.
She couldn’t believe she was going to work out without Cade pushing her to, but there wasn’t much else to do, and she hadn’t had a proper workout in a few days.
She did some basic exercises, then moved onto Cade’s pull-up bar.
She was curious about how many chin-ups she could do—if she could do any at all.
Asha managed the first one with difficulty, then a second, and a third. By the end of that one, she was huffing and puffing and cursing the man who no doubt invented this torture.
“Good work. I usually do five sets of twelve. So…get at it.”
She whirled around to see Cade leaning casually against the wall of the cottage, smirking.
“Five sets of twelve?” she burst out, wiping sweat from her brow. The air was still warm, even as the sun had begun to set. “Are you trying to kill me?”
He chuckled. “No. But…while we’re out here, we should brush up on your hand-to-hand combat skills.”
Asha rolled her eyes as she walked over to him. “Is that really necessary?”
“You worried?” he asked with a smirk, standing up straight.
“No,” she replied, and threw a punch.
Cade caught her wrist and tried to pull her into a hold, but Asha twisted away, out of his grip.
Unfortunately, that meant her back was toward the cottage wall, putting her in an unfavourable position.
She managed to dodge his next strike, countering with a blow of her own.
He grunted as she hit his shoulder, pushing him off-balance.
To counterbalance, he threw his weight forward, toward her.
Asha retreated instinctively, but there was nowhere to go; she was backed against the cottage wall.
His low, intimate chuckle at her predicament turned her insides molten, but it also challenged her to fight back.
She caught his wrist and twisted it away from her, executing a hold he’d taught her.
One good twist and it’d fracture. He couldn’t move without risking the same outcome.
They were an inch apart now, both breathing heavily.
Asha was painfully aware of his big, impossibly muscular body, and the heat that radiated from it, creating little sparks along every one of her nerve endings.
There was an unbearable tension unspooling between them, pulled tight like a cord that connected their bodies.
Cade rested his free hand against the wall beside her head.
“Go ahead and break my wrist, little viper,” he breathed, low and husky, his grey eyes boring into hers. “I’ll still kiss you.”
The pleasure of his lips on hers startled her, filled her with an unrecognizable need.
He kissed her slowly at first, and she melted against him, dropping his wrist and closing the gap between them.
He pressed her mouth more firmly against his, and when she made a small sound of pleasure, he grew wilder, more passionate.
He stroked his tongue over her lips, and she allowed him in, tangling her tongue with his.
Cade groaned and pushed her against the wall again, grabbing her face between his hands and kissing her still deeper, harder.
Asha felt wondrously, deliriously out of control—something she never thought she’d enjoy.
But she’d never been kissed quite like this, and certainly not by someone she cared for as much as she cared for him.
It added a sweet dimension to the passion that surprised her.
It gave it purpose. It made her want him in a way she’d never wanted anyone before, as if she’d die without his touch.
In a move that surprised her most of all, Asha clung to him, looping her arms around his neck and rubbing herself against him.
Another deep groan from Cade, and he pressed between her legs, nipping her bottom lip.
She gave a small yelp, clawing at his back, and he lifted her easily off her feet.
Her legs automatically curled around his hips, and he carried her to the back door of the cottage, only pausing his kisses to open it and bring her inside.
Once in the house, Cade pinned her against the wall next to the door, grinding against her as his mouth plundered hers.
She felt his erection through their clothes, and for the first time, stone-cold fear shot through her, as if she’d been doused with freezing water.
She broke away from his lips and squirmed against him, panting.
Cade, ever attuned to her mood, paused. Spreading kisses across her jaw, he asked softly, “What is it?”
“It’s just…I know where this is going,” Asha replied, and she hated how afraid she sounded.
“It can go wherever you want, darling,” he said, but his tone was different now: gentler, more careful, more like it’d been at the beginning of their time together. She instantly mourned the loss of his wilder, more passionate side. That part of him was new and already addictive.
But still…the memories of her past violation were hard to shake.
Even before Angel had raped her, she’d never enjoyed having sex.
She’d only ever brought herself to orgasm, and even then, she didn’t masturbate often.
She could close her eyes, pretend to be somewhere else, and mindlessly pleasure her husband, but her own pleasure made her feel dirty.
“But you want sex,” Asha said flatly. “And I…”
She couldn’t continue, mostly because Cade had discovered a particularly pleasurable spot just underneath her ear and was now kissing her there. She sighed.
“You want it, too,” he said in her ear, sending pleasant shivers down her spine. “Don’t you?”
Yes. It was the immediate answer of her body, but her mind was still mired in her fears.
In some ways, there was more at stake because she cared about him.
She trusted him, which was a minor miracle.
If he hurt or humiliated her, it would be more painful than she could bear.
At least when it was someone she hated or resented, it didn’t destroy the only fragile trust she’d ever managed to cultivate. It could ruin everything.