Page 30 of Deacon

She nods. “I always wanted one, but Aiden said no pets.”

There’s a trail of sadness through her words. I watch her for a second as she sips her coffee. Her soft, full mouth purses. Then, the tip of her tongue flicks out again. My dick jerks in response.

I’ve jerked off a lot to the scent of her ribbon, but that doesn’t compare to seeing her in person, feeling the heat of her presence or catching the vanilla scent that came off her when I lifted her from my truck.

“You like living with your stepfather and his sons?” I ask.

She shakes her head. Then, her pupils blow, like she made a mistake. “I mean, they’re fine. I like Bittern.”

“Bittern?”

“He’s Aiden’s youngest son,” she says.

“And you like him? Do the others hurt you?” I try to bite back the thinly veiled threat in my tone, but it comes out anyway.

She squirms. “No, not really. Bittern is nice, but he’s quiet from his accident in the mines.”

She hesitates, like she’s expecting me to cut her off. I wait for her to continue.

“Aiden had three sons,” she says. “His oldest, Wayland, died in a work accident. Bittern was with him, but he lived. He’s been off ever since, and he coughs a lot.”

Sadness tinges her voice, and it occurs to me Freya Hatfield has a lot of sadness in her. I wonder if she loves the butterflies and bugs, or if she never had any companionship to replace them. I met people like that in foster care, kids who bonded to animals, even insects, because they were loners in an unstable world.

“What are your favorite things?” I ask. “In the whole world.”

She stares at me like she’s startled. “I like outside,” she whispers. “I like the woods. I like the stars more than anything. I havenotebooks where I track them. When I was little, I used to pretend I could live up there, like it was its own universe.”

I listen, entranced. My mind goes up to the attic, where I installed four skylights so I could suspend my submissive beneath them, so I could put her in the stars. The woman I love will fit right into the place I’ve built.

Freya is the perfect fit. She doesn’t know it yet, but she will.

“I dissociated a lot as a kid,” she says. “Things got rough. You know how it is. But I don’t do that as much now.”

“Why?”

She considers it. “Montana is different. This part of it feels so wild. Dark. Some parts of growing up were…hard. But I miss the Appalachian Mountains.”

“You don’t like our mountains?”

“I’ve just never met them.”

That takes me aback. It doesn’t make sense, but somehow, it makes perfect sense. We’re both quiet for a moment. Then, she gets up and starts to pick up the dishes. I rise, towering over her body, and take them from her hands.

“You’re a guest,” I say. “No work. You tired?”

She backs up, edging out of my space. She does that a lot.

“Pretty tired,” she says. “Is that the phone?”

We both look down at the flip phone I laid there earlier. I nod, giving it over. She offers me a nervous smile and disappears into the hall with it. Her voice rises and falls for a minute. Then, she comes back in, a crease between her brows.

“Bittern says his truck got four flat tires while he was at the gas station,” she says. “That’s really strange.”

I keep quiet. It’s not that strange, considering I was the one who took a nail gun and shot the tires out while he was inside paying for gas and a six-pack. My only regret is that it took me longer than I anticipated. I’d planned on picking her up at the drop-off, not the middle of the woods.

“He had to get Ryland to come get him. I told him I was staying with Tracy,” she says.

“He can’t know you’re with the neighbor?” I ask.

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