Page 14 of Recurve Ridge

Where my parents would have dressed me in their neck-to-ankle cultish clothes and married me off to the highest bidder by Christmas in their small village outside Bristol. I mean, the next most interested suitor. Part of me found that funny still.

The other part couldn’t laugh anymore.

Cowering beneath the pathetic shield of blankets that trapped more than protected me, I peered over the stifling edge as he maintained his slow but steady progress toward me.

A red-and-white checkered shirt hung open to expose the expansive chest that its buttons had strained to confine when I first met him. The light that fell in sharp relief hinted at deep, carved muscles I’d become acquainted with during my sojourn over his shoulder for half the journey to his forest home. Beneath the brushed cotton, tails of ink peeked between the loose panels of his shirt. Dark hair and a freshly trimmed beard complemented his forest-green eyes that simmered with an intensity focused on one thing—me.

I’m not the only one he cleaned up.

Each measured step provided me with plenty of time to scream bloody murder or scramble away. Neither urge presented itself, a relief after the never-ending running and running and running. Craving security, I exhausted my supply of both energy and fight.

If I’m going to die, let it be here in a hard bed, near a harder man.

But it would be by my choice.

In what might have been the single stupidest decision of my life, I put my trust in him.

All of it.

A silent prayer left me that if he broke my tenuous faith, it would end fast. I clung to the facade of safety that let me pretend my life would continue on as per normal. But I couldn’t.

Nothing will ever be normal again.

His gaze never left mine as he approached, reaching out to pat the quilt around me like a mother hen. Careful to avoid all contact, he perched on the edge of the mattress, which dipped under his mass. I tumbled sideways into the dip, a slow-moving target pinned beneath a bear of a beast.

His features tightened under the shortened beard, almost horrified that the barrier between us might be broken—albeit through a swath of thick fabric—and retreated a fraction.

The visual brought on a fit of giggles while I fought to maintain a straight face.Inappropriate. Pushing my smile back with no small degree of horror, a stunted squawk passed my lips. The strangled sound would have terrified a bear on the hunt.

My savior sat back, his weight slipping to the edge of the hard mattress, eyes flaring with alarm.

The giggles returned for round two. Everest froze with every bout of hysteria that left my lips in snorts and suppressed grunts, panic written across his features. I laughed all the harder. My vision blurred as tears leaked free, and I raised my hands to scrape them off my face but couldn’t.

My hilarity died a short death as I realized my arms were trapped beneath the quilt and his weight, though he gave no indication that he noticed. I braced for the panic I expected to swamp me, but nothing arrived. Although I’d been tied down what felt like only hours before, though both my mind and my body promised me the trauma happened much longer ago, this seemed… safe. Like his restricted space gave my anxiety no place to develop.

No frantic flailing, no thrashing, no cursing.

Shit. I swore at him.

Hurled abuse right in his face, if I opted for honesty over ego. I could write my behavior off as part of my survival instinct, but screaming whatever came out had been a stress-relief mechanism, pure and simple. Taking my reclaimed freedom and doing whatever the fuck I wanted with it, I cussed out my wild mountain knight in the process.

The last of my unhinged mirth subsided in an inhale beneath his watchful gaze. Eyes wary, Everest leaned forward, his hand half raised. He paused, as though considering the action. When I didn’t shy away, he closed the distance and brushed hair from my face.

“It’s okay. I’m okay,” I lied. My voice came out soft and raspy, refusing to cover my falsehood, though nothing could be further from the truth. “I don’t know your name. To say thank you for stopping me. My escape from….”

Where, exactly? The pits of purgatory? An icy hell? I’d take either option to escape the violation my body had been subjected to while my mind tried to flitter free but failed.

A small smile curved his lips. I wriggled harder, trying to free my hands to trace over his features, but his weight compressed the heavy quilt over me, rendering me immobile. The draw to him doubled as my breath shortened. Even in my admittedly hysterical state, I knew I shouldn’t want to touch a man I didn’t know who resided in the middle of the woods with others who, like himself, screameddangerous, but I couldn’t help myself.

He leaned into my space, those forest eyes of a woodland god lighting with a promise of more I wanted to delve into. My body heated beneath the blankets, suffocating, my skin on fire but still craving the warmth of him. The only air I wanted was whatever he would give me.

One look, and I’d let him claim me.

What iswrongwith me?

I’d gone from running for my life like the typical victim in a horror movie to embodying the farce of the debunked Stockholm Syndrome myth. That wasnotreasonable. But after what I’d endured, what did my new baseline consist of, my new normal? I had no benchmark to align myself against.

“Robe Huntingdon.” He pronounced his last name in a stilted way, as though he hadn’t said it in some time.

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