Hers to Choose (Cannon Cousins) (11 page)

“No, I had no idea.”
Dan’s voice had sagged into sleepiness.

“Yeah, no problem,” Alex
continued, making it up as he went along. “I think it’s the best option. We
need to get those condos sold, right?”

“Yeah,” Dan mumbled.
“Fine with me.”

Chapter 8

The wood stove had gone cold and Bryn
shivered while she dressed in warm clothes. A layer of ice and snow coated
everything outside. With fire roaring up the brick chimney, she set the oven
and started biscuits. Steaks sizzled in red hot skillets. This weather required
more of a breakfast than sausage with eggs. But she cooked a few sausages
anyway, and a dozen eggs over easy.

Her decision, reached
sometime in the midst of half dreams and flopping around, was to get this
situation back to business only. It was entirely too risky to start feeling needy
about a man, any man. Maybe the natural situation for a submissive was to need
the control of a master, but she wasn’t really submissive to that extent. She
liked the itchy pain that came with discipline and restraints, and somehow the
situation had sidetracked into sex. That was fine, as long as she kept
remembering there was nothing personal about it. Okay, kind of difficult when
it involved touching and a lot of other incredibly personal stuff, like
penises, for god’s sake.

The point was
,
she didn’t want where it was going. Whether she wanted to
submit to Dan or not, she couldn’t stop thinking about Alex, what he thought,
what he wanted. She should have realized that her emotions would get involved.
Great.

She stood at the window,
bracing herself to drive to the cabin in this cold. Everything glistened with
ice—the grass, the fences, tree limbs, all of it beautiful and otherworldly.
Their hot breakfast sat in its box as she pulled on her coat. But then she saw
the Ram pull up in the drive with the tires crunching through frozen gravel.
They hurried into the house.

“No firewood,” Alex said,
stretching his hands toward her stove and shivering. Dan glared at her from the
depths of his heavy coat, also hovering beside the stove.

“Damn, guys,” she began. She
clamped her mouth shut at their furious expressions and went to pour two mugs
of coffee.

Alex accepted the mug and
managed a stiff grin. “My feet are frozen.”

“Did it not occur to you
when you used the last of the wood that you might need more?”

Alex held his hands
toward the stove and stared at her darkly.

“Yeah, it occurred to me,
when I woke up around midnight and remembered we ran out. Did you want me to
drive up here then?”

Was this really the guy
who kept her awake half the night?

“Hey, this is truly not
my fault. There’s plenty of wood here.”

Dan set his mug of coffee
on the stove beside him and bent over to poke the fire. “And that helps…how?”

He had a point, she
realized reluctantly. She should have piled the old Ford full and stacked it by
the cabin before they ever got here. It hadn’t occurred to her that they would
burn through all the wood already down there.

“You could have let me
know you were running low...” she began.

“Yeah,” Alex said in a
weary voice, starting to loosen up and running his hand through his hair. “I
meant to yesterday, but that was before chasing a gut-shot buck halfway across
the mountain and then...”

Her head jerked around as
his voice trailed off. And then...what? Was he trying to tell her that what happened
later between them actually registered in his memory? Her jaw clenched. God,
she was pathetic.

He shook his head and
drank more coffee, his glance catching her briefly before turning to Dan. “And
Dan had to drive to town.”

She went into the kitchen
to bring the skillets of sizzling steak to the table.

“Today’s your day, Alex
my boy. I’m figuring that area we tracked him to is their bolt hole. Did you
see the does scatter when we hiked in there?” Dan stretched side to side. “We
can get in there and work up a blind...”

Alex was shaking his
head. “No, the place today is by water. Everything’s frozen. Sooner or later,
they’ll come to water.”

Bryn walked back into the
kitchen, leaving them to their breakfast and hunting plans. She had to focus on
something besides Alex. She went to the back door and stared out over the land.
If only it could always be like this—men at the table, fire in the stove, the
land glistening like a Christmas card scene. Much as she had tried, wished, and
believed that feelings like this would leave her alone, here they were,
stronger than ever.

Dan was falling down on
the job if she had time and space to brood. If there was one thing she should
be able to count on from submission, it was to have no focus other than serving
her master. But he wasn’t her master. He was an amateur, a momentary event,
soon to expire. And she didn’t want a master, didn’t want to blindly depend on
someone else.

Self-reliance,
no one but herself in control.
Freedom to make her own choices, freedom
from mistakes made by others.
She had promised herself.

“We need to load up some
wood,” Alex said, startling her from her mood.

“Down there,” she pointed
out the kitchen door window at the carport, where her remaining firewood stood
in ricks by the four-wheeler.

“Is that all you’ve got?”

“I’ll call the guy for
another delivery. Take what you want.” She didn’t look at him.

The front door slammed,
and then the truck appeared in her kitchen-door view. He backed up, lunged out
the door, dropped the tailgate, and he and Dan started throwing wood into the
truck.

Alex cautiously made his
way up the icy back steps while Dan loaded more wood.

“Look,” he said, coming
inside and closing the door. “This situation—I went over the line last night
while Dan was gone. And I apologize, if you took it the wrong way.”

She stared at him. What
the hell was he talking about?
The sex?
“It seemed
mutual to me.”

He stepped toward her.
She could see a pulse in his jaw. What was he so worked up about? “This is a
hunting trip. And this thing with Dan…” he began.

Her anger flared as she
caught his scent. “Let me see if I can pick up your thought here,” she
interrupted. “This is a hunting trip. I cook, you hunt.
Right
so far?”

“
Yes,
and...”

“And the discipline was
something for Dan. Somehow the sex part got out of hand. I mean, yes, I enjoy
restraints. I enjoy spanking.
I admit, it’s arousing.”

“Yes, there’s that,
but....”

Her temper peaked. “Look,
I know, this isn’t about sex or relationships or anything else that might
develop down that road.”

“No, that’s not what I
mean.” He grabbed her arm.

Shivers immediately
sliced through her body.

“Damn it, let me say
something here,” he said gruffly, his eyes sending sparks. “Yes, you’re right.
I mean, this hunting trip is
not
about sex or relationships. I don’t
know what might develop down the road. I can’t think about that right now. My
concern is that you not get the wrong idea and somehow get hurt...”

“Oh, my
god.
Now you’re
protecting me from getting hurt?” She snorted and looked at him sideways. “Get
over yourself.”

“Damn it, you are so much
trouble.”

“And of course you
aren’t.
Or your cranky cousin Dan.”

“Don’t get attitude about
Dan. He’s got things on his mind. That’s what this is for.”

“I know, right?
Dan, his issues, my ass.”

He glowered at her. “A
private matter—I can’t go into it,” he said finally, his face grim. “Do you
want him to stop?”

Suddenly she wanted to
cry. Why was this happening? She shook her head, afraid to open her mouth.

He stood there a minute
longer. She suspected that, like her, a lot of words were rushing around in his
mind and he was afraid to say them. That suited her fine. The less said from
now on, the better. She would cook and submit. They would hunt and discipline.
Then they would leave and she could pick up the pieces and get on with her
life.

***

They came in tired and cold just
before sunset, or at least, what Bryn assumed would have been sunset if
sunlight could penetrate the heavily overcast sky. As it was, the amount of
light slowly diminished with the sky remaining pale gray. She heard them head
straight for the shower. Lasagna stayed warm in the oven, the tray of garlic
bread could wait until the last minute for heating, and the tossed salad sat
under plastic wrap in the fridge. She had already set some jazz CDs on low
volume and popped the cork on the cabernet sauvignon so it could breathe for a
while.

Her intent was to kill
them with kindness. She would consider every tiny detail and provide perfect
service. She would be so good they would be forced to leave a fat gratuity. In
the process, she would give them absolutely no personal attention other than to
submit to whatever discipline Dan decided to dole out. She would try her very
best not to enjoy any of it.

Dan came out of the shower
first, dressed in jeans and his gray sweater. He leaned against the kitchen
doorframe, his blue-gray stare ransacking her body.

“Martini?” she asked,
offering him a freshly poured glass and ignoring his pointed stare.

Her navy blue dress came
down just past the top of the black hose. It was something she’d bought to
please Ethan, too expensive to simply toss out. The deeply-scooped neckline
revealed the upper half of her breasts and the tight fit brought it close
against her midsection. Her hair collected in a loose chignon on the back of
her head and she wore their ridiculous four-inch heels.

Yes, they had given her
the cutesy maid outfit and nipple chains. And she had worn it. Surely they
didn’t intend that she wear it every single day. Even if they did, she couldn’t
make herself that obedient. If they didn’t like it, she had no doubt she’d hear
about it.
Sooner rather than later.

“Thanks.” He sipped.

“Olive?”

“No.”

“Any luck today?”

“Didn’t
see a buck.
A few
does, pretty spooked.”

“Yeah, they’re not
stupid. Once they hear gunfire, they disappear. Want to go sit down?” She
followed him to the seating area in the living room and watched him ease onto
the couch. “Where have you been hunting so far?”

“Down past the cabin
along that creek bottom, and then up the hillside to the west.”

“Might try crossing the
creek and following that feeder branch up between those two hills to the north.
We used to find them back there.” She leaned against the back of the chair
facing the couch and took another drink of her martini, chewing on one of her
olives.

“You hunt?” He looked at
her with what seemed to be real interest.

She laughed. “No—I don’t
care much for venison and it’s a lot of trouble. When I was younger, I’d ride
out on the land with my dad and granddad. He had horses. It’s so beautiful out
there.”

“We donate ours to the
food
bank,
get the head mounted if it’s impressive.”

“Does this one
stack
up?” she asked, relaxing into their first real
conversation. His angry edge had softened.

“Eleven points, not bad.
The one Alex shot at the first day was at least fifteen, haven’t seen one that
big in a long time.”

“Did I hear my name
mentioned?” Alex appeared in the bedroom doorway. Jeans clad his long legs and
a white sweater set off the rugged lines of his face and molded against his
wide shoulders and chest.

“Dan tells me you saw a
trophy buck that first day,” she gulped.

His azure eyes locked
onto hers and then ate up her body before returning to her face. His jaw
pulsed. Damn it. Hadn’t she made up her mind not to let herself get sucked back
into his spell, whatever it was? But the effect of his stare and his simple
presence did something to her legs. She leaned more heavily against the chair
back.

“Oh, and would you like a
martini?” she finished in a rush.

“Sounds great—couple of
olives, please.” He brushed past her on his way to the chair.

Relieved to have an
excuse to get out of that room, she stood in front of the kitchen cabinet and
lectured herself.
I will not think about Alex.
Or anything
else sexual.
Or personal.
NOTHING.

Unfortunately, it didn’t
matter what she told herself—her arm where he had brushed past radiated heat to
the rest of her body. She gave a vicious shake to the frosted canister and
poured.

“Thanks for the advice
about going north,” Alex said, his hands overlapping hers as she handed him the
drink.