The General's Daughter (Snow and Ash #1) (6 page)

He leads me outside, and once again the beauty of the wilderness rushes through me like a Christmas breeze. The trees may be bare and there may be snow on the ground, but there are no walls. I am on parole.

“What?” Talon flicks me an annoyed glance, and I realize I’m smiling and my cheeks feel warm.

“Nothing. It’s just…it’s so big out here. I know we can’t see like we used to, but it doesn’t feel like there’s a list of rules anywhere within a hundred miles!”

He frowns, and I lose my smile. Did I say something wrong?

He grabs an ax that is leaning against a burnt metal barrel and takes my hand in his. We head for a line of trees that stands a couple hundred feet to the left. I can’t tell north or south. The sun is still hidden by the volcanic debris way up in the atmosphere. They say someday it’ll all work out and the sun will come back, but for now, I’m stuck with forward, back, left, and right.

It begins to snow, light fluffy flakes that land on my eyelashes.

“Thank you.” I bite my lip. Is talking okay?

“For what?” he demands.

“For letting me come outside.”

He shrugs. “It’s either that or leave you in there with them.”

I suck in a breath as the chill hits my stomach. No, I don’t want to be in there with them. Suddenly, I’m not playacting the obedient captive. I’m glad for Talon’s protection.

Talon doesn’t like me. He never has and he never will. But all in all, he’s been surprisingly kind when you take in the circumstances. My hand is enveloped in his, and he’s shortened his strides so I can keep up. He’s warned the other guys not to mess with me. How would he be with a girl he actually liked? For some reason, the thought makes me sad.

We get a good twenty feet inside the woods, and Talon brushes off a log. “Sit.”

I do as he says, and he starts chopping a tall birch tree. I know it’s a birch because I recognize the bark. I used to love trees, back when there was such a thing as leaves, and wind, and the music they made together. I let my mind drift.

“You doing okay?” He’s breathing heavily, and there’s a good-size chunk missing from one side of the tree.

“Yes.” I give him a sunny smile, the one Dad looks for.

Talon scowls, then resumes chopping.

When he pulls out his water bottle, he takes a long drink and then holds it out toward me.

“No, thank you.” I smile. “I’m fine.” My posture is perfect, and I compose my expression into blandness. My eyes are downcast, lips uplifted, just as I’ve been trained. The perfect doll.

“What the fuck are you doing?” He’s squinting at me.

I wilt. “What?”

“Don’t give me that innocent look. You’re planning something.”

My lips part, and for a moment all I can do is blink at him.

“You’re mine now, understand?” he demands, taking a step toward me.

“I am,” I stutter. “I mean, I do. I’m trying to be, ah, cooperative.” What on earth does he want?

“Cooperative, huh? What’s going on behind those sappy little smiles of yours?”

I shake my head. I’m doing what he said. Not giving him any trouble.

“That shit’s not real,” he says with a look of disgust. He returns to the tree and regrips the ax. “You really don’t want to mess with me, Ilsa.”

“I’m sorry! I’m doing the best I can. What, am I supposed to pee my pants for you again? Is that what you want?”

He swings the ax, and it goes awry, striking above his mark. He swears.

Fine. He doesn’t want Obedient General’s Daughter. What does he want? Shoot. I don’t even know this guy.

“Where were you?” I ask.

He takes another swing. “When?”

“Duh. When Yellowstone happened.”

Comprehension lights his face. “JFK Airport. I was just getting ready to ship out to Afghanistan.”

“You were in the military?”

He smirks. “Did the uniform clue you in?”

I suck my teeth at him. “Dad wears a uniform. So do all of his men. His army didn’t exist before the Ash.”

He shifts position and takes a couple swings on the other side of the tree, just above the first wound. He is so strong. Life’s been hard since the Ash. For some, at least. The sheer power of him awes me, leaves me warm in places that have never felt anything but pain.

“Which one?” I ask.

“Which one what?” His tone tells me I’m getting on his nerves. “And wipe off that scowl.”

“You told me not to use my ‘Dad face.’”

“Your what?” He lets the ax fall to the ground. I have his attention.

“I have to act a certain way, wear the right clothes, arrange my hair the way he wants, at all times.” I shrug. “It got worse when I got back.”

“After the trucker?”

“Oh.
 
No. I didn’t go home.
 
I stayed with some college kids in Pittsburgh and worked in a strip club.
 
Serving drinks, not stripping.”

He snorts.
 
“How old were you?”

I spread my hands.
 
“They didn’t care.
 
It was all under the table.”

“Weren’t guys all over you?”

“I shaved my head and got a tattoo.
 
I dressed in black muscle shirts and wore chains. I sort of let people think I was a lesbian.”

He rolls his eyes.
 
“Having a tattoo doesn’t make you a lesbian.”

“Like I’d know that.”

He shakes his head.
 
“So how’d you end up back at your Dad’s place?”

I shiver, but it’s from more than the cold.
 
“After Yellowstone, when everything got bad in Pittsburgh, my one roommate and I tried getting into some of the smaller towns.
 
They were so not interested in taking in strangers. Then I got the flu. I don’t know what he did, but my friend Vaughn got his hands on a car with gas in it, and he drove me back to my Dad’s.
 
I had no say in the matter.”

“Vaugn sounds like a good guy.”

The conversation is getting painful.
 
I don’t want to talk about Vaugh anymore.
 

“Anyway, Dad isn’t just obsessed with how I look. Now it includes forks, napkins, facial expressions, and my accent. My posture too, in case you hadn’t noticed. And as for friends, there aren’t any.”

He fixes me with a look that tells me I’m nuts.

“So which one? Army? Navy?”

He pulls back and regrips his ax. “Marines.”

Somehow that fits. He always was the toughest of the tough.

“When did you enlist?”

“The day after the funerals.”

Shame shoves any further words down my throat.

“What,” he mocks after a moment, “no more questions?”

“I guess not,” I mumble.

“Oh, so you’re feeling bad all of a sudden. Goody for you.”

“No.” There’s no suddenly about it.

I sense him looking at me, and his stare is like a thousand pine needles poking me in the face. I stare out at the forest full of skeletons that used to chatter in the breeze.

“Willard Barry was the last company commander I had,” he volunteers.

“So, the Marines. Is that what’s left of the US?”

“There is no US.” He takes a particularly hard swing, and I hear a crack. Then a series of them. The tree seems to sway, as though it’s not sure which way it wants to go. Talon stands back and waits, an aura of satisfaction about him.

It tilts.

“Move! Move, move, move!” Talon charges toward me, and his face is a mask of panic. The tree is falling.

Toward me.

I leap to my feet, but I’m just as panicked as he looks and I don’t know which way to run.

He plows into me with all the power of a professional football player, and we both hit the ground just as the tree crashes around us. I don’t know what God’s plans are for me, because we’re smack dab among the limbs and none of them have hit us.

Talon begins frantically checking me for wounds. His face is pale.

“I’m okay.” I sit up and give him what I hope is a reassuring look. “See? I’m fine.”

But he glares at me, and his eyes are kinda wild. He grabs me and rolls us both over so that he is on top of me. His lips find mine, and they’re hungry, rabid. And I don’t mind because the muscles in my private places contract, my heart feels full, and I find myself melting into him like he’s the only thing that stands between me and death.

He fists my hair and deepens the kiss. His tongue mates with mine, and he grinds his dick against me like we’re really going at it. And I want to. I need him to shove that thing so far inside me that I’ll never be rid of him.

He sits up and pulls me with him so I’m straddling his lap. He reaches under my shirt and caresses the skin of my back, then pulls my ass so that I’m smack up against his cock. The only thing between us is a few layers of material.

“God,” he says, his breathing coming in gasps. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

He kisses me again, and his tongue stabs into me, simulating what he’s doing with his hips. I’m drowning in lust. I ache as I’ve never ached, and I’m so wet that I wonder if he can feel it through the layers of clothing.

But this is wrong. Talon hates me. I shouldn’t feel so excited. I wrench myself away from his kiss and push my hands against his chest.

“Please, Talon. I can’t. This isn’t—”

A look of horror sweeps over his face, and it’s like someone dumped a bucket of manure over him.

I stumble to my feet. “It’s just the danger,” I say. “I know you don’t mean it.”

“Damn right I don’t,” he hisses. He adjusts his crotch and picks up his ax. “Not one word of this to anyone. Not one word. Got it?”

I nod, disturbed by the savagery in his voice, in his glare.

“Sit there.” He points at a boulder sticking up out of the ground twenty feet away. “And keep your mouth shut!”

Talon swings the ax again with so much gusto he could be hacking the walking dead.

Me, I just sit like I’m told. The last time someone touched me with any kind of affection, my mother was alive. The only person who’s touched me in three years is my dad, and that’s like being touched by a cop. A very high-ranking cop. It’s ironic that the only person who’s caressed me with genuine feeling is the person who hates me most.

Why did I enjoy it so much? Thinking about his hips rocking against mine brings an involuntary twinge deep inside me, and I’m ashamed. It wasn’t as though he attacked me or anything. I mean, with the trucker it was definitely rape. And that other guy, well, he would have raped me if he could have, and I definitely would have clawed his eyes out to get away. But with Talon…it felt good. Really good. Even the memory of his hands on my hips makes me want more.

Talon unfolds a tarp and tosses on the smaller of the branches he’s cut. When he’s got a full batch, he gathers up the corners.

“Start walking,” he barks. “No more than three steps in front of me.”

I hate him for the things he’s done—for the brutal way he told me about Misty, for the kidnapping, for the way he looks at me like he’d rather kiss a maggot. So it shouldn’t hurt my feelings, the way he’s being so mean.

But it does.

That night I sleep on the bed again. Talon sleeps on the floor. That’s all right. Asshole isn’t the only one who can give the cold shoulder. I turn my back to him, still in my uniform clothes. The message is clear:
don’t touch me
. Between the horny dreams and the ones where someone’s chopping me in half with an ax, I don’t get much sleep. I’m the first one up. I nudge Talon with my toe.

“Shit!” He takes a bleary-eyed swing at me. “What?”

“Bathroom.”

“Hold it.”

I shrug, keeping my face impassive. “Fine by me. You’re the one who has to put up with the smell.”

This gets him moving. I can almost hear his teeth grind as he stands up and stretches his neck. He squints down his nose at me. “What time is it?”

Really, Mr. I Haven’t Noticed the Apocalypse? “I don’t have a clock.”

He gives me a warning look, then roots around for his boots. He flicks back his blanket then, and I discover that he’s been using my shoes as a pillow. He tosses them onto the bed. “Hurry up.”

I cannot keep the glint from my eyes. “How was it? Sleeping all night, smelling my feet?”

His eyes narrow as I jam my feet into the boots and begin lacing them up.

Once I’ve done my business and so has he, we return to the trailer in what feels like an unbreakable silence. Seated on an old plastic crate cleaning a rifle is a guy I haven’t seen before. His hair is longer than you’d expect on a military guy. He doesn’t so much as look up when Talon and I enter.

Blondie, Baldo, and Dinner-Plate Hands are already in the kitchen. DPH is stirring a pot of oatmeal over a coal heater.

Talon pulls out a chair and stares at me until I sit. He takes the seat beside me. “When you guys are done,” he says to Blondie, “go on out and chop up that tree I felled.”