Genesis Lost - Books 1 - 6, page 112
“You can’t force my mind, and neither can I,” I snarled. “You wanted to fuck me, and I would have let you.”
He draped the blankets over my body. One after another. Then he leaned down and cupped my chin, forcing my eyes to lock with his. “I never said I wanted to fuck you. Making love. That’s what I wanted.”
“You fucking piece of shit. There’s no love between us.”
“Nope, you’re right.” He poured me a glass of water and placed it next to me on the nightstand. “But can we at least fake it a little until we don’t have to anymore? You’re as stiff as a board. Why do you tense so much at my touch? Sometimes I believe the softer I am, the more you turn into a rock.”
The past was mine. “Untie me right now. We had a deal.”
“No deal.”
Fucking shit.
Perhaps I should have put a bit more life into this. Moaned a little. Arch my back. Toss my hips against him. I knew how to fake lust and desire. Orgasms, too. But love? How on earth does one fake love?
“Where are you going?” I asked Oriel when he marched out the door.
“To the village. I won’t be long, I promise. Might give you the time you need to rethink that deal I offered.”
Bam!
This was just insane. My so-called husband kept me prisoner in his cabin, asking me to fake love and marriage in exchange for freedom after sixty days. What the hell was wrong with that guy? Didn’t he see how hopeless this was?
With the zip tie cutting into my skin yet again, I quickly came to terms with the brutal reality. If I wanted to get out of here, I had to play by his rules. But if he thought I would do so without making sure he’d stick to his end of the bargain, he had no idea what it was like to be up against a Lily.
Six
Oriel
What the hell was I doing?
I kept a naked woman against her will zip-tied to my bed. Even though she was legally my wife, everyone would agree that was kinda fucked up. But what choice did I have? As soon as I’d cut her loose, she’d leave me. She had every right to do so… in sixty days.
That was a fair exchange, wasn’t it? Sixty days of genuine effort and she’d get her freedom back. Damn, if she didn’t love me by then, I’d personally help her to get away from me and find someplace safe.
I rode my ATV over roots and around boulders, my cock still hard inside my pants. Kim was so beautiful, so sexy. Letting her run around naked all day sure took its toll on me. No matter how many times I silently jerked off after I had tied her to the bed at night, it still wouldn’t keep me from going hard the moment I lay eyes on her again.
Restraint. That’s what it cost me and a lot of it. But I wasn’t in this for a quick fuck, especially not while her body rejected me like that. But she was right.
I couldn’t expect her to get all hot and bothered over the guy who kept her tied up inside his cabin. All I could hope was that she’d agree to the deal and give it a shot. A real one, which would allow me to show off my skills at being a decent husband. One she wouldn’t want to leave. I’d seen my dad do it. An advantage I had over many other clansmen who grew up without fathers, mothers, or parents in general.
Five minutes later, I pulled up in front of the clinic and marched straight inside the examination room, walking into Max, who held his head between Autumn’s spread legs. “Shit. Sorry. I should have knocked.”
I flung my palm onto my eyes and turned around for extra measure, while rustles and shoving behind indicated his wife was dressing.
“It’s not what you think,” Max said. “I was just checking her for dilation. Being your wife’s doctor kinda takes the romance out of it a bit. But she’s dressed now.”
I slowly turned back around, squinting through one eye first before I dared to open the other. Max held Autumn’s hand and helped her off the table, from where she waddled across the small room and slouched herself into a chair.
“So?” I asked. “How much longer you think she got?”
Autumn sighed deeply. “Whatever it is, it’s too long.”
Her face had gone pale over the last couple of weeks, her fiery spirit now only detectable in the way she mumbled curses underneath her breath at each second of the day.
Max sanitized the table and raised a brow at me. “Perhaps another week.”
“Ugh…” came from Autumn, who dropped her head and rubbed her hands across her gigantic belly.
“I’m sorry pregnancy is so tough.”
“It’s not,” Max said, his voice quickly overwhelmed by Autumn’s shriek.
“What do you know about it being hard or not?” An uncontrolled burp spilled over her lips, and she swung her palm in front of her mouth before she continued. “You’re not the one who’s constipated up to his ears.”
That was more than I ever wanted to know about pregnancy.
Max shook his head and took a deep breath. “Anyway, how come you’re here?”
Mostly because I wanted to get away from Kim’s naked body before I’d do something I’d later regret. “You said your truck wouldn’t start? I need the year, so I can see if I’ve got parts for it.”
“Right,” Max said and scratched the back of his neck.
“It’s a 2034,” Autumn said. “Three-hundred model.”
Max pointed at me, his eyes narrowed. “What happened to your face? Seems like you busted your lip a good while ago. And what’s with those scratches along your neck?”
Autumn’s mouth pulled into the hint of a smile. “Guess your new wife is a wildcat in the bedroom, huh?”
Now I was the one rubbing the back of my neck, embarrassment making my limbs tingle. “Actually, we haven’t really done it yet. She had her, you know, period when we got married. And she just now kinda stopped bleeding.”
They exchanged a quick glance before Max spoke. “But you got married two weeks ago.”
“Yeah, guess it was bad timing.”
A sputtering sound came from the chair, and by the time I looked up, Autumn sat there, clasping her belly while she laughed out loud. “You’re such a fool.”
“Huh?” I stood there with a hot face, watching how Max’s lips shoved into an amused smirk. From there, it didn’t take me long to make the connection. “Okay, tell me. How long do women bleed?”
“Well.” Max crossed his arms in front of his chest but left one hand free to gesture around. “See, it depends on the woman. From what I’ve learned, they can —”
“Five days,” Autumn blurted. “Could be a day or two more in some cases. But no woman bleeds for two weeks unless there’s another issue.”
“Perhaps there is an issue,” Max said.
“Of course there is one.” Autumn pushed herself up from the chair and leaned herself against Max’s shoulder. “It’s called getting married against her will.”
Gravity picked up and pulled my arms toward the ground.
Not because Kim had lied to me, but because she had felt the need to be dishonest with me.
“You can’t blame her,” Max said.
“Well, I’m not. But it doesn’t change that I feel like an idiot now.”
“Don’t. Most clansmen know nothing about the female body unless they’re married. Just go home and confront her.”
“Ugh… don’t listen to him.” Autumn let go of Max and leaned her palms on the examination table, her eyes searching for mine. “You have to sit down and talk to her. Be gentle. Understanding. This is such a life change for her, you have to stay calm. You’re a nice guy, Oriel, and I know Kim will come around.”
If only that were true.
“Alright,” I gave a pat against Max’s shoulder. “Guess I’ll go home and have a sit down with my wife. Calm and all.”
I turned around, my legs heavy, and my thoughts wearing down my head. Before I made it through the doorframe, Autumn shouted behind me. “Don’t force her, okay? You need to let her come to you, or she’ll never trust you.”
I nodded and stepped back outside.
I’d never force myself on a woman. But apparently, that didn’t keep me from tying her up as my prisoner back home. If mom found her like that, she wouldn’t hesitate to chase after me with her broom, like she did when I was a kid. And I’d probably deserve it.
No, Max and Autumn were right. I had to go home, free her, and have a grown-up talk between a wife and a husband. Shit. This marriage business wasn’t only more expensive than I expected, it was also much harder.
I jumped on the ATV and made my way back home, making a mental note on searching for a matching spark plug for Max’s truck once I was done gaining my wife’s trust. But the moment I had removed the three locks from my door and stepped inside, I could tell by the stench that something had gone wrong. Terribly wrong.
Kim stood dressed in one of my shirts in front of the bathroom, her wide eyes darting between me and the tiled floor. Now, I was pleased that she had somehow untied herself but was actually still here. She didn’t run.
What pissed me off?
The way my septic system must have backed up into the cabin, running down the shitter and creeping in a slow, brown wave toward the hallway. Between it, black rolled up pieces of fabric lay on the ground, worth at least a new set of wrenches.
“I’m so sorry,” she said as she tip-toed away from the flood, both hands in front of her mouth and her eyes white with fear. “I didn’t think it would eventually flood the entire cabin.”
Calm.
Given the amount of rolled-up cloth pads floating inside my house made my tendons strain underneath my anger. She probably never even had her period. But that was okay. Can’t blame a woman for being smart.
But this?
This?
I could either control my muscles, which wanted to strangle her, or my voice. I chose in favor of my muscles. “Fucking shit! What the hell did you do?”
There was no time to wait for an answer.
I ran outside and a few feet away from the cabin, where I grabbed for the pressure valve on the septic system. Stuck. Awesome.
Kim ran up beside me with her hands still in front of her mouth, her bare feet squishing the water from the moss.
“Run to the shack and get me a monkey wrench.”
She sprinted away while I took my shirt off and wrapped it around the valve, only to come back a second later. “What is a monkey wrench?”
“It’s one of the adjustable wrenches with a screw attached to adjust the jaw. They’re hanging along the left wall.”
She nervously bounced from her knees, her eyes racing between the way to the shack and how I tried to open the valve with my shirt around it, but still to no avail.
“Kim!”
“Huh?”
“Do you know what a wrench is?”
She dropped her hands onto her thighs, just an inch below where my huge shirt left her naked, her lips quivering. “No.”
“Shit.”
I jumped up and ran toward the shack, grabbing the monkey wrench with the biggest handle and made my way back to her. As soon as I loosened the nut on the pressure valve, a hiss streamed into the air, tinting it with a nauseating stench of two years worth of shit and piss.
“I swear, Oriel, I am so sorry,” she cried as she followed behind me back into the cabin, which now smelled worse than the outhouse I grew up with.
The backup had stopped, but the damage was already done. My bathroom was flooded with human waste and around thirty dollars worth of cloth pads — obviously no longer reusable.
“Go to my mom’s place.” I wiped my hair from my damp forehead, wondering if I should burn the entire place down and build new. “Stay there until I cleaned up this mess and tell her to send dad down.”
Her voice came quiet and small, not matching the Kim I knew at all. “I’m only wearing a shirt. Please don’t make me go to your parents like this.”
Defeated and with my nerves on edge, I nodded and walked with her over the bedroom, where I unlocked the trunk. I fumbled out some of the clothes mom had given me for her, all stuff which once belonged to my sister before she married and moved away.
“Here.” I tossed her a few pants and shirts to choose from. “There’re warm jackets in there as well. You might have to stay there for a few days, so you better bring a few pairs of change.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, you said that already.”
My voice sounded neither calm, nor gentle, and most definitely not understanding. All I could think of was a paycheck sitting in shit, plus five more I’d have to invest in new lumber, tiles, and bricks. Kim and I had been married for two weeks, during which she lied to me, tried to run twice and now flooded our home in human waste. For a second, I wondered if this was all worth it. Then she wrapped me in a hug, her body soft, no traces of stiffness left.
“I promise I’ll give it a real shot. No more running.”
I took in the only clean scent this cabin still had: hers.
Yeah, this was all worth it. And she could flood our cabin a hundred times if it meant she’d stay with me.
Seven
Kim
I’ve done a lot of shit in my life, but I’ve never actually flooded someone’s home with it.
Oriel and his dad had been busy gutting the bathroom for the last three days, replacing the subfloor and beams right along with the walls. I never wanted to cause such damage, but there was no denying I secretly hoped he’d hate me for it, realizing a wife like me wasn’t worth the trouble.
But each evening, he came to shower at his folk’s place after a day’s work at the cabin, the smile on his face unchanged by my lies and the chaos I’d caused. Oriel must have been a desperate man to put up with me. And I hated desperate men — they were hard to rid.
Eliza, who insisted I’d call her mom, handed me the rolling pin. “Don’t roll them out too flat, or the weight of the jelly will wear through the dough.”
“Roger that.”
I sprinkled some flour onto the kitchen counter, put the yeasty dough in the center, and started to roll it flat. Mom tugged the ends and pointed at the areas which weren’t flat enough just yet, then gave a dusty pat on my shoulder. “What’s next?”
“I cut triangles.”
“That’s right, hun.” She gifted me a smile too sweet and sincere for the likes of me, but damn did I love them. “Oriel likes them with raspberry jelly, but that’s not always easy to come by. Just mix a little bit of strawberry with it. Done it for years, and he never noticed.”
Once they were in the oven, the cabin quickly filled with the scents of sugar and fruit preserves, making me feel cozy inside all over again. My own mom never had an oven, but whenever Eliza and I got busy in the kitchen, I fooled my mind into thinking we did. She would have loved this shit. A roof over our head. A warm oven baking sweet goodies. Teaching me how to make this stuff.
Though the only thing my mom could teach me was how to spread my legs to get a man close enough before I cut his throat. Nothing about that was sweet, but it kept me alive — until Knox’s men found me.
“Smells good in here,” Oriel said with a default smile on his face as he stepped inside the cabin with his dad. “But I hope there’s meat as well because I’m starving.”
Eliza-mom hurried around the counter and pointed at the two men. “Boots off. I’ve swept and mopped all day, and I don’t want to see a single grain of sand on these floors.”
Oriel gave me a wink and struggled his feet out of his boots, while his father did the same and excused himself to his recliner by the fireplace.
“Kim made them from scratch today,” Eliza said, waving her hand in a ta-da kinda motion at me as if I’d been nominated for the wife-of-the-year award.
Oriel came into the kitchen and gently cupped my face, giving me a peck on the mouth like a good husband should. And I let him. After the damage I had caused, it was the least I could do, but I had also made him a promise.
I wasn’t a fool, though I certainly made it look like it the moment this man married me. There was no running away from this. If I wanted my freedom, I had to map out my way there carefully, playing by his rules while I did so.
If I could fake orgasms which made a man pat himself on the shoulder for a job well done, then I could fake sixty days of love and a harmonious marriage. Just how hard could it be? I mean… look at me. I already baked, cut the onions and the carrots for the roast. Clearly, I was a natural at this domestic wife shit.
Oriel grabbed a yeast roll from the counter and did a quick sidestep to dodge Eliza’s hit with the kitchen towel. “We’re done by the way. If you want, you can sleep at home tonight, unless you’d rather stay another night here.”
There was something tempting to his voice and the way his eyes trailed down my body as he waited for my reaction.
“I’d love to spend the night at home,” I said, then decided to lay it on extra thick. “I missed you so much these last couple of nights when you stayed down at the cabin.”
He raised a brow. “You did?”
“Uh-huh.” I stepped up to him and stole the yeast roll from his hand, which he probably didn’t even notice given the way he stared at me with his fingers unmoving, and his lips slightly parted. “Don’t get me wrong, your mom’s cabin is so cozy and inviting, but no place is like home, right?”
He nodded. “Right.”
“Oh, you’ll have your home all cozied up in no time,” Eliza said and rubbed our shoulders. “I already prepared you a bag of flower seeds. There’s some of our old furniture you can have back in the shack. William, where is that quilt I made when I was pregnant with our son?”
“What quilt?” came from the living room.
“With the blue border and the, uh, the trees embroidered. Or maybe it was flowers.”
William shrugged, then quickly grabbed a book and busied himself over the paragraphs.
“Oh, that man…” Eliza said quickly as if she’d practiced that phrase a million times. She grabbed the crochet potholders and carried the big pot from the range to the dining table. “Oriel, be good and bring the yeast rolls and the salad.”
