I put the night gown on and then walked into the large ensuite bathroom. This cabin was beautiful. Even the bathroom was modern with a beautiful stone basin, large round tub and a shower stall that looked heavenly clean and fresh. I washed my hands and face, scrutinized myself some more and stepped back into the bedroom.

Loneliness gripped at me. And dread. I thought of Remy returning to the clubhouse to find what I’d done. I wondered how heartbroken he was feeling right that very second. I breathed unsteadily, remembering the way he held me the last time. I’d hugged him so hard knowing it would be the last hug I’d ever give him.

My knees weakened at my sadness, and I wiped furiously away at my tears. I reminded myself I had made the right choice. Even if that choice had barely said a word to me and was sleeping on the couch. Maybe I was being too harsh on him. Maybe he was just tired.

It took everything in me not to go and seek him out. I kept thinking maybe he really needed some alone time. If he truly wanted to be with me right now, he’d have come in already.

On my way to the bed, I grabbed my switchblade and propped it under my pillow. Then I fell into the soft bedding and stared at nothing until my eyelids could bear it no more. Sleep took me, and for several hours I was stuck in a black void, conscious enough to feel the pain, but too trapped from exhaustion to wake up.

*****

The sound of pots and pans woke me up. My head ached from the light streaming through the one large window in the bedroom. I turned over and opened my eyes immediately, aware of what we’d done, of what I’d walked away from. Sleep had dulled my sense of reality, and for a long while I’d completely forgotten what had happened, expecting to wake up to Remy’s scent and the darkness of our room.

I moved off the bed and walked out of the room, feeling the cool hardwood floors under my feet as I stopped just outside the kitchen. I peered in through cloudy eyes and regarded the shirtless, tall man in front of the stove. God, he was huge. Maybe even bigger than Remy. He certainly was more ripped than him. His back displayed every muscle – some I didn’t even think existed – as he moved around on a mission to cook.

His jeans were low, revealing his black briefs that hugged the areas I would have given anything to see. My eyebrows rose in delight that he, too, was barefoot. Why did that stir my chest so much? Maybe it was that he was homely and comfortable here. Or maybe I just liked his fucking feet.

“Morning,” he greeted without glancing back at me.

I wondered how long he knew I’d been standing there. Man had stalker senses.

“Morning,” I replied. “What are you cooking?”

“Pancakes.”

“Do you need help making the mix?” He’d always sucked at it back when we’d lived together…which was about a century ago now.

“Already had it mixed.”

He pulled out a large jug of the thick pancake mix. I frowned, wondering if his friend had made it for him too.

I settled myself into a seat around a small round table on the side of the kitchen. I could see his complete profile from my view. The determined look on his face would have been laughable if I was comfortable enough to do just that. The weird buzz of tension was still thick around us. He told me to come away with him. That I would be his. So why wasn’t he showing me how much of his I was?

I drummed my fingers along the table, searching hard in my empty mind for something to talk about. Talk about his mom! Yes. Perfect.

“How’s your mom doing? I tried calling her a few times a while back but only got her voicemail.”

“I told her not to answer your calls in case anyone found out. She’s out of Gosnells,” he quietly explained. “I told her to pack her shit for a while until the heat died down.”

“Where did she go?”

“After she got over her hissy fit, she said she wanted to go traveling. Apparently she’s always wanted to see the world.”

“Oh.” Well, that would have been extremely exciting for her. I couldn’t recall a time she’d ever left the town. Worse than that, I couldn’t ever recall her ever telling me she wanted to travel the world.

Drumming away still, I leaned against the chair and ogled the entire kitchen. I mean, there was nothing else to do. He wasn’t talking, and all the things I wanted to discuss were heavy shit. I figured it was way too early to delve into that heavy shit. We needed to do some reconnecting first.

I was surprised when he finally set the plate of pancakes in front of me. They were cooked to perfection; a golden brown without any burnt bits and smelled delicious. He placed maple syrup in the centre of the table and sat on the opposite end with his own mountain of pancakes on a gigantic plate of his own.

While they looked amazing, I wasn’t really that hungry. I had a few bites, but as I swallowed, they sat fitfully in my stomach. I was unable to process this complete change of my scenery and a part of me felt haunted for abandoning Remy the way I did. I ended up kicking the pancakes around, imagining how hurt he was.

When I finally finished my pitiable reveries, I looked up. Jaxon was staring holes into my head, and he didn’t look happy. I blinked down at his plate, surprised that it was empty. How long had I sat there staring at my food thinking about Remy and how horrible of a human being I was? I felt his accusing eyes dart down to my plate and back at me. I swear he knew where my thoughts had slid away to.

“Why aren’t you eating?” he asked, and it came out dangerously low. I’d forgotten how intimidating he’d gotten.

“I’m not very hungry,” I muttered.

“You need to eat.”

I shrugged. “What do you want me to do, Jaxon? Force it down when all I want to do is throw up?”

“Why do you want to throw up?”

“I feel nauseous.”

“In the morning? What, are you fucking pregnant?” Disbelief emerged in those blue eyes, as he stared accusingly down at my stomach and then my face.

My eyes bulged out of my head. “Um, no!”

“Are you sure?”

“Pretty darn!”

“Then eat!”

I pushed the plate away from me, scowling at him. Now that he was demanding me to eat, suddenly I didn’t want to. “I don’t want to eat, Jaxon.”

He pushed the plate back to where it was. “You’ve lost a ridiculous amount of weight. It’s disgusting.”

My jaw dropped. “You’re such an asshole!”

“Why?”

“What do you mean ‘why’? You just told me I look disgusting!”

“No, I said it’s disgusting.”

“What’s the difference?”

Nose flaring, eyebrows bunched, he growled, “The fact you don’t eat is disgusting! You’ve lost at least ten pounds. You’re like a goddamn stray cat, bones and all. Your tits have shrunk, your hips aren’t as wide. I know how much you used to eat. You were like a fucking starved caveman and now you peck at your shit like a bird.”

Bird. Birdy.

I let out an unattractive grunt and stood up. “I’m going to take my stray cat ass away from you before I throw this plate at your head.”

I stormed out of the cabin and took a seat on the steps of the porch, crossing my arms. Anger flowed like blood throughout my body. One fucking encounter with him and we were back there again! Goddammit all to hell! I hated him.

I fucking loved him too.

Birdy. I grunted like a man again. Why did he have to say the word bird? Now the word was forever tainted with memories of Remy. Shit. Damn. Fuck. Ugh.

There was no way I could stomach food. I was already full. Guilt was an appetite suppressant. I didn’t regret what I did, but I felt damn bad about it. To fool and manipulate someone? But you did it to get out because you were a prisoner. Was I really? How come it didn’t seem so bad all those months? Why was I so confused about it all? A prisoner should know what a prison feels like!

I breathed deep, basking in the heat of the sun throwing up its rays of heat down on me in the cool wind. I looked around, noticing what I couldn’t in the dark last night. We were smack dab in the middle of the bush. The condensed trees, aged and full, swayed in the breeze around the cabin while the calls of birds overhead sang their morning tunes. Or maybe they were bitching at each other. Whatever they were doing, it was pleasant.

I stared up at the blue sky. This was peace. This was true silence. Not lonely silence, but real world kind of silence. No cars in the distance or people. God, being in that clubhouse had its ups, but always being around people was exhausting. My anger hated this quiet because rational me was able to fight it off. It washed away within minutes and I was feeling like a little wench for snapping at him like that.

He was so infuriating, though! So what if I didn’t want to eat? I’d lost weight, but not the amount he was going on about. A stray cat? Pahlease! I still had some cushion for the pushin’.

I peered down my night gown.

Well… they weren’t as cushiony as before, but whatever, they were still good. Tits are tits, right?

Interrupting my bodily inspection was a car making its way down the path and toward the cabin. I tensed. Had they found us already? Were these the wheels of death?

A red Prius appeared. Certainly not the wheels of death I’d have imagined. Looking at the people through their windshield, I’d say they certainly weren’t murderer material either.

When they found a place to park, two women stepped out. One was an old, fragile looking thing with white hair up in a bun wearing classical pearls and a floral dress you’d find in granny central. The other… Shit. The other was certainly not granny material at all.

It was Christy.

Twenty

Granny looking lady was actually Gretel Wallace, the owner of the cabin – and the maker of the pancake mix as she so fervently talked on about. With her was her granddaughter, Christy. The girl had been perfection in my eyes when I’d first met her at Lucinda’s house all those months ago holding hands with Jaxon and staring at him like he was her knight in shining armour.

I was scowling at her. I didn’t want to scowl either, especially when she smiled widely at me when she greeted me at the steps. I just scowled and then muttered about Jaxon being inside. They trudged up the steps and into the cabin. I could hear their conversation. Jaxon’s anger had long passed and he was laughing.

Laughing!

Why couldn’t I have made him laugh?!

I joined them eventually and Jaxon was cooking up some more pancakes and I suddenly wished he’d put a shirt on. He offered Christy my plate and I watched her eat my pancakes. I fought internally – war of the Titans style – not to snatch the plate away from her and scream, “MINE!”

Instead, I watched her.

And scowled.

Gretel was a nice woman, but she was stern with Christy. Whenever Christy talked about wanting to do things like buy a new car because her current one was shit, she’d snap and say, “Christy, you finish your placement at the hospital first before you run off spending money on useless junk. Grow up, now.” I watched how deflated Christy was by her grand-mother’s words and felt a pang in my chest. The nicest girl in the world didn’t deserve to be treated this way.

By mid-morning, Gretel invited us into the touristy town for some shopping and sight-seeing. There were vineyards with wine tastings and lakes with small water falls. The nature was beautiful, making the town a lovely camping spot where you could fish and enjoy the water.

Before we left, I changed back into last night’s jeans and top. I had no make-up to put on. But going natural these days is hot, right? The gargoyle look was nothing to be self-conscious about… Sigh.

Jaxon had changed into a white tight tee and camouflage shorts, looking every bit manly and rough: stubble cheeks, unruly hair and pressed lips. I awkwardly followed them out where he handed me the bike helmet, leaving me to buckle it on my own.

We tailed the red Prius all the way into the centre of town where the main streets were. I didn’t feel like I was in my body to experience the hours that passed by. Gretel thought it was impertinent to show us a historical mill where she revelled about the businessman who’d owned it almost a century ago. I had to pinch myself to stay awake as she droned on about the historical machinery used and how dangerous some of the jobs were for workers.

Ten million yawns later and we had lunch at a seafood restaurant with a built-in aquarium that bordered the walls of the entire place. I enjoyed this bit, watching the fish swimming around. The illusion of freedom right here… They swam and swam, but did they ever know they were trapped by glass walls? Or were they aware and content in their ignorance, allowing the control placed in someone else’s hands? They’re fucking fish, Sara.

Yes, they were fucking fish but they represented something to me. I’d been trapped too, and maybe allowing Remy to have the control had been a way for me to accept it and make something good out of something I would have otherwise been broken apart by.

In the line-up on our way inside, I caught Christy pushing into Jaxon’s side. She was murmuring something in his ear, but I couldn’t hear amidst Gretel’s yammering at my own side about some kind of historical prison with convict art or some bullshit like that.

What the hell was she talking to him about? He talked back to her, too. Oh, what it would be like to be a fly on their wall!

I hated him for ignoring me. I hated her for touching him the way she was. I hated Gretel for being nice and telling me about shit I didn’t care about. I hated everyone here for just being here!

I wanted to go home. And home was him.

Why was he acting this way?

*****

After an insufferable day, we parted ways with Granny Gretel and Christy. Christy politely said good bye to me and then she hugged Jaxon tightly, whispering some more in his ear before she smiled angelically up at him. He nodded in return and watched her climb into the car.