Work is proceeding on the next A Warm Place novel. Here’s the first chapter.
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I opened the door the second I recognized Jessica’s voice.
Though I didn’t let my guard down completely, given the fact that she could’ve been here under duress, used as bait, or, hell, maybe she’d turned against us. Didn’t seem likely, but it wasn’t totally out of the question.
I slowly began to raise my pistol as, in the blowing whiteout that reduced visibility quite a bit, I saw not one but two figures.
Neither were armed though, and the other was a woman and another redhead, though that was all I could tell about her, bundled up as she was.
“What’s going on?” I asked as I stepped back to make way. Jessica and the other woman stumbled in, panting.
“I left my husband,” she managed, leaning against the nearest wall.
Great. All at once, a few pieces fell into place. At the very least, I realized that Jessica was making good on the promise I’d made her: if she really needed my help, she could come to me and I would help her. I wasn’t upset, and I didn’t plan on revoking that, but damn, she could’ve picked a better time for it.
“Did he follow?” I asked.
“I don’t think so,” she replied.
I leaned out carefully and looked around, but it was practically useless. Visibility was down to barely ten feet. I couldn’t even see the trees at the edge of the property. I didn’t see anyone moving out there and no one was creeping up alongside the house. It would have to do. I shut the door and locked it tightly.
“Chris?! What’s going on?!” Susan called from the kitchen.
Right. Didn’t want to keep them in suspense. “It’s okay! It’s Jessica! Come here!”
“Jessica?” Lara called, and both women began walking closer.
“I’m so sorry to drop in like this,” Jessica said, looking at me as she leaned against the wall.
“I’m impressed you made it through the storm,” I replied. “And glad.” I glanced at the other woman, who had yet to speak. Her body language was standoffish, if not outright hostile. Her face was mostly hidden by a scarf and hat, only her eyes visible. They were extremely blue and they looked a lot like Jessica’s.
In fact, if she wasn’t standing right there, I’d have assumed I was looking at Jessica.
Those eyes were staring daggers at me, and they didn’t look away when I looked into them.
A sister, maybe?
Lara and Susan came into the hallway.
“Jessica,” Lara repeated, coming over and wrapping her in a hug. “What happened? Why did you go out in a fucking blizzard!? You could have died!”
“I know, I...didn’t think it through,” Jessica replied. “It was kind of sudden.”
“So what’s actually going on?” Susan asked. I glanced at her and noticed she was kind of standoffish right now, too.
Though that was really her natural demeanor.
“I got into a fight with Travis, my husband. It...escalated. I…” She broke off as Lara stepped away, shivering violently, and I realized she must be freezing.
“Come on, come to the living room, by the fire,” I said.
She nodded and she and the other woman followed us out of the hallway and into the living room. They both went to stand before the fire and I crouched down, throwing on another log and getting it a bit more blazing with the poker. “Did he hit you?” I asked.
“He shoved me,” she replied. “I hit him.”
“It’s about fucking time,” the other woman said, speaking for the first time.
“Hannah!”
“He deserved it.” I looked up and saw her taking off her scarf and hat. She let down short, vividly red hair, and as she revealed a strikingly beautiful face, I saw that there was no question: she was related to Jessica.
Had to be her younger sister, or cousin, maybe?
Jessica took off her own hat and tried to shake the snow from herself. “Anyway, uh, I left. We left. I remembered how to get here, from the time Lara showed me, and, well…” She looked directly at me now, blushing, uncomfortable. “You told me you’d help me. If I really needed it. And I really need it.”
“I’ll help you,” I said, and the relief on her face was obvious. As I stood up, she embraced me, and I hugged her back, held her tight.
Hannah’s body language definitely turned hostile and she crossed her arms, glaring at me.
What was her deal?
Did she know I was fucking Jessica? I guess that could be it. Could be awkward.
This wasn’t awkward, though. This was anger.
“Thank you,” Jessica murmured into my chest. “God, I’m so tired.”
“How did you actually make it here?” Lara asked.
“It wasn’t all that bad when we set out, but we did get lost for a bit. Honestly, I think it was just luck that we managed to get here,” Jessica replied.
“It was extremely lucky,” Susan murmured.
As Jessica disengaged from me, Hannah stepped closer to me. The way she did it kicked on some reactive instincts and I shifted my weight. I seriously thought she was going to swing on me or something. She hesitated, staring at me hard.
“You’re Chris,” she said.
“Yes,” I replied, wondering if I was going to get an answer as to why she was so pissed at me. The thought that maybe she was just pissed in general because she’d been through a trying, maybe even traumatic event, occurred to me, but no, it was obvious that it was at me.
“Thank you,” she said through gritted teeth after a few seconds, like she had to force it out.
“For…”
“Talking her into leaving that prick,” Hannah replied.
“Hannah!” Jessica hissed again.
“He is a fucking prick!”
“He is your father,” she replied.
“Whoa, wait, what?” I asked.
“Hannah’s your daughter?” Susan asked at the same time.
“Yeah...didn’t that ever come up?” Jessica asked.
But I was staring at Hannah, then looking over at Jessica, comparing the two. I was right, they were related, but…
Hannah didn’t look very young, then again, Jessica was forty years old. Though she didn’t quite look it. Hannah looked older, I thought maybe a few years older than me, but now that I looked at her more closely...yeah. She did look younger, youthful, and not just from good genes.
“What do you mean?” I asked finally, coming back around to what Hannah had originally said. “How did I talk her into it?”
“I don’t know, but that’s what she insinuated,” Hannah replied.
I looked curiously at Jessica, though the thought going through my head at that moment was that it made a little more sense as to why she didn’t like me.
I was fucking her mom, and she had to know that. Or, well technically I had fucked her mom at least once.
Jessica brushed some hair back from her face. She was blushing now. “When we...met, it made me think. About a lot of things. When you asked me why I was-” She glanced at Hannah. “-um. Why I was, uh…” she stumbled and her mind seemed to go blank.
Hannah sighed explosively. “God, mom! I know already, okay!? I know you’re fucking him and I don’t care! Dad’s a fucking asshole!”
“Hannah!” Jessica cried, part shocked, part exasperated. “You have no tact, you know that?!” The way she said it made me think that it was something she’d said hundreds of times and from the angry, volatile gaze in Hannah’s eyes, I could tell that was probably true. Or rather, she seemed like the kind of person who didn’t bother with tact.
Being as attractive as she was, she could get away with it.
I pumped the brakes there and put that in check. She didn’t seem like a teenager, although she very well could be, and honestly I was reluctant to go to that age. Not that I should even be thinking thoughts like that when I’d already hooked up with Jessica though.
Jessica looked back at me. “When you asked me why I was-” She stumbled again, but pressed on. “Why I was cheating on my husband, it made me think about it. Really think about it. And I started realizing a lot of things. And it ultimately led to the argument and us being here and…” She sighed softly and fell silent, looking just tired now.
This was too much. I glanced at Lara and Susan. Lara looked concerned, Susan looked…
Mad.
Crap. Now I had two of them glaring daggers at me.
And I at least knew why with Susan: I’d never run any of this by her as even a possibility. I really should’ve mentioned that I’d made a promise like that to Jessica, but I didn’t think it would come up so soon!
“Okay, um, this is a lot,” I said, stepping up and taking control of the situation again, because this was what at least some of the women in the room seemed to either want or be comfortable with, “so why don’t the two of you sit here and catch your breath and warm up. We’ll, uh, we were just finishing up lunch, so you can join us.”
“Fuck, I need to check on that,” Susan muttered. “Be right back.”
She disappeared into the kitchen and I looked at Lara, who gave me a worried look. No doubt she was concerned about something similar to myself: Susan was very close to blowing up at one or both of us. I can’t imagine she reacted to abrupt change very well, especially if she was already concerned about our living situation.
And that set off a fuse of anxiety inside my own head even as I thought it.
Now, instead of providing for three mouths, I was providing for five.
Shit.
And I had exactly one bullet left in the rifle.
Double shit.
Susan came back a moment later. “It’s fine, I took it off the stove.” She was clenching her jaw and a tendon in her slim white neck was taut as a bowstring as she stared hard at me. “Can I please speak to you somewhere else?” she asked tersely.
“Yeah,” I said. “We’ll be right back, just...relax here.”
“Okay,” Jessica said. Then she said, “thank you, again.” Then she added, “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine, and you’re welcome,” I replied, and set off.
Susan and Lara followed after me as we walked down the hall and finally came to Susan’s bedroom. Once we walked inside, she slammed the door.
“What the fuck is this, Chris?!” she snapped, stepping right up to me and staring at me with obvious fury.
Submission be damned this woman did not back down when she was pissed.
I had to admit, I really liked that about her.
“I’m sorry,” I replied. “When we met, after we had sex and I got an idea of how shitty her relationship with her husband was, I...offered her help. If she ever really needed it. It was the right thing to do.”
Susan glared at me and crossed her arms.
“Susan,” I said, more firmly, “it was the right thing to do.”
She stared at me for a few seconds longer, holding my gaze with her angry green eyes, then she sighed and relaxed ever so slightly. “Fine,” she replied begrudgingly.
“You really want her to stay in an abusive relationship?” Lara asked.
Susan sighed more heavily and threw up her arms. “I said ‘fine’! I just…” She looked at me again and her expression grew less angry, more worried. “Chris, this is a lot to take in, okay?! God, this house is just big enough for three of us, and now there’s five of us!? We’re doing okay for food right now, but this will cut our reverses almost in half!”
“I know, I know,” I said. “I didn’t even know she had a daughter…” I muttered.
“I’m sorry I didn’t mention that,” Lara said.
“There was no reason to. But it doesn’t matter. What matters is: they’re here, they need help, we’re going to help them...right? We’re agreed?” I asked, looking at Lara, then at Susan.
“Yeah,” Susan said after a few seconds. “Obviously I’m not going to kick them out. They can stay here. But we’ll obviously need to rearrange things.”
“We’ll get it figured out later,” I said. “Let’s go eat for now. That’ll calm everything down.” I paused and looked at Lara. “Is there any reason Hannah would hate me? Beyond the fact that she knows I’m fucking her mom?”
“I don’t know, but I noticed that, too. If looks could kill you’d be fucking six feet under.”
“Well she’s got no tact,” Susan said, “so you’ll probably find out soon enough when she screams it at you, if it’s more than that.”
“I guess you’d know,” I replied.
She was turning towards the door but she spun back to face me. “I have tact you fucking giant prick!”
“How’s that not a compliment?” I replied.
“You are insufferable sometimes, you know that?!” she snapped, and I actually couldn’t tell if she was angry or just mock angry.
I decided to test it. I reached out and traced a finger across her throat. “Keep it up, and I’ll show you suffering,” I replied.
She gasped softly and shuddered, closing her eyes briefly. Okay, either mock anger or I’d just hit her with a hard injection of horniness and pushed aside real anger.
“L-let’s just get lunch,” she managed.
I laughed. “Yes. Let’s.”
We went back out.
When we returned to the living room, I found the atmosphere to be uncomfortable and awkward. They were both sitting on the couch at opposite ends, not looking at each other. They seemed to have warmed up now, at least.
“Come on, let’s get lunch,” I said, and pointed them towards the dining room.
“Thank you,” Jessica replied as they got up.
We took a few moments to get the mountain lion stew Susan had been preparing. She’d made a lot of it with the intention of freezing the leftovers, but as it was, it was just enough for five of us to have a full meal’s worth.
“What is this?” Hannah asked once we were all settled.
“Vegetables and mountain lion,” I replied.
“Where’d you find a mountain lion?” she asked, and I noticed a little bit, just the tiniest bit of edge came off her voice.
“Little ways up north. Susan and I had to fight it.”
“You killed a mountain lion?”
“Technically Susan did,” I replied.
She looked at me, then at Susan, then down at her food and didn’t say anything as she began eating. We all ate, and for several minutes, no one spoke. I could tell that Jessica was still pretty shaken up over the whole thing. She looked pale and unhappy and stressed, and I found myself wishing there was something I could do to help her.
Maybe I could give her a good, hard dicking. An orgasm would help her relax, I think.
Or maybe I was just thinking with my cock.
I glanced briefly at Hannah. Shit, this was gonna get awkward fast.
“So, uh, listen,” I said after several minutes, “this house isn’t really big or anything. There’s just two bedrooms. I was thinking Lara and I could move into the master bedroom,” I glanced at Susan, and she just shrugged and nodded, “and you two could take Lara’s room. We’ve only got two beds, although I guess we could move one of the couches in there…”
“No, I don’t care about sharing at this point,” Hannah said. “We’ve had enough shitty sleeping situations that it’s whatever.”
“That will be fine,” Jessica said. She looked around as she chewed on her lower lip, and her gaze came to rest on Susan. “I’m really sorry about this,” she said. “I know Lara and Chris had at least some idea something like this could happen, but obviously they never got around to telling you, and I’m so sorry to impose like this, I just-”
“Jessica,” Susan said, “it’s okay. I know. You didn’t have a choice. I’d rather be inconvenienced than have a good person in a bad situation.”
“What makes you think I’m a good person?” Jessica muttered, looking down at the table suddenly.
“Lara trusts and likes you, that’s good enough for me,” Susan replied.
“Well...thank you. Really,” she said after a long moment.
“You’re welcome,” Susan replied.
We went back to eating after that, and no one seemed to be able to think of anything else to say.
