Treaters: Book One of the Divine Conflict.

by CJ Rutherford

  I leaned away from our embrace to see him smirking. I wanted to punch him, but no way would I hurt my hands. I glared at him, then stood up and stomped on his foot as hard as I could. He was wearing those huge, thick combat boots, and I was barefoot. He flinched in mock pain, but I was certain he’d barely felt the impact.

  “Now who’s kicking butt?” he smirked.

  His expression broke my self-control, and I began to giggle. It wasn’t a petite and lady-like giggle, but one interspersed with the occasional pig-like snort.

  Jaz sat watching me as I laughed uncontrollably, his mouth wide open in surprise for a moment before he tilted his head back and guffawed.

  It went downhill from there, and we had to support each other to stop from falling to the floor.

  Tears streaked down both our faces. We sat there for a long time, just being with each other, not needing to speak, happy in each other’s presence.

  Jaz broke the silence, and his voice betrayed an intensity I hadn’t known he possessed. “Jennifer, you're important to me. If I lost you...I don’t think I could keep fighting this shit.”

  His words hit me like a sledgehammer, and it took me a moment to realize they hit me so hard because I felt the same. I ran the backs of my bandaged fingers over his slightly stubbly jaw. “Jaz, I don’t know what’s going to happen to us, or how long we’ve got, so how about we agree to give life our best shot? Don’t you macho Marines have a saying? Stay together, or something like that??”

  Jaz snorted, and I thought he might start belly-laughing again. “Always faithful. Semper Fi in its Latin form, but yeah, it kinda fits, don’t it?”

  I smiled. “Yes. It kinda does.”

  Chapter Eight

  Winter is here

  Jaz

  When the snow hit, it was brutal. The first big storm buried the lodge so deep we had to dig a channel around to get wood for the biomass boiler. Within a month, most of the fresh and frozen food was gone, but we didn’t mind. There was enough smoked meat and canned goods to get us through the worst of the storms and into the more clement weather when I could safely hunt…or so I hoped.

  We kept track of the days, and every Saturday night we opened a pack of marshmallows and melted them over crackers, until we ran out of crackers. I wondered at the time why we’d run out of crackers so quickly, until I saw Jennifer sneak a few to Tray under the table. The sneaky minx. Even as I thought it, I didn’t know which nasty female I meant.

  Jennifer had finished Lord of the Rings, pronouncing it “frickin’ awesome.” I restrained myself from a smug “I told you so,” even if “frickin’” was an understatement in my humble opinion. Jennifer was a voracious reader, and I felt sort of proud that one of the first things I’d done while building this wing of the lodge was to scour the nearest towns for my favorite books. I’d found a few gems along the way, and I was pretty sure Jennifer had no clue she’d read the complete first edition of The Lord of the Rings.

  I had grown to trust Jennifer within a couple short weeks, so, of course, I gave her the run of the place. I didn't have any secrets.

  Or so I thought.

  I was in the kitchen plating up a lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches and creamy basil tomato soup when I heard an extended shriek from the library. There was no fear in the sound – more delight and happiness – so I decided Tray must be cleaning Jennifer's ears out again, and I smiled as I set lunch on the table. I went back to the refrigerator for drinks, Tray on my heels.

  Wait…

  A moment later, Jennifer stepped into the kitchen, her arms laden with around a dozen novels. I caught sight of the brightly covered spine of one of the thicker books.

  Oh. Oh, shit!

  “These were all behind a trunk on the bottom shelf!” Jennifer exclaimed gleefully, setting the novels onto the island as if they were precious, first-edition Tolkiens. “I almost didn’t find them. It was like they had been hidden or something.”

  I shrugged, feeling my ears burn a bright, hot red. “Yeah, uh. They’re kind of old,” I mumbled.

  Jennifer was looking through the titles, reading the blurbs and flicking through a few of them. “Oh. They were Sherri’s?” she asked, her tone sympathetic.

  For an instant, my brain seized upon that idea like a life raft. Salvation! Reluctantly, I shook my head. I had decided not to lie to the girl unless it was for her own protection. "No. Sit down and eat. Soup's getting cold."

  Jennifer sat, reaching for her spoon automatically, her eyes still on the stack of novels. "Mmm," she smiled, after her first taste of the soup. "Ohh, I know I always say it, but this is so good, Jaz."

  I smiled in return and relaxed, relieved the distraction had worked.

  “Wait a minute,” Jennifer said. She was flicking through Empire of Storms, by Sarah J. Maas.

  Busted!

  “I love this cover,” she cooed. “She looks like a total badass, and it’s book five in the series. Do you think the others are around here somewhere?" She looked inside the book and frowned. “Wait, that’s weird. This book only came out this year, but you said …” Her voice cut off and a wicked gleam of realization appeared in her eyes.

  “Did you notice I added basil to the soup? I didn't use much since we're running low, but we have enough left for a big pot of spaghetti sauce.”

  Jennifer started to chuckle. It rapidly became a full-on belly laugh.

  I felt the flush spread down my neck and forward to my cheeks. I was so busted.

  Jennifer turned to look at me, her cheeks flushed with mirth. She tried – badly – to compose herself. “You,” she said, barely getting the word out. “You. Big, brave, manly Jaz, the ex-Marine…”

  “Retired Marine…”

  Jennifer nodded theatrically. “I’m sooo sorry. Jaz, the retired Marine, reads girl’s…Young…Adult…fiction.” The last few words were barely intelligible as she totally lost it.

  I put my head in my hands. There was no point denying it. “Guilty as charged. But in my defense, Patrick Swayze in Roadhouse read ladies’ magazines, and he was a total badass.”

  If I had hoped this might help, I was wrong; Jennifer almost fell off her chair from laughing so hard. Shit…I was never going to live this one down. I waited for her to gain some semblance of control before saying, “Okay, okay, I read YA fantasy. Is that so bad?”

  Jennifer was grinning like the Cheshire cat, but managed to look a little sympathetic. “I’m sorry, Jaz. It’s just so…unexpected.”

  I grimaced as she lost it again. She was gone. Totally. Jennifer had left the building. Tray ran around, barking playfully. Shit, even the dog was laughing at me.

  I sat back in my chair, giving both of them the stink eye. Tray didn’t notice. Jennifer didn’t care.

  ***

  Jennifer

  I was being cruel, I knew it, and part of me felt guilty. A very small part. Tiny. Miniscule. My partner in crime, Tray, ran around chasing her tail, thinking this was the best game ever.

  It wasn’t as if it were so bad. So what if Jaz enjoyed YA? A lot of adults – male and female – loved them! What made it so priceless was his reaction. He was half-way between denial and reluctant embarrassment. He kept opening his mouth as if to start a sentence, then snapping it shut, deciding that whatever he was about to say would only dig the hole deeper.

  It took me a while, but I ended up biting my lip…hard. “I didn’t mean to let that get all crazy, out-of-control. I’m…sorry, Jaz.”

  “There's nothing wrong with reading young adult fantasy,” said Jaz, playing with the lukewarm food before him. “There’s dragons, assassins, all…”

  “All sorts of manly things?” I retorted.

  Jaz huffed. “When you put it like that, it sounds kinda sleazy. It’s not.”

  I held up Empire of Storms.

  “That’s not sleazy,” he insisted. “That’s Aelin Gal…” Jaz stopped short, a wicked gleam in his eye.

  “What?” He had me now. He’d almost let something slip.<
br />
  Jaz shook his head. “No spoilers.”

  Why was he looking so smug? “So, should I read the Throne of Glass series first?” I sifted through the books on the table, picking up a title by Stephanie Meyer. “Or maybe this one?”

  Jaz’s face was inscrutable. I’d told him that up until the last few weeks I had never been a reader – and that was no lie, I hadn’t. I’d seen the movies, though. I knew Twilight was about a young woman falling in love with an older vampire guy – everyone knew that – so I used it to tweak him a bit more.

  “No, maybe not that one.” He reached over to snatch it from me. I thought it might end up in the bio mass furnace later. “Go for Throne of Glass. After Rings, it’s one of my favorite series.”

  There was that edge again, like he knew something I didn’t. I let it go. I was an idiot for mocking him. It’s just…it had been fun! I had a nasty suspicion Jaz’s silence about the Throne of Glass series was going to end up biting me in the ass.

  The days settled into a routine, but each day was special. Jaz loved the library – or den, as he called it – and I did, too. Who wouldn’t, what with all those books and movies? I’d never been a pleasure reader before the end of the world. I was a millennial baby, and I lived my life on social media, but now there was no such thing. I’d gone through two shelves so far. Lord of the Rings, my first loaner from him and my first re-read, had me in tears, even more than when Annie Lennox sang “Into the West” at the end of Return of the King.

  Throne of Glass ruined me. Jaz had known it would happen, and even though I had busted him hard about his YA lit collection, I still wanted to kick him in the nuts! Five books, and I freaked when I realized book five wasn’t the last in the series.

  Oh, my, sweet, God. The odds of Sarah J. Maas having survived the end of the world were incredibly slim, and even if she had, I'm sure the last thing on her to-do list was to write another book just to appease me!

  I spent the entire day in a semi-catatonic state, with Jaz and Tray popping in to give hugs and licks respectively. What had happened to Aelin? I needed to know she was okay, and that she and Rowan would live happily-ever-after. And Elide and Lorcan? And Aedion and Lyssandra? And what about the war? I was ruined.

  I was still a wreck until the next day when I found she’d written another series Jaz owned but hadn’t read yet. Turns out, it was about a young woman falling in love with an older guy. I smirked. Go figure.

  At least, Maas had finished this series, and book three lay on the sofa beside me, half-way completed. Man, this one was racy, almost pornographic in parts, but I didn’t care. I found myself enjoying those parts a lot, enough so that I read them when Jaz wasn’t around. He might misunderstand the flush that invariably reddened my face, and I’m pretty sure he’d be shocked to know I imagined him as Azriel while reading them. Yes, things were definitely developing, for me, at least. I was pretty sure they were for him too.

  ***

  Jaz

  We’d skirted around the whole attraction thing without mentioning it. I was pretty certain we were good. I was absolutely certain it had been temporary insanity, brought on by the stress of the entirely inconvenient ending of the world.

  We settled into comfortable friendship and spent most evenings huddled under a blanket in front of the fireplace in the den, steadily depleting my DVD collection with several appropriate re-watches along the way.

  Jennifer had no idea how strongly I felt, but I thanked whatever god was up there each time she laid her head against my shoulder. It was always a battle of wills against the arm that wanted to reach out and pull her close and me. I was kidding myself. I was the fish, and she’d gotten a solid bite, hook, line, and sinker.

  She edged closer, snuggling in as Red walked up the beach of Zihuantanejo. As many times as I’d seen the movie, I always teared up at this bit, and, once in a while, the tears spilled over.

  Thankfully, she never noticed.

  ***

  Jaz

  We didn’t need to light the fire, but we were okay on wood for a while and we both agreed there was something hauntingly satisfying in watching a living flame while going through my DVD collection.

  “Next week’s Christmas,” said Jennifer, totally out of the blue.

  “Damn, and I haven’t got you anything.”

  Jennifer aimed a cuff at me, but I managed to dodge it. “Christmas already?”

  “Yeah, how time flies when you’re having fun, right?” she replied with a coy smile.

  I snorted. “So this is your idea of having fun? Cooped up in a rickety log cabin with some cranky old guy?”

  “The lodge isn’t rickety, and you’re not that cranky,” she said, her lips twitching up at the corners.

  “So the insinuation is that I am old. Is that what you’re saying?”

  Jennifer smoothed her hands over the blanket. “Well, if the shoe fits.”

  I dug a finger into her ribs, tickling her viciously. She descended into a fit of giggles, but I didn’t let up. In seconds, we were on the floor, a laughing tangled mess of arms and legs.

  Then Jennifer was below me, looking up into my eyes. Her lips were parted, her eyes sparkling in the firelight. I didn’t think I’d ever seen a more beautiful sight. I leaned down and Jennifer closed her eyes. She wanted this; wanted me. I felt the same, and my heart thundered in my chest. We were so close I knew she could feel the rapid thump of my heart against her breasts as she pushed against me. I felt hers, a counter beat to mine, like they sang a different verse of the same song.

  My lips brushed against Jennifer’s, so softly they barely made contact. It would be so easy to kiss her, and my blood burned with the desire I’d been repressing for weeks. Instead, the vision of Sherri’s smiling face swam across my mind. It was fleeting, but enough to make me raise my head up and kiss her on the forehead, instead. Fuck! I was such a wuss.

  I flinched as I looked down into her wide eyes. They narrowed when I pulled back, and she stiffened under me. My momentary elation vanished, and my heart stilled as something gripped it and squeezed.

  Then she simply sighed and relaxed. It was like she’d reached inside me and eased the pressure threatening to burst me from within. I searched her expression, expecting her to be angry or hurt. Instead, she opened her eyes and raised a soft, warm palm up to cup my cheek.

  “It’s okay, Jaz,” she said gently, but instead of feeling okay I felt something else.

  I rolled away, my anger and frustration erupting from the deep prison I’d hid it in. “It’s not okay, Jennifer. You deserve so much more than this; than what I can give you.” A deep pit of self-loathing opened inside me, and I teetered on the edge.

  Jennifer was silent for what seemed like an age before she stirred and propped herself up on an elbow. Her voice was matter-of-fact as she said, “You’re right.”

  My heart slipped over the edge of the pit and began to plummet.

  “I did deserve more, Jaz,” she continued. “I deserved to go out with boys. I deserved to grow up with my mom, dad, and my sister.” There was a bitter edge to her words, a tone I hadn’t heard since the night in the diner, and I saw the moisture around her eyes glisten in the firelight. I wanted to reach out and take her in my arms, but I was too much of a coward to risk the rejection, so I began to sit up. Before I could, she reached over to pull my head around so we looked into each other’s eyes.

  “You deserved more too, Jaz,” she said, her voice trembling with emotion. “You deserved to have the family you started, to watch your son grow up with your wife beside you. You deserved to grow old with all of them and your friends.” She dropped her eyes and was quiet for a long moment, as if debating whether to say more before she took a deep breath. “But you know what? They’re gone, Jaz. It’s all gone.”

  Her voice softened and grew gentle as she continued. “You asked me if this was my idea of fun, cooped up here with you. Jaz, if I had to pick one person to spend the end of the world with, I can’t imagine anyone else
I’d choose.”

  The pit in my heart filled, and I reached out to take Jennifer in my arms. Even now, I was scared she’d push away, but as she rested her head on my chest, my racing heart began to settle into a deep, steady rhythm. I ran my fingers through her soft, wavy hair and smelled the milk and honey shampoo she liked to use, breathing it in deeply.

  “You are a truly special young woman, Jennifer, and it has been my honor to spend these last weeks with you.”

  “So now I’m a young woman, not a kid?” Her lips were so close to my chest I felt them twitch upward.

  I huffed and hugged her tight; as tight as my chest felt. “You always were.”

  ***

  We were silent for a time, content to revel in our closeness. Something had happened, and I didn’t think the stopper could be put back into this particular bottle. The feelings I’d cocooned deep within were hatching like a butterfly – well, most likely a moth in my case – but for Jennifer, who I was certain by now felt the same way, it was definitely a butterfly, with delicate gossamer wings, glorious colors, and exquisitely graceful lines.

  “Can we do something?” Jennifer whispered, as if reluctant to break the silence.

  If I’d had any liquid in my mouth, I’d have spit it out. She was not saying what I thought she was, was she? Part of me was desperate for her to say it; part of me – the tiny part that still denied my feelings for her – longed for her to mean something else.

  “For Christmas, I mean. Something special.”

  I breathed deeply, utterly conflicted, both disappointed and relieved at the same time. I caught myself before my emotions appeared on my face. “I think we have a few cans of smoked salmon left.”

  Jennifer groaned. “Jaz, you’ve spent the last few weeks boasting about how you and the others hunted the local deer.”