Bound to Happen

by Mary Kay McComas

  “I don’t want to spend two weeks with you,” she admitted with her usual grace and tact, her voice quivering slightly for emphasis.

  “Aw. Cheer up, beautiful. By the time they get around to searching this far into the mountains and find our cars, then track us down through my truck’s registration papers, we could be looking at months here. But if it’ll make you feel any better, I’m not real crazy about this myself.”

  “That’s quite obvious, thank you.”

  “Good. I don’t want us starting off on the wrong foot,” he said in a deceptively affable voice.

  He turned back to his fire, which had started to glow and snap noisily as it consumed the dry leaves and twigs. Depressed and feeling vulnerable, Leslie wanted to stand up to this pompous, obnoxious man. Never had anyone treated her so badly. He wasn’t even pretending to be civil. And people thought she was unfeeling, she ruminated with an ironic half laugh. Well, she had plenty of feelings now, and not one of them was pleasant.

  With great determination, she pushed herself into a sitting position and cried out in pain and alarm as her head began to throb, and at the same time, she felt the bodice of her dress fall away from her body. Quickly clutching the dress and the blanket over her bare breasts, she turned startled and accusing blue eyes on the man who was now facing her. He looked concerned until he saw the anger in her eyes, and then he frowned.

  Before he could speak, Leslie attacked. “What have you done to me?”

  “What?”

  “I’m half naked,” she stated, the implications of which were clearly audible in the tone of her voice.

  The man actually laughed at her outrage. “When someone faints, you loosen their clothing. Even twelve-year-old Boy Scouts know that,” he told her in a patronizing tone. “My intentions were honorable.”

  “Oh,” Leslie uttered, somewhat mollified.

  “But,” he said quickly, moving back to her side, covering the short distance on his hands and knees so that when he stopped and looked at her, their eyes were level, mere inches apart, “I can’t say I wasn’t tempted to peek,” he said, wickedly grinning and allowing his gaze to lower and take in all Leslie hadn’t managed to cover with the blanket.

  Her heart began to pound harder and faster. Her skin grew warm, and her muscles began to tremble.

  “Stop that,” she ordered him with great bravado, her chest heaving as she struggled to breathe.

  “What?” he asked, his eyes round.

  “Stop looking at me like that.”

  “Why? Do I make you nervous?” he asked, enjoying himself.

  “A little,” Leslie admitted, her eyes narrowed cautiously even while her chin tilted defiantly.

  The strange man sat back on his haunches, resting his hands on his knees as he regarded Leslie with a great deal of humor sparkling in his eyes. Leslie, on the other hand, sat perfectly still, but she, too, was taking inventory with a leery eye.

  His dark hair was wavy and thick, a little unruly, and he wore it longer than most of the men she knew. His skin was tanned golden, almost bronze, and there were little lines creased in his face that deepened when he smiled or thought something was amusing, as he obviously thought she was at the moment. Overall, Leslie had to admit, he was much better looking when he was happy as opposed to not so happy.

  “Look, lady,” he said finally, merriment still gurgling in his voice, “I can’t even remember the last time I jumped an unconscious or unwilling woman. But don’t push me, because I’m not saying it hasn’t entered the realm of possibilities here. I didn’t give in to the temptation to peek while you were out, and even though I’ve found you provoking to an extreme since you ran me off the road, I haven’t attacked you yet. So, if you watch your step, I think you can feel reasonably safe with me. Do you want me to zip up your dress for you?” he asked, his eyes daring her to test his control.

  Swallowing hard, Leslie took up his challenge.

  “Yes, please,” she said, glad her voice sounded stronger than she felt.

  Carefully, the man moved behind her. Leslie ground her teeth together and began to pray he wasn’t a crazed maniac when she felt his big hands come to rest on her bare shoulders. She refused to release the scream that was building inside her when he slowly and purposefully glided his fingers enticingly down her back. Her mind ran amok when he slipped his fingers inside her dress.

  “You’ll have to stand up. I can’t get the little thingie to move,” he said with far less emotion than Leslie was feeling.

  Performing the simple task of getting to her feet proved to be easier said than done. Hampered by the reams of material and the damnable hoop below the waist, she also had to contend with her aching head and precarious bodice. It was some time before a frustrated and exhausted Leslie gave up her efforts. She found her companion waiting patiently with his hands on his hips and an idiotic grin on his face.

  “That’s one hell of a dress you got there, lady. You must feel like you’re living a nightmare from Gone With the Wind,” he observed, shaking his head in wonder. “You want me to help you up?”

  Something deep inside Leslie snapped. No longer was she the slightest bit grateful to this man, nor was she afraid of him. No longer did she care what he thought of her or if he was indeed a homicidal maniac. He had gone too far, and Leslie was spitting mad.

  “Yes,” she ground out through clenched teeth.

  “Please,” he reminded her good-naturedly.

  “Yes, please,” she said, seething.

  He stretched a hand out across the ruffles and wiggled his fingers at her in a very irksome way. With no other option, Leslie had to take a firm grip on his hand and hope for the best.

  This wasn’t her day. His big hand covered hers almost entirely. It was calloused and strong; its grip warm and secure. In one firm tug, Leslie was vertical and moving forward until she came full force into the man’s broad chest. Winded by the impact and overheated by her anger, Leslie stood stunned and breathless in the man’s arms, her face only inches from his. She felt the need to pull away, but something inexplicable appeared in his eyes and kept her still.

  The mocking humor in his expression of moments before was now laced with an undefined challenge, the indifference became almost a plea to take on his dare, and the scorn … the scorn had taken on a smoky cloud of mystery, it had become a puzzle for Leslie to solve, a question to answer.

  The moment seemed to stretch out past forever, but in actuality, it was only a split second and was gone before Leslie was ready to release it. The idea that this man was in any way vulnerable appealed to her very much. But that feeling, too, was short lived when, in a flash, the man was full of arrogance and mischief once more.

  “Then again, maybe I shouldn’t have made such a hasty decision,” he said as he lowered his head and boldly took Leslie’s lips with his own.

  At first Leslie was furious and tried to fight him off. But with her hands holding up the bodice of her dress, all she could do was squirm and try to pull away. When her movements only succeeded in allowing him to reestablish a firmer grip and give her a second kiss, Leslie decided to take a new approach. She stood perfectly still and the second his arms relaxed a little, she kicked him as hard as she could. It took her two attempts to finally hit his shin bone, but her reward was well worth her efforts.

  He gasped in pain and immediately released her. When he did, she held her dress up with one hand and used the other to push him away. To Leslie’s astonishment, as he held on to his leg he was also laughing uncontrollably.

  “Don’t you dare laugh at me,” she shouted. “And don’t you ever touch me like that again. Do you hear me?”

  The man laughed harder at her indignation.

  “I mean it! I’m sick of this.” She stamped her foot once. “I’m sorry you’re a nasty, ill-tempered, and extremely rude individual, but you’re not going to take it out on me anymore. The accident wasn’t all my fault. I refuse to take all the blame for it. And if I’m going to be such an i
mposition to you for the next two weeks—or so—well, I’d just as soon take my chances alone than put up with you.”

  By the time Leslie finished her tirade, the man had pulled himself together somewhat and stood watching her. His eyes held a certain humorous admiration, and his lips were still twitching at the corners, but at least he wasn’t rolling on the ground in a convulsive fit of laughter.

  “You’re not very funny.”

  “No. You’re right. I’m not,” he said, his amused look having faded to a smirk and a twinkle. “If I promise to be a good boy from now on, will you let me zip up your dress?”

  Leslie considered his offer with great misgivings. She was sure she shouldn’t trust him, but she definitely wanted her dress zipped so she could have two free hands. Courageously and with all the dignity she could muster, Leslie turned her back to him.

  Several endless seconds passed before she felt his presence behind her. All her senses were on red alert, on guard for the slightest untoward action. None came. With a minimum of movement, the man deftly secured her dress, said “There you go,” and walked away.

  But even though he’d amended his behavior, Leslie wasn’t satisfied.

  “Aren’t you going to apologize?”

  “For what?” The man didn’t bother to look away from feeding the fire. He kept throwing twigs and small branches into the flames as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened between them.

  “For being so rude and … and for what you did to me,” Leslie said.

  “I kissed you,” he said, because she didn’t seem able to identify the activity and he wanted to make his next point. “It wasn’t exactly a rape. I could have used a little more finesse, I guess, but all in all, I’m not sorry I did it. So, I won’t apologize.”

  “Honestly. You’re the most insulting man I’ve ever met,” Leslie said, disgusted.

  “That’s too bad. Maybe if you’d met a lowlife like myself sooner, you wouldn’t be so snooty now,” he said, turning to her at last.

  “Snooty? Snooty? I am not snooty.”

  “Defensive, then.”

  “I’m only defensive when someone else is attacking. In this case, that’s you.”

  The man seemed to be thinking her statement over. Leslie knew her argument was valid and drew confidence from it. The man finally nodded twice and said, “Maybe in the beginning, when I was still in shock. But I took care of you when you passed out, and that was nice of me. And since you woke up, I think I’ve been pretty civil.”

  “You kissed me,” she said in an accusing tone.

  “Oh. Well, that was bound to happen eventually anyway. I just figured that as long as we were in the right position, we might as well get it over with.”

  “What?” Leslie’s face was a grimace of shocked disbelief. Was this man not only rude and vulgar, but insane as well, she wondered.

  “Let’s face it, I’m reasonably good-looking. You’ve got all the right parts, very nicely put in all the right places. We’re alone in the woods together and most likely will be for some time to come. We were bound to kiss eventually,” he said, in a very matter-of-fact way.

  “What?” she repeated, more and more convinced that she was stranded in the mountains with a madman.

  “Come on, … What is your name?”

  “Leslie.”

  “Leslie, what?”

  “Rothe. What’s yours?” she asked, not really sure she wanted to know, fairly certain by now that it could be found on the F.B.I.’s ten-most-wanted list.

  “Joe Bonner,” he said. “And I think that human nature being what it is, we each would have started wondering what it would be like to kiss the other sooner or later anyway. I just wondered sooner, is all. There’s no need to make a federal case out of a simple little kiss, Leslie.”

  “There is if you won’t apologize for it,” Leslie said doggedly.

  “I’m not sorry. I admit I might have enjoyed it more if you’d cooperated a little, but it wasn’t so bad as it was.”

  Leslie gasped in frustration and anger. There was no dealing with him. He was impossible to talk to, she decided, as she pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders and began to walk away from him.

  “If you’re going off to visit the bushes, you should stay on the road and out of the underbrush. You’d probably hang yourself in that dress. Go up around the bend if you want,” he said in an annoyingly omniscient way.

  Leslie glared at him over her shoulder but took his advice nonetheless. Making her way clumsily through the darkness in her high-heeled shoes, her mind automatically switched to her problem-solving mode. In her usual way, she quickly identified her problems: The man, Joe Bonner, and being stranded in the mountains with him. Objectives: Get rid of this Joe Bonner person and get home safely. Solutions: The answer to the first problem was easy. Shoot Joe Bonner at the first opportunity. The second problem was not as easily solved. And, unfortunately, it looked as if she was going to need Joe Bonner to accomplish it.

  On her way back to the fire—and Joe Bonner—a calmer Leslie decided she simply would have to grit her teeth and bear with the impossible man until she was rescued or until she could come up with another answer to her dilemma.

  In the meantime, she knew of another problem she could easily solve. Knowing there was little of her to see under the skirt of her gown because of the additional slips she’d worn, she freely gathered up the silk and lace in one hand and began untying the strings of the hooped skirt with the other. With the hoops gone, the dress hung straight to the ground. It was now far too long but much less cumbersome.

  Well satisfied, Leslie looked up to find the man—as she preferred to think of him—watching her. Something in the way he was regarding her made her feel agitated and uneasy. He nodded his approval of what she had done and said, “Good idea.”

  “Thank you so much,” she said stiffly.

  “Definitely snooty,” he said as if it was a final judgment of her character.

  Leslie walked over to the man and strangled him with her bare hands—but only in the back of her mind, where she kept her fondest wishes and desires. In reality she gathered her skirts once again, ignoring the man, and settled herself on the tarpaulin where she’d been lying before. With great flair, she arranged the silk and lace over her legs and drew the blanket closer around her bare shoulders.

  “You hungry?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she said. Cannibalism flashed through her mind as a possible solution to one of her problems. But she quickly discarded the idea, assuming it would be rather tasteless, both literally and figuratively.

  Two pieces of bread landed in her lap. The slices were stuck firmly together, but with the aid of the light from the fire, Leslie could see the adhesive was either an appetizing pate or peanut butter. Considering the sandwich’s origins, she assumed it was peanut butter. However, she wasn’t altogether disappointed or ungrateful. She was very hungry.

  “Where did this come from?” she asked between bites, not caring that the food stuck to the roof of her mouth.

  “I was on my way back from getting groceries when we met on the road,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “My truck is full of food.”

  “And now it’ll all go to waste.” She shook her head regretfully.

  “Hardly. We’ll take as much as we can carry in the morning. And I’ll make another trip down for the nonperishables in a couple of days.”

  Leslie nodded. This made sense to her, and she’d always believed in carrying her share of the load. Basically a city person and not overly fond of outdoor sports, she really wasn’t looking forward to the hike through the mountains. But she vowed she’d accomplish it with as much grace as possible. She’d show him snooty.

  They were silent through most of the meal. Leslie took a second helping, her host went back for thirds. He’d boiled coffee in a saucepan and asked, or rather told her to hold a filter over two pint-size canning jars while he poured the hot, dark fluid into each.

  “I wasn�
�t planning on a camp out,” he said, needlessly explaining his lack of equipment.

  Leslie had to admire his ingenuity. The coffee was strong and hot, warming her from the inside out, which was more than she could say for either the fire or her blanket. While the heat of the fire did a fair job of warding off the cold night air in front of her, the chilling breeze seemed to catch and settle in the blanket that lay around her shoulders and across her back.

  After her third rather obvious shiver, Joe got to his feet and came over to her side of the fire.

  “Scoot up,” he told her.

  “What for?” she asked, confused and suspicious at once.

  “I’ll sit behind you and keep the wind off your back.”

  “That’s not necessary. I’m perfectly—”

  “Perfect. I know,” he broke in on her objection. “But if we’re going to survive this night without the right gear, we’re going to have to keep each other warm. My jacket will hold off the wind. So we’ll sit on the tarp facing the fire with me at your back.”

  No longer confused, Leslie focused her attention on her distrust of this man. “If you think I’m going to give you a second chance to manhandle me, you’re crazy,” she said, pulling the blanket closer, glaring up at him stubbornly.

  Again, he mocked her with laughter.

  “You’re certainly full of yourself, aren’t you? I give you one little kiss and suddenly you’re irresistible to me? Is that what you think?”

  “No,” she said. “What I think is that you’re a lunatic or maybe an axe murderer. The nicest thing I’ve thought so far was that you’re just some poor thing who wandered out the front gates of an asylum and can’t quite get the hang of being normal.”

  “Hey. You’re all heart, aren’t you? I’ll have to be careful not to let your high opinion of me swell my head,” he said. He didn’t appear to be offended at all, but he certainly was wearing a peculiar expression. At first Leslie thought he was still amused, but for a fleeting second there was almost a look of admiration in his eyes, and then it was gone, replaced by the thoughtful, considering look she was growing very familiar with. “However, flattered as I am, I am none of those things. I am hard to live with sometimes, which is why I spend a lot of time alone up here in my cabin. But you don’t need to be afraid of me. I am both safe and sane, and I won’t hurt you.” He paused briefly. “I won’t even touch you again without your permission. How’s that?”