The Woodsman (Lust in the Woods Book 1) Read online

But I wasn’t going to see her again.

  No fucking way was I going to see her again and get a chance to say her name.

  The last thing I needed to do was get involved with someone, especially not in a town this size. If I wanted to get laid, I needed to try farther afield. But the fact was I didn’t want to get laid. It wasn’t even on my list of priorities. The list was short and to the point.

  Food.

  Shelter.

  Freedom.

  Peace of mind.

  Maybe at some point I’d think about finding a woman, for sex at least. For now, I had other things to focus on. Like what the hell I was going to do with my life. I’d quit my job, and the disaster of my marriage to Cecilia was still fresh, despite it being over for a while before the ink on the divorce papers was dry.

  Our marriage had been a clusterfuck of misery, starting with Cecilia’s complaints that the ring wasn’t big enough. Then our apartment wasn’t big enough. Then I was away too often even though she knew what my job was when we got married. Finding the credit card bills she’d been hiding from me was the final straw. The irony that I finally did quit my job, after I divorced her, was not lost on me. I didn’t know how a woman who grew up in a trailer park could be so high-maintenance. But she was. The last I’d heard she’d married the owner of a used-car dealership and was already pregnant. I’d learned my lesson of falling for a pretty girl with a nice smile. And big tits. Apparently men, myself included, were actually that dumb.

  Right now, I needed to figure out what the hell I was doing. Not how to get a handful of Katy’s big tits.

  But I couldn’t stop thinking about them. All of her, actually.

  Even hiding behind the shop counter, it was clear she was gorgeous. I’d drunk my coffee, watching her serve customers, her vivacious personality coming through with every interaction she had.

  But it was her hair that did it. Fucking sunshine.

  Blonde that radiated with deep, warm yellow, reflecting under the too-bright lights of the coffee shop. Two long braids bounced across her tits, and I couldn’t help but imagine what she’d look like naked, those braids wrapped around my hand as I guided her toward me. She’d turned around, smiling at the customer she was serving, her white tank top twisting, further revealing a silhouette he’d die for. She was petite with curvy hips, a large rack, and what looked like a flat stomach, although not too slender. Just the way I liked it.

  She was twenty-four, twenty-five maybe. Younger than me. Much younger than me. Young enough to still get flustered when she was attracted to a guy. And yeah, the fact that she was attracted to me was pretty obvious. It was clear by how nervous I made her, having seen her acting all sassy and confident with her friend before I placed my order. It was a stark contrast to when she started rambling as she got my coffee.

  It was the way her nipples hardened through that thin white tank that was the main give-away. She’d thought I hadn’t noticed, but I noticed everything about her.

  The long braids matched the whole hippie-chic look she had going on. A few random silver necklaces adorned her delicate neck and half a dozen rings decorated her fingers. I’d watched her until I finished my coffee and then headed out, forcing myself to not to catch her eye before I headed home. Indulging in a little fantasy of what her hair might feel like draped across my bare chest was one thing. Actually making a connection and leading her on was another.

  A workout was all I needed. I wasn’t used to not working and the pent-up energy was making me antsy. Burning off some aggression was what I needed. Then I had to sort out the cabin.

  The cabin didn’t have an internet connection, and it didn’t bother me, except that it meant I had to actually return to civilization if I wanted to buy anything, like food. Or get toilet paper. Maybe even get another blueberry muffin from the coffee shop.

  No. I needed peace. Discipline. I didn’t need a muffin. I didn’t need to see Katy again. I needed to get some cheap instant coffee, stock up on carbs and protein, and hunker down. That was it.

  After making a shopping list and working out harder than was probably necessary, plus giving my cock some much needed attention in the shower, I headed back into town.

  Get in and out, Sam. Don’t even think about stopping by that coffee shop.

  It didn’t help that the only grocery store in town shared a parking lot with the coffee shop.

  Half an hour later, I loaded the bags of food into the back of my truck. Hearing a girlish laugh drift across the parking lot, I looked up to see Katy throwing her head back and chuckling at something her friend had said. She was with the other coffee shop girl, Charlie or something like that. The one who seemed to think my long hair made me into some sort of hipster idiot.

  I watched Katy laughing, the way she looked up at the sky as she wiped the tears out of her eyes. Fun. She looked like so much fun. Why the hell was that so attractive?

  I didn’t like it.

  Fuck.

  I yanked open the door to my truck and slid in. This day was going to shit. Slamming the door harder than necessary, I looked up to see her friend pointing, not so subtly, toward me.

  Katy’s braids swung around as she quickly twisted her head to take a look in my direction. My cell phone buzzed and I pulled it out my pocket, still staring through the windshield at Katy, inwardly cringing as she lifted her hand and waved at me. She fucking waved. Like we were best buds.

  I didn’t wave back. Instead I put the phone to my ear and scowled. She needed to get the message that we weren’t going to be friends. No more blueberry muffins, no chatty comments, no flirting about hair, and no goddamn waving at each other. I was a total stranger to her and it needed to stay that way.

  “Yo. I’m not dead. I told you I’d be fine.”

  “Well, hello to you, too, my darling brother.”

  “What do you want, Robby?”

  “I wanted to know if you’d grown a pair of balls and gotten rid of your man-bun yet?”

  My little brother, Robert, worked in property development on the East Coast. Successful was an understatement for Robby’s life. I had no idea how he ended up there. Well, I did and it involved doing exactly the opposite of me—getting a scholarship with good grades, going to college, sorority girls, internships, ass-kissing, promotions, expensive scotch, and more ass-kissing, but not the good kind.

  But he was happy enough. Rich and sort of happy. He was the only other person in the world I cared about, besides my mom. I hadn’t even told her what I was doing. She didn’t need any more stress, and worrying about her oldest son’s happiness was at the top of her list of things that stressed her out. She needed to focus on her health and nothing else.

  But Robby knew. He got what I was doing. We didn’t need to have a conversation for me to know he got it.

  “You sound grumpier than usual, dude. What the hell? That’s not the point of this whole thing, to get even more pissed off.”

  “I’ve attracted the attention of some locals.”

  “Ah, I see. Let me guess. Female? Somewhere between the ages of nineteen and thirty. This is pissing you off why?”

  “Women complicate the fuck out of everything. Or have you already forgotten that? I’m trying to keep things simple.”

  Robby was in the middle of a divorce from his very own Cecilia. Except her name was Karen. I had no idea how he’d managed to screw up his two-year marriage so badly, but she was mad. He’d never told me what he’d done, but I knew he had to have done something because Karen was going for blood when it came to her settlement.

  “No, I haven’t forgotten. But maybe you’ve forgotten how good a quick, dirty, no-strings-attached fuck can feel. I doubt these women are necessarily looking for an engagement ring. No offense, Sam, but you don’t exactly tick all the marriage-material boxes. Sex is simple. It’s our basest instinctual need. You can’t get simpler than that.”

  He had a point, based purely on my reaction to Katy. Robby kept talking about the benefits of getting laid, and I
watched the object of what seemed like a growing obsession hug Charlie goodbye before sliding into her tiny silver Honda hatchback.

  I interrupted Robby and told him I’d call him in a few weeks. The point of his call was to remind me that his invitation to stay with him in Boston was still open. Our mother lived on the floor below him, in an apartment we both paid for. Visiting him meant intense family time, which Robby thought I needed.

  I didn’t need family around me right now.

  I just needed to be alone.

  Pulling into traffic, I got to the lights that marked the edge of town and realized I was pulled up behind Katy’s car. I guess she lived out of town.

  I followed her for five miles.

  Farther out of town was an understatement. The area was still pretty new to me, but I was sure there wasn’t another town for at least fifteen miles, so where the hell was she headed? My turn was coming up. I flipped my indicator on, noticing she’d done the same.

  The dirt road up to the cabins was small, discreet, and unmarked. A person wouldn’t even notice it unless they knew what to look for. The guy I rented it from had told me about five times how hard it was to find. So why the hell was Katy turning into it like she knew exactly where she was going?

  Part of me fantasized she was going to my house. The rest of my brain kicked in and I realized she must live in the other cabin. Over the phone, the owner had told me the two cabins were a long way apart, but the guy obviously didn’t have any grasp of distances. He made it sound like half a mile when in fact it was barely a hundred feet.

  Her little car slowed down on the bumpy dirt road even though we still had about another mile in the woods before we got to the cabins. What the hell was she doing?

  Finally, she stopped.

  I put the car in park and jumped out to see what the problem was.

  Her car door swung open and she leapt out, holding her phone in front of her like a weapon. “Don’t come any closer or I’ll press call. I’ve already dialed the cops. So stay back!”

  “Whoa, relax. What’s your problem?” I held up my hands and stopped walking.

  “Okay, yeah. Just stop there.” I could see her shaking and her voice wavered with fear.

  “Katy, right?”

  “Oh, God, you remember my name. That’s not good. That’s really not good. Look, I know I was flirting with you and I know I looked like I was interested and I am, I mean, I was, but that so doesn’t mean you can just follow me home and expect something. It was nothing more than flirting, so whatever you think is going to happen, it’s not. Okay?”

  Her eyes were wide and kept flitting between me and her open car door.

  “I’m your neighbor. I think.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  Speaking slowly, since I could quickly see this turning into a disaster, I repeated myself. “I’m your new neighbor. I moved into one of the cabins this morning. You must live in the other one or else you’re just really lost. Am I right?”

  “The other cabin? Oh, right, the other cabin.” She didn’t sound convinced, so I kept going.

  “I saw James Darlin, from Darlin Properties. He met me here this morning and gave me the keys. Your car wasn’t at your cabin. James obviously failed to mention, to either of us, that we were going to be neighbors. I’m Samuel Hess. Do you want to see my license? Or do you want to call James and confirm all this? I have his number in my phone, and I bet you do, too, since he’s your landlord. Am I right?”

  She took a few deep breaths before she lowered her phone and put it in her pocket. Her hands came together in front of her and she placed them over her heart.

  “I’m not stalking you.” It seemed necessary to say it although it sounded like the most unconvincing statement. Especially when I had just stared at her in the parking lot when she waved at me and then followed her out of town. As if I was some sort of nonverbal caveman ready to make his claim. Of course she thought I was stalking her. “Although I can see what this must look like.”

  After a few more deep breaths, she responded. “Okay. Well, it’s nice to meet you, neighbor. I’m Katy, Katy Williams. I guess you already knew the first part. I’m going to go now.” She was still shaking.

  I almost told her to wait and take a few moments to calm down before she got in the car, but I didn’t. I barely knew the woman. She wasn’t mine to take care of.

  Correction, I didn’t know the woman at all. Having an irresistible urge to strip her clothes off and fuck her until she screamed my name and creamed all over my cock did not make a connection.

  Chapter Four

  The whole point of renting this place was that it was in the middle of nowhere. Just me and the trees. I didn’t want to have to worry about making too much noise or neighbors getting curious and snooping around, trying to borrow cups of sugar or whatever the hell neighbors did.

  More pressingly, I seriously didn’t like the fact that Katy was living out here all on her own. It was weird. Sure, it was fine for me. Who the hell would hurt me? It wasn’t right that a young woman, who looked and sounded like Katy did, was renting a shitty, rundown cabin in the middle of the woods. None of it sat right with me. The more I thought about it, the more I decided that tomorrow I’d have to make contact and find out what her deal was.

  The sun had set and I otherwise would have enjoyed the peace and calm that came with being in the woods at night. Cecilia refused to live out in the woods, insisting we have an apartment in town. I hated every bit of it. The noise, the endless smell of fumes from the cars, crappy music coming through the windows whenever some jackass decided to subject everyone around them to whatever the hell they were listening to. I hated being able to hear my neighbors, and the fact that they could hear me. The woods were where I wanted to be, where I needed to be. As much as I’d come to realize my job wasn’t worth the risks. Working outside all day, with my hands, surrounded by nature … it was what I needed.

  But tonight, I was restless. Every time I paced past the living room window, I saw Katy’s lights through the trees. Teasing me. Tempting me. Reminding me she was over there.

  She was probably wearing soft, skimpy pajamas, unbraiding her hair, and slipping into bed.

  Alone.

  Of course she was alone. And single.

  She had to be single, the way she flirted with me and blushed at a mild compliment. Maybe that meant she was lonely. She had to be, a girl that fun, with that cute sense of humor and spark. She had to be lonely, living out here in the middle of nowhere.

  I’m sure she could do with some company.

  Especially after getting scared like that.

  Maybe I shouldn’t wait until tomorrow.

  Maybe I should go over there now and get to know her better.

  I sat down on the crappy couch and adjusted my crotch. Just the thought of her being over there was making me hard. Maybe Robby was right. I needed to get laid. Because whatever this attraction to Katy was, normal and simple it was not.

  A piercing scream came from the direction of her cabin, quickly followed by another one.

  Fuck.

  Shit.

  Fuck.

  Katy.

  My Katy.

  Without thinking, I yanked open my door and sprinted through the woods toward her cabin. The front door was wide open, light streaming out. A tied black trash bag sat in the middle of the porch, almost as if she’d dropped it and ran. A raccoon sat on a knocked over trashcan eating what looked like a mushy Oreo. As soon as he saw me, he scurried off. I vaulted the steps up to the porch.

  Where the hell was she?

  Had someone grabbed her when she was taking out the trash?

  I slowly stepped into the house, aware that if someone was in there, the element of surprise was all I had. For all I knew they had a weapon.

  The layout of the cabin was same as mine and it was clear she wasn’t in the main living area or kitchen. I walked down the hallway, knowing there were only two options of where she could b
e. Her bedroom door was open, but the lights were out. Facing the bathroom door, I heard a shuffling sound.

  “Katy?”

  “Who’s out there?” she shakily asked.

  “It’s me, Sam, your neighbor. We met this morning and then again this evening.”

  “Wh-what are you doing in my house?”

  “I heard you screaming and I was concerned. Your front door was wide open. Can you please open the door so I can make sure you’re all right? Are you alone in there?”

  This was the worst rescue mission in the world. Maybe this girl was just a nut having some sort of breakdown. Here I was, trying to be a hero.

  She opened the door a crack and I bit my lip from laughing at the spatula held tightly in her hand.

  “Is it still out there?”

  “Is what still out there?”

  “I think I saw a bear. Or something. It was big. And hairy.”

  “There’s nothing out here, and there are no bears in these woods.”

  “I saw something.”

  “Katy, you can come out now. I promise there’s nothing out here except me. I may be big and hairy, but I won’t hurt you.”

  After waiting a beat, she finally opened the door and stepped out into the hall, spatula firmly in hand still.

  “Was that for the bear?” I tugged on the spatula until she released it, reluctantly.

  “Are you laughing at me? I’m freaking out here, and you’re laughing at me?” She looked up at me with her big blue eyes. Standing so close to her, the difference in height was extreme. She was probably five-foot-three, maybe four at a push. I towered over her.

  A dozen images flitted through my mind at the sight of those eyes—Katy on her knees, those beautiful eyes begging me to put something in her open, waiting mouth. Katy undressing and joining me in the shower, turning to be taken from behind against the wet tiles. Katy hiking up her skirt so she could straddle me in my truck and ride me to heaven and back.

  I was such a dick.

  The poor thing was shaking and I was mentally defiling her.

  Unable to resist touching her, I guided her with my hand on the small of her back down the hall and sat her on the sofa. She was shivering, and I realized she’d really been scared and was beginning to crash from an adrenaline surge.