In Strange Woods - Claire Cray Page 0,16
he peered out of the hallway and found James sitting at the kitchen table with a coffee, looking out the window with his chin in his hand.
“Morning,” Hunter said, stepping out into the kitchen.
“Morning.” James turned and laced his long fingers around his coffee cup. His voice was husky from sleep, his hair tousled and sexy, and he looked well rested. The purple smears under his eyes had faded, and there was more color in his face. Like he hadn’t been pretty enough already.
Hunter hooked another mug from the shelf and brought it to the table with the coffee pot, taking a seat across from James. “Mind if I open this window?”
“Of course.” James looked impressed when Hunter pushed the awning window up, practically opening the table to the outside. “You really know how to live. Look at this.”
“It’s not bad.” Hunter leaned back and looked over the landscape. The sky was a clear bright blue above the spiky treetops, and everything was still glistening with last night’s rain. Traces of silvery fog wafted among the dark limbs of the firs. The river rushed steadily past them, the rapids bright and pearly in the light, and the golden meadow just beyond it was starting to sparkle in the first rays of sun.
“It’s beautiful here,” James said, resting his chin on his hand. In the crisp light, his hair was the color of black coffee, and his eyes the same silvery gray as the fog in the trees. “I really like it.”
It was the second or third time he’d said so, and he really seemed to mean it. In fact, he did seem surprisingly at home. Like he woke up here every morning to drink coffee and watch the river while lounging around in Hunter’s clothes.
Hunter took a long sip of coffee with a minute shake of his head. Stop dreaming.
“Will it be hard to get the car out?” James asked after a pleasant pause.
“Shouldn’t be. How far up the road are you?”
“Not far at all.”
Hunter finally asked a real question. “You know what’s up that road?”
“Uh…” James’s open expression instantly shuttered. “Woods?”
Hunter cocked his head slightly. Interesting. “Oughta be careful out here, if you’re not sure.”
“Why?”
“Well, Woodstock’s chill, but it’s kinda lawless. Nobody likes trespassers. Some weird shit goes on.”
James’s eyes brightened with curiosity. “Weird, like…”
“Like I said, it ain’t all on the grid. There’s a gun nut for every hippie. Plus the occasional fugitive, not to mention the black market for weed.”
“Even though it’s legal?”
“Well, yeah,” Hunter said with a slight laugh. “Legal means you gotta follow rules and pay taxes. Plenty of outlaws still grow in the backcountry. You wander into one of those farms now, you’re just as screwed as before.”
“Why?”
“‘Cause you’d be a witness to multiple felonies.” Hunter shrugged. “People disappear.”
“Hm. I’ll keep that in mind.” James took another sip of coffee and licked his lips as he looked out the window, his brow furrowing in thought. After a lingering silence he murmured, “It sounded so good in here last night. The river and the rain. And the wind in the trees. I slept like a baby.”
Hunter smiled at the undercurrent of amazement in James’s voice. “I’ve always slept by the water,” he said. “Except for a couple years in Portland. Had a hell of a time without the sound of waves or a creek at night. Only good sleep I got was when it rained.”
James was gazing at him almost fondly, and he felt a thump in his chest.
* * *
The car was, in fact, impressively stuck in the mud. James was charmingly eager to learn how to hook it up for towing, and they cooperated with surprising ease, like they’d been working together for years. At one point, Hunter tottered precariously in the mud and James reached out to steady him with a quick smile. Hunter felt those strong, slim hands on his torso long after they fell away.
When the hatchback finally crawled back out of its muddy ruts and onto solid ground, James’s grin was so bright it was hard to believe he ever looked sad.
“You’re free,” Hunter said, hopping out of his truck to high five James, who had a smudge of mud on his cheek that he badly wanted to reach out and rub away.
“Thank you so much,” James said, following him around to the hood of the car while he unfastened the chain. “I really owe you. Two or three times over.”
“No big deal.” Hunter wound the chain into a