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After Avery and I hang up and get off the phone, I spend hours unboxing and finding a home for everything. I position the rug in the front room, unwrap the living room furniture and the dining room furniture, and wash the dishes. I haul in the plants, set up my bedroom, and hang my clothes. It’s after I’ve showered that I remember the blackberry bushes outside. Blackberries would go great with the yogurt I bought for breakfast tomorrow.
Slipping out the back of the house, I breathe in the earthy smell of the mountain and head toward the blackberry bushes that line the road and divide my property and the neighbors. I thought about going over there this afternoon to introduce myself, but I was sweaty from unpacking, and well, that feels strange. That’s not something we do in New York. This tiny part of me had hoped they would come over to welcome me themselves, but they didn’t.
Ash was right. These bushes are huge and covered in berries. I pick them off one by one and place them in the bowl I brought. I’ve never had a need to cook much, as we always had someone cook for us or we ate out, but with the number of berries out here, my mind spins with ideas of jam, cakes, and cobblers.
My mother flashes through my mind. She would be appalled by this entire scenario. She was never very domesticated, so the idea of keeping a home or cooking is just beneath her, and she let everyone around her know this.
“Oh, look at that one,” I say as I reach deep into the branches to grab it.
But just as I lean over and stretch my arm to pull the berry off, the bush underneath shakes.
Four glowing eyes pop open and stare back at me. My breath catches in my throat, and my heart starts galloping to a very alarming speed. I’m frozen in fear as we continue our face-off, and then whatever it is . . . it growls.
3
BRIGGS
Screaming.
High pitched–fear for your life–screaming echoes across the mountain and sends me immediately into fight mode. I’m out of my chair, grabbing my rifle, which sits next to the front door, and I’m over the steps of my house, across the dirt road, and down the driveway of my closest neighbor. My only neighbor.
I had heard through the grapevine back in June that the house across the street had sold. Poor Mrs. Benson had lived there alone for the past twenty years after the passing of her husband. She was a true modern Appalachian homesteader and lived her whole life in that house, well before Horizons Valley became what it is today. She lived off the land, and even my orchard was hers at one time. I had thought that one of her kids or grandchildren would take over the house, but nope, they sold it and took the cash instead.
Now, it’s almost August, and every day, it seems there have been construction or delivery trucks rambling up the mountain and tearing up the gravel road we share. Until today, I saw a small SUV with an attached trailer turn off toward the house and not leave. I don’t want to be that neighbor out of the gate, but I gritted my teeth with each truck and told myself it would be the last one. Eventually, we’ll have to discuss the maintenance of the road. It has to be resurfaced every year after winter, and it’s our responsibility as the property owners to maintain it.
Speaking of maintain, my mind starts racing as I think about what I’m about to encounter in the yard. Is it an animal? Is a woman being attacked? I have no idea, but I’m determined to do my best to protect her.
Coming around the bend and into the neighbor’s yard, I stop dead in my tracks as I take in the sight before me. A woman about my age is flailing around. Her blonde hair flies in every direction as she jerks and continues screaming, and the part that has me completely speechless is that she’s damn near naked.
“What the fuck is going on!” I bellow at her.
She freezes and locks eyes with me, finding me standing in her yard. Her eyes dart toward the gun, and then I swear she screams even louder than before, causing every hair on my neck to rise.
“Lady! Would you stop screaming!”
If she keeps this up, I’m certain the whole town will hear her and come racing up the mountain with pitchforks raised to avenge whatever they think is happening to her.
“Get off my property!” she yells at me while pulling on the sleeve of her robe. With all her flailing, she’s got it caught on the thorns of the blackberry bush, leaving it wide open and giving me the perfect view of her breasts and the most incredible body I’ve ever seen.
Not that I’d admit to looking to anyone.
“Why are you screaming? Are you hurt?” I look past her and around her to see if I might spot what has made her so worked up, but I don’t find anything. There are no bears, no panthers, and no snakes slithering off into the bushes.
At the question of what’s happening, her focus shifts back to the bush, where a strangled sound comes out of her, and she again pulls hard on her robe with a shaking hand.
When I march toward her, her already pale face turns even whiter. She’s so spooked at whatever she saw, and then with me here as well, she cringes as I toss the gun to the ground and move into her space. I try not to look at her, but her creamy skin, tiny light pink underwear, and the smell drifting off her is so mouthwatering that I can’t help but lock eyes with her. Her cheeks flush red, and time suspends as we both size each other up until the bush shakes, and she jerks so hard while letting out a strangled cry that the sleeve of the robe rips and propels her backward.
Instinct has me grabbing her to keep her from falling, but she wrenches herself free and moves away from me while pulling her robe tight around her and closing off the view.
“There!” She points, eyeing the bush like it personally offended her but standing taller and feeling justified for her crazy behavior.
I glance down into the bush and see two white furry faces with a black mask covering their eyes.
“For fuck’s sake, they’re just raccoons!” I look at her like she’s lost her mind.
“What do you mean ‘just raccoons’? They’re rabid, they growled at me! Kill them!” she demands, still pointing at the bush.
If I wasn’t so annoyed at this moment, I would laugh.
