Fallen Angel

Louise took a long moment before answering.

"The world is full of coincidences, Chris. I can't deny what happened last night, but you are a man full of yourself. You don't listen to my desires and my plain and simple request that you leave me alone. This isn't my destiny, Chris. There is my life that will return with my memory. I intend to reclaim that life. As soon as my ankle heals, I'm out of here, even if it means hiking miles and miles in my bare feet. You have taken something that is not yours, Chris. You've taken something from me. Something I will never get back. Don't press me, Chris or I will fall. If I fall, I'll lose myself. The life of a wild man living off the grid may appeal to you, but I know it is not for me. I know you are envisioning me, barefoot and pregnant, raising wild children, all of us in your thrall. It doesn't wash, Chris. It just doesn't wash. With my memory coming back in snatches, I'm more convinced than ever that we can never be together. Yes, you are a superlative lover, the best I've ever had, but all the hottest sex in the universe isn't enough for a woman like me. I need the city, I need my job, even if it is crappy, and I need my book club and my female friends even if they don't actually like me. I may never again reach the heights I did last night, and I can live with that. Please don't press me, Chris. Please respect my space, respect ME! It's such a small thing really."

"Look at it from my perspective, Angel."

"I have. I need you to be a gentleman, Chris. I'll move to the couch. You can have the bed. Let's just agree to share this cabin until I'm fully healed. Do that and you will have my undying devotion and appreciation. Those are all I can give you."

"Not good enough, Angel."

He closed the distance between them. He swept up Louise in an embrace.

"No, Chris! No!"

He kissed her protesting lips firmly, silencing her. Louise beat her fists against his chest. And then his unambiguous, utter maleness overwhelmed her. He was a force of nature, a windstorm. She was the dust being stirred up by his path. Her resistance deserted her,

"Oh, Chris!" she cried with a forlorn voice when he broke their osculation. "Oh, Chris!" she gasped. She kissed him back, ran her fingers over his anatomy. Her desire for him was overwhelming. This is what she feared. The last of her resistance left, taking with it something she knew was priceless but suddenly did not care about. He carried her to the bedroom. Louise understood without question that he would do everything he asked of her and more. Her independence, her old life, half-remembered as it was, collapsed upon her like a crumbling wall.

He expected her to beg him to take her and she complied pleading with him to take her any way he wanted. She delighted when he took her from behind. She cried tears of joy when he took her ass. She swallowed his cum and smiled when he used another load to paint his initials on her flat, toned, tummy. When he was done, she thanked him like a sated wanton and fell into the slumber of the dead.

**

Louise wondered if she had ever been this happy. She and Chris made love sometimes as many as six times a day. Her memory seemed in no hurry to return. Louise wondered if all the orgasmic bliss was erasing the old her entirely. At first, that bothered her, now, two weeks since she had first awoken in this cabin, she was bothered less and less. Sometimes she even wondered if she had lost anything important with her memories. If they never came back? She could get quite used to being called Angel.

Chris was outside the cabin chopping wood. Louise had discovered an old "Smithsonian" magazine and decided to try and solve the crossword. She went looking for a pen or pencil. She pulled open a drawer and noted... "BOB!" she cried out loud. It all came back to her, her longed-for bolt from the blue. She was Louise MacDonald, she worked for an entertainment and bridal party service, in Buffalo, New York, and this was Bob's ring. Her fiancé's ring! Bob was tall and broad and had the cutest smile. He was compassionate and caring, was in great shape, and had a goofy but endearing sense of humor and her time with Chris had completely ruined him in her mind!

"CHRIS!" she wailed.

He burst back into the cabin. Louise held up the incriminating platinum diamond-studded band.

Chris's face fell.

"You bastard! When were you going to tell me the truth? When were you going to admit that when I entered your life, you knew I was spoken for, that I wasn't yours? What happened, was I delirious and revealed the fact that I had amnesia? Or did you take the calculated risk that I would forget all about the man who loved me? You planned my seduction and debasement from day one. You almost succeeded you, asshole! My name is Louise MacDonald, and this ring belongs to the man I am going to marry! You are pathetic, Chris, little better than a rapist."

"Rape? What has been passing through us for all this time is the furthest thing from rape!"

"I had no memory! I was injured and vulnerable! I was at your complete mercy! No, you didn't force me, but I think the cops would take a very dim view of your actions!"

"Baby!"

"Don't "baby" me, you jerk!"

"If you expect me to apologize for doing what you wanted to do..."

"That's how you see this, don't you, Chris? Super macho man can never be wrong? God's gift to women! Hah! Those women you told me about. The college girls, the wayward wives? They weren't mourning, you, Chris, they were thinking good riddance! All you are good for; Chris is spectacular sex. You could never hope to give a woman what she really needs in addition to that, compassion, understanding, self-actualization, equality, and partnership. Everything is over between us. I'm on the couch like I suggested so long ago and don't you dare lay a finger on me! You need to make me some sandals or shoes or moccasins to wear for the day the splint comes off my leg. You are going to escort me to civilization. In exchange, I will tell the outside world that you were my hero. My knight in shining armor and keep the fact that you have been a monstrous cad to myself.

"Ang...Louise, be reasonable!"

"I AM being reasonable. I'm the only one in this cabin who has been reasonable. Now give me space and stay out of my way. It won't be long until I am fully healed. If you don't want the cops crashing down upon you and ending the life you have here, you will be nothing less than a gentleman from this moment forward."

Chris's mouth opened and closed like a stuck fish. For the first time in his life, he was in a situation where the woman wielded all the power. It was an uncomfortable feeling.

**

Louise had to give Chris a modicum of credit. He respected her wishes at last. He could in fact be a gentleman for more than a few hours. The only time he touched her was to remove Louise's splint. Once it was off, Louise realized that she needed at least a week to regain full strength and mobility in the joint. It felt wonderful to cast the crutches aside. A week and a half later, Louise clad in one of Chris's hoodie sweatshirts, tried out the new moccasins he had made for her. They felt pretty good, and the soles, made from abandoned car tires were firm enough the guard against stones, pebbles, and thorns along the route to the secluded cave where Chris kept his jeep. Chris restored the battery to his jeep, made sure the tires were fully inflated, and inched it out from under the camouflage netting. Louise clambered into the passenger seat and allowed Chris to hold her hand when he wasn't operating the vehicle.

After a surprisingly long drive, Chris announced, "The ranger station is just around this corner."

"Pull over for a second, Chris."

"Sure."

"I owe you a lot, Chris, for which I am thankful. I can understand, a bit, why you did what you did. That does not mean that I forgive you. We are both going to have to deal with a lot of questions, me from Bob and my friends, you from the outside world. I trust you to be circumspect and protect my privacy as best you can. Do you understand what I'm asking?"

"Yes, I do, Louise. I realize now that I was a bit of a rat, but I will protect you."

"A bit of a rat?" Louise followed this by a laugh and then said, "Let's seal the deal, Chris with one last kiss."

The mountain man was only too happy to oblige.

"That was nice," he said.

"Yes, it was. I know I read you the riot act for the last couple of weeks, Chris, but seriously, never change. A force of nature does not respond well to fences."

"While you would die without your picket white fence surrounded ranch house."

"Yes, I would. Had I stayed with you, I could have dulled my senses and lied to myself for a while, but in the end, I would have done anything to get away from you, even if it meant throwing myself off a mountain again."

"What the devil were you doing up there anyway. Louise?"

"Trying to get a couple of K's in before breakfast."

"Alone?"

"Hey, even smart people make dumb mistakes."

"Falling into my life was not a mistake."

"Well, parts of it weren't at any rate."

The two shared a laugh before Chris placed the idling jeep back in gear and onto the winding mountain road. He leaned on the horn to alert the rangers to his arrival.