Unintentional

Eyeing the man in front of me, I exhale. "Eight inches is a little too much."

"Don't be picky, Cara. Be grateful."

I put my coffee mug down on the end table. "Grateful that the schools are closed and I have a snow day? Of course. Grateful I have to remove eight inches of snow today? Not particularly."

Sarah, my roommate, clucks her tongue. Out of the corner of my eye a pillow comes flying. It bounces harmlessly off of the flat screen TV as I duck. The weatherman that I've been glaring at carries on with the forecast, oblivious to the assault.

"All right, fine. I'm sorry that you are eternally cursed by the god of emergency room necessity. Good?"

Her nurse scrubs have snowflakes on them, and I can't help but giggle.

"Good enough. We'll be busy today with shoveling injuries, I'm sure." She grabs her keys off the hook by the front door and pulls on her winter coat.

"I'll have the driveway done by tonight. Promise." I hold out a pinkie, leaning forward on the couch.

"Well, that's nice of you. But I'm staying at Tyler's tonight, so the only person you'll be plowing it for is yourself." She raises her overnight bag off the floor and gives me a naughty grin. "Or plowing yourself."

I pull my pinkie back, trying not to look too excited. "Oh. I suppose there's no reason to plow it until tomorrow then." I giggle at her suggestion. "The driveway, I mean."

With a stretch, I rise from the couch. "I love it when snow days fall on a Friday."

"Oh, shut it already." She looks around the room for something else to throw at me, but all the pillows are on my side of the living room.

I stop teasing her. "Have fun. Really. You deserve that day off tomorrow."

"Thanks, Cara. Try not to eat all my Girl Scout cookies while I'm gone this time."

I look sheepish. "One-time thing. I promise."

"Mm hmm." Without another word, she opens the front door and steps out into the storm.

From the window, I see her brush the snow off her Jeep Cherokee and carefully drive down the snow-coated asphalt. Trees obscure my view of where the main road meets our driveway, but I know she'll be fine-that Cherokee has gotten us through worse snowstorms than this.

"What to do..." I muse. Truthfully, I know exactly what I need to do-grade papers, clean the fridge, and prep some meals to freeze for next week-but doing it is the hard part.

Cooking is the least daunting task, so I decide to take care of that first. Maybe, if I'm lucky, I'll accidentally spill tomato sauce on my pile of grading.

"Keep dreaming." I chide myself. Not because it's wrong to want to ruin my students' papers, but because it would take multiple cans of sauce to sufficiently cover the pile of papers I've got stashed in my workbag.

The day suddenly seems too short.

"Shepherd's pie, here we go."

Potatoes take the longest to cook, so I pull a 10-pound bag of them from the pantry. Like a squirrel, I dig through it, tossing the ones that look easiest to peel into a colander over the sink and leaving all the awkward-shaped ones in the bag.

Snow falls rapidly as I wash and peel the potatoes, coating the pine trees in the backyard and covering the flower pots I forgot to bring in during fall cleaning.

December snowstorms are a treat because they're novel; usually the first big storm isn't until January or February.

"Shit. The onions." Shepherd's pie is incomplete without them, and I should chop them once I finish the potatoes.

They're buried in the garden, leftovers from the summer harvest. Sarah swears they will last through the cold as long as she covers them with mulch. I'm skeptical, but she planted them and so she can accidentally kill them too, if she wants.

Annoyed, I slip on my boots but skip the jacket-it will take two minutes to pull up a few bulbs. I unlock the backdoor and push the screen door forward, dragging a pile of snow with it.

If it keeps snowing at this rate we'll have over a foot by nightfall.

"Onions, onions...onions." Green shoots poke vainly from beneath the snow and I regret not taking the trowel from the garage. Yanking them out by the stalk doesn't always work.

"Damn..." I turn, sighing, and loop around the house, heading to the front, so I can hit the garage door opener on my car visor.

In surprise, I stop halfway between my car and the garage.

There's a pickup truck in the driveway.

I squint at it. The front seats are empty.

"Who the hell-"

A massive hand slaps hard over my mouth before I can finish the sentence, squeezing tightly. Screaming and pulling away are fruitless; my voice is muffled and his grip is ironon my cheekbones.

Before my instincts tell me to fight back, he intensifies his assault, throwing an arm around my neck and lifting slightly. My feet skim the ground, and everything around me fades to dark as the blood flow to my brain is cut off.

A chokehold. Jesus.

"If you want to stay conscious, you don't fight me. Understand?" His voice is deep, inquisitive, and exceptionally calm, considering that my entire body is dangling from his clenched forearm, like a trophy fish from a hook.

Nodding is impossible, but I try.

He lowers me with ease as I gasp and choke, trying to catch my breath.

"Who are you?" There's curiosity in his voice. He moves his hand slightly down from my mouth so I can speak, but he keeps it ready.

"I live here." My words are breathy and unsure; I don't know if that's what he wants to hear.

He growls and the muscled arm around my neck squeezes in warning. "The people here are at work. Just like every other Friday. You don't live here."

"I do. The snow...work cancelled." I rush my words, terrified he'll choke me into unconsciousness this time. "I'm a teacher."

"Fuck." He loosens his arm around my neck slightly and exhales, pressing his wide chest against my back. It's hard and warm, and my shoulder blades don't even reach the top of it.

Involuntarily, I shiver at the thought of what he could do to me. I have to find a way out of this.

"We're going in. Move." He untangles his arm from my neck and shoves me forward. I lose my balance, but before I can fall, his hand darts out and he fists my hair, holding onto it like some kind of fucked-up leash.

"Ow." I squirm and twist backwards, determined to see who I'm up against.

He tightens his fist in my hair and yanks, forcing me to look at nothing but sky. Anger and fear rise inside of me, and I lash out, clawing at his hand in a fit of rage.

With brutal control, he yanks my hair so hard that tears come to my eyes and I lose my balance completely. He doesn't bother to break my fall, and instead all my weight hangs from the thick handful of hair that he's fisting.

He snarls. "Fucking touch me one more time and you'll be Jane Doe on the six-o'clock news."

I freeze in horror, envisioning his words.

"Go in. Now."

I hug my chest, defeated. We march to the door together, surrounded by a blanket of snowfall that is white and pristine and deathly silent.

"Open it."

I reach out, hesitant, and twist the knob.

Without a word, he shoves me through the entryway and up against the couch. His groin presses against my ass, and I clench it, trying to put space between us.

"You weren't part of the plan. The better you behave, the easier this is going to be."

Does he want a response? Before I can decide, he lets go of my hair and spins me to face him. I rake him over with my eyes, desperate to know more about the man who holds me captive.

He's not what I expected-instead, he's masculine and gruff and appealing in the worst kind of way. Short-cropped dark hair is the first thing I notice. It highlights the light blue of his eyes; eyes that I'd stare into freely if they had been looking at me while we were on a date, or flirting at a club, or even hooking up at a party.

But instead, their lightness only intensifies the look of arrogance and dominance that he's giving me; I cower beneath them. Dark stubble rises to meet his sculpted cheekbones and I wonder what his plump, scowling lips would feel like if he were to press them against mine.

Ashamed of my thoughts, I look away.

"I know that look, sweetheart. I bet you'd be a good fuck, but that's not why I'm here."

Hot, angry redness floods my cheeks. "If I wanted a good fuck, I wouldn't get it from you."

From out of nowhere a hand explodes across my cheek, and I yelp in surprise. "You need a lesson in manners, darling. That's not the way you speak to a guest."

I raise my hands over my face, expecting his next blow. But it never comes. Instead, metal jingles in front me, followed by the unmistakable sound of a zipper. He yanks his belt out of his pants, and every nerve in my body tells me to rebel.

I lunge to the left, trying to skirt around his hip and to the front door.

He tuts. "If you want me to beat your ass with this belt,

that

is exactly how you go about doing it." He flicks it against the floor next to him. "Can you be a good girl?"

I stare at the floor, mute.

A strong hand on my shoulder pushes me down onto the couch. The belt hangs limp in his hand. I watch it warily.

"Deep and wet."

I make a questioning noise and watch as his free hand goes into his briefs.

"That's how you will suck my cock. "

"I won't."

Quicker than lightning, he raises the belt. "Tell me "no" one more time, sweetheart."

I cower, arms over my face, and a moment later warm, ugly wetness presses against my hands. Impatiently, he cracks the belt against the floor.

With self-loathing, I lower my arms but refuse to look at him. His cock presses insistently against my lips. Hesitantly, I flick the tip of my tongue against his warm skin.

He groans. "More."

I screw my eyes shut, refusing to acknowledge what I'm about to do. But it's no surprise when the wide, slippery head forces itself between my lips. Hesitantly, I open my mouth for him and he slides it in deep before I've even had a chance to get it wet.

He doesn't care. With careful strength, he grasps my hair and pulls my head back and forth against him, holding it still for a moment every time his cock is in me all the way. His rhythm is harsh as speeds up, maneuvering me like a rag doll.

His thrusts hurt my lips, but the grip in my hair is only as hard as it needs to be once I give up control and let him set the pace. As he thrusts harder, his grunts increase and I know his orgasm is close.

Before I can pull away, hard, rough fingers wrap themselves around the back of my neck and pushes my head all the way against his crotch, shoving his cock down my throat completely.

Surprised, I gag and try to pull myself away. His grip is tight and relentless; I can't breathe.

He pushes against my neck relentlessly, forcing his balls against my chin. I claw at his legs, but it's fruitless; he pushes himself forward, brutally fucking my throat as his orgasm hits.

Warm, sticky liquid coats my tongue as I sputter and whimper against him.

It feels like a lifetime before he releases me to breathe. I pull away, wiping saliva and his fluids off my mouth.

He leans backwards, assessing me with those critical blue eyes.

"I'm going to let go of your hair." His words are smooth, impersonal. "If you move, you will regret it."

I can't help but shiver. That must not count as moving though, because he lets go of his grip on my hair.

"I like you like this."

I refuse to look at him, but I can hear the smirk on his lips. "Like what?"

"Submissive. Quiet. Full of my cum."

His arrogance makes me angry. I glare at him, and realize he hasn't put his cock away yet. I try to keep my voice respectful, afraid of what else he might do to me. "Why are you here?"

"If I tell you that, I'll have to kill you." His eyes remain on me, cold and determined, as he tucks himself back into his briefs and zips up his jeans.

I can't tell if he's serious.

"What matters is I'm going to be here for a while." He kneels in front of me so we're eye to eye. I scoot back into the couch.

"I'm not here for you, sweetheart. But you seem to have a mouth on you, and as you can see, I tend to take my temper out physically. So sit tight, let me do what needs to be done, and keep your mouth shut. Got it?"

I nod, but I'm a liar and so is he. I've seen his face. He'll never let me leave here. And so- as I bob my head at him like a doggy on a dashboard-I begin to plan my escape.