Chapter One
Caleb White tapped his fingers on the steering wheel as he waited for his brother to finish collecting their mail. He hated coming to town, but once every couple of months, they made the long trek from their cabin back to civilization. They had to buy food supplies for their pantry. In another three months they’d make the same damn trip but it would be to stock up for a lot longer as they were forecast to have a rough winter.
Damon was taking too damn long, and it was starting to piss him off. He nodded at the townsfolk and played the polite card, when in truth, he couldn’t give a shit about what people thought about him. The only reason he played along was so it made life easier.
Their parents had decided to live off the grid before they were born, and it had been the only life they knew. When their parents got killed in a bear attack, they’d been shipped off to the city to live with their estranged uncle.
Going from complete freedom to living within boundaries, and constantly being told what they were doing was fucking wrong, it had gotten tired real fast for him.
They’d done their time in the city, going to college, building a business, and finally, selling up, and returning back to their old life, which Caleb loved.
At forty years old, he’d finally found the life for him. His brother, being two years younger, felt the same way. The only problem? They were … lonely. It had been an unexpected variable. When they were kids, living off the grid was perfect. They never thought about women, too busy helping their father build and farm.
It didn’t take long after moving back home as adults to realize something was lacking. But they didn’t just want any woman.
It would have been easy to phone up an escort, meet her in town, and then go back to their life, but they didn’t want that.
They both wanted a woman to share, and who’d love to live their life with them outside of the parameters of society where they could make their own rules. What woman would want that life? He doubted they’d ever find the woman for them.
“Come on, Damon,” he said, starting to lose his patience.
Finally, his brother came out of the shop, carrying their letters with a huge smile on his face.
“Took you long enough,” Caleb said the moment he got in the truck.
“Stop your whining. If you’ve got an issue with how long I take, next time you go in, and stop fucking riding my ass.” Damon chuckled. “She was flirting with me, and so I was flirting back with Dana.”
“She’s married with three kids.”
“And I’m this strange guy from the wilderness. Give me a break, will you?” His brother sat back. “I heard they’re doing one of those self-discovery camping trip things again.”
Caleb cursed. “Why do they fucking bother?”
“It’s big money. A bunch of rich people pay to think they’re one with nature,” Damon said.
“Most of the time they end up lost and we’re the ones that have to find them, and I don’t want to be the one to have to deal with that.”
“At least they’re not doing it in the dead of winter this time. I nearly froze my dick off because of them last year,” Damon said and rubbed his crotch.
“We don’t have time for a bunch of people who are out of their depth. We’ve still got to finish canning the fruit.”
“Please, do not say canning while anyone can hear. I don’t want the guys in town to know that while they were chasing women, we were learning the dangers of canning the wrong way.”
Caleb burst out laughing. Even though they’d been with their uncle, he’d known he was going to go back to his parents’ way of life one day, and so he spent every available second learning what he could. He remembered a lot from when they were teens, but hadn’t paid attention to many of the important elements of survival.
“Maybe there’ll be a woman in this group, and we can, you know, lure her into our cave. Convince her that being around us is better than the whole world, make her fall in love, and we can have lots of sex and babies.”
Even though Damon tried to make a joke, Caleb still heard the yearning in his brother’s voice. They both wanted a woman together. To love, to cherish, and to fill her with their child.
They’d shared women in the past, and it felt right to the both of them to have a woman between them. They hadn’t found one worth keeping.
“We’ll find her, Damon,” he said.
“Yeah, we will.”
Each time they came to town, his brother lost a little more hope along the way. Caleb hadn’t lost hope yet. He did truly believe there was a woman out there who’d like to live their lifestyle.