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  “I’m sure you do. We’ll take you home, honey. Where do you live? Do you know which direction to go?” he asked.

  She just stared at him, and a lone tear escaped her eye. “No. He kept taking different paths in the woods. I don’t know where to go to get there.”

  “Aw, honey. Don’t cry,” Garrett said. “Let’s get you to our place and you can rest. Then we’ll see if we can figure out where your place is.”

  Jeremy stood and held out his hand to her. She looked at it then put her hand in his and let him help her up. She had a rocking-hot body despite the shape she was in. She was curvy and round in all the right places. Even in need of a bath and a good night’s sleep, she looked great.

  “Would you like something to drink, Mandy?” Garrett asked.

  She smiled. “No thanks.”

  “Let’s get going then. It’s a few hours away,” Jeremy said.

  Jeremy watched Amanda closely as they walked toward their place for any sign she needed to stop. He didn’t want to push her too hard. She’d already been pushed far enough as it was. When he saw her falter an hour into their walk, he called a halt and helped her sit on a fallen log and handed her his water to drink from. Then he handed her some dried berries and nuts to eat.

  “Thanks.” She handed the water back to him.

  “How are your feet and legs holding up?” he asked.

  “I’m okay. Just a little sore, but I’ll be fine,” she insisted.

  “Be sure to let us know if you need to rest again. We don’t want to overdo it, Mandy,” he said.

  She smiled at him. It was obvious she liked the nickname they’d given her. He liked that. Liked that she could smile for them. Her smile was like a ray of sunshine on a bleary day.

  “Thanks for saving me. I never did say thank you,” she said.

  “No need. It was obvious that you didn’t want to be with him. No one should be a captive of another human being,” Jeremy said.

  She just nodded and continued chewing on her snack. When she’d finished, she stood and flexed her legs a few times. “I’m ready to get started again when you guys are.”

  Garrett nodded and started walking. Jeremy walked behind Mandy this time and enjoyed the view of her sweet backside as it twitched back and forth with her walking. He could look at that all day long and not get tired of it. His cock hardened at the sight and made it uncomfortable for him to walk, but he adjusted it so that he was able to move without too much discomfort.

  Yeah, she was one hell of a good-looking woman. They needed to ask how old she was. If she wasn’t old enough, he needed to get his lust under control. He wasn’t going to rob the cradle, no matter how good looking she might be.

  Please God let her be over eighteen.

  He really wanted her to be over twenty, but he’d settle for nineteen or twenty. Then again, she might not be interested in them in the first place. They didn’t force women. If she wasn’t interested, she wasn’t interested, and they would move on. First things first. She wanted to go home so they would have to try to find her home if they could. Then, if not, they’d have to see what she wanted to do after that.

  The moment they walked into the clearing that was their homeplace, Jeremy felt a sense of relief. He always did when they returned home after being gone for any length of time. They’d been gone for four days this time, trading with some of the guys just to the north of them for some of their fruits. They didn’t have fruits here, so they got dried fruits from them. Two of the men had new wives, with one of them having had a baby and the other having one on the way. He couldn’t help but feel a tad bit jealous.

  “This is our place. Let’s get you settled in. We’ve got solar panels so you can have a hot bath if you like,” Jeremy told her.

  “That would be great. My sisters have hot baths. I’m so jealous of them,” she said.

  “So, you don’t live with your sisters?” Garrett asked.

  “No, they’ve got their men now. I still live at home with the Johnsons. They don’t have solar panels, so we have to heat up water for a bath in the winter and take cool ones in the summer,” she said.

  “How far from your sisters do you live?” Garrett asked.

  “About a four- or five-hour walk I think. Not too far,” she said.

  “That’s not too far. You can visit them occasionally,” Jeremy said.

  “I still miss them. We hadn’t been separated at all until they moved out.”

  “I’m sure it’s hard,” Jeremy said.

  “Let’s get you inside.” Garrett ushered her inside the house once he’d unlocked the door.

  Jeremy didn’t see any sign that anyone had messed with the place while they’d been gone. He began unloading their packs while Garrett escorted Mandy through the house and showed her to the bathroom, which was rigged with the hot water heater that produced the hot water from the solar panels.

  When Garrett returned, Jeremy stopped putting away the dried fruit and supplies. The other man looked ready to burst.

  “What?” he asked.

  “She’s perfect. Did you see how pretty her hair is and those eyes? They look like a summer sky after a heavy rain,” Garrett said.

  “What, you’re a poet now?” Jeremy asked.

  “Fuck you. Tell me you don’t think she’s perfect.”

  “I agree. Love how soft she is. Has all the right curves in all the right spots, and she’s sweet. But she wants to go home, Garrett. We’ve got to at least try to get her home,” Jeremy said.

  “I know. She might still want to see us if we take her home.”

  “More than likely she lives a couple of days away from us. There’s no ‘seeing’ her like she’s just down the street, man. This isn’t twenty-nineteen. Either she wants to be with us or she doesn’t. There’s no in between these days,” Jeremy said.

  “I know.”

  “Any idea how old she is?”

  “I started to ask then chickened out.”

  “Fuck.”

  “I’ll ask her when she gets out of the shower,” Garrett said. “Oh, I gave her a pair of my sweats to wear since I’m a little shorter than you.”

  “Things will still swallow her.”

  “Let’s hope she can’t figure out how to get home. I want her to stay,” Garrett said.

  “I want her to be happy about staying, so I’m not so sure that’s a good thing to wish for, man.” Jeremy didn’t want her to feel defeated.

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

  “Let’s just hope we can make a good impression on her so that if she does figure out the way to go home, she still wants to be with us in the end,” Jeremy said.

  “I agree with that. We turn this into her new home.”

  * * * *

  Amanda stepped out of the shower and dried off with the rough towel. The shower had been amazing. Nothing had felt that good in ages. She pulled on the overly large warm-ups and had to turn the waistline down several times until she could keep them up and rolled the pant legs up so she didn’t trip over them.

  Once she was as presentable as possible, she carried her dirty clothes downstairs and found the men in the den talking. She stopped just inside the doorway and waited for them to see her.

  “Hey there, Mandy. Come on in and have a seat,” Jeremy said.

  “Um, where can I put my dirty clothes to wash? Do you have a washroom or something? I’ll need to do that tonight so I can put them back on tomorrow,” she said.

  “I’ll show you how to work the washer later,” Garrett said.

  “You have a working washing machine?” she asked with wide eyes.

  “Yep, sure do,” Garrett said.

  “Have a seat and rest. We’re just talking about where you might have come from,” What is the name of the family you lived with? Jeremy asked.

  “They were the Johnsons.”

  “Don’t recognize that name. Must not have traded with them or I’d have remembered them. Course, someone as pretty as you would have rememb
ered, as well,” Jeremy said.

  Amanda felt heat warm her cheeks at his not-so-subtle hint that he found her attractive. She wasn’t used to compliments like that.

  “I wish I could remember the way better. He followed a path that wasn’t very well kept, but he turned off of one path to another twice, so I’m not sure exactly how to get back. Do you know all the pathways in that area of the woods?” she asked hopefully.

  “Not really. We use one main path that crosses the one you were on. That’s how we found you. We go to trade with the guys we know up north aways twice a year. Takes us a good week to travel there and back,” Jeremy said.

  “You’ve never come across the Johnsons either, or I would have remembered you. No one really ever stopped there except Jessup and Evers. They showed up when they were on their way back from trading,” she said.

  “Wait,” Jeremy said. “Did you say Jessup and Evers?”

  “Yes. Do you know them?” she asked.

  “They are some of the men we trade with every year. We just got back from trading with them when we stumbled over you,” Garrett said. “What the fuck? Is that coincidence or what?”

  “So, their woman is your sister?” Jeremy asked.

  “Right. Holly is my sister.”

  “So, does that mean that you have another sister with Ty and Jeff? We trade with them, as well, and they have a new woman, Lucille.”

  “Yes! That’s my other sister. You know them, too! Then you know my whole family. I can’t believe it. This is great. I can go home then. If you can get me to one of their houses, they can get me home,” she said, clapping her hands together.

  “Mandy, we’d love to take you to one of their places, but that’s a good three days’ travel, maybe four with you, and it’s going to snow soon. Even if we make it there, we wouldn’t be able to make it back to our place, and you wouldn’t be able to make it to your folks’ place until the snow melted.” Jeremy shook his head.

  “But I can’t stay here,” she said.

  “You’re welcome here,” Garrett said.

  “Are you sure it’s going to snow? I mean it’s not even all that cold yet,” Amanda said.

  “It’s going to be cold come morning. The wind has already picked up. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s not freezing when we get up in the morning. I’m sorry, honey. If you’d been sure of where your home was, and it wasn’t but a day or two away, I’d have been willing to risk it, but if we’re talking about three or four days, we just can’t do it,” Jeremy said.

  “What am I going to do?” Amanda asked.

  “There’s plenty to do around here to keep you busy if you’re interested. Do you like to sew? Got an entire room upstairs of sewing crap from the previous owners. Didn’t know what to do with it and didn’t bother throwing it out,” Jeremy said.

  “I suppose I can do some of that. Won’t I be in the way?” she asked.

  “No. You’re not in the way. It will be great having someone to talk to besides each other. We get tired of hearing the same old things all the time. It will be good to have you to talk to. Only hard thing will be that we don’t have a cow or chickens, so no milk or eggs. Never got around to getting them. If you’re going to be here, we might need to think about getting some,” Garrett said.

  “Oh, but I’m only going to be here for a little while,” she said.

  “Yeah, that’s right,” he said and looked away.

  “Still wouldn’t hurt to have them. Would be nice to have eggs for breakfast sometimes,” Garrett said.

  “Means one of us has to stay and take care of them when the other goes to trade,” Jeremy said.

  “True,” the other man said.

  “Where would you get them?” Amanda asked.

  “There’s a man and his wife who live about two hours south of us who have them. We’ve talked about getting some before but always ruled it out for that very reason. Might walk down there tomorrow and get some if it’s not snowing yet,” Jeremy said.

  “You got somewhere to put them?” Amanda asked.

  “Yep, previous owners had them. In fact, they had fancy chickens because they have a fancy chicken house that’s more for looks than anything else. You’ll have to look at it tomorrow. It’s getting dark out there now. The barn is set up for a cow just fine. We’ll have to leave the cow out in the pen to eat and bring her in to milk her every morning.” Garrett stood and stretched. “I’m going to fix something to eat. I’ll call you when it’s ready.”

  “I wish it wasn’t going to snow. I really miss my sisters. I haven’t seen them in months. I have a little niece and I’m going to have another little niece or nephew soon. I can’t believe I’m an aunt,” Amanda said.

  “That little girl is a cutie. I saw her when we were trading with them. They dote on her and your sister. You can tell that she and the baby are the most important people in their lives,” Jeremy said.

  “I know. They are so good to Holly. I’ve never seen her so happy. I was worried at first with there being two of them, you know? But it seems to work.”

  “You’re the youngest of the three of you, right?” Jeremy asked.

  “Yeah. I’m twenty-one. I’ll be twenty-two in two months,” she said.

  “Good. I mean happy early birthday,” he said.

  “Haven’t much celebrated our birthdays in a long time. Too much other stuff to do to take time to do that. I bet we celebrate those little babies’ birthdays though.” She sighed.

  “Do you ever think about settling down with your own men, Mandy?” Jeremy asked.

  Chapter Three

  Amanda blinked slowly. Settle down with her own men? Had he just asked her that? Well, yeah, sort of. She hadn’t thought about two men, but a man. Sure. But two men? No. That hadn’t really crossed her mind until now.

  “I’ve thought about getting married someday, but that was years ago. Now I mostly think about getting through the day ahead. I guess I hadn’t thought much about the future.”

  “Guess that’s what most of us think about. Don’t you ever get lonely sometimes? Especially since your sisters are out on their own now?” he asked.

  “Well, yeah, I guess. I have wished I was nearer to them. We’ve never been apart like this before,” Amanda said.

  “Garrett and I have been wanting a woman of our own for some time now. We get lonely out here all alone. We’d treat her good and make sure she had everything we could possibly provide for her. Finding a good woman isn’t easy to do though. There are so few of them available,” Jeremy said.

  Amanda nodded then realized he was serious and in a roundabout way asking her if she were interested in becoming their woman. Asking. Her. She swallowed. What could she say?

  “I—I don’t know what to say, Jeremy. I just met you two. How do you even know if you really like me or not? What if after a few weeks you can’t stand to be around me?”

  “I doubt that. You’re sweet. I think we’d have figured that out after the first few hours out walking. You never complained and were strong and determined to make it. If anything, we admired you, honey,” he said.

  “What about my family?” she asked.

  “We’ll still take you to see them. I understand that you want to see them. If we had any, we’d want to see them, too, but we don’t have any alive that we know of. Of course, you can go see them,” Jeremy said.

  “I need to think about this. I mean I really never thought about me being with two men. I had to get used to the idea of my sisters with two men. I suppose I should have thought about me with two, but I honestly didn’t consider it,” she said.

  “Just think about it, Mandy. We’ve got time.”

  Garrett walked into the room carrying a tray with plates of meat. He deposited the meat on the table then returned to the kitchen to bring in plates and silverware along with a bowl of beans.

  “Nothing fancy, just meat and beans. Dig in,” he said.

  Once they’d finished eating, Jeremy showed her how to use the washing ma
chine, and then she hung her clothes over a chair in front of the fireplace to dry. When it was time to go to bed, she was surprised to find that they planned for her to sleep with them.

  “Absolutely not,” she said, crossing her arms.

  “It’s the only way, Mandy.

  “Why?”

  “It’s going to get cold tonight and because it’s the only way we can ensure your safety,” Jeremy said. “Look. We’re all going to be wearing clothes. It’s too cold not to.”

  “I’ve never slept with anyone other than my sisters. Since they’ve been gone, I’ve slept alone in the same room with my foster brothers. I don’t like this,” she said.

  “I know, but it’s the only way, honey. Nothing is going to happen. We’re just going to sleep. Neither one of us would ever force ourselves on you. I promise,” Garrett said.

  Amanda finally gave in and climbed into the bed wearing the warm-ups she still had on. They were right, and it was already cold. She snuggled under the covers and felt the bed dip as both men climbed in on either side of her. She expected them to cram in close to her, but to her surprise, they stayed on their sides of the bed. She finally relaxed and soon drifted off to sleep.

  * * * *

  The next morning Amanda woke before the sun had even broken the horizon to find both men firmly fixed at her sides. She felt like the hotdog in the center of a bun. Not only was she warm and toasty, but she was completely wrapped up between the two men. While Jeremy snored lightly into her ear, Garrett’s breath tickled the top of her head. How had they gotten so twisted up together like this?

  She needed to use the bathroom and wanted out of the pretzel sandwich they’d managed to get them into. She started to move her legs, only to find them firmly held in place by their legs. She was almost sure her knees were in precarious positions. Well, it would serve them right if she bumped them in the wrong place by accident.

  Amanda squirmed between them in hopes it would wake them up so that she could get free of them. Jeremy groaned and pulled her tighter into his grasp. Garrett mumbled something and settled his chin on her head.