Saved by the Montana Hero

by Vella Munn

  “Not so fast, all right,” Kolina called out. “I don’t want you getting lost.”

  “His nose will bring him back to us.”

  “I guess.”

  “And his belly.” He knows who’s been feeding him.

  “Yes.” The way she stared at the trees and steep slope on the right, he had no doubt she was trying to penetrate their surroundings. Maybe coming here this late in the day hadn’t been such a great idea. Being on the mountain in the middle of the day on a quad was very different from hiking after dark.

  “Did you hear about the wolf prints Echo found the other day?” she asked. “She thinks they’re pretty fresh.”

  “And three miles from the resort.”

  “Yes. The more I learn about wolves, the more I realize how complex they are. No way can anyone get inside their minds.”

  Vegetation had grown partway over the narrow footpath just ahead. He drew back so Kolina could go first. “Why do you want to?”

  “Because wolves will play a role in the center. I offered to help Echo decide what to include about them.”

  When he asked what else she’d been up to, she enthusiastically responded in detail. He was impressed by how much she’d learned about the area’s geological history and the role logging played. This was the vibrant woman he’d glimpsed before her shoulder complicated her life. No wonder she’d intrigued him. Maybe it was being in wolf territory, maybe it was wanting to hear the passion in her voice when she talked about the predators. Whatever the reason, he asked her to expand on what she was learning about them.

  “That reintroduction of wolves has turned out to be unbelievably complex.”

  Their arms brushed. He didn’t move away. Neither did she, which he took to mean she’d gotten beyond their disagreement.

  “Montana is different from most states because Canadian greys have always found their way into Glacier. In fact, greys deliberately taken from Alberta’s Jasper National Park and deposited in Yellowstone produced the first cubs officially born in Montana since the nineteen thirties.”

  “And the population has been expanding ever since, right?”

  “Exactly. Not everyone is crazy about that, especially ranchers and some hunters who are concerned about having to compete with wolves for game animals.”

  “It sounds as if striking a balance between wolf lovers and haters will be tricky. Are you going to make the material at the center is as nonpolitical as possible?”

  She rested her good hand on his shoulder. “Yes. The truth is, I’m having trouble keeping the romanticized version out of my first draft.”

  Her touch was making thinking difficult. “Romanticized?”

  “Yeah. For example, I’ve been asking myself what was it like for the first female wolf to give birth in Montana in decades. Did she have any sense that she was part of history?

  Thoughts of what the pioneering wolf and her mate had had to do to keep their pups fed prompted him to look around. If he was a wolf, where would he look for a den? Shadow had returned and was whining, probably trying to convince them to pick up the pace.

  “You’re faster than we are,” he told the dog. “You’ll just have to get used to it.”

  “This research I’m doing is so much fun,” Kolina said. If she realized how much of an impact her touch had made on him, she gave no indication. She was an enigma, a fascinating one.

  The sun was reaching the horizon. However, even with watching where he was going and keeping up his end of the conversation, he felt content—and acutely aware of her. What was the saying, jumping someone’s bones? He’d do that to her in a heartbeat.

  Maybe it was time to let her know.

  To challenge himself.

  “I’m intrigued by all the wildlife here,” she continued. “I think about all the places I’ve lived and all the miles I covered as a trucker. None of them made the impact on me that Lake Serene has.”

  Concentrate on what she’s saying. Be part of the conversation. Look beneath the surface of her words and see if you really want to go there.

  “Some of that’s probably because you couldn’t check out an area while you were behind the wheel.”

  Initially he hadn’t wanted to leave Billings because it represented familiarity and roots but now he seldom thought about it. Kolina would probably experience the same once she was settled in Kalispell. Maybe she’d find learning about what planning departments did as interesting as what she’d been doing. She had that kind of curiosity about the world. As for whether he should try to stay in contact with her after she was no longer living here—he both wanted to and needed to explore more of this thing called freedom. By himself. “It was all about getting miles under your belt so you’d be paid wasn’t it?”

  “To some extent. Shadow, wait up. Oops, you don’t want me to say that.”

  “That’s not what I—relax. It’s going to be all right.”

  “I hope so,” she muttered.

  “It will be. What was trucking like?”

  “Hard on my spine. I didn’t care that much about the money. Brian went over every accounting, but as long as we could pay the bills, I didn’t obsess over finances.” She shook her head. “He couldn’t understand why my approach was so casual. I couldn’t understand why he felt the need to count every penny.”

  Even though he didn’t want to hear about Kolina’s relationship with Brian, he said something about many couples having different approaches where money was concerned.

  “Tell me about it. And as my vehicle and I’ve gotten older, having money in the bank has become more important.” She whistled and Shadow reappeared. “Fortunately we agreed about a lot of things.”

  No wonder she’d been devastated when Brian was killed.

  “He would have liked Lake Serene,” she said. “Especially the fishing.”

  I don’t care about him. How about we talk about bones jumping? “Brian enjoyed fishing?”

  “Oh, yes. He really loved going after salmon. Once—this was before he and I met—he was river fishing when the motor cut out. The boat ran into boulders and flipped over. He said that was the closest he’d come to dying.”

  Until he actually did. “What happened to the boat?”

  “I’m not sure. I don’t think I asked.” She indicated the deeply shadowed drop-off ahead and to their left. “Now there’s the ultimate ski run.”

  “For the reckless.”

  “True,” she said. “Do you think it’s going to get down to freezing? It feels like it. Brian believed life should be lived to the fullest. He’d traveled to every state, even hiked through part of Europe. He worked road construction in Canada for a couple of years. That’s probably the longest time he spent in one place.”

  I envy him. “And you had no objections to signing on with his lifestyle? He was quite a bit older than you.”

  She stopped and faced him. The rapidly approaching night muted her expression, but he didn’t need to see it to know he’d hit a nerve. It wasn’t the first time that had happened tonight. “He had nearly twenty years on me, but I was a lot like him. I wasn’t interested in settling down.”

  “I get that.” But twenty years? “What if he’d said he wanted to go to Kansas and your heart was set on Texas, which of you would have won the argument?”

  “Kansas and Texas never came up for discussion.”

  “I figured it probably hadn’t. I was using them as examples.”

  “I know you were.”

  “Back to my question, if you don’t mind, who usually had the final word?”

  She ran her left hand through her hair. “He did.”

  “Really? Didn’t your wishes matter to him?”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Kolina had stepped away from Terron before it registered that she was going to. Moments ago she’d been about to suggest they head back. Now she didn’t care. Darn Terron. He had her off balance.

  “What I wanted to do mattered to me. I don’t appreciate you insinuating I didn�
�t stand up for myself.”

  “It wasn’t an insinuation. I was just asking.”

  Had that been his intention? Maybe she’d overreacted. “Brian had a lot more life experience, but I wasn’t a child.”

  “No, you weren’t. You’d experienced more than most people your age, a lot of it on your own. Hopefully Brian gave you credit for that experience. I’m thinking he must have or you wouldn’t have stayed with him.”

  He was right. Brian had respected her. More importantly right now, there was no shaking off the impact Terron had made on her in a short time. He wasn’t everywhere she turned, wasn’t involved in everything she did, and yet he’d influenced her in ways she didn’t fully understand and wasn’t sure she was ready for. He was more than a friend, less than a lover, something she’d never encountered.

  “I didn’t know the first thing about walking around Europe or repairing roads in Canada or spending two weeks in the nation’s capital,” she said. “Brian had done those things and more so of course I often followed his lead.”

  “Did you want to be a trucker?”

  Night would be here before long, a blanketing, isolating, and comforting force. She let it and Mount Lynx embrace her.

  “Not really. It wasn’t that big rigs intimidated me. I felt powerful knowing I could make them do what I wanted them to.” A memory of settling herself behind a massive steering wheel and wrapping her fingers around it briefly took her from where she was. “What got to me was having to share the road with idiots. The close calls—there were more of those than I want to think about.”

  “The weather must have factored in sometimes.”

  She’d been near the Washington coast one January night when a rainstorm became a nightmare. Devil winds had buffeted the trailer with such force she’d barely been able to keep it on the road. The windshield wipers had been useless. Brian had been in another tractor-trailer ahead of her. She hadn’t been sure whether she was still following his lights or had confused his with another rig and had felt trapped by something of hell’s making. The longer the storm had raged, the harder it had became to remain in reality. By the time she’d pulled over, she’d no longer known where she was or cared why she was doing this for a living.

  The only thing she’d been certain of was that she’d lose her mind and maybe her life if she kept going that night.

  “The weather,” she repeated. “Yes, occasionally it made things hard.”

  “At least Brian was there.”

  Yes and no because she’d been determined to prove herself to him. If she showed no weakness he’d continue to respect and admire her.

  Not leave her.

  “Are you trying to make a point?”

  “Not really. I think I’m trying to remind myself that you weren’t alone on all those highways.”

  “Not all but some.”

  His response, if that was what he’d intended it to be, was to stop and reach for her. She’d felt more levelheaded when there was distance between them but that didn’t stop her from letting him draw her into his embrace. Then she was against him with his warmth seeping into her pores.

  “You constantly amaze me,” he muttered. “Makes me want to get to know you better.”

  Between Terron’s declaration and his body all around hers like a living, breathing blanket, she couldn’t think of anything to say. She was starting to get chilled, but it didn’t matter. She barely felt the ache in her shoulder. Mount Lynx couldn’t claim her, not with this forthright man standing between her and the world. She couldn’t care less about the sperm donor as she sometimes called the illusive man who was her father.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I had no right dumping that on you.”

  “No, that’s all right. I just didn’t expect it.” She swallowed but couldn’t make her voice stronger. “Thank you for saying what you did. I just always took being responsible for myself for granted.”

  Terron didn’t respond. She didn’t ask what he was thinking since telling herself she understood was easier. He didn’t feel sorry for her, nothing like that. He was simply being honest, being here. She should get out the flashlight but that would have to wait until she didn’t need Terron’s warmth as much as she did right now.

  Until she understood how she felt about that need.

  “Your and my upbringings were so different,” he said at length. He still held her close. “Family shaped me in fundamental ways while—please don’t take this wrong—the lack of parental support played a large role in fashioning the woman you became. You’re self-contained, which is what I believe women need to be these days, but I wish you’d had a male influence while you were growing up.”

  “There were men in my mother’s life. They just didn’t stick around.”

  “Why not? Do you know?”

  “I think so. Mom hated anyone reining her in.”

  “Not even her daughter.”

  “I was a child,” she whispered from the safety and challenge he provided. She’d already admitted a great deal, didn’t know how to stop and pull a protective shield around herself. “I wasn’t in a position to tell her what to or not do.”

  “But you did.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The fact that she had a child she had to be responsible for changed her plans or lack of for her life.”

  She knew that. She just didn’t want to talk about that tonight and in this way, with Terron. Their relationship was becoming more complex with every moment, word, and touch. In a way, she was replaying the wild ride she’d been on during that stormy night on the Washington coast. There was no getting out of it, nothing to do but experience every moment to the fullest. Survive. Learn. Grow.

  “She adapted,” he continued after a short silence. “You told me she loved you and judging by your compassionate nature, I believe it, but she wasn’t parental material, was she?”

  “No.” She’d spent years trying to deny her mother’s failings but no longer needed to. “She wasn’t. She said I was the best thing that had ever happened to her, but…”

  “Say it.” He touched his mouth to her forehead. “Don’t hold back.”

  Get it done. Be honest with yourself and him. “What she felt for her only child wasn’t strong enough to put that child first. I think that bothered her but there wasn’t much she could do about it.”

  “That’s sad.”

  “She, uh, I have a letter she sent me when I was in high school and on my own saying she’d done me a favor by acknowledging her failings and setting me free. If she hadn’t I would have hated her.”

  “Ah, honey, you deserve better.”

  Honey? The word was a gift, something precious and fragile. A reward for everything she’d told him. “Water under the bridge,” she managed to say before her throat closed down.

  His chest rose and fell. She matched her breathing to his. Felt him throughout her. Lost a bit of herself. “Maybe. Maybe not,” he said. “One thing, you can’t change your mother. I’m proud of you for accepting her as she is.”

  What choice did I have? “Thank you.”

  When he didn’t immediately reply, she wondered if they would have been so honest if they’d been anywhere else.

  “It sounds as if you did better than I did,” he said.

  “In what way?”

  “Accepting that my mother was dying took a long time. Before I got to that point, there was a lot of denial on my part.”

  What messes they were, two imperfect people grabbing a few minutes together with not enough regard to whether there might be backlash or regret.

  Thinking to protect herself a little, she pulled out of his embrace and engaged the flashlight. She kept the illumination away from her features so he couldn’t see the naked emotion there. She granted him the same respect, opting for trying to orient herself. When it didn’t immediately happen, she tightened her hold on the light.

  “Where’s the moon?” Her voice was higher than she wanted it to be. “Isn’t it
nearly full?”

  He took hold of her wrist and directed the beam to her left where a ribbon of bare ground waited. “It’ll be out before long. I think we should go back.”

  Yes! “I promised Alisha I’d be at her office before noon tomorrow. She’s been working on a list of apartments that are for rent.”

  “Yeah, well…”

  She steeled herself for whatever he’d been about to say, but he didn’t finish. Neither did he again suggest they get moving. She replayed everything she’d revealed to him. Going to Kalispell for the week should allow her time to get her equilibrium back. Admitting how hard it would be to get beyond the feel of his body against hers would remain her secret.

  He’d caught her at a vulnerable time that was all. It wasn’t as if she was falling in love with him. Once her shoulder had healed, she was assured of a paycheck, and had settled into wherever she wound up living, she’d be able to put him into perspective.

  Get over whatever he’d done to her.

  “Shadow,” Terron called out. “Time to head out of here.”

  How could she have forgotten the dog? How long had it been since she’d seen him? Uneasy, she called his name. Seconds passed, then minutes. Night arrived.

  Between Terron and her, they must have called Shadow’s name twenty times before they stopped and stared at each other. She kept trying to convince herself Shadow was familiar with the area, but he wouldn’t be here tonight if she hadn’t brought him. Maybe he’d never been on this trail with a drop-off on one side and a cliff on the other and who knew what ahead of them.

  “I’m sorry.” She spoke in a sing-song. Cold sweat filmed her skin. “I’m a bad dog mother. Please forgive me. I swear I’ll get better. Just don’t give up on me.”

  Terron took the light from her and started up the trail.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  “Stay here. He’s probably just ahead pretending he can’t hear us because what his nose is telling him is more interesting.”