by Holly Hart
The smudged letters read "Denver Veterinary College" and they’re followed by an address that’s no longer visible, probably as a result of the early spring rain. All around me, the Rocky Mountains are still capped with white, and judging by our experience for the last two years – the two happiest years of my life – they'll stay that way almost until June, when the hot summer sun finally overwhelms them for a brief period before the harsh winter sets in again. About two hundred yards in front of me, Jake’s playing in the long grass with a half dozen almost identical dogs.
"Hey, buddy," I call out, before jamming my fingers into my mouth and letting out a loud, ear piercing whistle, "time to go home!"
In the distance, I see Jake, my faithful old friend, leap to his feet and shake spring blossoms off of his fur. I let the hand carrying the mail drop to my leg, and almost absentmindedly give it a little stroke. Most of the time, the pain has completely disappeared; Katie puts it down to all the walking we do these days – up and down the mountains with these dogs. And probably a bit of carrying little Tommy around, too.
And hell, who am I to argue with her… I'm just some dumb grunt. Even now, sometimes I have to pinch myself to believe it's really true, and that I'm not just dreaming – she really did choose to marry me, out of all the hundreds of other guys who must've been chasing after her.
But out of all of them, she chose me.
I look up, ready to call Jake again – but as usual he's way ahead of me. He barks twice, the sharp sound echoing off the rocky outcroppings all around us, and the other five dogs snap to attention. It's almost, I think to myself in amusement, like they're soldiers.
"Good boy," I say under my breath, even though he's still hundreds of feet away from me. It’s done him a world of good getting out here into the wild, and it's the one thing I'll never be able to thank Katie for enough. I have no idea how she convinced the army to just give me a dog they spent fifty thousand dollars training! That girl, I tell you – she's smart. So smart that I know there's no way the envelope in my palm won't contain good news – good news she’s worked hard for, while giving birth to and then raising our son.
And yet, my mind still worries that it won't. After all, she followed me out here into the wild, into the Rocky Mountains, giving up her career as a nurse. Sure, she was as jaded and burnt out as I was – but still, all she ever wanted to do was help people. And if I somehow took that away from her, I don't know if I would ever be able to forgive myself, even though I know she’d forgive me in a heartbeat.
I turn, striding back up the road towards our cabin, and hear the dogs barking happily in the distance behind me. I don't need to worry that they won't follow me, Jake's got them whipped into shape, and I look up with pride as I walk past a hand carved, wooden sign that reads: "Carson Shelter for Working Dogs".
It’s our pride and joy, this shelter. It’s allowed us to ‘retire’ from the real world and heal ourselves – both of us. For me, it’s helped me forget the terror of combat, the fear of losing friends, and the grief that comes naturally with their deaths.
For Katie, well – she’s had it every bit as bad as me, if not more. After all, at least I once had training to deal with the kind of trauma a warzone brings. Katie? Not so much. She was on her way to burnout when I first met her, after months upon months of ceaselessly helping save some of the most badly injured men on the planet. And often, through no fault of her own, failing.
Katie and I lived up here in a trailer for months, building our cabin and all the outbuildings almost by hand, though I can't say we did it without help – as soon as that lady at the post office saw my mail from the Veteran’s Administration, not a day went by without someone turning out to give us a helping hand. And it wasn’t just the locals – after the nightly news somehow got ahold of some footage of Jake, for a couple of months donations flooded in! Easily enough to take care of us and help the dogs we’ve adopted.
The last twenty yards melts away in my excitement to reach Katie and stick the envelope into her hand. The short walk in the brisk, cool spring breeze has eliminated any concern that I might be the bearer of bad news. No way, no how – she's worked way too hard for anything to go wrong now.
"Katie?" I call out loudly as I reach the cabin, not knowing if she's inside or – as she often does – taken the truck down into town to pick up some supplies for the dogs. Not this time, though.
"Yes, honey?" I hear her reply, her tinkling, upbeat voice lifting my mood as it always does. "What's up?" she asks, appearing from behind the cabin just as I leap up the three stairs leading to our front door. I throw myself to a halt, spin around, and jump excitedly down onto the ground, ignoring the steps in the process and almost crushing one of the dogs, as all six of them are now gamboling merrily near my pretty wife, jumping up to steal a kiss.
"Hey!" I call out amusedly. "Get off her, Lily – that's my job!"
"Now, now, no need to be jealous," Katie chides me with a grin on her face. "I've got enough love to go around…"
I close the short distance between us and sweep her into a long, passionate kiss, closing my hands around her tiny waist that firmed up so quickly after giving birth, and pull her in towards me, feeling her soft cheeks graze against my short stubble.
"Sorry," I say hurriedly, "I meant to shave earlier… "
"No," she says smiling, raising her hand to my grizzled cheek, "I like it – makes you look like a mountain man."
"I am a mountain man," I reply, kicking myself almost before the words come out of my mouth. God, it's hard to believe that a woman this smart and pretty ever settled down with me! Every time I look at her, it's as though all conscious thought evaporates from my brain, only to be replaced by caveman-like babble. "I am a mountain man," I think to myself, replaying the moment in my mind – what an idiot!
"And I love you," Katie replies with a sweet smile on her face, completely unaware of the little internal monologue going on in my mind. "What's that in your hand? Anything interesting?"
Straight to the heart of the matter, as usual. Absentmindedly, I reply, "I love you, too," and I see her stand a little taller with happiness, a sight that fills my heart with joy. Wordlessly, I hold up the thick yellow envelope for her to look at.
All the blood drains from her face, and for a second I think I've made a terrible mistake. "Oh my God," she says, "that's not what I think it is, is it?"
I nod, the broad smile returning to my face. "Oh, I'm pretty sure it is – this feels too weighty and thick to be a bill," I say, "though – knowing the college, I wouldn't put it past them…" I finish up, throwing a joke in for good measure.
I thrust out the envelope towards her, waiting for her to take it off me, but it's like she's afraid, and I see this brave, smart woman almost shrinking away from my arm.
"Oh, come on," I say jovially, "surely you're not scared to open it? What's the worst that could happen?"
She fixes me with a stern glare before replying, and it's my turn to shrink away! "What's the worst that can happen?" she replies, mimicking me. "Are you serious? I've spent more than a year training up for this. Think about what it will mean for all our plans if I don't pass… How will we pay for all the things Tommy needs? Diapers aren’t cheap, you know!"
I see her clenching her fists, and a slight reddish hue on her face indicating that she's building up the moment too much in her head. "Seriously," I say, reaching out and putting my free hand reassuringly on her shoulder, "we've been through way bigger things together than some silly exam, haven't we?"
Katie looks up at me, finally meeting my gaze again, and nods. I see her relax, and she opens her mouth. "I'm sorry, I'm being silly – aren't I?"
"Hey, it's no bad thing to be worried, but seriously – worst case, you do it again. Does that really matter in the grand scheme of things? And seriously – do diapers really cost that much?"
"I," she begins, stuttering, "I guess not…"
"Good," I reply firmly, "now let's open this damn envelope!"<
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For a brief second after I hand it over, Katie's hands tremble over the paper, but as usual, she pulls some resolve out of thin air, and starts tearing into the paper sheath. Again, she hesitates before she pulls out the contents, but as quickly as she overcame her previous dalliance, she pushes through that small barrier as well, hungrily unfolding the folded white paper in front of me. I'm about to cry out, desperate to know what she's reading, but I hold back, biting my tongue – this is her moment, and I don't want to ruin it.
Katie lets the hand holding the papers drop to her side, and for a brief second just looks at me with an unreadable expression on her face.
"So…" I venture.
"So…" she says, rolling the word out on her tongue to extend my agony, "I did it!"
The words seem to take a long time for my brain to process, but when my mind finally catches up to my ears, I shout loudly in glee and lurch towards her, arms open. The dogs milling around us look at me like I've gone mad, but I've made a habit out of ignoring their judgment over the last couple of years, and it doesn't bother me in the slightest.
"You did it! I'm so happy for you, Katie," I say, well aware of the inadequacy of my words to express the depths of my joy for her success, but it doesn't seem to matter in the slightest, and she grabs me and clings to me as if she's about to collapse from exhaustion.
"I wasn't sure I was going to make it…"
Chapter Twenty Seven - Katie
It's like in one moment, every decision I've made over the last two years since meeting Mike has been validated. Sometimes I feel like after all he's been through, and after all we've been through together, that I need to bring more to the table – after all, he's the goddamn hero who saved my life!
I know it's not true, and Mike's way too good a guy to ever say something like that to me, or even think it – hell, if he even knew about these moments of doubt I have, he'd be shocked, because he's genuinely the best man I've ever known. And I know that bringing up a kid is no small job, but even so, after all this money I've been spending to get my veterinary degree, even though we aren't doing badly for cash, especially since the kidnapping insurance payment came through, and even though I've been able to do a smaller version of the degree, because a lot of the basic credits were already covered by my nursing license – even after all that, sometimes I feel like he's too good for me.
But seeing the words: "Congratulations on successfully completing your degree course at Denver Veterinary College…" immediately washes all those doubts away, and I can't help but squeal excitedly as I wrap my arms around Mike's broad back and press my head into the crook between his head and shoulder.
He leans in and whispers into my ear with his stubble deliciously grazing my skin, "You made it, honey."
I don't have to think either long or hard about my response. "No, we made it! No way I could have done it without you, any of it."
"Good of you to say," he whispers, and again I feel his stubble graze against my cheek and smell the manly scent of a hard day's work on his body. All of a sudden, every single hair on my head seems to stand on end, and I'm suddenly – uncomfortably – aware of how close both of our bodies are.
Sometimes, even up here in our pretty little cabin in the mountains, there's a time for candles, a nice hot bath, and a passionate session of gentle, soft lovemaking. I mean, sex like that's some of my favorite. But right now, that's not what I want – not nearly what I want.
I think there's something about Mike smelling like this, and maybe the feel of the breeze sweeping through my long hair, the scents of fresh spring blossom, wildflowers and cut grass intersecting with the rougher tinge on the air of the smoke from burning firewood – still necessary to take the wicked chill off the evenings at this time of year, but hell – I don't know. It could just be that after all this time, Mike still gets me as wet and excited as a new lover, perhaps even more so now than ever, now his body's hard and chiseled by our vigorous, active mountain life.
Or maybe, just maybe, it's because Mike's hard as a rock – and pressing his manhood against the top of my stomach.
"Oh, so you are happy for me – aren't you?" I ask with an amused grin on my face, raising my eyebrow cheekily. To Mike's credit, he goes bright red – I know he thinks that his, ahem, package is an unwanted guest, even though nothing could be further from the truth.
"Oh, sorry about that…" he tails off awkwardly, shuffling on one foot. I bite down on the inside of my lip, desperate not to grin and give him an out. But, try as hard as I might, my horniness gets the better of me and I can't help but lean in once again to catch another hint of that scent of hard work on his body. It's like a drug; it hooked me from the very first time I smelled it in Afghanistan, and it's got me now. If I have to be addicted to something, I think to myself wickedly, there are worse things than this…
"I don't want you to be sorry, Mike," I say, standing up on tiptoes and whispering into his ear in as sultry a tone of voice as I can manage. "I want you to fuck me…"
The look on Mike's face as the gears turn in his mind is almost comical – he goes from looking bright red and nervous to hungry and animalistic in almost a second. It's good to know, in moments like that, that he still desires me as much as he did the day we first met…
"You had me going there…" he whispers into my ear, squeezing his arms around my body hard, and in the process pressing his rock hard manhood into my stomach once again, so hard I can feel the heat pulsating off it, so close that I can almost feel his desire vibrating through my body.
I stifle a chuckle as he lifts me bodily of the floor and slings me over one shoulder. I remember the first time he did that, I kicked and punched at him until he threw me down, but as soon as his lips met mine on the bed, I stopped fighting and gave in to him completely. Now, I love it when he does it…
"Jake," he calls out loudly, and I feel the vibrations of his voice reverberating through my tiny body, "give us some time, will you?" The first time I heard Mike try that trick, I thought he'd lost the plot. But one of the good things about taking care of retired military dogs every day is that – without exception – they're damn well the best trained dogs you'll ever come across. If you tell them to run off and play, they'll do it – but without fail, they'll stay within ear shot, just in case they need to protect their master. Or mistress…
"Good," I giggle as they run off into the woods, "they shouldn't see what we're about to do. It might scar them for life. But don’t worry – Tommy’s down for a nap. I’ve got you all to myself…"
"I wouldn't go that far," Mike grunts beneath me as I hear the sound of his heavy boots climbing the stairs up to the front door of the cabin, and then the thud of his arm pushing the heavy oak door open, and the barest hint of the sound of well-oiled hinges opening. "I think I've got quite a nice ass, thank you very much…"
I giggle and reach down – his ass one of the only things I can reach in this odd position he's got me in, tossed backwards over one shoulder. I reach down and grab one of his muscular, toned cheeks lustily. "You do," I agree. And just like that, conversation time’s over.
Mike throws me down onto the soft, luxurious couch we had made by a local craftsman from down in the town, and the small fall briefly knocks the wind from my lungs, but before I can recover, he's on top of me, kissing every exposed part of my skin, his hands roaming across the rest of my body like he hasn't touched me for days. Not that that's anywhere close to the truth…
My skin feels like it's on fire, and it's like Mike's desperately trying to pat it down – only every single time he touches me, the sensation drives me wild, making me buck my hips in wild, desperate attempts to grind my pussy against his thick, muscular leg. Only, that's not what Mike's got planned – not at all.
He grabs my wrists roughly and forces them up above my head, and I pout, knowing exactly what's on his mind.
"Mike…" I whine desperately, "I want you – no, I need you – to fuck me right now, I mean it!"
He
breaks away from relentlessly roaming his hands across my body for a brief, torturous second and his smug, grinning face pops up right in front of my eyes. "I thought I was?" he says, knowing perfectly well what I want. It's infuriating! I look at him, and all I can see is that perfectly contoured jawline, the fact there's not an ounce of fat on him, and even the bead of sweat trickling down his cheek doesn't detract in the slightest from the fact that to me, this man is the very image of perfection. Even right now, when he's doing his very best to irritate me. No, that's not fair – he's trying his hardest to tease me, and it’s working – because regardless of the fact that I'm not sure if I've ever been this wet, the slit between my legs is actually on fire…