High Country Hero

by Ford, Holly

  Her phone buzzed. With a grimace, she retrieved it from the folds of the duvet and looked at the text. It was Benji.

  Got two tickets to Herrick races Sunday. Want to come?

  Fuck it. Why not?

  Sure, she texted back. Do I need a hat?

  The phone buzzed again. Beanie maybe. Pick you up on my way through. Eleven okay?

  Perfect. Will rug up.

  Lennie glanced out at the falling dusk. ‘Speaking of which,’ she told Pesh, ‘come on, up you get. We’d better go take care of your new BFF before it gets much colder.’

  In the porch, she pulled on her jacket and gumboots. Pesh was already at the paddock gate. Seeing the dog, Alice pottered over to the fence, watching greedily while Lennie measured out the evening ration of deer nuts. As Lennie crossed the lawn with the bucket, she took another look at the fading sky. It was clear, the first stars already starting to show. They were in for another frost tonight.

  First through the gate, Pesh patrolled the paddock, checking out suspicious shadows under the trees as Alice tried to bury her head in the feed bucket.

  ‘Just wait,’ Lennie admonished, tipping the nuts into the feeder.

  Having given the old deer a rub, she headed back to the gate. Opening it, Lennie looked back for Pesh. ‘Come on.’

  Pesh just looked at her, ears up, not budging from the spot she’d taken up beside Alice’s feeder.

  ‘Oh, alright,’ Lennie said. ‘But you’re not staying with her all night. Bark when you want me to let you out.’ She shut the gate behind her.

  The kitchen windows were completely dark and Lennie was halfway through her turn to cook dinner when she finally did hear Pesh. But the dog was at the door, not in the paddock. Opening it, Lennie stared down at her. ‘How did you get here?’

  ‘She jumped the fence?’ Jim looked over from his chair in front of the TV.

  ‘I guess she did,’ Lennie said. ‘That or went through it somehow.’

  ‘I thought you said she didn’t challenge fences.’

  ‘She never has before.’

  He frowned. ‘We’re going to have a big problem on our hands if she starts jumping the side gate as well.’

  ‘No,’ Lennie said. ‘She’s just been looking after Alice, that’s all. Pesh would never wander.’

  ‘I hope you’re right.’ He gave Lennie a serious look. ‘You know some of the neighbours might not stop to ask questions if they see a stray dog near their stock.’

  ‘I know,’ she said, pushing the thought away fast. ‘That’s not going to happen.’ Lennie was as sure of that as she was of the sun coming up in the morning. ‘It’s her job to guard the stock we’ve got here. There’s no way she’ll leave her post.’

  •

  Manning the clinic the next morning, Lennie found herself with plenty of time on her hands to enjoy her Hard Yard flat white. Sitting out with Krystal on the bench behind the recovery room, the mild autumn sun on their faces, Lennie studied the Kimpton Ranges up ahead. The snow on the mountains had lowered overnight, and with a sharp white crisping of frost on the hills below, the view seemed particularly spectacular today.

  Over by the fence on the far side of the neatly mown horse paddock in front of her, Pesh was exchanging news with the Wilsons’ cat. All the crates in the recovery room behind Lennie were empty—not a single creature in the Kimpton Valley was relying on her help this morning. She leaned back against the wall, relishing the feeling. The easy life had to get old at some point. Didn’t it? One drama a week instead of ten a day? Realising said drama per week was now overdue, Lennie hurriedly tapped the wood beside her. She was going to need a challenge soon, she knew that. But not right now.

  ‘Pretty quiet for a Saturday, huh?’ Krystal said, stretching out her legs in the sun. It being the weekend, Krystal was working reception as well, but so far the phone had barely rung. ‘Looks like we’ll actually get to go home on time today.’

  ‘Shhh,’ Lennie said quickly. ‘Don’t you dare jinx it. We’ll get an emergency in at ten to twelve and be stuck in surgery till four-thirty.’

  Right on cue, her mobile started to ring. ‘Shit.’ Fumbling it out from the pocket of her scrubs, she glanced at the unfamiliar local number. It must be bad if they were ringing her direct. ‘Lennie O’Donnell.’

  ‘Hey.’ Lennie felt her chest tighten as she recognised the voice in her ear. ‘It’s Mitch.’

  ‘Hi,’ she said slowly.

  ‘Nate told me you called yesterday,’ he said, his voice as thoughtful, as calm, as ever.

  ‘Yeah,’ Lennie said. ‘Yeah, I…I did.’ She didn’t even want to know what else Nate had said.

  ‘I was away for a couple of days.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Shifting on the bench seat, Lennie cast a furtive glance at Krystal beside her, who was busily pretending not to listen. ‘He told me.’

  ‘Look,’ Mitch said, ‘I know you said you’re working today, but I was thinking…What about tomorrow? The forecast’s good. We could fly up to the tops.’

  Shit, shit, shit.

  ‘I can’t,’ Lennie said. ‘I mean, I’d like that. But I can’t tomorrow. There’s a…a thing I have to do.’

  ‘Right,’ Mitch said.

  ‘Another time?’ Any other bloody time, in fact.

  ‘Yeah.’ There was a moment’s silence on the other end of the line. ‘Look,’ Mitch said, ‘the thing is…Can we talk? Some time soon? There’s something I…Something I need some help with.’

  Lennie shot a look at Krystal again. ‘I’m not doing anything tonight.’

  Another pause. ‘Would it be okay if I came over?’

  ‘Yes.’ Lennie closed her eyes. ‘Yes, that would be okay.’

  As she ended the call, Krystal gave her a grin. ‘Benji, huh? You guys make such a cute couple.’

  Thirteen

  ‘Ian and Pam rang,’ Jim informed Lennie when she got home. ‘They’ve invited us over for dinner tonight. I said I wasn’t sure what you were doing.’

  She turned away to hang up her jacket, hoping to hide her relief in the process. ‘You go,’ she told him nonchalantly. ‘I might just stay home tonight. Get a few bits and pieces done.’

  ‘Mental health night, eh? Fair enough.’ Jim nodded, reaching for the phone. ‘I’ll let them know.’

  Walking through to the hall, Lennie let out her breath. Well, that was going to make things a lot more comfortable this evening. If she was having more success explaining to herself why Mitch was driving two hours to see her tonight, she might have had a crack at explaining it to her grandfather as well, but as it was, she was glad to skip what had been almost certain to turn into another lecture.

  ‘Dak?’ Jim called up the stairs a few hours later. ‘I’m off. I’ve fed Alice.’

  ‘Have fun,’ Lennie called back.

  From her window, she could just make out Alice’s shape in the grass under the trees. Snowy-white Pesh, snuggled up at Alice’s side, was easier to see.

  As her grandfather drove off into the dusk, Lennie checked her face in the mirror again. Hopefully Jim wasn’t going to meet Mitch coming up the road the other way, or have some explaining to do. Ugh, living here was turning her into a teenager again. Why hadn’t she just told him?

  Much as she loved her grandfather, much as she loved this comfortable, comforting house, she needed to get out of it and into a place of her own. Somewhere she could have her own things around her. Somewhere she could invite people over without needing to ask. Have a girls’ night, have her friends—Del, Sam, her grandmother—to stay. And yes, Mitch too. If he wanted to see her…

  The villa down Chalfont Road was still for sale. Even at asking price, the sums worked out. She could get a real builder to look at it instead of renovating it in her mind. That gorgeous duck-egg blue she’d seen for the bedroom walls—it didn’t have to be just a daydream. There was a life waiting for her in this valley. A real life. Not the life she’d expected a year ago, six months ago, even two, but a life that felt increasing
ly like…Well, like home. Should she take it? Would that be settling? Was settling so bad?

  You’ll get bored, Lennie’s voice of reason insisted. Sooner or later, you’ll get bored with the work.

  She was far from bored tonight, though. Dusting her palms on the ripped jeans her grandfather hated so much, she pushed up the sleeves of her oversize cardigan and adjusted the vee of the t-shirt below. Suddenly unsure what to do with herself next, she made her way downstairs. God, it felt good to be in an empty house. Under other circumstances, she really could have used a mental health night.

  An eruption of barking outside told her Mitch had arrived before she heard the chug of the Land Cruiser’s engine. Shit. Lennie looked out the window just in time to see Pesh sail over the side gate. She was going to have to do something about that. But what?

  Dismissing thoughts of how much it would cost to deer fence the property, Lennie headed for the front door. Mitch was already there, Pesh standing proudly at his side, delighted at having delivered him to the proper spot.

  ‘Hey.’ Lennie smiled, the weight of worry she’d been carrying for the last three days dissolving as she looked into his face, her pulse beginning its usual skitter at his nearness. If Mitch had fallen apart after Wednesday night, he’d done a bang-up job of putting himself back together again.

  ‘Hey.’ His eyes, meeting hers, were warm. There was something else in them, too, something new, softer than the usual current that ran between his body and hers, as if more stood open between them now than the door Lennie was holding. A possibility she didn’t want to look at too closely for fear of frightening it away, one that up until a few hours ago she’d been convinced was about as likely as Mitch arriving on her doorstep of his own accord—no coincidences, no excuses. Of him reaching out for help. Her help.

  ‘Come in.’ Lennie stood aside, wrestling down the instinct to touch him. More than anything—more than his body under her hands, than his mouth on hers—she wanted to be whatever help it was he needed tonight.

  As Mitch moved past her in the narrow space, she could feel the different energy about him. It was pretty much the first time she’d met him when he hadn’t been working, when he didn’t have a helicopter hitched to his truck, when the shirt and jeans he was wearing were wholly clean. But it was more than just that. As if something that had been blurred was now very sharply in focus.

  ‘Have you eaten?’ Lennie asked him. Oh god, she sounded just like her grandmother. It must be genetic. When in doubt, offer food.

  Mitch shook his head. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘I was just making a salad,’ she said gently. ‘Come on through.’

  Having settled Mitch into a bar stool and got a drink in his hand, Lennie turned her attention to washing the ludicrously expensive out-of-season lettuce Jim had given her such a hard time for bringing home, grateful for something to concentrate on other than the hunch of Mitch’s broad shoulders above the bench, those dark eyes watching her. Pesh nudged her elbow, eager to get back to Alice. With a sigh, Lennie opened the back door.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ Mitch said. ‘About what you showed me the other night. About Chase. I’ve been thinking about it a lot.’

  Lennie nodded. Was that good or bad? From the look on his face, she was going with good.

  ‘The shelter’s got him up for adoption, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ she admitted carefully, not wanting to get his hopes up. Chase’s best chance of getting out of the shelter had been the servicemen who’d got him there in the first place, but they were long gone. Who else in their right mind was going to want a very large untrained, unhousebroken, unsocialised, soon-to-be-geriatric Afghani dog?

  ‘I want to bring Chase over here,’ Mitch said. ‘I want to bring him home.’

  Lennie dropped the lettuce back in the sink. If it was anyone but Mitch, she would have hugged him.

  ‘I don’t know if that’s even possible,’ he said, ‘but I want to try.’

  She watched his face, the spark in his eyes.

  ‘The thing is, I haven’t got the faintest fucking clue where to start.’ Oh god, there it was—that smile. That open, easy, wholehearted smile. Getting it felt every bit as good as she’d thought it would. ‘I’m hoping you might help me.’

  ‘Mitch,’ Lennie began. The last thing she wanted to do was take that look off his face, but did he have any idea what he was letting himself in for? If he got any change out of five figures for bringing Chase into the country, she’d be surprised.

  ‘I read the website,’ he said. ‘I know how much it costs. It’s not about the money. It’s the red tape I don’t know how to handle. But you’ve done it. You know how it works. They have rabies in Italy too, right?’

  ‘I’m pretty sure the import standard has changed since I brought Pesh back.’ Lennie reached for the laptop charging on the bench. ‘Let’s take a look.’

  Twenty minutes later, the lettuce was still in the sink.

  ‘The shelter’s doing everything right with their vaccination protocol.’ Lennie double-checked the notes she’d made. ‘But Afghanistan isn’t on the list of approved countries for import.’ She glanced up in time to catch an ironic look from Mitch. ‘No kidding,’ he said. ‘So what does that mean?’

  ‘It means Chase can’t come here direct.’ Lennie watched his face, wondering if this was going to be the point at which Mitch gave up. ‘You’d have to get him to an approved country first.’

  ‘Like where?’

  ‘The UK,’ Lennie said, thinking aloud, ‘or the US…Those would be your easiest bets.’ She nodded. ‘The US, probably. It’s heading in the right direction at least, and Chase wouldn’t have to go into quarantine there.’

  A line of thought was creasing the centre of Mitch’s forehead. ‘How long would he have to stay there?’

  Yep, that was the clincher. ‘Six months,’ Lennie said.

  ‘Six months?’ Mitch swore under his breath.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Again, she had to fight the urge to put her hand on his arm. ‘It sucks. But it is what it is. There’s no way around it.’

  Mitch stared at the stem of the wineglass between his fingers for a full half-minute before he spoke. ‘Then what happens?’ he said, looking up at last.

  Lennie’s eyebrows rose. He was still considering this?

  ‘So Chase has to spend six months in kennels in the States,’ Mitch said. ‘It’s not going to be any worse than where he is now.’

  ‘No,’ Lennie said. ‘No, it isn’t.’

  ‘There must be some good places over there.’

  ‘There are.’ She nodded, trying to rein her enthusiasm down to a walk before it bolted with even more of Mitch’s money. There were kennels in the US with acres of space, places with trees, and grass, and—

  ‘At least he’d get out from behind that fucking wire,’ Mitch said quietly, voicing the thought that had already started to bring a lump to Lennie’s throat. He looked at his wineglass again. ‘I know what that feels like,’ he said. He flexed his shoulders, shrugging it off. ‘So after we get him here, then what? He has to go into quarantine?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘but just for a few days. So long as he checks out okay, then he’s free to go.’

  The gleam was back in Mitch’s eyes.

  ‘It’s something to think about,’ Lennie said.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said. Suddenly, his smile broke through again. Mitch held out his hand. ‘Can I have that for a second?’

  He could have pretty much anything he wanted at this point in time. Lennie slid her laptop across the bench. ‘What are you looking for?’

  ‘It’s coming up to midday in Kabul,’ Mitch said. ‘I’m emailing the shelter.’

  She stared at him. ‘Just like that?’

  ‘If it’s going to take seven months to get him here, I’d better make a start.’

  As he got on with doing just that, Lennie stood for a moment watching him type, her whole head filling with happiness for Chase, for Mitch, for the unexpec
ted gift of this night and her part in a minor miracle that, for a dog in a run in Afghanistan right now, wasn’t so small. The kind of crazy, forty-seven-storeys-high happy that could lead to a big fall…

  What was it she was supposed to be doing again? Having poured them both another glass of wine, Lennie retrieved the lettuce from the sink and got on with making the salad. Tossing it together with the chicken and the best of the rest she could forage from fridge and pantry between glances at Mitch, she tried not to dwell on how good it felt to have him sitting there on the other side of the bench, unselfconscious and relaxed, engrossed in what he was doing.

  Lennie waited until he was done before she put the bowl down between them.

  ‘Thanks.’ Mitch snapped the laptop shut. ‘That looks great.’

  She smiled. ‘Leave it up if you want.’

  With a rueful look, he reopened the screen. ‘It’ll probably be weeks before they reply.’

  ‘Probably,’ Lennie agreed.

  ‘God knows what their coms are like.’

  ‘Could be awful.’ She leaned down, extracting a couple of plates from the cupboard under the bench. ‘You want to check again now?’

  They grinned at each other as Mitch hit refresh. ‘Nothing yet.’ He pushed the laptop a little further away, clearing space for the cutlery she was laying out. ‘I guess they need more than ninety-three seconds.’

  Having dished up the salad, Lennie took the stool beside him, trying not to read too much into the shift in Mitch’s attention, the change in the quality of the silence between them. Boarding school manners, that was all. He was waiting for her to pick up her fork. Doing so, she turned the leaves on her plate a little more.

  ‘This is really good,’ Mitch said.

  ‘Thanks.’ Given how distracted she’d been, it’d be a miracle if it was. Lennie manoeuvred a forkful of lettuce into her mouth. With the laptop and Lois’s oversized salad bowl taking up most of the bench, she and Mitch had ended up barely the stretch of his broad hand apart. She could see it moving beside her as he, too, played with the food on his plate, the flex of his thigh as he shifted his weight on the stool. With something of an effort, Lennie swallowed.