Dream Chaser (18 page)

That night, Suzanna began to have second thoughts
about going with Jonathan to Bozeman
.
It’s just a dinner.
Why am I so nervous about
this
? He’s such a gentleman and a great dancer, and more than good-looking.
She couldn’t deny how intensely she
react
ed
to him
whenever he delivered the mail or just dropped by
.
And that kiss
after the dinner for the library
.
Maybe that’s why she was nervous.
Can he tell part of me wanted
to slide his shirt off
and
take
a good
hard
look at those muscles I felt?
She’d so wanted to say yes when he asked.
She blushed
then
smiled to herself.
Penny would be shocked if she knew what I was imagining.
His men respect
ed
him, and seem
ed
to like him, too. All the women in town admire
d
him.
It
was
just a dinner. It
was
just a dinner.

Suzanna
frowned in
to
the mirror as she debated what to wear.
Her first date in too many years to count.

While Jonathan conducted his business meeting
in Bozeman
, Suzanna picked up some items she wanted to send to Kevin for his birthday, and to
Penny
to celebrate her recent promotion.

After she
met
Jonathan
at the
town’s
central park
, they
wandered around the square before se
ttling on an Italian restaurant,
one of Jonathan’s favorites.

“You’re looking rested, Ms. Wallace,” he said after they were seated. “And very easy on the eyes, too, if I may say so.”
He
slid his hand over hers
. She enjoyed the warmth it created from her fingers to her toes, glad he liked the red handkerchief dress she wore.

“You’re not so bad yourself, sir.” The blue in
his
shirt matched his eyes, and set off the burnished brown of his hands and face. “How’s your back?”

“Never better.” H
e grinned.
“You have magic fingers.”

Over a large a
ntipasto and two other dishes served family style, he toasted her with his glass of wine. “I’m not quite sure how you managed
it, but I’m glad you’re
rent
ing
my cabin.”

Her heart bumped against her ribs. “Thank you for letting me stay.
I wasn’t sure what I was going to do if you
had said no
. You were my last hope.” She clinked her glass against his.

After dinner, they
walk
ed around the square and entered a Mexican cantina where
people were
dancing in the inner courtyard.
“Time
for a spin or two,
”
his voice rumbled.

They danced
a
slow number and then a faster one. An hour later, after several
more
dances, they sat and shared
a m
argarita before leaving for home.

Suzanna shivered in the late evening breeze.
Jonathan
wrapped
her light shawl around her shoulders after helping her into the truck. Their drive home was quiet,
her thoughts
consumed by
him
.
Jonathan
walked her to the door of the cabin, kissed her on the lips, and said quietly, “Thank you for a very nice evening, Suzanna.”

This time, she did not hesitate to kiss him back, lost in the sensations of his lips, his hands, his arms. When he pulled her closer, his heartbeat, so steady and strong, was beating nearly as rapidly as her own.

I could fall in love with him, but do I dare?
I feel safe with him, not smothered, not like with Brad.
And he wa
s so interesting
, so exciting
.
How can I keep my distance when I
really don’t want to
?
That night, she dreamed of his hands exploring her
body and of hers doing the same.

“Sun hat on head, food and matches in backpack, kibble in
Sam’s
pack.”
Suzanna looked forward to an overnight hike, now that her shorter ones had gone well, and her boots were broken in.
Suzanna ticked off what she didn’t want to forget as she left the cabin
, swung her backpack into position
and headed toward the hills
, checking her compass against the small map book she had borrowed from Emma
. “Come on, Sam.
We’ll be on the ranch the whole time, so no need to worry about those animals in the national forest. They would never come near the cattle out in the open. With this little map we might even reach that lake we saw on our first hike.
”

As the afternoon wore on, she pushed her hair up and under her floppy sun hat to cool her neck as the temperature rose and the morning breezes melted away. With no one to see her, she unbuttoned her blouse and wrapped it around her waist. “Wouldn’t Penny have a fit if she could see me now, Sam,” she chuckled. “Hiking in my bra. Too bad I didn’t bring shorts with me, too.”

She and the dog skirted the open areas of the ranch
,
wh
ich
she
knew would include
cattle,
and only occasionally detoured into
the cooler
woods
y areas
,
before reaching
high pastureland. When she stopped for lunch, she spotted white dots moving up a steep hillside and realized she was watching a shepherd
, his two dogs moving rapidly on either side of the flock
. “Sheep, Sam. Look! I
wonder if they’re on the Ames ranch, or if that’s still part of Jonathan’s spread
.”

She stopped for the night near a
fast-running stream that bubbled and sang as the water cascaded over rocks. She
set up camp, creating a small lean-to
in case it began to rain. The little shelter
allowed her to
gaze at
the
myriad
stars when she lay down on her sleeping bag. Sam snuggled near her back and
soon
was
snoring softly while she watched shooting stars
burst unexpectedly into view and slide
across the
star-dotted
sky
before dissolving in the darkness
.

Peace in my soul
, she thought.
That’s what I’ve found.
She imagined the winking stars to be the worries she’d left behind in Minneapolis. With Penny taking care of the bills and deeply involved in her first real job since college, her daughter’s letters had finally settled into quick occasional notes. Kevin seemed happy in his summer job at Brad’s law office. He’d written that he was glad she was enjoying herself.

When her thoughts focused on Jonathan, Suzanna’s pulse picked up. Was it luck that she had found someone she wanted to be with so soon after Brad’s death? Twinges of guilt that had held her back occurred less frequently now. At home, she had never imagined she could be attracted to another man after such a troubled marriage, something barely tolerable that she admitted she’d endured because of the children.

She rubbed her arm where Brad’s last attack had left bruises. Some days, she thought she still felt them. But here, looking at the stars, how he’d treated her no longer seemed to matter. Maybe that was why she found herself contemplating a relationship with Jonathan. He seemed to like her and, oh, how she felt when he kissed her. As if she’d just opened the best Christmas present ever.

She smiled in the darkness. He made her believe that she was an attractive woman, desirable. He was a man who could have anyone he wanted. Amazingly, he seemed to want her! She was dazzled by the thought. She slid deeper into her sleeping bag and closed her eyes with a contented sigh.

The
next
morning,
Suzanna
set off again, h
ik
ing up one hill after another. That afternoon, she stopped at a large lake.
“This must be it, Sam. We did it. We’ll camp here.”

Suzanna moved some rocks
into a circle
and dug out the center
to make a fire pit. Using some of the many dry pieces of wood along the shore to make her fire, she enjoyed a cup of hot stew, into which she dipped one of the hard rolls
from her pack. “Yummy, Sam.” S
he let him clean out the bowl, “just this once,” before going to the lake for a bucket of water to heat
for
wash
ing
her dishes. With a bone to chew on, Sam lay down
nearby
as she cleaned up the camp, hung the bag of kibble and
another of apples
in a nearby tree, and enjoyed a
second
night under the stars.

Her third day away from the cabin
, she woke early. The air was hot and still. Clouds building on the far horizon hinted at possible rain
and she thought she spotted heat lightning near the far reaches of the nearby mountains
.
As they explored the nearby woods, Sam
snapped at the swarms
of the tiny flying creatures buzzing about his ears and eyes in the quiet, moisture-laden, air
.

When they returned to camp, Suzanna
opted for a swim to soothe the mosquito bites on her
neck
and arms. “Sammie, let’s
go skinny-dipping.
”
Dropp
ing her clothes
onto
her sleeping bag, Suzanna scampered into the lake
and swam well away from shore. Sam whined and paced along the water’s edge before following her, standing up to his stomach in the still water.
She was halfway to a small island in the
middle of the
lake when she
turned to see why
Sam
had begun
barking
.

Sam left the water and raced toward their campsite.

What Suzanna saw next stunned her.
“Oh, my God.”

A large black bear
had
lumber
ed
into their camp
, its head swinging back and forth as it neared her backpack and sleeping bag
.
The big animal bit into the backpack and opened it with a pull of his teeth as one large paw held the straps to the ground. Another swipe scattered her clothes.
S
uzanna
began swimming toward the shore, her heart beating faster when
she saw
Sam
circling
the bear
, growling and barking by turns.

“Sam, stay away from
him
!”

The dog ignored her commands, alternately charging and then
rac
ing away from the bear, who turned to swat at
the dog
whenever
Sam approached
too close. The bear
raised his heavy head and seemed to sniff the air. Then he
rose on his hind legs and
bit into
the bag of fruit
still hanging in a nearby tree. After eating an apple, it went after the bag of kibble swinging in the breeze.
The dog food scattered all over the ground
as the bear slashed open the bag
. Sam growled
,
charged the bear
,
and bit one of his hind legs.

“Sam! No!” Suzanna screamed, horrified that Sam would be hurt. “
Don’t
!”

The bear turned on Sam with a roar, caught the dog’s shoulder with one large paw and bowled him over. The dog yelped
as he rolled, then scrambled up,
and savaged the bear’s back leg again. When the
big animal
again
turned in
the dog
’s direction
, he leapt high in the air, avoiding the bear’s paws
as he
continued
growling and barking.

“Sam! Stop!” Suzanna called, tears now mixing with the lake water
that splashed in her face
as she swam
frantically
toward shore.
“Oh, no.” A curtain of red
appeared on the dog’s shoulder. Suzanna swam faster as the bloody mark
widened and spread down
Sam’s leg
.
S
he
spied a long branch near the shore and headed for it.