SBC Fighter: Tails Of Love Part 10

Mike rol ed his eyes. A goat and his wagon.

Unbelievable.

Dusk purpled the sky. It would soon be dark. "I'l grab a couple of flashlights from my office," he said. "We'd better get started."

They separated, met again at the main gate. "Which way?" he asked.

"North," she said, glancing at her watch. "It's feeding time and Houdini wil be hungry. There's an empty field close by.

Goats are Weed-wackers."

They walked at a clipped pace, Hermes on a leash between them. Mike pul ed the Red Flyer. Time and again Norah cal ed Houdini's name, until her voice grew hoa.r.s.e.

Pa.s.sersby cut them strange looks, which they both ignored. There was a pygmy goat on the loose. Houdini needed to be in his pen by bedtime.

Norah's heart stopped when they arrived at the field and there was no sign of her goat. Vegetation grew wild; there were knee-high flowers, weeds, and an overturned palm tree.

Mike left the wagon on the sidewalk and tromped across the acre. He swung his flashlight through the darkening shadows as he covered every inch of land. Lines of concern soon scored his features. "No sign of hooves. No pul ed up weeds," he said grimly.

Panic hit, and her stomach squeezed.

Her knees went weak. She sat down in the wagon.

Absolute stil ness settled around them, thick and defeating. Mike came to stand beside her. He curved one hand over her shoulder, gently squeezed. "Don't give up.

Let's keep looking. We'l find your goat."

Norah nearly jumped out of her skin when Hermes bleated, shril as a whistle. Her little nose sniffed the air.

Soon her ears twitched and her tail wagged. She began tugging on her leash.

"Hermes has picked up Houdini's scent." Norah was on her feet and moving fast.

Darkness. .h.i.t ful y, and the timer-set streetlights il uminated the sidewalk and street corners. Norah kept pace with Hermes; Mike fol owed with the wagon.

Another block and Hermes stopped at a public park. She pawed the ground. Then head-b.u.t.ted Norah's leg. Norah bent and scratched the little doe's ears. "Where's Houdini?"

Again Hermes bleated.

A return bleat broke the night air. A frustrated, forlorn bleat that sent Norah running toward the sound.

Mike was on her heels. He held both flashlights and shed brightness across the darkened park. "There's your goat."

He pointed toward a playground where several old tires sat upright at varying depths off the gra.s.s. The tires provided jumping chal enges for children. Apparently Houdini had tried to play, too, only to get his horns stuck in several connecting metal links on a low chain that secured the tires to the ground.

His next bleat asked forgiveness. Houdini sounded sorry he'd run away. Sorrier stil he'd caused Norah so much worry.

Norah fel to her knees. Her hands shook as she tried to pry his smal horns free. Blood trickled from a gash in his head, a result of his struggle to free himself. He was in need of doctoring.

Anxious for his freedom, Houdini stomped his hooves and jerked wildly. His bleat was now bel igerent.

Norah struggled against Houdini. She needed him stil .

Mike hunkered down beside her. "You hold the flashlights and I'l free him."

Norah watched as his big hands turned gentle. Even after Houdini sidekicked him, Mike soothed with soft words and a stroke down the buck's back.

Hermes chose that moment to nuzzle noses with Houdini through the metal rings, which calmed the goat long enough for Mike to disengage his horns.

Freed, Houdini tossed his head and bleated his lungs out. The pygmy goat was as loud as any wolf baying at the moon. Norah opened her arms and Houdini came to her.

She hugged the goat so hard she nearly choked him.

Hermes wanted her fair share of affection. The doe b.u.t.ted her way between Norah and Houdini.

They were a family, Mike realized. As crazy at it seemed.

Norah loved her animals, even the escape artist who sent her into the night to find him.

Mike swept one flashlight over the playground equipment. "Houdini came here to play?"

Norah nodded. "Pygmy goats are as inquisitive and active as children. Houdini can jump through tires, walk the low teeter-totter, climb the wide steps onto the platform of the wooden fort."

She pushed to her feet. "It's time to go home. Ride, Houdini?" She patted the bed of the red wagon.

The goat hopped in.

Mike led the group, pul ing the Red Flyer.

Norah and Hermes trailed behind.

They returned to the petting zoo, tired and ready to cal it a night. Once in his pen, Houdini jumped from the wagon and trotted to the barn. Out of her harness, Hermes soon fol owed.

Norah exhaled, tired and relieved. She would doctor Houdini shortly. At the moment, she was indebted and grateful to this man for finding her goat. She wasn't certain she could have gone it alone.

She cleared her throat. "I owe you-big."

His smile was slow and very male. "Big works for me. I'l col ect tomorrow." He brushed a soft kiss against her brow, then departed, leaving Norah as high on antic.i.p.ation as she was on Mike Kraft.

Morning rose to overcast skies.

And the sounds of sawing, hammering, and dril ing.

Once dressed, Norah stepped from her resident office, cal ed to one of her staff. "What's going on?" She raised her voice over the noise.

"Construction in the goat pen," her employee shouted back. "Mike Kraft and a dozen workers showed up at dawn."

On a Sunday? With Houdini safe, she'd slept like the dead. She hadn't heard them arrive.

Al around her the air resounded with deep male voices and a whole lot of banging. Norah jogged down the path to her goat pen. She dodged a smal forklift, then circled a trailer from Mc-c.u.mber Lumber. She moved to the fence, and stopped short.

What Norah saw, she would never forget.

Her throat thickened and her heart warmed as she watched Mike Kraft in action.

Throughout the pen, construction workers built a playground. Cemented in the ground, huge electrical spools stood up like tabletops, great for climbing. A twenty-foot commercial water pipe al owed Houdini and Hermes an opportunity for hide-and-seek. The goats could trot the ful inside length and surprise each other at the opposite end.

Their bleats would echo inside the pipe.

A low narrow beam would show off Houdini's gymnastics skil s. Set in the far corner of the pen, a wide staircase curved around the base of an ancient Banyan tree, climbing to a tree fort. The structure was intriguing. Houdini would be highly entertained. He'd never be bored again.

Amid the commotion, the little buck stood beside the contractor. Houdini's horn had been wrapped in gauze.

Mike gently scratched the buck's ears.

Wide-eyed and twitching, Houdini was alert to Mike's every order and movement. Hermes peered from the barn, taking shelter against the shouting and whirring buzz saws.

Through it al , Norah focused on Mike in his gray T-shirt and jeans. He wore a black basebal cap backwards, dark sungla.s.ses, and a tool belt on his hip.

With his back to her, she took in the tempting bunch of his muscles along his shoulders, the flex of his biceps, his amazingly tight b.u.t.t as he hunkered down and helped anchor the last of the three tractor tires.

Houdini bleated, looked to Mike as if asking permission to play. "It's al yours, buddy," Mike said, as he and the other workers stepped back.

Houdini ran wild. Bleating, trotting, prancing, the little goat tried every piece of playground equipment once, then started over again. Hermes joined him, al sniffing and twitching, and slower in her exuberance.

It didn't take long for both goats to play tag.

Houdini won the game by climbing the boulder mountain and bleating his superiority. Hermes p.a.w.ned the base, waiting for him to come down and go a second round.

To the west, clouds thickened and the sky bore a purple haze. Humidity weighed heavily, the air in need of a cleansing rain.

"Hey, boss, we're going to take off," one of Mike's workers cal ed to him. "It's going to storm."

Mike had hoped for rain. He'd noticed Norah's arrival.

The harder it rained the better. He wanted her wet and wil ing and needing him bad.

Mike dismissed the last of his men, then turned to the zookeeper. She leaned against the fence, a smal woman wearing a white tank top, black jeans, and a big smile. In that instant he realized she meant something to him.

Beyond their attraction, he liked her as a person. She cared for her animals as strongly as a mother for any child.

Mike hoped she'd care for him, too.

Even Houdini had gotten under his skin. Mike wished the little buck would b.u.t.t Norah in his direction now, but it didn't take the goat to draw Norah to him. She came on her own.

She entered the pen, amid a clap of thunder and the first fat drops of rain.

Hermes bleated Houdini off his mountain and coaxed him to the barn. Mike swore the buck winked at him in his retreat.

"Two by two," he said as the pygmy goats took shelter.

Norah looked up at him. "Life's better with a mate."

He nodded his agreement.

Tucking her into his body, he kissed her long and slow.

She tasted of cleansing droplets, deep need, and shared happiness.

As he held her tightly, Mike thanked the heavens for rain and romance. He was also grateful to Houdini, a pygmy goat with a whole lot of att.i.tude and a mischief for matchmaking.

He faced a future with the zookeeper.

Along with al her incredible animals.

THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS.

Dianne Castel He loved this woman with al his heart and that was the problem.

Rex Barkley held on to a last bit of control as he kissed the soft inside of Jane's delicious thighs. He wanted to make this good for her, prove his love for her, not that making love did that al by itself.

"Rex! I need you now! You're driving me crazy."

Thank G.o.d, he thought, his lips devouring hers and he slid into her soft wet heat. He loved her and she loved him .

. . probably. d.a.m.n! Did that word have to pop up now?

In one last stroke she climaxed, taking him with her. The whole city of Savannah tilted, least it felt that way every time he made love to beautiful, intriguing Jane Louise Garrison.

"What you do to me, Rex." Jane sighed as he rol ed them over, her on top, her pearl necklace swaying gently as her long auburn curls tumbled down around their faces. She smiled, her brown eyes clouding with dreamy euphoria that turned his insides to fire. He stroked his hand down her spine, the sweet scent of their lovemaking fil ing his head and his smal apartment over the clinic. His love for her fil ing every part of him.

But did Jane Louise feel that way about him or was he just . . . convenient? A love of the head more than the heart.

"You're perfect, you know that, sugar." Her pink inviting lips formed the words an inch from his. "You're strong, steadfast, loyal-"

"Honest, trustworthy, faithful, low-maintenance." He pointed to the little black and white dog of questionable parentage perched on the dresser. "Just like Maxwel . Your dog and I are two of a kind." Did he real y just say that?

She giggled. "And don't you go sel ing my pup short, now. He's the best, just like you." She buried her face against Rex's neck, her lips kissing and sucking and doing magical things to his earlobe. His insides clenched, and his limp d.i.c.k lost its fatigue. See, that was more of the problem. He was consumed by her, but was he just good old Rex to her? Always there when she needed him? Wel , he'd find out soon enough . . . like today. Before he and Jane Louise got any more involved, he had to tel her what was going on in his life and the only way they'd get through it was if she loved him way beyond probably.

"We need to talk," he said in his most even voice as he tried to ignore his clenching gut. What if she ditched him?

Turned him down flat? What if she thought he was out of his freaking mind! He'd had that thought once or twice himself.

"You'd better not be tel ing me you're married and have a wife and kids tucked away over in Beaufort. If you do, I swear on Mama's blueberry cobbler I'l cut your heart out with her silver serving spoon." She glared but there was a twinkle in her eyes. He hoped it was there ten minutes from now. "So, do I go get out the spoon and desert china?"

"No tableware needed. A sense of humor might help or a love of adventure depending on how you look at it."

"You know my family, humor and adventure are constant companions. That's why I adore you, Rex." She grabbed his shoulders and brought her mouth to his, her nipples hard and firm and delicious. When it came to s.e.x, he and Jane Louise were perfect together but what about the rest of the time? He kissed her. The real-life times when they weren't in the sack.