Falling in Love by Dusty Miller Page B

remarkable
experience. Maybe even a new lease on life.
    He gazed into her eyes and
smiled.
    This sure as hell wasn’t Kansas
anymore.
    And again, she thought of those
blasted condoms; or if he’d ever even seen one before, or if
Kenn’karr would have the slightest idea of what to do with one. His
hands fell from the mane, the man clucked and muttered something,
and the horse moved on at a measured pace.
     
    ***
     
    There was a long, tenuous
flutter in her midriff as she contemplated the unthinkable, but
putting things as logically as she could, that bloody lake didn’t
just disappear into thin air.
    There was no explaining
that part. She shoved those terrifying thoughts aside.
    Sooner or later they must get to a
phone.
    In the meantime, Kenn’karr
seemed like a really nice guy, and if nature didn’t take some kind
of a course pretty darned soon, she might be strongly tempted to
have a go, and to take matters into her own hands.
    She definitely felt that
way about him. There was no denying it.
    Jayne Dickson buried her
head in Kenn’karr’s back, and taking a strong deep breath, sucked
in the very smell of him, squeezing him tight in a long and
unrestrained hug.
    This was really living.
    Tomorrow need never come
at all.
     
     
    Holed Up When the Shadows
Grew Long
     
     
    They holed up when the afternoon
shadows grew long.
    Kenn’Karr seemed intent on sharpening
his sword with a worn black stone. They were in a clump of
cottonwoods and there were a lot of flat stones and large rotten
timbers lying around.
    The ruins of a small barn or shed
hung, one end gaping wide open, over the bank of a small,
clear-running stream. The rest of the farm buildings must have been
long gone. It was still warm but would cool off quickly. They were
out of sight, but Kenn’Karr had stopped her when she began to
prepare some kind of a fire ring of rectangular stones.
    Jayne looked around. She could see
that he had chosen a defensible position. After this morning, that
seemed wise enough.
    “ Do we need more
water?”
    He glanced up, but then went back to
work.
    She shrugged.
    Picking up the almost empty water
bags, she sat on the lip and then dropped down to the sloping
gravel river bank, where the horse was tied with a few
hastily-gathered bundles of fresh grass to nibble on. That was one
smart horse. The thing was being very quiet, without being spooky,
but it did seem to listen. It spent a fair amount of time, looking
up and all around from time to time, as if in studied contemplation
of the immediate surroundings.
    It probably would let its ears do most
of the work, she realized.
    Kenn’Karr was still being very
cautious.
    That made sense.
    She looked for a deep pool, one where
she could submerge the containers fully. There was no sense in only
filling them halfway up.
    After filling them, she set them
aside. Having thought all of this out beforehand, Jayne wasn’t
wearing her bra or panties. She’d taken them off during a quick
late-afternoon bathroom break, where Kenn’Karr’s basic shyness
guaranteed her just enough time and privacy.
    The dress slipped off over her head in
seconds. She put it beside her sandals, stuck in the crotch of some
branches in a small tree on the bank. The water bags were on the
damp grass, all in a row, right there. The sun felt good on her
skin, noting it was now fully turned to tan in the dark
spots.
    Better than red patches,
anyways.
    There were sunny glades all along here
and the tall grasses and bull-rushes obscured the camp from sight,
and vice-versa. How long would it take him to get curious? She’d
felt his eyes upon her, when he could manage it, all day
long.
    Wading into a shallow pool, it didn’t
seem too bad. The water would be bearable for a short time and she
was feeling grubby. It was time for a bath, and maybe, just maybe,
to try and drop some kind of a hint. Finding a suitable sand bar in
a shallow spot, festooned with tiny green underwater plants
trailing in the current, she