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"Well, whatever I say that's bad enough to wake you up."
"Mesa--" Whiskey-brown eyes turn to look at me and my gut churns.
"Don't worry, angel," I grab my cane and make quick work of crossing the small kitchen so I can wrap her up in my arms before she has a chance to apologize. "I get it. I'm not upset, I just miss you in the morning is all."
"They said it'll get better with time," she whispers, laying her head against my chest with her arms around my waist.
"Yeah, I know, Angel. I've just never been a patient man."
Robin's never told me what I say in my sleep. I know what kind of dreams I have-- images of burning trees falling on her, the sound of her screams as the flames melt away PPE and flesh. But it wasn't Robin under that branch, it was me, and I still have no memory of anything after someone saying everyone was clear. That Robin was out of danger.
I always wake up from those dreams with Robin's sweet face hovering above me, her cool hands against my fevered skin, cooing softly to remind me that it was just a dream. She's fine. I'm fine now. Just a dream and that it's safe to go back to sleep.
So fuck if I know what it is that I must be going on about in my sleep that keeps her from getting any rest.
2
ROBIN
After Mesa leaves to go meet with the fire chief in town, I take his advice, but it's not sleep I need to catch up on when I slip back between the sheets on Mesa's enormous, mountain man-sized bed.
It doesn't take long for me to get wrapped up in the smell of him with my fingers between my legs.
We never got our weekend together and then there were hospitals and surgeries, burn wards, rehab centers, and painful physical therapy while Mesa healed.
Even once he moved into the off-site rental with me for the last few months of his therapy, we never got a chance to be intimate beyond some a few hushed and awkward make out sessions.
There was always family in the apartment with us and, of course, Mesa's injuries: the femur that had been broken in a couple places and had to be pinned back together, the third degree burns that covered most of his right leg and hip, and a large section of fourth degree burns where our crew couldn't get the smoldering log off of him before it had melted away the wildland turnout gear, as well as flesh, nerves, and muscle beneath it.
There were weeks of not being able to sleep beside him because my slightest movement put him in agonizing pain. Then there were weeks of not being able to leave his side because of the nightmares that only I seemed to be able to soothe when he'd wake up screaming my name in terror.
The one time we tried was the night before his parents arrived to drive us back to Moonshine Ridge.
Mesa has the all-clear signal from all his doctors to attempt any physical activity he feels he can handle and there was only one thing he wanted to try.
We had the apartment to ourselves for a blissful twenty-four hours and we'd waited long enough.
Guilt still grips me when I remember that night. The determined grit of Mesa's jaw as he tried to pretend he was okay, until he couldn't deny it anymore and collapsed in a heap on the bed beside me, covered in sweat and shaking uncontrollably in pain.
Since we've been back home, he hasn't tried to touch me again.
He works out at the gym down at the fire station every day and I know the day will come when he's ready. Till then, I'm not going to pressure him.
I figure I've waited twenty-three years so far; I can wait however much longer it takes before the man I love is ready to make me his in all the ways a woman wants to belong to her man.
But damn, if it's not hard as hell to wake up aching and needy every morning with him beside me, saying those filthy things while he's lost in some sex dream I can't wake him from.
That's the real reason I've been out of bed before him every day since we got back. The reason he finds me downstairs, staring out the windows, lost in my own fantasies.
That's what I think of now, while I have the house to myself and I can lose myself in Mesa's manly scent clinging to his pillow while I spread my legs wide and rub my throbbing clit while I picture the day I'll finally have him inside me.
I imagine his intense, dark eyes on me, that gaze that says he'll die if he has to wait another minute as he stalks toward me and captures my mouth in a rough kiss before forcing me back into the sheets...
Mesa
Leaning against the side of the truck while I reach behind the seat for my cane, I take a deep breath of fresh mountain air.
Damn, am I glad to be back home. Another minute in the city, dealing with doctors and therapists and I'd have probably lost my mind.
