Page 53 of Rescued By the Dog Trainer

"It never is." She shuts the small fridge door with a quiet click. "The military called a damaged joint a liability at thirty thousand feet. Down here, that's eleven years of critical care experience and nerves of steel. Whatever they boarded you out for has no place in this valley. The posting is yours if you want it."

"I haven't decided what I'm doing when my sixty days end with the progam."

"Well." Tess's expression softens just enough to show the woman behind the surgeon. "Open the envelope and find out. Stop letting a piece of paper in your glovebox hold you hostage. Today would be good."

Outside, the 4Runner is warm from the afternoon sun. Juno sits up in the passenger seat, her tail giving one thud against the console. I reach into the glovebox, rest my fingertips against the sealed envelope, and push the door shut without breaking the seal.

Then I drive back up the mountain with the notebook against my ribs and the letter in the dash. Tess's today repeats in my head with every switchback.

Jason's at the stove when I come in. Two coats on the wall. I hang mine on its peg, and the pocket knocks against the wood.

"How'd it go?" His back stays toward me, shoulders tight under his flannel as he stirs the pot.

"They want me."

"They want you." He turns then. Something's different in how he's standing. The stillness I've learned is gone. He's holding his weight forward on his feet.

"May first." I reach up to loosen my scarf. "Offered it outright."

"How's the setup down there?" He rests both hands on the edge of the stove, his grey eyes locked on mine. "Good equipment?"

"Decent gear. Warm room." I drape the blue wool over the peg beside my coat. "Tess is sharp. Cole knows his trauma protocols."

"It's a good setup." He stays by the fire, his shoulders braced under his flannel. "Does it fit what you want? Or did you already have plans for after graduation?"

The question hangs between us, quiet and heavy. My hands drop to my sides. He asks like a trainer checking an exit route, his voice flat, but his gaze stays locked on my face.

"I have an offer in Spokane." The admission scrapes against my throat. "Civilian flight service. Sixty days to sign the contract."

"You taking it?" He grips the iron rim of the stove.

"I don't know if I can set foot on a flight deck again." The truth tastes like ash. I look down at the floorboards between his boots and mine, my fingers curling into my palms. "I spent eleven years believing my hands were only good for keeping airmen alive at thirty thousand feet. Then the Air Force called my knee a liability, and my chest locks up every time an engine roars."

"They're wrong about your hands." He pushes off the stove, his voice dropping into a low rasp that vibrates through the room. "Wyatt saw it. Tess saw it. Cole did, too."

"Tess made her offer clear. She needs a nurse." My chin comes up, holding his eyes. "I need the truth about why you told Cole to hold that posting. If you did this to rehabilitate me—if this is about fixing another broken veteran before she crashes—tell me right now so I can pack my truck."

"A project?" He closes the distance in two strides, his hands coming up to cup my jaw, callused palms locking against my skin. "I don't rehabilitate people. I train dogs. If this was about duty, I'd let you pack that truck and drive down the pass."

"Then why?" The question leaves me in a raw breath, my hands coming up flat against his chest.

"Because I can't watch you leave." His hands tighten on my jaw, his forehead resting hard against mine. "For years, I lived on this ridge waiting for the clock to run out. Then you walked into my yard. You don't look at me with pity. You don't ask for a soft landing. You make this cold room feel like a life I actually want to keep. I'm not fixing you. I need you."

His mouth comes down hard on mine. There's an urgent desperation in his grip, driving me back until my shoulders hit the timber wall beside the pegs.

The impact knocks the air from my chest, but my arms go around his neck, pulling him closer. I kiss him back with the same raw hunger, meeting his mouth with everything I've spent days trying to bury.

His hands drop to my hips. He pulls my thermal up over my head and lets it fall to the floor. His thumbs drag across my ribs, his eyes locked on mine, searching past the silence between us.

I hold his gaze and pull his shirt open. Buttons. Two of them skip across the boards.

He lifts me. My knee complains. I ignore it.

He gets me to the bed in four strides and puts me down with more care than the rest of him is showing. He takes my boots off left, then right. Then he's over me. His mouth finds my throat. My breast. The burn scar on my forearm. My hip, marking a route. He's rougher tonight than he's ever been with me, and I open for it.

He pushes into me in one long stroke, and my breath goes out on his name.

Then he holds still.