Page 5 of Mountain Man's Valentine
2
Cole
They dothis every fucking year.
Half of them are drunk. The other half really are trying, but no one is really very good or knows what the hell they’re doing.
Excepther.
She knows what she is doing with her rifle. She is hunched low to the ground, she is steady, she is confident, she is sure. She has practiced, she is cautious, she is tactical and she is methodical.
She is also the most beautiful and pure creature I have ever seen.
The first time I saw her was a year ago today. She came out to play this stupid game they have. Last year was the first time I saw her. She was sloppy last year. She was under-dressed, and she didn’t blend into the terrain. She never shot at a target. She never evenlocateda target.
She was beautiful a year ago. She was fuckingperfect. She looked like she didn’t know what the fuck she was doing. She swung her rifle through the air, playing, pretending to know what she was doing.
But she never squeezed the trigger.
It was warmer last year, unseasonably warm for mid-February. The ground was warm and damp and she skipped through my fucking backyard, twirling her hair and eating these fucking chocolate candies out of a baggie, and she didn’t take the game seriously. I could give two shits about the game, and clearly she didn’t care about it, either.
She also didn’t know she was trespassing on my property, either.
I let these kids have their fun, though. Someone should have some enjoyment around here.
They leave my property littered with beer cans, but I have a full staff and I give them a big, hefty bonus to clean everything up. It’s not in their job description to clean up after a bunch of privileged assholes who have nothing better to do than get drunk in the woods and shoot paintball guns at random targets.
It’s not like I’m going to go out there and tell those punks to get off my lawn.
I’m notthatmuch of an old curmudgeon.
But her...she doesn’t belong here. She didn’t belong here last year, and shecertainlydoesn’t belong here this year. Last year she fit in a little bit better because of how decidedlyun-seriously she took the whole thing.
This year, she’s taking itveryfucking seriously. She crouches down behind a fallen tree trunk and expertly takes a shot at a target, and the pink paint she’s packed her rifle with splatters on the target she’s found.
She’s so happy. It makes my fucking heartclench upin my chest when I see her celebrating her little victory.
And all I want to do is go out there and celebrate with her. I always hated this game, and now I love it. She makes me want to celebrate with her. The innocence she exudes, mixed with the confidence she has, it makes my heart melt and my cock roar when I see her perfect skin and her silky blonde hair peeking out from the massive hood on her white coat.
And that pink bullseye. Itisher - alone in the wilderness, this beacon of somethingspecialand pure in the vast expanse of the untamed, messy wild.
I want to go down there andtakeher. Throw her over my shoulder and bring her back up here to my home and keep her here.
She turns, and she smiles, and Iswearthose perfect heart-shaped red lips are smiling just for me.
She takes another piece of candy out of her pocket and pops it between her delectable lips. I imagine what she tastes like. Sweet and pure and melting into me.
But suddenly my attention is torn away from my security monitors by my phone ringing in my pocket.
It’s the satellite office down in San Francisco, and they never call unless there’s a problem. I don’t like problems. Not when it comes to my business, and not when it comes to my personal life. So I answer, even though it means taking my eyes off my girl.
“Yeah, what’s going on?” I say into the phone, getting up to pace my small auxiliary office where I man my security system.
“Hey, Cole,” the voice on the other end of the line says. He doesn’t have to identify himself; I know it’s Conrad, my head systems analyst. He’s the best man in my employ, which means when he’s calling me, there must really be a fucking problem.
“What is it?” I say impatiently. As much as I like to run my business smoothly and get involved when needed, everything’s on autopilot right now as far as I’m concerned. I’m not a control freak. I let that shit run itself. I can’t afford to be a control freak. I was once. That’s why I’m up here in the mountains, letting the best tech people money can hire run the show. At least that’s part of the reason I’m up here. I only intervene when needed. Andthat’swhen I can turn into a controlling prick.
“We got a problem, boss,” he says. “One of the servers in New York is down, and it’s fucking us.”
