Wild and Free

by Vella Munn

  Dean glanced down. Icy water was seeping up his pant leg. The expensive rifle Hawk had entrusted to him was floating down the river. The cub was pushing at its mother with a pink-tipped nose.

  Calley was walking toward him.

  “Are you going to stand there and freeze?” she asked in a small voice.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes,” Calley managed to reply. She held out a hand to help him out of the river, but once he was on firm ground, she collapsed against him. A spasm tore through her; he clutched her tightly, running a hand through her hair as a parent might comfort a frightened child.

  “You’re shaking,” he whispered.

  “So are you.” Calley tried to draw back, but she lacked the strength.

  “I’m cold,” he said laughing. “Calley? We have work to do.”

  “I know.” Still holding on to him, she reached for her walkie-talkie to interrupt the staccato questions coming from Steve. After reassuring him that they were all right, Calley switched the walkie-talkie to park headquarters and handed it to Dean. It took him less than a minute to inform Hawk and the helicopter pilot of their location.

  “They’ll be here in a few minutes.” Dean sighed. “It’s all over, isn’t it?”

  “But the work,” Calley pointed out. However, she knew that wasn’t what he was thinking about. “Do you have any idea how proud I am of you?” Although they were making their way back to where the dozing bear and loudly complaining cub were, she hadn’t let go of him.

  Dean pressed the palm of his hand against his forehead. “I didn’t think about myself. I don’t remember jumping into the river or what I was thinking about when I shot at the cub.”

  Calley stopped. “Were you trying to hit it?”

  “No.” He gave her the answer she wanted to hear. “I think I was trying to distract the mother. If she’d kept after you—” Dean shuddered and gripped Calley, pulling her closer.

  Calley surrendered herself to Dean’s arms. They still had work to do before the helicopter and Steve arrived, but that would have to wait. First they needed to reassure each other that everything had turned out all right—that neither of them had been injured or killed. Calley wanted to know more about the emotions Dean had felt at the moment he’d heard she was in danger, but that could wait, too. It was enough to know he’d come to her and not run away.

  “That poor baby,” Calley said at length. She turned away from Dean long enough to watch the confused cub, which was still trying to get his mother to her feet. “We have to take them to where they’ll be safe.”

  “Where everyone will be safe,” Dean pointed out. He held Calley away from him but still hadn’t released her. “I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of holding you.”

  “It’s a reaction to what happened,” Calley said with a heartfelt whisper. She knew she didn’t have to add that she was feeling the same emotions. It didn’t make sense, but even when she was the target of the grizzly’s wrath, her mind had been on Dean. He’d gone through so much already, she had thought. The grizzly couldn’t turn on him. It couldn’t.

  She suppressed another shudder before turning to the task of caring for the bears. The cub scrambled off when they came near, but when they started checking the location of the dart to judge the dosage in the huge creature, the cub slunk back. It would be an easy matter to capture it when it came time to load the animals. Calley knelt on the barren ground around the river and held out her hand. “Come on, little fella. I’m not going to hurt you,” she tried to reassure it.

  “I don’t think it’s going to work,” Dean pointed out. “This isn’t a puppy you’re talking to.”

  “I guess not.” Calley sighed. “Born wild. Always wild. I wish those politicians were here. I think they’d see the dignity in that.”

  Steve reached them before the helicopter arrived. By his red face Calley guessed that the Indian had run the entire way. He asked a minimum of questions, but his eyes settled first on Calley’s and then on Dean’s face. “Are you going to tell me?” he asked finally.

  “Tell you what?” Dean asked.

  “You know what! How’d it go?”

  “Fine. No problem.”

  “Yeah?” Steve said skeptically. “Then how come Calley looks like she’s been stuck in a deep freeze?”

  Dean studied Calley for a minute. He placed his hands over her cheeks and gently rubbed color back into them. “I thought you were lady cool,” he chided gently. “You aren’t going to cave in on me now, are you?”

  In reply Calley covered Dean’s hands with hers and held them in front of him. They weren’t as steady as they used to be. “What’s this?” she asked. “Coffee nerves?”

  Steve sighed loudly. “The two of you are going to tell me the whole story as soon as we get Sleeping Beauty here to her new home. When’s that helicopter getting here?”

  In response to Steve’s question, the river’s solitude was broken by the low but growing hum of a powerful engine. A minute later a large helicopter appeared over the mountains and dipped lower to hover over the trio and their sleeping quarry. The pilot dropped a cable with a hook and carrying net at the bottom of it. It required a major effort on the part of Dean, Steve and Calley to roll the sleeping grizzly onto the net and secure it around her. Next the pilot dropped a rope, which Steve secured around his middle before signaling the pilot to lift him into the helicopter.

  Calley and Dean stood back as the powerful engine revved and slowly climbed upward. The limp grizzly hung suspended over them, moving higher and higher until at length she was little more than an indistinguishable mass. Below her the cub bellowed his confusion.

  “Come on, little fellow,” Calley crooned. “We’ll get you back to your mom as soon as we can.”

  Before the bewildered youngster could scamper away, Dean picked up the blanket the helicopter pilot had dropped and threw it around the now squalling and fighting cub. Once the blanket was around the youngster’s head, he stopped struggling and allowed Dean to lift him into his arms.

  “You missed your calling,” Calley observed once Dean was sitting cross-legged on the ground with the cub cradled between his knees. “You should have been a professional baby-sitter.”

  “As long as the babies are smaller than this one,” Dean pointed out. “I just hope this kid grows up with a more mellow temperament than his old lady.”

  Calley plopped down next to Dean. She reached out to rub her hand over the cub’s head. “I couldn’t kill her,” she said to no one in particular. “I know. I should have been thinking of my survival first, but when I thought of this little guy becoming an orphan…”

  “So you endangered your own life. That wasn’t the smartest decision you’ve ever made.”

  Calley refused to take offense. She hadn’t taken time earlier to notice the day, but it really was perfect. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The temperature was in the seventies. They were surrounded by Dall sheep and eagles and maybe were being watched by a fox or a wolf. “It turned out all right,” she said, not trying to keep her feeling of contentment out of her voice. She was intuitive enough to realize that tonight’s sleep wouldn’t be peaceful, but for the moment she wanted nothing more than to enjoy being with Dean.

  “It did, didn’t it?”

  Calley took note of the wonderment in his voice. “Why didn’t you try to kill her?” she asked.

  “I did,” Dean explained. “But I lost my footing and missed.”

  “You could have tried again.”

  Dean frowned, but the gesture didn’t last long. “I didn’t think you’d forgive me if I did.”

  “When did you have time to think?” Calley rested her head against his shoulder. He felt stronger to her than he ever had before.

  “I didn’t. It was just something I knew.” Because Dean had his arms full with the cub, he was unable to put his arm around Calley. Instead, he ran his lips over the side of her face. “I know you pretty well, Calley Stewart. That smelly old sow’s
life is important to you. I figured there was a chance I could divert her from you. It worked.”

  “And if it hadn’t?”

  Dean tensed. “Don’t make me think about that, Calley,” he said sharply.

  “You have to,” she whispered.

  For the better part of a minute there was no sound except that made by the river and birds flying overhead. “If that grizzly had killed you, it would have killed me, too.”

  “Were you scared?” Calley asked her question, holding her breath. What she felt for Dean at the moment left no room for anything as unnecessary as breathing.

  “There wasn’t time for that emotion. Calley, you were what mattered. Nothing else.”

  It was the answer she had to hear. “I think you learned something about yourself,” she whispered. “You’re stronger than you thought you were. As strong as I knew you were.”

  “You never thought I might turn and run?” Dean was staring down at the blanket-covered lump in his arms.

  “Never,” she replied with the conviction of her heart. “But I also knew it was something you had to discover for yourself. Oh, Dean! So much has happened today.” She wasn’t talking only about capturing and transporting a rogue grizzly.

  There was little that needed to be said in the time the two spent waiting for the helicopter to return. Dean ventured a guess that Hawk would splutter and complain about the lost rifle but that he wouldn’t care as long as Dean and Calley were safe. “We’ll keep Hawk in suspense until we get back,” he said. “They can tell him a little from the helicopter, but if he wants the details, he’s going to have to wait.”

  Calley didn’t mind waiting. Time hung suspended as the Alaskan sun warmed their backs and dried Dean’s pants. Her mind drifted off from time to time but kept coming back to one glorious fact. She and Dean were together. Loving each other. Dean had met and passed his supreme test. Now he knew what she did already. He was a man who could stand up and be counted when the circumstances dictated.

  And yet Calley held back from telling Dean that. Certain things didn’t need words to bring them into focus. It was enough that they’d shared today.

  “Montana’s going to seem tame after this,” Dean said when they heard the first faint hum of the helicopter returning. “What are you going to do for excitement now?”

  Calley pretended to be debating the question. “Didn’t you and Hawk say you’ve about run out of excuses for not climbing Mount McKinley? What are you doing next week?”

  “Next week I’m taking you to Hawaii. Warm sand. Surfing. Tourists all over the place.”

  “Spare me.” Calley laughed and got to her feet. “If you go to Hawaii, you’re going alone.”

  “Isn’t that just like a woman.” Dean tucked the blanket more closely around the cub before handing it to Calley. “I’ve already taken her to one of the most glamorous spots on earth, but is she satisfied? No way. We may have to discuss this at length later.”

  Calley balanced the weight of the squirming cub in her arms and turned her attention to the helicopter landing a short distance from her. Dean gathered up their equipment and stepped into the open helicopter door as Calley lowered her head against the wind caused by the whirling blades. She handed the cub back to Dean and climbed aboard. As the helicopter started lifting, Calley took a last look at the place where so much had transpired. Her eyes sought out the spot where she’d been standing when the grizzly challenged her.

  “I’d like to come back here someday,” she said so softly that the helicopter engine almost swallowed up the words. She reached for the bundled cub and insisted on holding it during the trip to where its still-drugged mother lay waiting.

  When the pilot indicated that they were ready to descend, Calley leaned over and looked down. She could make out the huge brown mound and the solid man standing guard over it. “I wonder if she’ll find her way back to Toklat,” Calley mused aloud. “Too bad we can’t explain to her that she’d save herself and everyone else a lot of trouble if she just stays put.”

  “If she comes back, we’ll haul her out again.”

  Slowly Calley nodded. Dean was right. Some people piloted helicopters. Some passed laws in the nation’s capital. Others, like Steve and Dean and herself, had taken on the mantle of responsibility that would ensure the continued existence of one of earth’s largest mammals. “Hold on, kid,” Calley admonished the cub when it tried to jump out of her arms. “We’ll have you with your mother in a few minutes. Ungrateful brat!” she gasped as the cub dug a paw into her right thigh. “I’m trying to save your hide. Can’t you get that through your thick skull?”

  The cub was still testing its strength when Steve helped her out of the helicopter. She could have handed the cub over to Steve, but this was something she wanted to do herself.

  Calley walked over to the inert mound lying on the Alaskan tundra and slowly dropped to her knees. Only then did she pull the blanket away from the cub’s eyes. For perhaps three seconds the cub lay passive in her arms.

  “You’re home, baby,” Calley whispered. “Wake up your mama.”

  With a loud squall the cub catapulted itself toward its mother. It sniffed anxiously at the unmoving head and then swatted the grizzly on her nose. “Serves her right,” Calley said with a laugh as she turned back toward the waiting helicopter. “I hope you turn out to be a juvenile delinquent. Give the old lady a few gray hairs.”

  Calley accepted Dean’s assistance back into the helicopter and sat with her body wedged against his during the trip back to headquarters. Although the men were talking animatedly about the day’s excitement, she was content to simply sit and listen. It was enough to hear the mixture of admiration and lingering concern in Dean’s voice as he relayed the details of what had happened.

  The story had to be told over again once Hawk had hauled them out of the helicopter. Over coffee in Hawk’s office, Dean restated his belief that the grizzly wouldn’t cause any more trouble as long as she was kept away from large concentrations of tourists. Hawk pretended to be dismayed when Dean told him that the park was out one rifle, but that didn’t prevent him from insisting that Calley and Dean stay one more night before flying out.

  “You still haven’t seen the park. Not really,” Dean observed as they were walking back to their cabin. “I’m going to have to get your boss to give you more time off.”

  “As long as you serve as my guide.” Calley slipped her arm through Dean’s. It seemed as if they’d left the cabin only a matter of minutes ago, but already the sun was setting behind the high mountains. “I wish we didn’t have to go back,” she said with a sigh.

  “You really like it here?”

  Calley waited until they were in the cabin with the door closed behind them. “I love it here. So much has been left the way nature intended it to be. You don’t suppose—”

  “You don’t suppose what?”

  “Nothing.” Calley shook her head. It was too early in their relationship for her to be thinking about forever with Dean, and yet the thought was there. What she’d almost said was did he think Alaska was a place to come for a honeymoon. “Hawk said we should have dinner with him. That’s going to leave us less than an hour to get cleaned up.”

  “Calley?” Dean touched her arm, the gesture enough to turn her toward him. “Would you mind if we didn’t eat with him?”

  Of course she didn’t. Food was the last thing on her mind. “What will he think?” she had to ask.

  “I think he’d figure it out.” Dean touched the side of her neck with fingers that had suddenly gone cold. “I need you next to me, Calley. Every time I think about what could have happened—”

  “It didn’t happen,” she reassured him. She didn’t know which of them was trembling. “It turned out all right.”

  “I know.” Dean’s whispered breath caressed her cheeks. “But I still need you next to me.”

  Calley closed her eyes, but that didn’t stop her body from swaying. She couldn’t name the emotion coursing throu
gh her body, only that she was accepting it, loving it. “Please make love to me, Dean. That’s what I need.”

  Reverently Dean covered her mouth with his. “Do you have any idea what you’re doing to me, Calley Stewart? How much you mean to me?”

  “Show me,” she said.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “No one goes to Alaska for a honeymoon.”

  Melinda’s words followed Calley out to the car on a trail of rice. Calley bent her head to escape the white shower, waiting impatiently as Dean opened the door and helped her in. She smoothed the white satin she’d been married in around her and pushed the short veil back from her face. “Except us,” Calley continued the conversation once she was safely inside. “Besides, I don’t think we can honestly call it a honeymoon since we’re going to be there on business.”

  “You just got married and you’re going on a trip. That qualifies for a honeymoon.” Melinda squeezed her friend’s arm in reinforcement. “You can’t tell me you aren’t going to find time for a little recreation.”

  Dean was behind the wheel. He leaned across Calley to speak to Melinda. “You have a point there. We might not get out of the first motel.”

  Calley blushed; fortunately Dean started the jeep before she had to face a knowing look from Melinda. She turned and waved at the friends who’d attended their wedding and then slid close to Dean. The day was perfect. Despite an earlier threat of rain, only a few puffs of white clouds were in the sky during the ceremony, held in the same magic garden spot where Melinda and Kirk had been married. Dean was unbelievably handsome in his dark blue suit. Calley could still hear echoes of his softly spoken words of commitment. “Melinda said to tell you it’s about time we tied the knot. She said we’ve been acting like newlyweds ever since we got back from McKinley.”

  “Hmm.” Dean carefully removed Calley’s veil and smoothed her hair with his hand. His eyes told her that she was beautiful. “That’s pretty much what Steve told me. I had no idea people were that interested in us.”