We slept that way the whole night with our hands linked in the middle.

At one point, I’d gotten up and made something to eat. We ate our dinner on either side of the open doorway. Eventually I grabbed us both a blanket and pillow when it got to be too dark and too tiring to keep sitting upright.

In the morning, I was surprised by the sight of Mustang, certain that he would have slunk off to his own bed somewhere when the hard porch floor became too uncomfortable.

Instead, he lay motionless on his back, his eyes closed, his hand still holding tightly to mine even as he slept.

I dared not move, afraid to startle him, afraid to send him running away in fear and shame. I stayed there patiently watching him, waiting for him to wake up. When he did wake, he didn’t move or open his eyes.

He simply spoke as if we’d never been asleep.

“The word that describes how I’m supposed to feel is ‘hero.’ But I don’t feel like one.”

“Then what do you feel like?” I asked.

“I feel like a coward,” he replied quietly.

How he knew I was awake was a mystery. This wasn’t the time to question him.

“Why don’t you feel like a hero?” I asked with a soft voice, holding very still and watching his face intently.

“Because I killed a lot people who never saw it coming. It’s one thing to fight with another person, but a sniper shoots them from far away, from a hiding place. Some of the guys I killed...I shot them in the back. Like a coward. They never had a fighting chance.”

So many thoughts raced through my mind, empty words and assurances that wouldn’t mean anything coming from someone who’d never experienced the turmoil that Mustang was drowning in.

I simply held his hand tighter and waited.

Instead of talking more about it, Mustang turned his head and looked at me. Our faces were close, separated by an invisible line of the doorway.

“Why don’t you think I’m a monster?” he asked.

“Who says I don’t?” I teased quietly.

“I can just tell. You like me,” he said solemnly in a matter-of-fact tone.

“I admit it. I sort of like you. A little bit. To me, you’re not a monster, you’re more like a big, gentle giant.”

“Good,” he answered, closing his eyes again.

“Oh no you don’t, mister. You don’t get me to admit that I like you and then you don’t say anything back,” I laughed and slapped his arm. “Don’t make me get my best friend to ask your guy friends if you like me, too.”

Mustang laughed, only the second time I’d ever heard him. His chest rumbled with the sound and his face lit up in a way that stunned me for a moment. It was enough to make me want to spend the rest of my life making him laugh, just to be able to see that joyous expression cross his face again.

“I like you too,” he finally said. “Only a little bit, same as you.”

“Good. Now that’s settled, let’s eat breakfast.”

While I busied myself putting a quick meal together, Mustang got up and tended to the horses. He came back and asked me to fill one of the tubs with water for them, which I did.

After breakfast, Mustang suggested we ride the horses back to where they’d been staying so the animals could adjust slowly to their new environment. He offered to keep watching them until I had food and a place for them to stay at night in the barn.

I changed clothes and then we headed out into the bright morning to ride.

Once we were away from the imposing weight of the house, Mustang took a deep breath and turned his face up to the sunshine, like someone freed from a prison cell after too many years.

He relaxed his tense shoulders and talked more easily, pointing out different plants or rock formations to me.

He even talked a little bit about how he came to be out here, away from everyone and everything, looking for a place where he wouldn’t have to work so hard to try to appear normal.

I stayed quiet and let him talk.

As a caretaker who lived out in the wilds of the ranch, Mustang probably didn’t get the chance to talk much.

After riding for more than an hour at a slow, meandering walk, Mustang pointed out a low overhang in the rock where the ground was stamped down.

“What am I looking at?” I asked.

“My home.”

“A cave? You live in a cave for real?”

“That’s it. That’s my home,” he said.

I stared at the charred remains of his camp fire and the bedroll that was neatly folded and hanging beneath the rock face by a leather cord to keep it dry.

“Wow,” I said, almost speechless at the living conditions. “What do you do when it rains?”

“Get wet usually.”

“Okay, smart guy. It doesn’t bother you to be out here alone in bad weather?”

I couldn’t imagine ever choosing to sleep out here on purpose. I took in the rest of the area and noticed what had to be the horse pen, near another place where the rock jutted out. It provided a little shelter and protected their bin of grain from the elements.

“Nope, it’s never bothered me the least bit,” he answered. “It’s no worse than the living conditions on any military exercise I had to do. In fact, it’s a whole lot better than Afghanistan. That place is a fucking hellhole. Excuse the bad language. The heat, the sand, the dryness to everything. It was awful.”

Mustang made a small noise to his horse and steered her around. He walked her over to the pile of grain and jumped down from the saddle. He unhooked the horse’s bit so the animal could eat, then reached for my horse to do the same.

He opened a large hinged box and took out some pouches of food and bottles of water before tossing them in his backpack.

“Come with me,” he said. “Let’s take a walk.”

He held out his hand to me, and together we began walking. He showed me the river at this end of the property, too small and too far to be useful for the ranch, but beautiful and serene just the same.

When we sat down beside the river to rest and have a snack, Mustang impulsively pulled me onto his lap and kissed me.

“What was that for?” I asked with a giggle.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he said. “I don’t really want to be alone. I just could never figure out how to not be. I didn’t know how to explain to someone that I needed to sleep under a rock instead of a house, and that I’m going to run away every so often because I don’t know how not to.”

My heart tightened in my chest. There was so much pain in his voice. Pain that I would do anything to take away or ease even a tiny bit.

“You don't have to run anymore,” I said. “You know that, right?”

“I know,” he whispered into my hair.

“And if you run, I’ll be right behind you.”

“I hope you’re fast,” he whispered again.

I didn’t answer, but instead took Mustang’s hand and guided it between my legs as we kissed, begging him with my body to touch me.

He did as I wanted, rubbing my pussy until my breath came in short gasps and I moved my hips against his strong hand.

I reached for his shirt as I had done before, but he stopped me, instead laying me back and tugging gently at my jeans and helping me slide them off.

Mustang moved between my legs and brought my leg up to his mouth, kissing me gently behind my knee and making me squeal lightly in surprise as he began sucking on the sensitive skin there.

He worked his way up my leg and across the inside of my thigh, guiding my foot up over his shoulder as he traveled towards my middle. I was tense with anticipation as I waited for Mustang’s loving assault, shuddering when I felt his hot breath across my soft mound.

I struggled to keep from screaming from the sensation when Mustang’s tongue finally found my wet slit and dove inside me, sucking carefully at my sex bringing me almost to the heights of climax.

I could tell by his every touch that this was more than sex for him. Mustang couldn’t tell me with words how he felt. He was too broken to utter the words. Instead he showed me with his actions.

This meant more to me than any words he could possibly say.

Reaching up with both hands, he leisurely circled my breasts, palming the nipples into they puckered into hard, throbbing tips. He took his time, putting my pleasure above his own.

Our lovemaking this time was very different.

Before, we were two people who simply craved each other physically, but now, I understood Mustang in some small way.

He knew that, too, and knew that I was someone who had not pushed him away, even when he had given me every reason to. We explored each other’s bodies passionately but slowly, taking our time and devoting our full attention to each other’s fulfillment.

As we held each other afterward, Mustang leaned close to my ear and whispered, “Thank you for not thinking I’m crazy.”

“You’re welcome,” I said and rolled over to face him. “Thank you for letting me in. I admit, it took some effort at first. You just need to be who you are, in whatever way you can. You don’t have to become someone else, not for me and not for anybody. But I do want to say this...if the day ever comes when you can feel safe and comfortable indoors, you are going to be absolutely blown away by having sex in a bed. The feeling is amazing!”

I patted the hard ground under us, earning another smile from Mustang before he hid his face in my shoulder.

“I can never get enough of the scent coming off your skin,” he said, catching me by surprise.

He nuzzled the soft skin of my shoulder, scratching me with his beard and I smiled at the compliment.

As we slowly made our way back to my house, a revelation came over me so strongly that I wondered if it wasn’t truly heaven-sent.

I sat up taller in the saddle and looked over at Mustang, and said, “I know what I’m going to do with the ranch.”

He gave me a questioning look.

“Go on,” he said. “I’m all ears.”

“I want to turn this place into a getaway for kids who’ve been hurt or people who’ve been damaged in some way. Let it be a place where they can spend time learning how to breathe again. We both know you can’t handle pain until you learn how to breathe through it.”

A look of total admiration crossed his face, and he smiled, bigger than I’d seen.

“That’s a great idea. You will make a huge difference to people.”

“What do you mean ‘you’? I meant you and me, mister. Who better than two damaged people to show others how to become unbroken?”

He shook his head.

“I’m not sure if I can help anyone. I would like to. I just don’t know if I can.”

“Will you at least think about my idea?” I asked.

“I will.”

We rode in contented silence the rest of the way back. Back at the house, I watched Mustang take the horses to the barn and I headed into the house. I had a million ideas running through my mind and started to jot them down before I forgot them.