Sunrise Point

amazing-looking—and he didn’t want her at all. He didn’t even want to kiss her and he was no longer curious about her perfect breasts.
    He’d been having very disturbing dreams for several weeks in which he was having the most delicious sex of his life. He was taking his partner to heights she’d never before experienced and she was satisfying him in ways he hadn’t imagined. They were like bunnies, just screwing their brains out. He could taste her, feel her breasts and hard nipples under his hands, slide into her and make her climax in seconds over and over again and he would wake up hungry for her.
    And she was Nora, the woman he didn’t want to want. Every goddamn last time, she was Nora. The woman with kids from a felon, the girl who was desperately down on her luck and hanging on to her dreams and her pride by a thread…
    …and impressing the hell out of everyone, including him. Though she had these profound obstacles, she laughed as though life was a treat. It was only Tom who had hang-ups, who wanted the woman of the rest of his life to match some unachievable fantasy woman. What a fool. The real deal had been picking apples for him all along.
    Duke wandered to the back door. He wagged and looked over his shoulder at Tom and Tom got up to let him out, welcoming the distraction.
    “There are so many options for us to look at as we get to know each other better,” Darla was saying. “I mean, things change, Tom. I’m sure you won’t want to grow apples forever. Then again, maybe you’ll want to expand, have a good team running the place while you do something else. And did you know that one of Maxie’s friends lives in a very nice seniors’ community?”
    Just out of stubbornness he asked, “Which one?”
    “Oh, I can’t remember. I think it was—”
    Duke started to bark ferociously, that kind of bark that Tom recognized, not just from Duke, who was ten years old, but from dogs of his youth. That wild, high-pitched cry for backup. His eyes grew big, his mouth opened. He shot to his feet just as the dog’s scream came, as if he’d been attacked.
    “Did you leave the gate open?” he asked Darla in a shout.
    “I…ah…I don’t…”
    “Tom!” Maxie yelled as she came pounding down the stairs.
    He had the back door open. “Duke! Duke! Come on, boy! Come, Duke!”
    The dog skittered up the porch steps and into the kitchen door, tail between his legs, head down, panting in terror, shaking all over.
    “Bear!” Maxie said. “I’ll call Junior!”
    “I’ll call Junior—check Duke over. He doesn’t look like he’s bleeding. I hope he’s just scared.” He picked up the phone and punched in some numbers. “Junior—we got the bear back. I’m pretty sure the gate was left open.” There was a pause. “I’ll be waiting near the house so don’t shoot anything that just rustles in the bushes—it could be me. I’ll carry a flashlight. Let’s not waste a lot of time.”
    He went to the living room where the locked gun closet was and pulled out a rifle and extra ammunition. He put on his jacket, gloves, hat.
    “What are you going to do?” Darla said, standing uncertainly from the table.
    Tom ignored her. “Duke all right?” he asked Maxie.
    Duke was down on the kitchen floor, baring his belly, Maxie beside him. “He’s all right, just scared to death. You be careful, Tom.”
    “I’ll be careful,” he said.
    “What are you going to do?” Darla shrieked.
    “I’m going to get the goddamn bear!”
    “Can’t you just go close the gate?”
    “And close that bear and her triplets in here for the night? Then maybe when my employees come in the morning they can meet four bears face-to-face? I don’t think so. Or I could leave it open all night and have a herd of elk or deer divest me of my apples. Didn’t I tell you to close the goddamn gate after you come through?”
    “I don’t know,” she said, immediately crying. “You always did it for me!”
    It was pointless. “Yeah,” he said in exasperation. He looked at his grandmother. “Maxie, stay in the house. And I mean it.”
    “Aren’t you going to tell me to stay in?” Darla asked.
    “I know you’re not going out there.” And he left the house.
    * * *
    Junior and Tom took out the quads in search of bears. Typically they used the quads to pull a small flatbed with equipment or to drag soil aerating attachments when the tractor was too large to get between the trees. They could cover the orchard once in