A Beautiful Heart

She was down on her hands and knees wearing cut-off jeans and a robin's egg blue blouse in the bright mid-May sun tending her garden when a deep voice behind her said, "Hello Kira."

She froze and sat bolt upright. "How does this man know my name?" she thought with some distress. She turned around to see a large, well-dressed man lounging with his arm atop a fencepost. His fedora was set at a jaunty that threw the view of the right side of his face into shadow. She did notice something familiar in the part of his face that she could see, but couldn't quite remember who it belonged to. "Hello?" she asked guardedly while standing and turning to face him. "Have we met?"

"We certainly have, Kira. I lived here many years ago," he responded with a half twisted grin.

She looked at him up and down for a moment, almost remembering who he was from that simple grin. He was six foot four inches tall, weighed about two hundred and thirty pounds with weathered complexion. He wore a grey jacket with the collar turned up, further shading his face. The one fact she had was that he had lived in this house decades ago. "Elliot Havoc?" she queried.

"You remember me!" he grinned. How could she forget him. He was two years her senior but had always seemed to be the boy next door riding in to her rescue. He had always come to her aid and helped her survive the spiders and other denizens of the garden and always managed to stick up for her at school. He had always had a beautiful heart and genuinely cared for those around him. The last time she had seen him, she was a young girl in tears as she watched while he was thrown into the back of a black car and driven out of her life.

"I was so sorry to hear about your parents," she said in a sombre tone. "Then, you were gone too. We didn't know whether we'd ever see you again!" she said as she thought, "I didn't know whether I'd ever see you again!" "Now, here you are!" she finished.

"Oh, it was a wild ride" he returned, still doing his best to grin.

"Well, come on over and come on in." she invited. "I'll put on a pot of coffee. Seems we have some catching up to do!"

I'd like that very much!" he said now smiling widely as he walked around the fence that separated the two properties and followed her into her house. Once inside, he kicked off his shoes and followed her into the kitchen.

"Sit down at the table," she said. "Take your coat and hat off, stay a while!" she grinned.

With a little hesitation, he took off his hat and hung it on the back of the chair. He swept his coat off, placed it on the other post and sat down, apprehensive about the next few minutes.

She swept around from the counter to the kitchen table with a tray of coffee, cups and a plate of cookies. She placed the tray on the table before looking up and seeing him for the first time without his disguise.

It now became apparent to her as to why his clothing had been adjusted they way it was. It was obvious to anyone looking that he had been burned quite badly. She smiled and tried not to stare.

"That must have hurt," she remarked nonchalantly.

"It's okay," he said quietly. "I'm just not one of the beautiful people anymore."

She took his head in her hands, turned it to face her and looked him dead in the eyes. She took a breath and told him in a solemn voice, "The body is just a shell that houses the soul and heart. They're what are really important." She then smiled, "Now, how do you like your coffee?"

"Black please," replied Elliot both relieved and elated to hear that she felt that way.

She sat down on the opposite side of the table and got comfortable on one of the padded kitchen chairs. "So tell me, what have you been doing all these years?" she asked in earnest interest as she settled in to listen to what she was sure would be a fantastic story.

"Well, after they took me way from here, I was placed with my grandparents as guardians. As you can imagine, I was an atypical very angry young man; so, I was definitely too much for them to handle. They enrolled me in a military school upstate to get my attitude under control. From there, I entered R.O.T.C, and was on my way to becoming an officer and a gentleman in the army. I graduated just in time to go to the war in Iraq. I did two tours of duty in Iraq and one in Afghanistan. The tour in Afghanistan put paid to my military career.

"What happened?" she asked with natural concern in her voice. She was now picturing this angry young man in black leather, and the heat at her loins grew incrementally as the image resolved.

He sighed before beginning to recite the tale that he had told a thousand times. "Our group was escorting a shipment of food to a remote village when we were ambushed. The lead Humvee was hit by a rocket propelled grenade. It stopped dead where it was and a fire started. We all piled out of the vehicles in the column and assumed a defensive perimeter, firing in every direction when I heard screams coming from the lead vehicle. There were still some of my people trapped in that thing! I sprinted over and wrenched open the door to find six soldiers inside. I helped out everyone who was able to walk, but one was terribly wounded man was left, and he was unable to get out under his own power. I lifted him out to safety, and was backing away from the vehicle when the fuel tank exploded. The man in my arms was instantly roasted to death but his body protected me from a similar fate. That's where I got this," he said as he indicated the burns on the right side of his face.

"Oh my God," she said in a stunned voice. In mind, she thought, "Just like Elliot to do something like that. He really hasn't changed a bit!"

"That was just our little piece of a very big and very nasty war," he said quietly. "So, what have you been up to in the interval?" he asked, trying to change the subject.

After school, I decided to go into nursing," she began.

"Natural fit," he commented..

"A few years into my nursing career, I had an accident lifting a patient and wrenched my back. It did heal, but not all the way and still gives me trouble from time to time. I had to have three fused vertebra now.

"We've both had some adventures it seems," he pondered as he finished his coffee. "Well, it's been great to spend some time and catch up with you, Kira, but I have a few things to take care of today. May we continue this conversation later?"

"Ever polite," she thought. "Of course!" she smiled, getting up to see him out. Once he was gone, her curiosity got the better of her. She agonized for long minutes about prying into his life; but, in the end, she just had to know. She fired up her computer, determined now to find out more about her enigmatic childhood friend.

What she found shocked her. As she read through the list of his commendations and medals she thought "Should he put all of his brass on at once, he'd walk around with a heavy list to port!" she thought as she read down the list of his decorations. She found several commendations. One was for stopping a riot without firing a shot. He'd evidently won a silver star for his action in the escapade he had related to her. He hadn't told her about that part.

Then, she read the commendation that made her heart skip a beat. He was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honour! "At great personal risk to himself," the citation began. "Yeah, that sounds just like Elliot," she thought. "Major Elliot Havoc single handedly captured the three man crew of an enemy machine gun that had pinned down his column. This capture turned into an intelligence boon, saving many more lives." The fact that he also had three Purple Hearts for three different wounds was a testament to just how tough this old soldier really was. She sat and marvelled as the words on the page leapt off to inform her of the exploits of her childhood friend. The more she read, the more impressed she became with the man who had grown out of the boy she had once known.

The following morning, Kira was outside in her yard moving some decorative bricks that she intended to ring a flower bed with. It was hot already and her back was bothering her, but she wanted to get this part of the work done.

The Major appeared at his back door wearing army issue shorts, a black shirt with a bold "10" printed on the back in stark white, white socks and white sneakers. He took one look at what she was doing, vaulted the fence and began to move the bricks for her, saying, "No, no! You were just telling me yesterday afternoon about having a bad back. Moving these bricks will be just terrible for that. Just let me do this for you, okay?" he begged.

She nodded her consent and sat down on the step up to the porch, shook her head and smiled. "Typical Elliot. That part of him will never change. Here it is a decade and a half later and he's still coming to my rescue," she thought as she watched him move. "What's the ten for, Elliot?" she asked, making conversation.

"That's the number of my last unit," he replied, "Tenth Mountain Division. I've accumulated quite a few T-shirts over the years," he chuckled as he continued his self appointed task.

As he completed his mission, she jumped up, threw her arms around his neck and planted a big, wet kiss of appreciation on his neck. "Thank you," she beamed. "Always my rescuer!"

"For as long as you will have me," he replied in his baritone voice and a huge grin on his face.

A warm shiver ran through her entire system at the sound of his words. "Would you like to stay for coffee?" she offered as the words, "Would you like to stay forever?" echoed in her mind while she led him through the back door of her house.

As was the newly formed custom, Elliot kicked off his shoes and sat down at the kitchen table as she busied herself with the coffee. "You never told me that you won so many medals over there!"

"You looked me up, did you?" he asked rhetorically. "Yeah, I won some bits of tin with ribbons on them. They say on paper that I went above and beyond with my actions, but I can't name another soldier in any of my units who wouldn't have done exactly the same thing."

"You don't appreciate them?" she asked incredulously. "You won them for courage defending your country!"

He thought for a moment before answering. "In my heart, each of those medals represents a number of people who died so that someone else could award that to me. Do you know how many soldiers I lost under my command?" he asked.

"No, I don't," she admitted quietly, riveted to the man.

"Twenty seven soldiers died under my command over there," he said quietly, "and I see each of their faces every night when I sleep. Once you have seen war, you never really stop seeing it. Those medals are just a painful reminder of a horrible conflagration," he finished as his voice began to crack with emotion.

"My God," she breathed while she turned and enveloped his head in her arms. "I never thought about it that way. I'm so sorry for bringing it up." she said with clouds gathering in her blue eyes.

"It's okay," he comforted, sliding his arm around her. "You didn't know, now you do," he said with a grin.

She melted into his grasp. "So, did you ever meet that special someone in your life?" she asked. Immediately, she sensed his body stiffen and realized that she had just stepped on another land mine. "Ooh," she mentally fumed. "I just can't say anything right today!"

"Yeah, I thought I had," he replied in a lower voice but no moving his grasp. "Janice, my ex-fiancée, took one look at me like this and bolted before I could blink. I was down and blue about it for a while; but, I realized, just as you seem to have, that she was only superficial, with no depth beneath that. I came to understand that I had not really missed her, per sey, while I was overseas. The only thing I really missed about her over there was not having someone to hold at night." He paused for a moment before continuing, "I'm adjusting to the bachelor lifestyle, though. What about you?" he enquired, graciously accepting the coffee mug from his friend.

At this point, Kira very nearly blurted out, "I'm someone to hold at night!" but instead, gracefully sat down next to him, chuckling at his candidness. "Well," she began,"I developed a rather bad habit," she began. "I fell in love with the 'bad boys'. I made that mistake too many times. Then, I took it to the next level and even married one of these losers a few years ago. Worst mistake of my life, and it haunts me to this day! The first time he came home drunk and hit me, it was over. I waited for him to pass out, packed my things and left. Mom and dad took me back in and even left me the house when they moved to Florida a last year.

"What's his name?" asked the Major as the storm clouds began to roll across is brow.

"Vance," she spat venomously. If there was ever a flame between them, it was long extinguished. "He's a good looking low life," she began. "He sells party drugs to the local college kids and fake IDs to the young ones. He'd walk over his grandmother's grave for the next big score. He's always playing an angle."

"Sounds like a charming young man," remarked the Major in a rather flat tone.

"Lowest Little Hoodlum in Texas!" she chuckled. "To re-gender a phrase, 'He ain't pretty he just looks that way'," she laughed as his bass guffaw joined hers. She watched a look of joy appear when he laughed. His whole face smiled when he did and the burned parts seemed to begin to fade, overlooked in the emotion. She was drawn to him in primal ways, ways she didn't truly understand; but, she could feel the waves of love emanating from him like she had from no other. She lazily draped a finger on his hand and held her breath.

Much to her great relief, he took her hand into his, pulled it to his chest and turned to face her She noted the semi wild look that had come into his eyes. It was his turn to take a chance. "You were always special to me, even when we were kids, Kira" he blurted. "I loved you back then, and I still do. I have a feeling that I always will." His face turned scarlet as the final words exited his mouth. "Ahh... I'm sorr... err... uhh... I mean... umm?" he sputtered, embarrassed that he had let his mouth get away from him like that.

Kira was somewhat shocked by the words of her friend. Now, as images from their youth flitted through her mind, she began to realize how right he was. Her own deep and unabiding love for him that she had harboured for him all of her life finally burst into flame. She put a finger to his lips to quiet him, then pressed her hungry mouth to his.

She allowed his tongue to probe the softness just inside her lips, touched her straight, white teeth and taste the sweetness of her inner self. She was delightfully animated under his kiss. He was enamoured with the thought that she was enjoying the fruits of his lips and relaxed into her embrace.

When they came up for breath, she fixed her with a demure, sultry look. She gripped his hand in hers and held it on her shoulder as she stood up and turned away from the table, bidding him to follow suit with her. He rose and followed her lead knowing instantly where she was leading him. His desire for her was reaching a fever pitch in the time it took them to reach her bedchamber.

He drew a deep breath as she pulled him through the portal and into her inner sanctum, leading him with her eyes, smile, and honeyed kisses. He followed her lead as she backed up in front of him, enticing and enchanting, making him want her more and more until her legs touched the side off the queen sized bed she slept in.

Her lips brushed his as she tucked her fingers under the hem of his T-shirt and began to draw it up his body. As they surfaced, he raised his arms and shook it off, and dropped it to the floor. This was the first time she had seen his torso without its customary clothing cover. Into his sculpted muscle, there was a circular scar on his left shoulder from where a bullet had found its mark, a jagged knife wound tracing across his six pack stomach and, of course, the burn that covered most of his right side.

As she gingerly ran her fingertips over his war scarred body, she could just imagine the pain he had endured as each was inflicted. She marvelled and shivered at the same time on seeing his scars, knowing that they were sustained in defence of their country, and indirectly, sustained in defence of her. The heat between her legs began to amplify exponentially as the thought crossed her mind.

This man was not a 'bad boy', the kind of man she had thought she wanted. This man was a genuine, one hundred percent, dyed in the wool 'bad ass'. She realized he would never hit her, would always protect her and was already devoted to her. His past deeds were more than testament to that. She looked up at him and met his ever soothing gaze.

His hands explored her body. Gently touching and soaking in every detail they encountered. They conveyed the message that she was precious to him and she revelled in it. As their lips and tongues continued to entwine, she felt his fingertips begin to explore her exquisite breast flesh.

A sigh escaped her lips as his fingers found purchase and gently caressed her chest through the light fabric her blouse. She had dreamed of making love with Elliot for a very long time; but, after he was whisked out of her life, she had never even dreamed that her fantasy would, or even could, be realized. Now, here he was in front of her in her bedroom. It wasn't exactly as she had romanticized, but it was definitely close enough.

He deftly began to undo the buttons of her blouse and unwrap her gorgeous body from the fabric constraint. The sight of her half naked body took his breath away, but she gave it back to him with their next passionate kiss.

Her hands trailed down to the waist of his shorts and then slid below, fondling his half hard cock through his shorts. He started as her fingers touched him and broke their kiss. "I'm sorry. It's just been awhile," he remarked with an awkward smile.

"It's okay," she breathed as she took his head in her hands and peered into his anxious face. "Just relax." she said soothingly and softly as she kissed him gently about the head. "It's me, Kira. The same girl you have always known." she finished with a smile. He visibly relaxed upon hearing her words and continued stroking her luscious breasts.

Slipping her hand into the waistband of his shorts she felt his growing excitement. She knew then that he wanted her just as badly as she wanted him. His encouragement led her hand to continue on its journey to grasp his magnificent prong as it was shrouded by underwear with mysteries and delights still awaiting.

Sliding his finger beneath her bra strap, he marvelled at the feel of her supple skin. His hand slipped around to her back where he tenderly undid the hooks of the lingerie. The D-cups fell away from her gorgeous tits, exposing her cherry red aureoles and and already perking nipples. Her senses thrilled as his fingers found the target of their search. He gently began rolling first one then the other between them while his tongue returned to dance in and sample the delights hidden inside his mouth.

His lips strayed away from hers, kissing along her jawline until he finally reached her neck. He nibbled the soft skin all the way down her soft throat to the tops of her breasts as she closed her eyes. Her breathing was becoming gradually raspier as he drove her passions to higher heights.

Suddenly, she flowed down his body to sit in on her bed in front of him. She easing his shorts over his stiffening prong, down his well sculpted thighs and to the floor to join the growing pile on the floor. Reaching up, she began to delightedly fondle his cock through his underwear. Upon her touch, he instantly hardened and was very excited. She grinned put her lips to the bulbous head of his cock and began to blow hot air through the thin fabric.