Sunset Romance

Three

Damian led me out of the stables and back into the bright afternoon sun. A gentle breeze grazed my skin and swept away a strand of my hair fluttering in front of my face. It was still hard to believe the quiet, peacful atmosphere in conpaeison to noisy LA.

"I think I already know the answer to this," Damian began as we climbed the stairs of his porch, "but do you like dogs?"

"I love dogs," I laughed, "I had three growing up. They're one of my favorite animals."

Damian chuckled, "Good. I want you to meet my dogs. If my horses liked you that quickly then I'm sure my dogs won't have a problem."

The minute he opened the door, a very ecstatic Bernese Mountain dog came barreling towards us. He barked happily and jumped up on Damian licking his face.

"Hey, hey, Rex, calm down," Damian laughed petting the dog. Rex barked again and wagged his tail. He jumped down off of Damian and began sniffing at my feet.

"This is Rex." Damian said patting the dog on the side. Rex looked at me and wagged his tail then began to sniff my feet some more. I crouched down on the floor so I was face to face with Rex. I giggled when he sniffed my face then licked it, "Hi, Rex!" I laughed, petting him gently. A movement behind Rex caught my eye. I saw another Bernese approaching us slowly. I could tell that she was pregnant by her swollen sides. She made it over towards me and sniffed me, like Rex, then wagged her tail.

"Who's this then?" I asked petting the pregnant dog.

"That's Shelly," Damian replied crouching down next to me.

I looked at Shelly and felt her swollen sides, "Hmm...you look about one and a half months in" I stated pensively.

"That's right" Damian said. He shook his head, "I'll never get over how sharp you are."

"It's a gift" I said dramatically flipping my hair. Damian chuckled and stood up.

"Is she uncomfortable?" I asked

"From time to time. I've given her extra padding in her bed but still she seems to be a bit tense."

"Where's her bed?" I asked looking around the living room.

"Over here, by the kitchen." Damian led the way over to Shelly's bed. Her bed was well padded. Damian had put down about four pillows around the perimeter of the bed along with a heavily padded quilt. It certainly did look comfortable. Shelly sauntered over to where I was and sniffed my hand, then licked it. I looked down at her and smiled. She made her way over to the bed and tried to lie down. I immediately saw the problem.

"I think the bed is a little too well padded to be honest." I noted looking at her trying to move around. I removed two pillows and smoothed out the quilt so it laid flat instead of propped up. Shelly immediately lay down on her side then sighed closing her eyes. If I didn't know any better, it looked like she smiled.

"There," I said softly. I stood up and looked around the room for the first time. There were black and white photographs on the walls that looked like the ones in the other house, except these were photographs of a rainforest. I stepped closer to a picture of a tall tree, sunlight streaming down through the branches. In the corner of the picture was a signature: Katie Hendricks.

"Who took these photographs?" I asked turning to Damian

"My little sister. She's a professional photographer," he replied

I nodded, "Wow. She's really talented." I saw another picture on the small table just below the frame on the wall. This one was in a gold frame and in color. In it, there was a man and a woman standing in a garden wearing work gloves and smiling. The woman had fiery red hair that came just to her shoulders. Her blue eyes were similar to Damian's while the man had dark brown hair and a similar build to Damian's as well.