“What are you planning for tomorrow?” she asked, her eyes on his.
“You don’t really want me to spoil the surprise, do you?”
Her heart teetered slightly, because he was right. She wanted the anticipation, this prelude and, yes, she wanted to be surprised, even though waiting for surprises was almost unbearable.
“I will tell you this much,” he said, his mouth a few inches from hers. “Tomorrow is the beginning of step three. I still have a lot to do, but I should be ready by five. Can I pick you up then?”
She nodded. And then he kissed her full on the mouth. He left her breathless and wanting, and eager to see him again.
The American flag Tom Bender raised to the top of the flagpole outside his office window every morning flapped in the breeze blowing across the tarmac. Lacey and Noah were caught between that same breeze and the warm air whirling from the propeller of Noah’s newly restored Piper Cherokee.
He’d arrived to pick her up a few minutes early. His hair still damp from his shower, he’d wasted no time on small talk. “Are you ready?” he’d asked the moment she opened the door.
Ready? She’d taken a bubble bath, dried her hair, applied her makeup and changed her clothes four times. Oh, my, yes, was she ever ready. She was practically bursting with readiness.
“Where are we going?” she’d finally asked after he’d pulled onto Orchard Highway.
He crested a hill and said, “There’s something I want to show you.”
He was wearing blue jeans and a blue cotton shirt with buttons down the front. When he turned into the county airfield, she was glad she’d decided on jeans, too. “Is your airplane finished?”
Noah didn’t blame Lacey for being curious. Patience had never been her strong suit. Waiting until Christmas morning to open her presents had been excruciating for her. There was no hiding place she didn’t discover, no wrapping paper she didn’t tamper with. She was being a hell of a sport. A few minutes from now, he planned to make the wait worth her while.
When they’d first arrived at the airstrip, he’d gone inside to check the computer and radar. The wind had picked up an hour ago, and was coming straight out of the north, pressing a mass of hot air ahead of it. There was a thunderstorm sitting behind it, but the front was moving slowly. It was a little after six now and, as luck would have it, he was going to have plenty of time before it hit.
Just then his sleek white airplane taxied from behind the first hangar. “My plane is finished,” he said with a sense of undeniable pride, “but that’s not the main attraction.”
A Cessna landed on the second runway. Noah paid close attention to the engine speed and the sound of the brakes immediately after it touched down.
“Could you at least give me a hint?” she asked.
“I’d rather show you.” He took her hand and led her out onto the tarmac where Digger was making another pass with Noah’s plane. The Piper was a beauty, if he did say so himself. They’d finished her test run this morning, and she’d passed every inspection with flying colors. The engine hummed, the electrical system worked perfectly and so did the rudder, the propeller, the landing gear and ailerons, the beacon lights and navigational signal and every gauge on the dash. She’d been two years in the making and now she was all his.
“Is Digger going to fly the plane?” Lacey yelled. “Is that what you want to show me?”
Noah shook his head. For two years Digger had been helping Noah restore the Piper from a beat-up relic to this flight-ready beauty. All he would accept as payment was first taxiing rights after the last tweaking had been done. Noah could see Digger inside the cockpit, an old leather cap and goggles on his head and a big old smile on his face. Digger didn’t fly—not anymore. One of these days he would deal with his issues, but not today.
He finished his loop around the airfield and brought her back to Noah. He cut the engine, opened the door and climbed down.
Lacey didn’t know it yet, but Noah had faced the fear that had been eating at his insides since his parents’ accident. As he took her fingers in his and led her to the plane, he’d never felt so free.
He ran his hand along the Piper’s left wing. Next, he helped Lacey up. When he was in his seat, too, they fastened their belts. He flipped switches and started the engine. In almost no time they were rolling forward. He made adjustments for the direction and speed of the wind, and poured on the power.
He kept his eyes on the dials and instruments on the dash, his hands on the control wheel, his feet on the pedals on the floor. Ground lights and runway markers blurred in his peripheral vision. One second the plane was barreling across the ground. The next she was airborne.
Every takeoff was a thrill. This one was special. Not because he was flying his own airplane, although that added to the excitement, but because of the woman sitting in the noisy cockpit with him, her hair windblown, her cheeks pink, her eyes bluer than the sky.
He climbed to two thousand feet before he leveled off. He didn’t see another airplane in the sky tonight, but in the distance was the Chestnut River. Two miles north of it was what Noah had been working on today.
He began his descent. When he was directly over his mark, he tipped the wing so Lacey could see all the way to the ground. He knew the moment she saw it, for her breath caught and her mouth opened.
Nine months out of the year, the meadow east of the orchard was just that, a meadow. Every autumn it became a parking lot for thousands of customers who visited Uncle Sully’s Orchard to buy apples and pies, to ride in a horse-drawn wagon and attend craft shows and watch the cider press in action. This afternoon Noah had transformed it into something private.
Tears pooled in Lacey’s eyes. She blinked them away, but more formed. She wasn’t normally a crier, and didn’t know what was wrong with her lately.
“Would you make another pass?” she asked. It wasn’t easy for her to speak around the lump in her throat.
She didn’t look at Noah. Instead, she kept her eyes trained on the terrain far below. She saw apple trees and rooftops and roads laid out in a grid pattern. He did as she requested. And then he was tipping the wing again, and there it was.
LACEY + NOAH was spelled out in white block letters. She stared at it until they flew past it again.
“How did you do that?”
“I wrote it with the same kind of chalk they use at the ballpark. I had to promise a free flight lesson next month in exchange for the use of their machine this afternoon, but that’s a small price to pay. There’s more.” He climbed back to a safer altitude and said, “For years I flew away from you, Lacey Bell. Tonight, I’m coming back to you.”
Her breath caught all over again. “Can you land down there?” she asked over the air leaks and engine noise.
“Do you want me to?” he asked.
She nodded.
She knew that Marsh kept the runway mowed for those occasions when Noah chose to land here. It was just a track through the old pasture, but it was long enough and it was a perfectly safe runway for small planes. Although he obviously hadn’t planned to land here tonight, he radioed Tom and cleared it with him, as if he would grant her any wish at all.
“With this storm moving in, you’ll have to wait until the wind changes to take off again,” Tom warned.
“I’ll park her on low ground,” Noah said into the radio. “Don’t wait up.”
Lacey’s gaze met his.
“Ten-four, pal, and give Lacey a kiss for me.”
He set the plane down lightly. Landings were always loud. Because of the grassy track, this one was bumpy, too. He brought the Piper to a complete stop with plenty of runway to spare. Directly ahead of them was Lacey’s name in big white letters.
“I can’t believe you went to all this trouble,” she said.
“A woman like you deserves a grand gesture. I thought about having a banner made and flying it behind my plane, but you’re too private for that. This is intimate, for you alone.”
Lacey had
always known Noah had a noble streak and a heart of gold. She’d had no idea he was sentimental, too.
“Come on,” she said, removing her seat belt. “I want to see it up close.”
Noah got out first. Reaching up for her, his hands went to her waist, lingering even after her feet touched the ground. The branches in the nearby cottonwoods sang in the evening breeze. There was something romantic about the sound of the wind. Romance, it seemed, was everywhere.
“If I forget to tell you later,” she said, “I had fun tonight.”
He leaned down. For a moment she thought he intended to kiss her on the mouth. He surprised her once again when his lips brushed her cheek instead. Holding perfectly still, she closed her eyes, for there was something incredibly touching about the whisper of a man’s lips on a woman’s cheek. It was a first for her.
“Believe me, I’m planning to make tonight so memorable you’ll never forget it.”
It was so like him that she couldn’t help laughing out loud. Noah Sullivan might have been on his best behavior, but he was no choirboy.
Thank heavens.
“You sound awfully sure of yourself, flyboy.” She darted away, toward the letters in his name.
Noah let Lacey go, but he didn’t let her out of his sight. He knew what she wanted. It so happened that he wanted the same thing. What an understatement. Before the night was through, they were going to make love. He’d been planning for it all day.
He’d written his message to her on the downward slope of a grassy hill. He’d flown over it twice, driving back and forth in order to tweak it to get the lettering just right. Now Lacey was walking along the lower edge of his message. Unable to contain her joy, she did a cartwheel and laughed out loud. Her arms outstretched, her hair streaming behind her like an aviator’s scarf, she wove in and out of the letters in his message. The woman held nothing back. She never had. His body heated the way it had the first time they’d made love.
At eighteen she’d been a lot like him, a little beaten up by life, slightly belligerent and very bold. The guys around the pool hall used to say she was easy. She’d been an enchantress who knew her own mind, what she liked and whom she’d wanted. For some unexplainable reason, she’d wanted him. Back then he’d been so full of himself that he’d seen no reason to deny her. If he could go back and do one thing differently, he would change the way he’d taken her that first time. But he hadn’t known. Like everyone else, he’d assumed she’d been experienced.
He’d been wrong, for there had been blood on her sheets, and afterward, he’d heard her crying in the bathroom. Uncertain about what to do, he’d gone in to talk to her, and wound up wrapping his arms around her. He would have been content to do just that, but she’d had other ideas. Lacey Bell wasn’t one to stay down for the count.
In the past two-and-a-half years they’d been intimate on only one occasion, and that had been more than a year ago. When she’d first broken it off, he’d tried to eradicate her memory every chance he had. He couldn’t remember a single face, and yet he’d never forgotten hers. He hadn’t admitted it out loud, but he hadn’t been with anybody since that night a year ago after her father’s funeral.
“What’s next?” she called.
She stood near the bottom of the hill, her hair blowing in the wind, her jeans low and her black knit shirt just tight enough to be interesting. He walked closer, his stride long and purposeful. “What I’d planned to do was have a picnic. And then I was going to seduce you.”
Her chest heaved with the deep breath she took. “That sounded like past tense to me.”
He heard himself chuckle. “That’s because I didn’t plan to land here. The grinders and drinks are in a cooler in my truck at the airfield.”
He was only four feet away when she said, “As luck would have it, I had a late lunch.”
His body heated a little more.
“Do you think you could kiss me now?” she asked.
“I don’t think anything could keep me from kissing you.”
They came together on a rush of air and joy. The kiss was an explosion of heat and need and everything earthy. His hands were in her hair, on her back, at her waist, but his mouth never left hers. Her curves molded to the contours of his hard body, and desire unlike anything he’d ever felt kicked through him at three g’s.
His arms tightened around her as they dropped to their knees on the soft grass, the wind whipping her hair into both their faces. The low-hanging clouds formed an arc over their little haven, making the meadow feel secluded and exotic. They remained on their knees, their bodies tight together, their mouths connected the way solder joined metal.
The sprinkles came first. Warm and gentle, they fell from the low clouds, soaking into their clothes and dampening their hair. Too soon the sprinkles turned to rain. Then the thunder came. It rolled and rumbled, shaking the ground until they both felt its vibration in their knees.
Noah cast a look to the sky as lightning forked in the west. “It’s going to get dangerous to be out here,” he said, drawing her to her feet. “We’d better make a run for the house.”
She looked up at the clouds and then at the rain falling to the meadow. “It’s going to wash away your note.”
“Only from the grass,” he said. “Never from here.” He pressed a fist to his chest.
“What about your airplane?”
“They’re not predicting strong winds. The Piper’s on low ground. She’ll be fine.”
They started toward the house at a jog, building to a steady run. They followed the lane through the west orchard, emerging into the clearing at the foot of the hill leading to the house, winded. It was pouring by the time they reached the back door. Although it was only seven o’clock, it seemed like much later.
The clock on the stove ticked and the rain pattered against the window. Otherwise, the big old house was quiet and empty.
Noah brought them each a towel from the bathroom downstairs. “We have the house to ourselves,” he said as the lights flickered off, then on again.
“How long?” she asked, drying her face and hair.
“For a few more hours, at least.”
Invigorated by the run and the landing and the storm, he dropped their towels to the back of a kitchen chair and reached for both her hands. He drew her to him and kissed her again, long and slow and deep.
The next time lightning struck, the lights went out and stayed out. It was too early to need candles or a flashlight, so, without saying a word, he led the way up the back staircase.
Partway up the stairs Lacey thought about the scars on her abdomen. Other than her doctor, no man had seen them. Noah would be the first. She would tell him how she’d gotten them, and what they meant for her future. It would be a relief to finally tell someone, especially someone who’d gone to so much trouble to tell her how he felt about her.
The back hallway was narrow, the floors old and creaky. It was their music. The rain on the roof was their refrain, and Noah’s murmurs and Lacey’s sighs as his arms came around her in his room was the most amazing melody.
Not much had changed since she’d been here last. His bed was on the wall opposite the window where it had always been. There was a lamp and an alarm clock and a dresser and a bedside table, too. Outside, lightning zigzagged out of the low black clouds.
Noah quickly closed the window and drew the blinds. While nature put on a light show between the slats in the blinds, he placed his hands on her shoulders.
How many times had she seen him looking at her this way? How many times had she looked back at him, her eyes wide in the semidarkness, her thoughts gentle as she tried to commit the sight of him to memory?
She stepped closer to her bad boy turned knight in shining armor and unfastened his first button. Beneath his damp shirt, she felt his heart rate quicken. She could tell by the slow deep breath he took that he was trying to be patient and let her take her time. His patience lasted until she loosened the second button.
An
d then he took over. He undid them all and peeled the wet garment off, turning it inside out in the process. Her black shirt was next. His eyes were on her now. She thrilled at the way his gaze heated as she reached behind her and unfastened her bra.
He had her in his arms, a hand on her breast, his eyes closed deliriously. Moaning softly, she closed her eyes, too. Belt buckles jangled and zippers were lowered and jeans came off. Wearing only a wisp of black lace, she shivered, but she was only chilled on the surface. Everywhere else there was only heat.
He whipped the summer quilt off his bed and held the sheet for her. She climbed in, and he followed her. Between the smooth layers of thin cotton, their legs entwined.
She lay on her side now, and he lay on his. He touched the tip of her chin with the outer edge of his hand, slowly trailing to the little hollow at the base of her neck, down the center of her chest, grazing her breasts, each in turn, with the back of his hand.
He found her mouth with his lips, working magic there. And then he moved his magic elsewhere. He began at that sensitive little spot below her ear, moved to the ticklish hollow on her shoulder and, finally, to her breasts. She wound her fingers through his rain-dampened hair, along his ears, to his shoulders and the corded muscles of his back. As thunder rumbled, they rolled across the bed, lips trailing, hearts quickening, breaths rasping and deepening in turns.
She didn’t tell him how wonderful it felt to be back in his arms. Instead, she showed him with every kiss, every sigh, every touch and murmur and groan and lusty cry for more.
“You’re wild,” he told her.
But she wasn’t the only wild person in this bed. In some far corner of her mind, she was aware that he’d leaned over the side of the bed and was rifling through a drawer. He came back to her with a small foil package between his teeth.
He tore it open, and said, “I hope these things don’t have an expiration date.”
She didn’t understand what he meant.
Until he said, “Hopefully they’re good for longer than a year.”
For a moment she thought she’d heard wrong. Noah had gone an entire year without making love? Her heart rose up to her throat again. She took him in her hand and said, “You don’t need to use anything. I won’t get pregnant.”
A Bride Before Dawn Page 14