A Risk Worth Taking (18 page)

While he lingered over her body in an embrace, she ran her fingers through his wet hair. “It’s a promise. I’ll tell you then what Jackson had to say about finding his mom and brother-in-law in the throes of passion.”

Vaguely, she heard him growl. Damn, that medicine was quick. “Yep,” she slurred. “It was quite an eye-opener.”

Chapter 18

A week after Abby’s accident, Grant had come up with a plan to fix about a dozen of the issues he and Abby faced. All she needed to do was say, “yes.” He tapped his razor against the edge of the sink as he rehearsed. “Abby, these past few months have been great.”

Oh hell, that wasn’t it. Sounded like the opening line to a breakup.

He rinsed the traces of shaving gel off his face and slapped on some aftershave. “Abby, I know I said I was content to take things at your pace.” He shook his head.
For christ’s sake, if he led with that they’d never get to the part where he asked her not to take the job in London.

“Maybe I should start with the good stuff then work in the other part,” he muttered as he stepped into a pair of black boxer briefs. He moved to the closet and unzipped the garment bag. “Abby, I love you and you’d make me the happiest man alive if you would consent to marry me.”

After that he’d bust out the three carat solitaire he’d stowed in his safe at work.
That was it! Short, sweet, and to the point.
Once he’d shown her how serious he was about the two of them building a life together, he’d tackle the Atlantic Ocean sized issue.

While he buttoned up his shirt, a HD picture of how this would all work out played through his mind. Instead of staying in the gatehouse, he could move in with his beautiful lady. Then, if she still wanted a career change, she could run Help and Hope full-time.

After shoving his feet into a pair of loafers, he jumped into the new car he’d bought to replace the one he’d given Abby, and headed to Davis Air Transport. Operation Engagement was now in motion.

He hit the door to the hangar office and found his right-hand-woman at her desk. “It’s after seven. What are you still doing here?”

She leaned back from the desk top computer and stretched her arms over her head. “My ex took Matt and Lexi to Florida for spring break, so I thought I’d catch up on some paper work.” A wry smile crossed her face. “I could also ask you the same question.”

“I left something in my office,” he answered, not slowing down. The last thing he wanted was to get cornered into answering Maggie’s questions.

Ignoring the shit-ton of paperwork on his desk, he pushed the chair forward so he could get at the small safe bolted to the floor. Lying on top of a nest of deeds, certificates and treasury bonds sat a small, black velvet box. He shoved it in his coat pocket and double-timed it out the door.

Then he thought of the nine hundred times a call from work had interrupted his time with Abby. “I have something kinda important to do tonight,” he told Maggie, his hand stealing inside his coat pocket.

She pointed to the suit he’d worn for Katie’s wedding. “Your outfit was a dead giveaway.”

“Can you handle things here tonight?”

She nodded. “Sure, unless the place catches fire, I won’t bother you.”

“Excellent,” he said, fisting the velvet box.

Then she folded her arms across her chest, a smirk plastered on her face. “Anything you want to tell me?”

“Not yet.” He wasn’t a superstitious man, but why tempt fate. He sent her a backward wave. “Check ya later.”

Grant hit the car’s key fob, unlocking the door just as his phone came alive on his hip. Hearing Maggie’s ringtone stopped him with one foot inside the car. For a nanosecond he considered ignoring the call.
Dammit!
She wouldn’t be hitting him up unless some shit had gotten critical in the two minutes since he seen her. “What happened?”

“Harry’s fine,” she said, getting the important part out first. “But, there was weather in Birmingham and four-two-seven ran off the runway. The left strut got bent so the thing’s not airworthy.”

Thank God, it wasn’t worse than that.
He checked the time. “Any chance you could take over the other legs?”

“I would, but I’m scheduled to take the Caribbean flights in the morning. If we switched that would put you out of the office through the weekend.”

“That won’t work,” he said, recalling he had Grace beginning Thursday evening. “I’ll be there in a second, and we’ll start digging our way out of this cluster fuck.

An hour later, Grant swapped the monkey suit for his flight suit, marking the first time in history he preferred wearing black and uptight over brown and comfy. On the way out to the hangar he palmed his phone and speed-dialed her house. “Hey there, beautiful lady,” he said after Abby answered. “About dinner tonight, something’s come up.”

They had planned to drive downtown where he’d booked a table at a nice restaurant. He could see her wearing a clingy dress that showed off her gorgeous curves. She’d have her hair pulled up, exposing the ivory skin of her neck. “Okay,” she drawled.

They’d come so far since the first time he’d had to cancel on her. Still, her easy acceptance stabbed him. “Sorry, sweetheart, one of the planes had a problem and I have to take care of it.”

“Come over when you get done. I’ll wait up.”

He'd spent every night in Abby's bed since she broke her arm. It had been seven nights of bliss. His imagination has been on the mark, he fit just fine in her space. She even had cleared a drawer in the bathroom for him.

“I wish it was as easy as that. I have to fly to Birmingham and from there I’m off to Jackson, Dallas, and then up to Little Rock. I won’t be back until Wednesday.”

“Then you’re at Grace’s the rest of the week,” she said, her voice trailing off.

Between school, her work with Help and Hope, and his jam-packed schedule, God only knew when he’d get another chance to do this up right.

Like hell, he was going to ask the woman to marry him over the phone. It felt like he’d been waiting a life time to get to this point and his anticipation needed a release. Maybe if he just got her mind to thinking over the situation she’d be ready to give him an answer when he got back. “I was hoping we could talk tonight.”

Her laugh was low, sexy, and went straight to his cock. “Now why would we want to do that?”

“Most of the time I’d agree with you. I love when we don’t talk.” Which was one of the reasons they hadn’t discussed the future, the present was too damn fine to mess with.
With the exception of Jackson, who still needed a boot up his ass.

Grant scrubbed his palms over his cropped hair. “I want you to…” He was going to ask her not to go to London and was prepared to beg if he had to.

Fuck.
In the end he couldn’t do it. Hell, he’d been trying to get her to take some chances since he met her. Instead of the some selfish plea he told her, “The end of May is looking pretty big in our windscreen. I know I said we could take this at your pace…” His mind played over all kinds of commuter romance scenarios. Twelve months wasn’t too long as long as he didn’t think too hard about the days without hearing her voice and nights without feeling her body next to his.

“It means a lot to me, that you’ve been so understanding.”

“God, I need to be looking in those gorgeous eyes of yours when I say this.”

“Grant, you’re really starting to freak me out. What’s going on?”

“I want you to think about our options,” he finally managed. If she decided to go, knowing she had a ring on her finger made it seem better. Not because he thought it would keep her from cheating, but because this way she could look down anytime she wanted and be reminded how much he loved her. “Dammit, baby, I want more of you.” The words hung in the air between them. “I just want you to keep an open mind when we talk.”

He wanted to drop those three little words on her. He loved her so much it made him mental sometimes, but saying it would only make her feel pressured to say it back. As far as how she felt about him, he knew where he stood. She loved him even though she had never used the words. He saw it in the way her eyes took him in.

“Okay.”

One of the mechanics caught Grant’s eye, signaling the plane was ready. “Sweetheart, I gotta go.”

“I’ll miss you this week. Will you call me?” She sounded okay, but she had a way of hiding her feelings behind a bunch of perfectly crafted words.

He wished he’d thought to make a video call, at least that way he could read her better.

“Every night, promise.”

Dammit, he wanted her to say yes.

****

“I can’t leave you alone for a minute,” Chris stated as he surveyed the damage Abby's fall had caused. Besides the books scattered across the floor, she’d also taken the curtains along for the ride on her trip to the floor. He stepped over the remains of her kitchen chair and unfolded his ladder.

She palmed a couple books with her good hand, then passed them off to him. “It was more than a minute. You’ve been gone two weeks,” she laughed. The day after the fall, she’d come into the bedroom, taken a look at the disaster and considered calling FEMA.

In this case the F stood for “friend.” He reached from his perch to take another handful of books. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t here for you,” he said, guilt all over his sweet face.

“Don’t be. Contrary to how it looks, I can take care of myself,” she said, picking up a couple of the bigger pieces of chair.

She thought about the past week and the amount of time she’d spent rambling around her house. True, she was fine on her own, but it didn’t mean she didn’t miss her guys. In addition to Chris being up to his eyebrows in his antebellum remodel, Grant had been flying cross country for the past week. And Jackson… she wouldn’t let herself dwell on the reasons why he wasn’t around. Abby pulled her thoughts out of that tailspin. She and Jackson would patch things up. He just needed time.

When she returned from disposing of the chair, Chris had rehung the curtains. “This room turned out cute,” he announced as she stepped into the lavender-colored room.

“Thanks for helping me put it back together. If you're hungry, I’ve got leftover lasagna to heat up.”

“I could eat,” he said, folding the ladder and tucking it under his arm.

While Chris returned the ladder to his truck, Abby started dinner. Then in an easy, practiced way that spoke of the hundreds of times they’d done this, he set the table while she put a salad together. With all the changes in her life lately, Abby took comfort in the ritual.

“So what’s going on with the teacher exchange thing?” he asked, once they were seated. “You haven’t chickened out, have you?”

“No,” she said, sounding a heck of a lot more certain than she really felt.

She couldn’t stand wishy-washy people, had never understood their indecision. Just weigh the pros and cons, make the choice with the most pros, and then stick to the decision. Easy, breezy. But lately she hadn’t been so certain. Grant was too important to her not to have an impact on her decision. “Even if I wanted to, it’s too late to back out. I’ve got Ms. Griffin to consider. If I don’t go, there’s no job and no house for her to come to.”

Then the universe had gone and added a new kink to the situation. It was an enticing twist, but it upped the ante all the same. “Besides something new just came up. One of the other teachers contacted me about participating in a teacher exchange blog.”

“Cool,” he answered, pouring himself another glass of tea.

“There’s more. The lady has published a couple nonfiction books on education, and she wants to see about turning our blogs into a book. She needs an answer from me by next week.” Abby had written a couple articles for a parenting magazine and the chance to see her words in print again was a fabulous opportunity.

So, why didn’t her good news make her feel better? Some of her angst came from the fact she needed to be discussing this with someone else.
God, she couldn’t wait till Grant got back.
Maybe they could find some middle ground. After all, he did own a plane large enough to fly over the Atlantic. On the other hand, there were others besides the two of them in the relationship. Maybe she was asking too much of him. Wanting to curse the universe’s timing, she tried to envision a scenario where she could have both.

She’d always rolled her eyes at women who were dependent on a guy, considered it ridiculous to stake so much of their happiness on something as uncertain as a man. Well, the shoe was definitely on the other foot.

When the person was as important as Grant had become, it was like trying to tie your shoes with one hand: doable but darn hard.

“Anyway, that’s one more thing I need to decide. Along with what personal items I can take.”

Chris pushed his plate aside and stretched his long legs. “I can bring some of your things over. Don’t forget I’m coming for a visit as soon as this house is finished.”

“I haven’t,” she said. “Sometime in August, right.”

“Yeah, jeez that seems like such a long way off.”

“It does,” she answered, thinking about how many weeks that was. Not counting the past few weeks when Chris had been working in Charleston, the two of them rarely spent more than a couple days apart.

“Don’t worry. You’re going to be so busy you won’t have time to miss me.”

“Yeah, I will.” Her bestie wasn’t the only one she’d miss. Without realizing what was happening, Grant had become an important part of her life. Although, she might be getting ahead of herself in assuming Grant would visit. He had a lot on his plate between work and his daughter. She didn’t want to add another obligation.

Chris stood to clear the table. “Did anyone else say they were flying over?”

“My niece, Jessica, wants to come if Sarah will allow her to visit.”

“What about Katie and Jackson?” His brow furrowed. “Oh, by the way, what’s up with them blowing off our weekly dinner?”

She shrugged. “They’re just busy,” she answered, trying not to think about not seeing the two of them for a whole year.