California Girl (35 page)

“The sun is setting,” he said, working for that yoga-like
calm Alys could inspire with one sunny smile.

She wiped her eyes on his shirt and turned her head enough
to look into the sky. “Ow.” She winced and sat back some more, poking at a hole
in her sweatshirt. “My arm hurts.”

With a curse, Elliot grabbed her arm, found the charred
black holes and the trickle of blood, and jerked the sweatshirt off of her.
Under it, she was wearing the knit shirt that was all collar and no shoulders,
and he could see the raw, bleeding wounds across the pale skin of her upper
arm.

“He must have used pellets. You’ve been shot.” He’d had
years of practice at speaking calmly, even after he’d just swallowed his heart
and it lodged in his esophagus.

He tore off his jacket and threw it on the floor. Ripping at
his buttons until they skittered across the basket, he pulled off his shirt,
shredded the cotton, and folded it into a compress.

“It’s just a flesh wound.” He hoped. He hadn’t dressed a
wound in years, and this one had started to bleed copiously.

“Shot?”

To his disbelief, Alys dried her tears to stare with
interest at her arm. “Like in the cowboy movies when the hero says it’s just a
flesh wound and keeps on fighting?”

“Right. Want to fight?” Elliot used the sleeve of his shirt
to tie the compress into place. He didn’t think she would bleed to death
anytime soon, but now that he had a task to accomplish, he set his mind to it.
He understood action far better than the emotions rioting through him.

“No, it hurts like heck. I can’t imagine riding a horse like
this.” She winced while he tied it. “This means some of the pellets didn’t hit
Mame. Maybe the others missed, too?” she asked with hope in her voice.

“We can hope,” he told her, so she could keep giving off
those positive vibrations. “If they were just pellets, she should be fine. The
idiot was probably aiming at the balloon.” Which meant Mame could have had a
heart attack. Elliot preferred not to think of either alternative.

She poked at the bandage in wonder. “You’re good. I think
it’s stopped bleeding already.”

“No major arteries there, but it needs cleaning.”

He glanced doubtfully at his makeshift handiwork, then at
her tearstained face watching him with admiration, and he couldn’t resist.

Slowly, so she had time to back off, he lowered his mouth to
hers.

She didn’t back off. She didn’t tell him this was entirely
inappropriate. She parted her lips for him and responded with the warmth and
vibrancy he desperately needed.

Life and love poured into him through the sweet delight of
her lips. To prevent her from lifting her injured arm, Elliot cradled Alys in
his lap, tasting the salt on her lips and kissing her tears away. She purred
when he covered her breast with his palm, and her nipple sprang alive beneath
his touch, as alive as he always felt with Alys in his arms.

He wanted this moment to go on forever—sailing freely above
the world, holding happiness against his chest.

Alys applied kisses along his jaw, and he leaned back
against the basket, soaking up the pleasure, watching the balloon sail into the
dusk. Lust might play a part in what he felt right now, but it wasn’t lust
healing the pain in his lonely heart. Alys’s hand splayed across his chest,
teasing him into arousal even though they couldn’t act on it. He didn’t think
he’d ever known a better moment in his life.

Life would go on. No matter what was happening down there on
the ground, there was always another day after this. If he let it happen, there
could be babies to scare him and break his heart, music to get lost in,
laughter to enjoy, his brothers to look after.

And Alys to love.

And because he loved her, he couldn’t break her heart and
make her cry. She deserved all the love and laughter life had in store for her.

Trying not to crush her too hard, he kissed her with all the
passion he possessed, hoping to gather enough strength to let her go.

* * *

The heat from Elliot’s broad, bare chest warmed her. The
heat of his kisses set her on fire. Alys knew instinctively that her response
wasn’t just animal passion, but she couldn’t think about it right now. He held
her and caressed her and made the world go away. Almost literally, since they
were flying high above it, and she didn’t know if they would ever come down.

And didn’t care. She could die happily like this, with
Elliot’s lips on hers, his strong arms holding her anchored against the winds
of fate. She trusted him to do what was best for both of them.

Until this moment, she hadn’t realized how long she had been
standing on her own. She’d been the one Fred had relied on when he got sick.
She’d been the one who had arranged her parents’ funerals. No one had offered a
helping hand until Mame had dragged her back to her feet after she’d collapsed
from the sheer burden of it all. And she’d still been alone.

The sheer bliss of letting go, letting someone else brace
her against life’s buffets, showed her that she didn’t have to be alone. That
no one should be.

“I think I could fly with you to the moon,” she murmured,
stroking the bulge of his upper arms and lifting herself into his hungry kiss,
unable to clarify her thoughts any better than that.

“To the moon, Alys,” he chuckled against her mouth.
“Although there are days I think you’re already there.”

The balloon hit an air bump and jarred them back to the
moment, where they needed to be. Alys glanced up and saw the mountains moving
closer. In the rosy hues of the setting sun, the red rocks were spectacular.
Shadows carved images into the buttes and hills, and her heart soared with the
birds.

“I suppose I’d better be looking for a safe landing place.
Surely they’ve sent someone after us by now.”

Elliot was looking down at her with regret. Alys didn’t want
to move. She wanted him to make love with her right now. Burned with the desire
for it. And knew they might never make love again.

“We need to get back to Mame,” she agreed, knowing that’s
what he needed more than her.

He didn’t agree or disagree. He ran his hands through her
hair, cupped her face, and kissed her nose in the very un-Elliot-like gesture
he’d developed over the past few days. She wanted to explore this new Elliot
and all the other Elliots hiding inside him.

He set her away from him and stood up tall against the sky,
efficiently pulling on cords and resetting burners and checking gauges she
couldn’t hope to understand. The sun gleamed off his bronzed, muscular
shoulders and dark curls, and she thought if she lived to be a hundred, she’d
never forget the sight of Elliot commanding the winds.

She gave him her heart then, to do with as he wished. She
wouldn’t need it anymore.

“Tell me what to do.” She stood beside him, watching the
balloon drift lower into the shadows beneath the hills. The world needed men
like Elliot. She would always be proud of this week, no matter what the future
held. She’d helped him. She knew she had.

“I don’t want your wound to open. Just admire the scenery
and tell me if you see a car racing in our direction. We could spend a cold
night out here if no one comes for us.”

Away from Elliot’s warmth, she shivered in the cool breeze.
He instantly reached for her sweatshirt and helped her pull it back on, easing
her injured arm through first so she wouldn’t have to lift it. She’d forgotten
how comforting it was to have someone caring for her.

Clinging to a rope, she glanced over the side, locating a
highway with cars. She searched the shadows closer to the balloon and saw a
racing vehicle. “How do we know that isn’t Salvador down there?”

“Do they have a flatbed for the balloon?”

“A trailer of some sort,” she agreed, watching the car slow
to check their position. “There’s a small road and lots of cactus.”

He snorted. “We’ll survive cactus.” He pulled the vent cord
some more so the balloon descended in the direction she pointed. “If they have
a trailer, they’re crew. I don’t think Salvador would be so considerate.”

She didn’t want to land. She wanted to sail off into this
fantasyland they’d created. But Elliot and Mame needed her right now, and she
threw him a big smile to show it would be all right. “Maybe I could be a
balloon pilot!”

“That works.” His dry tone returned to the familiar as he
gauged his distance to the approaching ground.

Alys laughed. She could do this. She could give him laughter
and help him through whatever lay ahead. She knew how to make the best of every
minute she was given without wondering what the next would hold. She could
teach Elliot to do the same.

“I love the way your chin tilts up when you laugh.” He
leaned over and kissed her before returning his attention to the controls.

See, she’d done it right, given him what he needed while
hiding her breaking heart.

Minutes later, the slowly deflating balloon bumped the
basket along the rocky ground. Alys watched in awe as the crew worked in
coordination with Elliot, grabbing the wicker to hold it down, rushing to
spread a tarp across the cactus-studded ground, catching guide wires to pull
the balloon toward the tarp while Elliot opened the valve at the top of the
balloon all the way, releasing the hot air into the cold night.

The magnificent maroon-and-gold envelope slowly collapsed
over the tarp, and after a few bounces, the basket stood still.

Before leaping out as she fully expected him to do, Elliot
stopped to caress her cheek. “Thank you.”

He didn’t give her time to ask for what. He jumped out and
held his arms out to her while men yelled and ran about, pushing the remaining
air from the envelope. As deflated as the balloon, Alys stepped from the
gondola, back into the real world.

“She’s stabilized for the moment,” Elliot informed the
doctor entering Mame’s room on night rounds.

Holding Mame’s frail hand between hers, Alys watched Elliot
pace while the admitting physician checked Mame’s vital signs, noted her chart,
and with a nod to Elliot, returned to his rounds.

Elliot was in full doctor mode, wearing his sports coat and
a black T-shirt someone had given him, checking the IV, reading charts. The
nurse didn’t dare shoo Alys or Jock out, for fear the formidable Doc Roth would
bark at her.

“They’ve given her medicine to help her sleep. You can’t do
anything here, Jock.” Elliot stopped beside the other man’s chair. “Get some
rest. You have a race in the morning, don’t you?”

Jock looked as if he hadn’t slept in a week, although they’d
only been here a few hours. Empty styrofoam coffee cups littered the table
beside his chair. His complexion was nearly as gray as his beard, but he’d
watched Mame’s lined face with care since they’d arrived.

He shook his shaggy head. “The crew can take over without
me. I’d feel better if I stayed here. I’ve been waiting for this woman to come
around for a long time. I’ll not leave her now.”

“Mame needs his positive energy,” Alys argued at signs of
Elliot rejecting Jock’s offer. “Perhaps we ought to assign shifts so someone is
with her all the time.”

Mame’s
pellet wounds weren’t serious. The damage to her heart from the second attack
might be irreparable. Alys had clung to the hard seat of her hospital chair for
hours, her knuckles white from the strain of fighting a panic attack. As usual,
the hospital environment made it impossible to find her center, until she
realized
Elliot
was her center. After that,
her hysteria subsided, and she’d fixed on him, letting his energy flow through
her and into Mame. She was worried now, but calm.

Elliot glanced at her. His long face was lined with concern,
his dark eyes shuttered against the pain of watching Mame lying there so still.
Alys knew him well enough to know what he was thinking. It was tough for him to
admit that he couldn’t change anything by his presence, that Mame had to come
around on her own.

He checked his watch. It was past midnight. Alys knew they
couldn’t do anything at this hour except watch Mame breathe. If Jock was
willing to stay, she needed to get Elliot out of here, give him time to rest
before whatever tomorrow wrought.

To her relief, Elliot nodded. “That sounds good. Jock, if
you can stay until dawn, I’ll come back then. I’ll ask the nurse to bring some
blankets and pillows for you.”

The frown on Jock’s forehead relaxed, and he stood to shake
Elliot’s hand. “Mame’s spent a lot of years worrying about you boys, waiting
until the lot of you were old enough to stand on your own before changing her
life around. I didn’t think she ever meant to let go, but I can see the effort
was worth it. She raised you right. I’ll call the hotel if anything changes.”

Exhausted, relieved, and scared, Alys let Elliot take
charge. Mame would want her to look after Elliot. If there was any chance he
could end up on a hospital bed looking like Mame, she had to prevent it.

On the way out, they stopped to speak with the policeman in
the corridor. He looked as weary as Alys felt.

“You won’t be able to get a statement from my aunt until
tomorrow, I’m sorry,” Elliot told the man. “She has to have complete rest. Are
Dulce and Lucia safe?”

The cop nodded and tucked his notebook away. “The tribal
police were watching out for them. The guys in the semis thought they were
rescuing their boss’s kidnapped kid. They watch way too many movies and got
carried away playing hero. Once they found out the kid was happy and with her
family on the reservation, they cooled down. The jerk who shot at the balloon
is a hothead with prior convictions for firearm violations, but he wants to
apologize. We told him to get a lawyer.”

“Did they mention why there was a positioning device in a
kid’s camera?” Elliot asked, wearily draping his arm over Alys’s shoulders.