On the Wings of Love

“He’s a big-game hunter?”

“No. Just a rich man who uses his money to buy excitement.” In more ways than one, Alex thought, imagining for a moment how the heads of Buck’s female conquests would look in a mounted collection above the fireplace. “He makes firearms. Guns and such,” she said.

“Of course!” Rafe’s eyebrows shot upward as the realization struck him. “Bromley and Burnsides!”

“Burnsides and Bromley—though father is all of it now. Joshua Burnsides, my grandfather, died fifteen years ago, when the company was still a small one.”

Rafe didn’t reply. He was gazing straight at her, his eyes as intense as two burning coals. “Help me get up, Alexandra Bromley,” he said. “I want to see my aeroplane. I have to see it!”

The passion in his voice was so commanding that Alex stiffened where she stood, fighting the strange impulse to do as he demanded.

“No,” she protested. “The doctor ordered you to keep still, and he told me to watch you.”

“Where is it?” he persisted, stirring restlessly beneath the bedclothes. “Isn’t there a window, or maybe a balcony where I could at least get a look? If I can see how bad the damage is, and decide whether it can be fixed—”

“You heard me. Make one move to get out of that bed, and I’ll scream for the doctor!” The ridiculousness of the situation was beginning to dawn on Alex, but she could not back down now.

“Rubbish! I’m not a prisoner. Which way is the beach?”

“Don’t be a fool. It’s only a machine. It will be there tomorrow.”

They glowered at each other, separated by the length of the bed. “Only a machine!” he exclaimed in a low, rasping voice. “For your information, Alexandra Bromley, that tangled wreck out there is my life!”

When she only stared at him in silence, he sank back onto the pillow. “You don’t know what I’m talking about,” he said. “You can’t know, if you’ve never flown. The freedom of it…the wonder…”

“And the danger?” Alex curled one hand around the bedpost. Almost against her will, her gaze traveled down the length of his body under the sheet—the broad shoulders and powerful chest, the narrow hips and lean, hard belly. Her eyes lingered on the intriguing bulge at the top of his thighs, then shifted guiltily away.

“The danger’s part of it, yes. But it’s more than that.” His face was flushed, his eyes alive. “When you’re in the sky, it’s as if you’ve left the whole dirty world behind. There’s nothing up there but you, the birds and the fine, clean air. You look down and you see the earth for what it is—little houses, little fields and factories, little people with little problems. It’s like…like—”

“Like being God?” Alex’s blasphemous whisper rang loud in the room.

Rafe laughed, deep in his throat. “Maybe. In a very precarious way—though I like to think that God doesn’t have engine trouble or get caught in downdrafts.”

“Tell me,” said Alex. “When you’re in the sky, don’t you ever have the urge to just point the nose up and keep going, higher and higher? But no, that would be very dangerous, wouldn’t it?” She laughed uneasily, conscious of his eyes on her and wondering what he was seeing. His gaze seemed to burn through her clothes. No man had ever looked at her like that. Not openly, at least.

“I did that once,” he said quietly. “I climbed, and kept on climbing. It was wild, like being drunk on sunlight. I didn’t want to stop, but the air began to get cold and very thin. I started to lose control—that was when I knew I had to get down.” He fell silent for a moment, as if focusing on something inside himself. “I want to see my aeroplane,” he said. “Just a look. Then I’ll know how soon I can be flying again.”

Something broke loose in Alex—a reckless, impulsive urge that had been building since she entered the room. “There’s a balcony at the end of the hall,” she said. “You can see it from there.”

“Will you help me?” His green-flecked eyes engulfed her.

“On one condition.” Alex took a deep breath. “I noticed your aeroplane has a second seat. When you’re able to fly again, you must promise to take me up with you.”

He scowled. “It’s too risky.”

“Not for you.”

“Your father would have my hide.”

“My father wouldn’t have to know.”

“And what if something were to go wrong?”

“Then neither of us would be in a position to care, would we?” Alex shrugged with feigned disinterest. “Promise me or lie there and rot. It’s up to you.” She turned her back on him and took a step toward the door.

“Wait!”

Alex spun around to find him laughing.

“Why, you stubborn little chit!” he exclaimed. “You’d really leave me, wouldn’t you? All right. One very short flight. As soon as my aeroplane and I are mended. Now, come here and help me get up.”

Alex hesitated.

“Please,” he said.

She came to him, bending over the bed so he could slip his arm around her shoulders. His skin was warm beneath the thin gray silk of Buck’s pajamas, his muscles solid and sinewy. His clean, leathery aroma reminded Alex of the dark brown jacket he’d been wearing when she lifted him from the water.

“Easy now,” he said. “Watch the ribs.” His arm lay lightly about her as he used his own strength to sit up and slide his legs off the bed. Alex was acutely aware of his closeness, the warm weight of his arm across her back, the slow, even rise and fall of his breathing.

“Here goes!” he muttered, pulling himself to his feet. Alex braced herself to steady him. Standing, he was even taller than she’d realized. Her own head did not reach the bottom of his ear. He took one step, then another, leaning on her to ease the weight on his broken leg. “You make a fine crutch, Alexandra Bromley!” His laughter stirred her hair. “Would you care to stick around till my leg mends?”

Alex groped for a clever retort and came up empty. Most of the time she felt at ease with men. She could be flippant and bitingly funny, especially when she didn’t care what they thought of her. Why was it that now, when she so wanted the upper hand, she felt like a tongue-tied dolt?

Together they made their way through the door and down the thickly carpeted hall. Rafe was silent, concentrating on each step, wincing when a movement hurt him. Once he stumbled, and Alex’s arm went around his waist to steady him. He was, she realized, wearing nothing at all under the thin silk pajamas.

A glass door at the end of the hallway opened onto a small balcony that overlooked the back lawn. Maude had decorated it with potted palms, hanging asparagus ferns and a pair of white wicker chairs.

“There!” Alex pointed as they reached the railing. “See, there’s your aeroplane at the far end of the lawn!”

Rafe let go of her, braced himself with one arm on the railing and used his free hand to shade his eyes. “If I were only closer!” he muttered.

“Can’t you tell anything from here?”

“Not enough. You were right about the wings. They don’t look badly damaged. And the rear elevators can be fixed. But the engine and the propeller…” He shook his head. “I’d have to see them up close.”

“Why be so concerned? You built it once. You can build it again.”

“Yes. But how much time will it take? How much money?” He turned bitter eyes on Alex. “You’ve no understanding of what’s involved—people like you, with everything at their fingertips. You don’t know what it’s like to go without heat in the winter, to go without cigars and haircuts and decent meals just so you can buy an engine piece by piece and put it together, so you can afford the right kind of wood for the braces, the right kind of wire, the right kind of linen canvas.” His knuckles whitened on the railing of the balcony. “Damn it, how can anyone who’s always had whatever they wanted understand that kind of love?”

Alex had listened quietly to his outburst, but her own indignation was building. “That’s the most arrogant crock of nonsense I ever heard!” she stormed. “You think you’re better than I am because you’ve had to struggle! You think that building an aeroplane qualifies you for some kind of sainthood! Well, maybe it does! Maybe you are an expert on that kind of love! But let me tell you something, Rafe Garrick! You have no tact at all, no gratitude, no consideration for people at all! There are other kinds of love, and you don’t seem to know anything about them!”

She whirled away from him and started for the door that led back into the hallway. Let him stay there. He could crawl back to bed by himself or shout for help. She wasn’t putting up with his self-righteous arrogance another second!

She had almost reached the door when he caught her. His hand seized her shoulder with the strength of an iron vise and he whipped her back toward him. “Don’t tell me what I don’t know!” he muttered, jerking her hard against his chest.

His kiss arched her backward over his arm. Alex struggled against his strong hands and brutally seeking lips. Then suddenly, incredibly, she felt herself responding. A ripple of fevered excitement coursed through her as she softened against him and felt the hard contours of his aroused body through the thin silk. Her lips went molten beneath his. Her fingers dug into his flesh, clinging, demanding. Madness. It was running away with her and she couldn’t stop it—didn’t want to stop it.

No! Something in her was still fighting him, still struggling for control. This was insanity. He had no right!