Maybe My Baby

There’s always a first time, Emmy thought. But she didn’t say it. Instead she reminded herself that this was all part of the job she was going to do without the nervousness and fussiness Evelyn had exhibited.

Besides, not flying would add two days and who-knew-what other complications to the trip, and she didn’t like that idea any better than the idea of flying in a small plane.

So she decided she was just going to have to trust this man.

“I guess it’ll be all right,” she finally conceded.

“I guarantee it will be.”

Emmy took a deep breath and sighed a resigned sigh. “Where to, then?”

“The noncommercial terminal is on the other side of baggage claim. As soon as we pick up your luggage we can head out.”

The doctor took her carry-on without comment and pointed with his well-defined chin in the direction they needed to go. “This way,” he said.

But even as they began to walk he looked at her, up and down.

“I hope you packed some warmer clothes and a heavy coat,” he commented after a moment of scrutiny.

“I have jeans and slacks. And a light sweater.” What she’d thought would cover most needs, even should she have to trek through some countryside.

“No coat?” he asked again.

“It’s only September first.”

“But this is Alaska.”

“Which is why I brought long pants and the sweater.”

“The trouble is, Boonesbury isn’t far from the Arctic Circle. Our highs aren’t getting much above freezing and our lows are already getting down into the single digits.”

“Oh,” Emmy said yet again. She hadn’t looked into the possibility of chilly weather because she’d honestly thought it was too early in the season for cold to be a factor even in Alaska. It was still the height of summer in Los Angeles.

But the doctor was unfazed. “Looks like first thing tomorrow we get you a coat and some warmer clothes. Even though it’ll be Sunday I think I can get Joan to open up the store for us.”

“There’s a woman’s clothing store in Boonesbury?”

“No, it’s more of a general store—Joan sells about everything imaginable. But we all just call it the store.”

“I see. Well, I probably won’t need much. I’m not all that susceptible to the cold.”

Aiden Tarlington couldn’t seem to suppress a grin at that. A grin that put two intriguing lines on either side of his mouth. “Uh-huh,” was all he said as they reached baggage claim.

It didn’t take long to grab her suitcase and get to the terminal used for private flights. Unlike the commercial accommodations, there was no covered boarding ramp, though. They had to go out onto the tarmac. Into air that was surprisingly chilly and hit Emmy like opening the door on a meat locker.

But she hid the shiver that ran through her so her companion didn’t see it and have his suspicions confirmed that she was some kind of wimp.

The small plane was dwarfed by its jet-liner cousins waiting at the surrounding gates, and Emmy had a resurgence of tension at the idea of getting into what seemed to her like a miniplane. A miniplane that would be piloted by a country doctor rather than by someone who had made a career of it.

As the country doctor did his preflight check he seemed to know what he was doing, but still Emmy buckled up tight and found both armrests to clutch just for good measure.

Then, after some back-and-forth conferencing with the control tower, they taxied out to the runway and took off.

“We’ll be flying relatively low,” Aiden explained over the din of the engines. “So you’ll get a good look at things until we lose daylight. And in case you were wondering, I am instrument trained to fly in the dark.”

Emmy hadn’t known special training was required to fly at night, and it didn’t help calm her nerves to learn that it did. Even if he was qualified.

“Come on, relax and enjoy the sights,” he urged as if he knew what she was thinking.

They weren’t in the air for more than a half hour when all signs of civilization disappeared and a spectacular panorama took over.

Aiden began to point out lakes and glacier-made valleys, specific mountain peaks and natural wonders Emmy might have missed otherwise.

But despite the incredible beauty of it all as a setting sun dusted everything in rosy hues, Emmy was left with little doubt that she had entered a true wilderness. And that didn’t thrill her. In fact, it left her with a sense of isolation she hadn’t thought she’d ever feel again, even on these trips.

To keep the feelings at bay she told herself, I won’t be here forever. I’m not changing my whole life the way I was before. I’m only here for work. For a short while…

But still the feeling persisted, tormenting her.

The flight took about an hour and a half—the last half hour of it in darkness. But finally Aiden announced that they were about to land.

“Where?” Emmy wondered aloud since she couldn’t see an airport or so much as a light in the distance as they descended. And, unlike on takeoff, there was no radio contact going on, either.

“We’ll put down in the field. It’s what passes for Boonesbury’s airport,” Aiden informed her.

“A field?”

“It’ll be fine,” he said with yet another touch of amusement in his voice.

But the reassurance didn’t keep Emmy from hanging on to those armrests with a white-knuckled grip. Or from thinking about Evelyn again and beginning to understand why the other woman had had so many complaints about the conditions she ran into on these trips.

Aiden was very intent on what he was doing, and his concentration allowed him to land the plane smoothly, gliding to the ground with little more than a bump before the plane slowed and came to a stop near a small shack illuminated by a single pole light. There was an SUV waiting beside it but no one was in the SUV. And no one came out of the shack to greet them, either. In fact, there was no indication of another human being anywhere around. There was just the field, the shack and a whole lot of fir trees in the distance.

But at least they were on terra firma again and the relief of having accomplished that without incident was enough for Emmy to once more vow that she would rise above whatever rough patches she encountered.

As Aiden shut down the engines and began flipping levers and noting gauge readings on a paper on a clipboard, he said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you. The bed and breakfast where you were supposed to stay had to close. Their pipes burst. So you’ll be bunking with me. And since my cabin is between here and Boonesbury proper—what there is of it—we won’t get into town tonight.”

“Bunking with you?” There was enough of a surplus of shock in that to completely hide the fact that something like titillation had taken a little dance across the surface of her skin at the idea of “bunking” with him.

“Let me rephrase that,” he said, obviously fighting a smile as his end-of-flight tasks came to a conclusion and he turned toward her. “The B and B is the only thing we have in the way of a hotel or motel so there isn’t really a choice but to stay with me. But you won’t actually be staying with me. My cabin has an attic room complete with its own bathroom, and it can only be reached by an outside staircase. So in actuality it’s a separate residence. Well, except that you’ll need to use my kitchen. But it’s a pretty cozy room that I’m sure you’ll be comfortable in. And I promise you’ll have complete privacy.”

Again Emmy was reminded of her predecessor and of Evelyn’s gripes about some of the accommodations she’d had to suffer through. And even if the attic room of Aiden Tarlington’s cabin was nice enough, there was the added complication of being in close proximity to the man and how awkward that might be. Emmy didn’t appreciate this situation any more than Evelyn would have. Plus she knew it would only be made worse if she didn’t find a way to curb her heightened awareness of how attractive he was.

“There’s nowhere else I could stay?” she asked.

“Sorry.”

Emmy chewed that over in her mind to get used to it.