On Wings Of Love. Ashley Summers
Unprepared for his question, she stammered, “Why, I—I’d planned to go out for dinner, that is, if you’d kindly point me toward a restaurant,” she ended with a small laugh. “Do you have a map of the island?”
“Yes. But I thought, well, you’ve obviously had a full day already, so if you’d like, you can have a bite with me tonight.”
Her mouth shaped an “Oh!” before she said, “But feeding your guests dinner isn’t one of your services, is it?”
Such beautiful eyes, Thomas thought. Big and dark and vulnerable. His voice gentled. “Not ordinarily. But now and then I do go out of my way for a guest. Dinner’s nothing fancy, just ham and fresh pinto beans and corn bread. Raspberry shortcake for dessert, though,” he added as an inducement when he saw doubt clouding her face. “I’d be delighted to have you join me.”
Katy bit her lip, devilishly tempted despite her habitual wariness. It would feel so good just to put on a comfortable outfit and have dinner here, rather than driving to a restaurant. Down strange roads, she reminded herself. And it would be nighttime when she returned.
Better to keep your distance, Katy. “Thank you, but I’ve had a nap and now I feel a need to get out for a while.” Her smile was spontaneous, warm. “But I appreciate your kind offer.”
“Anytime,” he said, apparently unbothered by her rejection.
He didn’t move. She hurried into the bathroom, closed the door behind her and leaned against its heavy surface. She could feel his presence tugging at her even through the wood.
After a moment she straightened. She’d forgotten her shampoo. Opening the door, she peeked out. He was going down the stairs. She hurried to her bedroom, then stopped just outside the door as she noticed for the first time the photographic gallery he had created on the hallway walls.
More family pictures: babies, graduations, weddings, outings, all the special occasions that bond a group of people. But what riveted her attention were two pictures of Thomas Logan.
In one, he waved from the cockpit window of a plane that bore the insignia T. L. Airlines and a decal of Pegasus, the mythical winged horse. In the second picture, he stood beside a sleek little jet that flaunted the same proud insignia. He wore a captain’s hat and a uniform bearing that unmistakable logo.
Katy recoiled. So this was his true profession, she thought with chilling disappointment. He was a pilot.
Becoming conscious of her tense stance, Katy released her breath and drew in air. This is absurd, she told herself. Why should you care what he does for a living?
But a pilot! She shivered and hurried into her room.
A moment later she returned to the bathroom. As she closed the door, she heard him downstairs, laughing as he scolded the cat. The sound of that husky laughter struck some vibrant chord deep inside her. Bemused by her spontaneous reaction, she grasped a corner of the mirrored shower stall to steady herself.
His effect upon her was startling, to say the least, Katy thought flippantly, trying to minimize its intensity. But she had never felt such a warm and immediate response to a man. And she knew with a profound feminine awareness that the feeling had been mutual. This thrilled her, and confused her. If she wanted intimacy, there was nothing stopping her. In fact, a little summer fling could be an exciting new experience.
“All you have to do is whistle,” Katy murmured with a wry smile for her rosy-cheeked image. She already knew he could whistle...
She sobered, her features tightening as she came back down to earth with a jarring thud. What if it didn’t remain just a pleasant little fling?
He’s a pilot, she reminded herself, and shuddered as a host of images shot through her mind with the swiftness, and destruction, of summer lightning. To Katy, the plane he touched so proudly was a symbol of devastating loss. Flying was synonymous with death.
Hot tears surged to her eyes, then spilled down her cheeks. All day she had tried not to think of the date. An anniversary of sorts, she thought bleakly. The nine-month anniversary of the death of the person she loved more than she loved herself, her sister Karin.
Karin, her identical twin, her other self. Katy drew a breath against the stabbing hurt. Love, to her, had become simply another word for loss. Fate had taken her entire family, parents, grandparents, sister. She’d even lost the man—had been dumped by the man, she corrected with searing honesty—she had loved. Or thought she had loved. Whatever it was, it didn’t matter, she decided, suddenly ragingly furious. Love, lust, illusion. Whatever you called it, it was still devastatingly painful when it ended.
So she’d become wary. “Built myself a wall against love,” Katy conceded wearily. But wariness was both natural and sensible, she insisted as Thomas Logan’s clear blue gaze shot to mind. She was still in mourning. And she was still healing from the destruction of the hopes and dreams she’d brought into her marriage.
She’d had far too much trauma in her life already. No more risks equaled no more pain. An intelligent rationale, Katy told herself fiercely, swiping at tears.
Suddenly, she wished she had someone to hold her. But as usual, the only arms around her were her own.
Two
Thomas Logan walked downstairs still smarting from his encounter with the elusive Miss Lawrence. He wasn’t accustomed to having his dinner invitations rejected.
Besides, it made no sense for her to go out to eat when she was obviously exhausted. A nap hadn’t done that much for her, he thought moodily.
A fine rain had begun falling, shortening the dusky evening into twilight. His mood lowered even more. He didn’t mind eating alone, didn’t even think about it, most times. But he would have enjoyed looking across the table at that intriguing face tonight. Enjoyed it tremendously, in fact. And they could have talked, answered the dozens of questions whirling in his mind. He wanted to know everything about her.
“Curious, the feelings she stirs up,” he thought aloud. Sighing, he went to the kitchen and checked the fragrant pot of beans he’d been cooking. There was no better eating than fresh pinto beans, in his opinion. He grinned at himself. This from a man who used to dine in New York’s trendiest restaurants?
Just then, the telephone rang; someone wanted a reservation for the weekend. For a moment he nearly refused. Then common sense asserted itself. He’d hate to have to explain to his mother why he couldn’t provide a room to her best friends, especially when he had rooms to spare. The house was big, four bedrooms and two baths upstairs, the master suite and living areas downstairs.
After jotting down expected arrival times and replacing the receiver, he took the pan of corn bread from the oven and set it on a cooling rack. Bending over sent a dull ache down one hip, a rainy-day reminder of injuries sustained in the car wreck that had nearly killed him.
His thoughts lingered on the subject. Before his near-death experience, he’d been a Wall Street wizard whose main interest in life was what he’d arrogantly termed the easy-money game. Making money was a power-trip that had utterly consumed him, until the day he’d rounded a curve too fast and sent his Porsche and himself over the edge of a deep ravine.
During the ensuing days of pain and confusion, he realized what a joke his life had been up to that point. Motivated by the radical change in his outlook, he’d left New York and returned to the islands to help his adored grandparents run this lovely inn.
Remembering, he shook his head in wry amusement. No one could believe that he’d given up his glamorous, high-profile life-style for the rough urbanity of Orcas Island. They’d believe even less how happy he was here, he thought, uncapping a beer. He had taken up flying immediately upon settling here, got his license, discovered the sheer, rapturous glory of soaring into the sky. He could, and often did, spend hours in his plane, alone or taking people out on chartered flights.
True, since his grandparents had moved to Florida,