She realized she stood at her office window with her nose pressed up against the glass. With effort, she forced herself to relax, even as he finished filming.
She’d known, hadn’t she, what he did for the thrill as well as the extra money? Somehow she’d forgotten that basic fact. That it was slammed home now when she stood quivering on the ground while he so foolishly risked his life, didn’t improve her temper.
He was so totally wrong for her.
All men had a long list of faults, but Bryan had more than his share. First, he gave her hot looks that fried her brain. Second, he gave her hot kisses that fried her brain. And third, everything he did or said fried her brain.
Oh, and he was passionate about everything, including her.
Wait. Those weren’t exactly faults, were they?
No problem, she could come up with others. He was startlingly tender and gentle, and he made her laugh at things, at work, at herself.
At life.
Darn. Those weren’t faults, either.
How had this happened? He brought out the worst in her. He did! She’d sent an entire truckload of toilet paper to the maintenance hangar, for God’s sake.
It had to stop.
She just didn’t know how. So she went back to what had become her own private spectator sport.
She plastered her face to her window and watched him fly.
AS WAS HIS PREFERENCE, Bryan tied down his own plane, only this time his mind was not on the job at hand.
He’d nearly lost it up there.
“Ace! That was fab, man, absolutely-”
Bryan lifted a hand to Ritchie to ward him off. He didn’t want to talk about his latest stunt, he didn’t want to talk at all.
He passed right by the film crew, who were still congratulating themselves on a job well-done, as if they’d risked their lives for a stupid beer commercial.
The fact was, Bryan was disgusted with himself. Hell, he was disgusted with the whole world at the moment, and needed to be alone to think.
One wrong move up there and he could have died. It was a thought that had rarely occurred to him before, even on hundreds of previous, more dangerous flights, and yet he couldn’t stop thinking about it now as his long stride churned up the tarmac. He entered the lobby and made a beeline for his office.
It wasn’t as though his plane had malfunctioned or failed him. No, it had been his own hands, when he’d held the spin for a fraction of a second too long.
He’d had control at all times, but still, for the first time in his life, he’d imagined the could have, the might have, the almost.
Then imagined himself dead.
And it wasn’t his own pain he thought of, but his family’s. He was the baby, the joy of his parents’ hearts. How would they take it?
And Katie. God, Katie.
It would kill her.
All for a stupid beer commercial.
He passed the women at the front desk, each of whom grinned and sent him the thumb’s-up sign.
He passed several clients milling around in the lobby, who wanted to comment on his expert flying.
He passed Holly in the hallway, who managed to annoy him with one easy smile. “Do you make love the way you fly?” she wondered, her eyes laughing. “Because if you do…wow.”
Bryan moved faster, needing solitude, needing, for some inexplicable reason, to touch base with his family and hear their voices.
Needing…
He moved by Katie’s door, which was ajar. She stood with her slim, straight back to him, staring out the window at the tarmac.
At his parked plane.
He stopped so fast he nearly tripped.
She’d watched.
“Katie.” He’d whispered it before he could stop himself and though she stiffened, she didn’t move. “I’m sorry…” Sorry for what exactly? “That you had to see that. That-”
She didn’t turn to him. “I’ve been watching you fly stunts for months, why would you apologize now?”
He wished he could see her face, wished she was in his arms, straining against him as she had last night…he wished for so much he didn’t know where to start.
“I’m really busy,” she said pointedly, still not looking at him.
“Yes, I can see that.”
“Then you’ll be sure to shut the door on your way out.”
Well. That couldn’t be any more clear, could it? No matter that he didn’t want to walk away, instead wanted to make her relax, even smile.
He was a man of action though, not of subtlety, and she wasn’t ready for action.
Or that’s what he told himself as he backed out of her office and shut the door.
Two minutes later he was in his own office with his oldest sister on the telephone, and just the sound of Mandy’s voice made him smile.
“What have you done now?” she asked. “You only call me when you’re feeling guilty about something.”
“I do not.”
“Uh-huh. When did you call me last, Bry?”
“Well…”
“Let me refresh your memory. You’d just forgotten Mom’s birthday and you wanted me to call her up and tell her you’d been held hostage on some remote island.”
“Hey, she would have believed it coming from you!”
“And the time before that,” she continued, undeterred, warmth and love and affection clear in her voice, “you called because you’d just beat up Cindy’s boyfriend and you didn’t know how to tell her.”
“I didn’t beat him up. Exactly.”
“I suppose he got that black eye by walking into a door.”
Actually, he had. His sister’s no-good boyfriend had cheated on her with a close friend. When Bryan had run into him in town, the boyfriend had taken one look at Bryan’s furious face and whirled to run, smacking himself on a door so that Bryan didn’t have to.
“And don’t forget when you crashed Dad’s prized ’69 GTO into the mailbox because you were busy yelling at me for wearing too much makeup.”
Bryan laughed. “I was sixteen.”
“And let’s not forget our famous trip down the driveway-our steep driveway-on what you so lovingly called a rocketship, but was really just a cardboard box?”
“Hey, my arm healed and you can see almost perfectly out of that right eye!”
She laughed. “And who, in spite of her pain, covered for you?”
At her soft voice, he smiled. “You. Always you.” Suddenly he felt better. Warmed somehow. “Thanks, sis.”
“For what? Don’t you hang up yet, you haven’t told me what’s-”
“For loving me,” he interrupted, because it was the only way to cut her off. She’d talk forever if he let her. “I love you, too.”
“Bry! Don’t you dare hang up on me-”
Gently, he set the phone down, and when he looked up and saw Katie standing in his doorway, her hands clasped tightly together, nervousness so clear on her lovely face as she offered him a hesitant smile, his heart stuttered.
“You’re busy,” she said. “I’ll just-”
“Stay. Please?” he added, walking toward her.
“You love your family.”
“Always.”
“They love you back,” she said, retreating as he came toward her.
“Mostly,” he said with a smile as he cornered her.
“Even when you do crazy stuff.”
“Uh-huh.” Their bodies brushed. She was breathless, and he was getting there. “That’s how family stuff works.”
“I was rude before,” she said quickly, lifting her hands to his chest when he reached for her. “I wanted to apologize…”
“Katie-”
“I never meant to kick you out like that, but I was watching you fly and-”
“Katie-”
“And it reminded me of-”
“I think about you all the time,” he said, dipping his head to slide his cheek over her hair. “Even when I’m flying. You should know that.”
“My father-” She stopped abruptly, finally allowing his words to sink in. “What?” she whispered. “What did you just say?”