Chapter 2
Bill knew he should have shut up before he started talking, but he never could stop himself from running off at the mouth. “You should have seen the woman I was with last night, Hawley. Her name was Edith, and she had the most luscious lips, so full and ripe. And her curves—”
“Enough, O’Donnell.” Hank rubbed his hand down his rugged, film-star face. The man looked like Douglas Fairbanks, and it wasn’t fair. The ladies fell all over themselves trying to get Hank’s attention, and Bill was eternally relegated to the position of sidekick.
They took their usual seats at the bar in the Gold Bug Hotel, nodding at the other denizens with their flight caps and goggles still perched on their heads.
The pianist played ragtime beneath a broken propeller of a Golden Flyer that hung like a trophy from the ceiling.
Photographs of every airplane Glenn Curtiss had produced lined the walls.
The place was owned by his father-in-law, after all.
And when Curtiss built an airplane hangar across from the hotel, the place had swiftly turned into the principal watering hole on Long Island for pilots.
Bill loved the aeronautical ambience and the company of fellow flying lunatics.
Hank signaled the bartender for two whiskeys. “We came here because I’ve fallen for a woman I can’t have. I don’t need tales of how much fun you’ve been having. By the way, how close are you to having enough money to start that luxury passenger flight business you keep talking about?”
Bill’s ears burned in a way they never did when he talked about ladies. He’d only ever told his sister and Hank about his secret dream. “Two more years of saving up, and I should have enough to buy a Lawson C-1, barring any surprises.”
“An enclosed cockpit. Can you imagine? Beats the hell out of the Army hand-me-downs we fly.”
Yes, it did. In his mind’s eye, Bill lovingly traced every detail of the ten-passenger, twin-engine biplane with five wicker armchairs lining either side of a slim, center aisle.
The rich and famous would flock to his interstate air taxi service.
He’d serve his passengers champagne and then take them soaring up into the stratosphere.
Someday he’d have a fleet and ferry people across the country in a fraction of the time it took to travel by rail.
He could see the future so clearly sometimes.
But most of the time, he doubted himself because he was plain old Bill O’Donnell from Mineola—far too much of a clown for any serious endeavor.
And he had no interest in hearing Hank tease him about his big dreams, so it was time to change the subject. “But enough about me. Tell me about all the fun you’ve been having with Miss Belmont.” He waggled his eyebrows.
“A gentleman never tells.” Hank smiled mysteriously and narrowed his eyes.
“Aw, come on. Just one teeny-tiny tidbit?” It scratched some deep itch to hear other people confess their secrets.
It meant they trusted him, and he wanted to be worthy of that trust. But he also couldn’t resist a good, juicy story, and sometimes he blathered when he shouldn’t have.
He tried to walk the line between keeping confidences and entertaining his audience, but sometimes he got it wrong.
This time, though, he was determined to get to the bottom of things. Hank had always been the paragon of the playboy pilot, but something had changed recently. Bill had to know why.
“On second thought, maybe I would like to hear more about the fun you were having with Edith,” Hank grumbled.
Thankfully, their drinks arrived, providing a moment’s distraction.
They clinked glasses and drank. Bill really didn’t want to go back to talking about his love life.
Because the truth was he hadn’t been having fun, or at least not that type of fun.
After what happened with Betty, he couldn’t bring himself to risk a meaningless tumble.
Her baby scare had had the opposite effect on him.
He’d been so filled with unexpected hope and joy at the news that he was going to be a father.
It absolutely broke his heart when she miscarried.
Betty wasn’t exactly the love of his life, but he would have done right by her.
Still, since they parted ways, something had shifted within him.
He couldn’t bring himself to play the field anymore and craved, more than anything, a lasting love and a family.
He had always loved children. He spoiled his niece and nephew rotten, but he hadn’t felt ready to be a parent himself.
A father should be responsible and respectable, but everyone knew Bill was a big goof and a terrible flirt.
The incident with Betty, though, made him realize he didn’t want to wait to be ready.
He wanted that future and that companionship now.
And so, when he went home with a lady these days, he held off on anything more than kisses in the hopes of getting to know her.
The results so far had been disappointing to say the least.
Last week, he tried out his new approach with a date, making the excuse that she had a kitchen cabinet coming off its hinges that needed his urgent attention, and he’d tried to have a real conversation with her as he worked.
Unfortunately, she had no interest whatsoever.
“Gawd, you’re so serious,” she complained.
“What happened to the fun guy who bought me a drink?” And that, right there, was the problem.
No one wanted serious Bill. They wanted Bill the clown or Bill the rascal.
Would anyone ever see him as anything more than a good time?
Once he’d fixed the cabinet, he pleaded exhaustion and went home to sleep in his own bed, disappointed once again.
He wanted a love like his sister had. She and her husband, Floyd, adored each other. They had a love just like Mum and Da—a love that would last. When could he have that for himself? As time went by, his craving for something real and meaningful only sharpened.
Sometimes the loneliness was too much to bear. He wanted nothing more than to find a nice girl, who saw the man underneath his bluster, and settle down. But she had to be the right girl. None of the ladies he met in his usual nights out with the boys fit the bill.
Still, he had a reputation to uphold. Truth be told, he was embarrassed to admit his change of heart to his friends.
They seemed to expect him to say and do outrageous things, and whenever he tried to be earnest, they assumed he was wisecracking.
He’d tried a few times to come clean, but they always dismissed it as another of “O’Donnell’s jokes.
” He’d finally given up and told them what they wanted to hear.
But if his friends couldn’t take him seriously, what woman ever would?
Still, here he was, hoping for more from Hank, even though he shouldn’t.
Something told him Hank and his new lady were very serious indeed, and Bill was dying to hear everything.
If Hank had a change of heart, maybe he could finally open up to his friend.
“I solemnly swear to keep everything you tell me in the strictest of confidence.”
“Ha!” Hank chuckled and shook his head.
“No, really! I promise you can trust me.”
“There’s nothing to tell.” Hank shrugged and ran his hand through his hair.
Nice try, Hawley. “If that was true, we wouldn’t be sitting here.”
Hank narrowed his eyes and downed his drink. “She is absolute perfection in every way.”
“Every way?” Now they were getting somewhere.
“Yes.”
“Every, every way?” Bill wanted to kick himself. He could hear the insinuation in his own voice. It was force of habit to turn everything into a dirty joke.
“O’Donnell,” Hank warned.
“Oh, never mind me.” Bill grinned, pretending innocence, and motioned to the bartender for another round of whiskey. “When you took her flying, what happened?”
“Nothing,” Hank said quickly, but there was a guilty look in his eye. Something happened on that flight. Bill was sure of it.
“Go on. You were saying she is perfection?”
“I can’t get her out of my head. And then she had to go and pull a crazy stunt like this.” Hank pressed his head like he could squeeze some unwelcome memory out of his mind.
But Bill had lost the thread. “In what way does inviting us to some stodgy fundraiser constitute a crazy stunt?”
Hank shook his head and rested his forehead in his hands.
“The organization doesn’t exist. I made it up a few weeks ago as an excuse to see her.
I didn’t think her family would suspect an invitation to a fundraiser.
Now she’s upped the ante. She said she wanted to see me again, but I had no idea she’d invent an entire charitable organization to do it. ”
It was hard to keep his jaw from hitting the bar. “So you’re telling me she’s throwing a gala at the Waldorf-Astoria just to see you again?”
Hank nodded.
“How do you do it, Hawley? How did you get the Princess of New York to fall for you so hard that she’s invented an entire charity just to see you when I can’t even—” Too far.
“Can’t even what?” Hawley turned to face him, head cocked to the side.
Can’t even find a woman who makes me want to do more than tell her jokes and fix her cabinet hinges.
But Bill wasn’t ready to confess to Hawley, not just yet.
He needed to know for certain whether Hawley’s feelings were as deep as he suspected they might be.
He didn’t want to be laughed out of the room for admitting he wanted a meaningful relationship.
Bill took a sip of whiskey, grateful for the warm oblivion it offered. He had to distract from his near-confession, and fast. “Don’t think I missed that you let slip that you saw her again after the flight.”
Giving him a long look, Hank finally admitted, “Yes, I saw her again.”
“And?”
Hank took a long deep drink of his whiskey, as if it was water. “I’m not discussing this.”