Chapter 20 #2
“My father had been doing cleanup jobs for your family for at least two decades, maybe more. But then your Uncle Tommy showed me a workspace inside of his barn that had some of my dad’s stuff, things that he purposely left to work on whenever he was here, and I have questions, ones that I won’t get answers to from him. ”
“But maybe you can get some from Birdie? She would be the most levelheaded of the two people you could ask,” I suggest. It takes him a moment, but when he turns back to me, he masks a bit of his feelings with a reassuring smile, his hazel eyes glassy.
His fingers close, pressing my palm to his, holding my hand.
“Did Birdie ever mention anyone? Or did you happen to see her spend time with?—”
I’m already shaking my head slowly before he finishes.
“For as many men as I’ve seen my mother cycle through over the years, there’s never been anyone with Birdie.
My grandfather died long before my mother ever had me, but Birdie has always been Birdie.
A big, bold personality that my sisters and I always thought had been beyond finding someone for herself like that. ”
He nods, working something around in his head.
“Mickey at Moonie’s said he knew my dad too.
” He runs his hand behind his neck, beneath the long hair that covers it.
“Which isn’t something he would’ve allowed to happen on jobs.
” He shakes his head. “Regardless of whether he came to the same place repeatedly, it wouldn’t be smart. ”
Being smart sometimes doesn’t have anything to do with why we did things; he and I are the case and point. I run my fingers along his leather cuff, feeling the smooth edge of it, and thinking about all of the things he’s done that he might catalog as “not smart.”
“And here you are, pulling up a chair at my family’s dinner table, ordering dealer’s choice at The Whispering Fool, and making friends with Mickey at Moonie’s.”
He turns his body slightly toward me, close enough that I watch as his eyes focus on my mouth just as his tongue wets his bottom lip. “I know why I’m doing it.”
It’s really hard to think about anything else when Julian is looking at me like this. My cheeks feel flushed again, and I’m lost on any logical reason why we shouldn’t be sharing this moment together.
“You play dirty, Crowne. Brought me to an airfield, got me to tell you more in the last few hours than I probably have told anyone in my entire life,” he says with a smile dancing on his lips. “Pretty sure you’re the one doing the romancing now.”
I laugh, and he reaches up, pushing a piece of hair that fell, his fingers twirling the strand as I really look at him. The things I didn’t notice until now, like the small dimple to the right of his mouth that only pulls when his smile seems devious. I like that he talks to me.
“You call it playing dirty, I call it learning,” I say playfully as I shift a bit closer to him.
“I’m trying to figure out what you want,” he says softly, lifting my palm to his mouth and kissing the center. This is what I’ve never had before—feeling important enough to someone that they wanted to divulge the hard things.
“So am I,” I answer quietly and honestly.
“Can I ask you something?” he says, looking at my palm and then back up to me. “With your colleague, Reed, at Moonie’s, it wasn’t a date. But does he know that?” Julian asks with a smirk.
I have no reason not to share this with him.
“Reed was a mistake,” I answer, pulling back enough so that I can look him in the eyes and tell him all about my poor decision-making.
“I’m not going to make excuses. He was an assistant professor when he started at the university, and we became friends. ”
“Doctor Crowne,” he says in a teasing tone, knowing where I’m likely heading with this.
I shrug a shoulder and stifle my smile. I’m not proud of it, but I’m also human and need to remember that sometimes.
I watch as his fingertips draw along the lines of my palm.
“We had worked late, and he told me he had a crush on me, and I was . . .” I release a heavy breath, knowing how this is going to sound.
I haven’t told anyone about what happened with him.
My sisters knew I liked Reed back then, but I never mentioned what transpired.
“It felt good to have someone interested and bold enough to say it. I was in my early thirties, having only ever been with one guy, and I was thinking maybe this is it. Maybe this is my love story, the one I didn’t let myself believe I was going to ever have. ”
That feeling with Reed was so different than what I’m feeling with Julian now.
“Why did you think you wouldn’t have that?” he asks curiously, his eyebrows slightly pinched and his hand closing around mine.
“I was never the one who got the guy. My sisters smiled, and men fell all over themselves. My mother would call someone an asshole, and that asshole would be walking out of her room the next morning. But I’m just not built that way.”
He quirks an eyebrow. “Easy?”
When I give him a leveling look, he chuckles. “I just mean that most men see someone smart and complex, a beautiful woman who intimidates them, and they decide they’re not man enough to put in the effort.”
“Maybe.” I smile at the way he so easily made me see it as a them problem and not my own.
“I didn’t feel very good about what we did.
I had a moral crisis thinking about how I was in a position of authority.
And I mistook friendship and the attention of a guy as something I should act on.
I wanted to take it back. But he said he was fine with being friends.
” Pausing, I recall the days after. The semester was ending, and I didn’t see him again until he showed up in Nashville at the symposium .
. .” I clear my throat. I don’t want to think about the dark stuff.
I want to shove it back into its box and feel normal just for a little while longer.
The sound of propellers breaks the moment, pulling our attention to the airfield below.
A small, double propeller plane moves forward down the landing strip, readying for takeoff.
I always held my breath watching this part as I quietly cheered on its pilot as the distance between its wheels and the ground grew wider.
This spot on the hill has two extremes—complete silence, as if the air is settled and waiting for the next plane, or it’s so loud that the ground vibrates and the sound of the propellers or turbines erase whatever you were thinking about.
I smile as the plane on the strip picks up speed and moves toward the blinking red lights that line the concrete.
The sound grows louder and the breeze swirls up just as its wheels lift.
My hair whips at my face, my heartrate skyrockets, and the rush of watching it take off has me leaning back and laughing, turning my body to look behind me as it sets off to wherever it's headed.
The science of aerodynamics is fascinating, but watching it without the logic behind it feels like witnessing magic.
I shake my head at the way that would sound if a scientist said that out loud.
When I push my hair away and steal a glance at Julian, he’s still watching me. I wonder if he’d been looking at me the whole time.
A smile or maybe curiosity plays out on his lips like he just heard what I was thinking.
His gaze flicks down to my mouth again, making the smile I had and the question of whether he saw it or not, completely falter.
It’s a fleeting moment between us, both knowing what we want and the spike of courage to give in to it.
“That might be one of my favorite things to watch,” I say with a shy smile.
His fingers glide along my neck and into my hair, when he says, “Mine too.”
I sway closer, unsure if he means the planes, or me.
The warmth of his palm pulls me to his lips with measured urgency.
As our mouths meet and lips taste, our tongues collide effortlessly.
It’s carelessly wet and driven simply by the need for more of each other.
Climbing into his lap, I pull my skirt higher so I can straddle my legs around his.
Julian’s fingers move from my hair, down my back, helping my skirt higher so I can sit where he wants me.
I loop my arms around his neck and tease my fingers into the hairline at the back of his head.
His arms wrap around me so tightly that I rock forward.
A small breath escapes my lips as a groan rumbles from his chest. I want to feel it and hear that again. I roll my hips.
“Crowne,” he growls my last name, like he’s warning me.
I smile against his lips and nip at them in response.
“It’s too easy to get lost with you,” he says, moving his mouth to my neck, finding a spot just below my ear and dragging his teeth against it. It makes me shiver, pulling a needy and pleading moan from my throat, and my hips grind harder. I know exactly what he means.
He shifts his weight, holding me close as he lifts us up and changes our positions.
My back meets the blanketed ground as he moves his body off to the side of me.
He ignores the piece of his hair falling forward as he says, “I’ve been trying to remember the taste of you.
” Nipping at my lips, he kisses me so passionately I feel fucking dizzy.
My fingers delve into the hair at his nape as he leans forward and bites along my still-covered breast. He practically growls as he pulls away, shifting his weight back to kneel in front of me.
With his eyes on mine, hair disheveled, his fingers toy with the hem of my skirt that’s already ridden up to my hips.
“Keep going,” I breathe out as my thighs rub together.