Chapter Fifty
ONCE LAUREN HAD made up her mind about what to do, it was almost too easy to set it all into motion.
By Thursday evening she had arranged to get her apartment up on the market and given notice at Clarke’s.
She offered them one week, and had been pleasantly surprised when Sam Clarke, the restaurant’s owner, told her that he would be happy if she just worked through the weekend.
She had, of course, jumped at the offer.
Sunday afternoon she took Jenks and all of his things over to Jen and Ben’s apartment, and she was proud of herself for managing to not sob her eyes out until she was in the elevator afterwards.
A moving company was scheduled to come the following week to box up her things and move them into storage, and all that was left was for her to pack her clothes and the few things she could not leave behind.
The hardest part out of all of it had been not letting on to Grey what was happening during their daily calls. Jen had thrown the idea of her surprising Grey out as a joke—a ‘hey, wouldn’t it be cool if you…’ kind of thing—but Lauren immediately fell in love with the idea and had run with it.
It was just after noon when Lauren’s plane touched down in Charlotte Amalie the following Monday, and she jogged through the terminal to baggage claim to pick up the one large suitcase she had brought with her.
She slowed to a walk as she entered the baggage area, and waved when she spotted a familiar face in the crowd.
While she had not told Grey that she was coming back, she had called Kelly Kipling because she knew that would need her help.
The blonde had access to resources Lauren could only dream of having, and she smiled as she walked up to her. “Hey.”
“Hey yourself,” Kelly drawled, her lips curled in a warm, welcoming smile. “How was your flight?”
“Long,” Lauren admitted with a small laugh. She had barely slept the night before due to her excitement about seeing Grey again, and that anticipation had intensified with every mile her plane had covered.
Kelly chuckled and nodded. Lauren’s eyes were twinkling, her smile wide, and it was clear that she could not wait to surprise Grey. “You’re adorable. Let’s get your bag and get going. Peter Island, right?”
“Yeah.” Lauren nodded. “She said her guests were going to be spending the day at the resort, and that they would leave there for Tortola tomorrow.”
Kelly looked at the luggage carousel, which had just jolted into motion. “She is going to flip her shit when she sees you.”
“I sure hope so,” Lauren murmured.
“She will.” Kelly wrapped an arm around Lauren’s waist and pulled her into a light hug. “Trust me.”
Lauren nodded and pointed at a silver hard shell suitcase that had just spilled down the conveyor to the carousel. “That’s me.”
“Well, grab it, and let’s go,” Kelly said. “Lots of things to do still.”
Once Lauren had her bag, Kelly led the way out of the airport to where she had parked her car, and they then headed to a smaller private airfield where the Kipling helicopter was waiting for them.
The green and white Bell 206 was sitting empty on a pad outside a large hangar, and Lauren whistled as Kelly rolled to a stop in front of it. “Wow.”
“Just you wait.” Kelly patted Lauren on the leg. “You’re going to be my copilot for this jump.”
Lauren’s eyebrows lifted over the frame of her sunglasses as she turned to look at Kelly. “You fly that thing?”
“Damn right I do.” Kelly shouldered her door open and flashed an expectant look over her shoulder at Lauren. “Well, do you want to go get your woman, or what? Let’s go!”
“Damn right I do,” Lauren muttered as she slipped out of the passenger seat and walked around the back of the Range Rover to retrieve her suitcase.
A middle-aged man with jet black hair in a pair of khaki shorts, blue polo shirt with the airfield’s logo stitched onto the right breast, and a pair of mirrored aviators drove up in an open Jeep just as her bag hit the pavement, and Lauren smiled gratefully to him when he took her suitcase and lifted it into the cabin.
She stood back and watched as Kelly and the man went through the preflight checklist, double-checking everything to make sure the helicopter was ready to fly, and her heart leapt into her throat when Kelly turned and held a gleaming white helmet out to her.
“You’re sure about this?” Lauren asked as she inspected the helmet.
“Helmets are kind of required equipment.”
“I didn’t mean that. I meant having me copilot.”
“I’m not going to make you fly it or anything, I just figured you’d rather sit up front with me. And the helmet has a com, so we’ll be able to talk on the way over.”
Lauren nodded and jammed the helmet onto her head. She looked up at Kelly, who was fastening her own chin strap, and grinned, her excitement getting the better of her as she got one step closer to finally seeing Grey. “Thank you for doing this.”
“You keep Grey happy, and we’ll call it even,” Kelly said with a soft smile.
“I’ll do my best,” Lauren promised with a small nod. She took a deep breath and turned toward the helicopter. “Right. Well, shall we?”
“We most definitely shall.” Kelly walked around the nose of the helicopter to her preferred half of the cockpit and climbed inside. Once Lauren was buckled-in beside her, she turned on the engines and began easing the throttle forward to lift them off the ground.
Kelly spent the flight from Saint Thomas to Tortola explaining what she was doing and answering Lauren’s questions.
She did not miss the way Lauren’s attention never wavered from the water beneath them, actively looking for the Veritas even as she held up her half of the conversation, and Kelly chuckled at the way Lauren sat up straighter when she announced that they were coming up on Peter Island.
Lauren’s pulse jumped as a populated bay came into view, and she could not contain the smile that lit her face when she spotted a familiar red and white catamaran tied up at the end of a T-shaped dock. “There it is.”
Kelly leaned forward to look, and nodded when she spotted the Veritas. “That it is. You ready?”
“Oh yeah,” Lauren muttered, nodding as she looked over at Kelly. “More than ready.”
“Let’s go get you your girl, then.”