by JoAnn Ross
The truth was, Nora was tired of being alone. The even greater truth was that there was only one man she wanted to share her life with. A month ago, Nora had been trying to convince herself that marrying Caine would be impossible. Now she knew that the impossibility would be not marrying him.
More nervous than she'd ever been in her life, and more determined, Nora left the hospital at the end of her shift and headed for the airstrip. Toward her future.
Caine had just landed a red-and-white six-seater Beech Bonanza aircraft and was taxiing to the hangar when he saw Nora's car headed down the road toward the tarmac.
"It's about time." He was on the ground, but his heart was suddenly back in the air.
"Handles like a dream, doesn't she?" the enthusiastic salesman beside him said, misunderstanding Caine's murmured statement. "And the club seating in the back is perfect for your kind of recreational charter work."
"She's a sweetheart, all right," Caine agreed, trying to keep his mind on bringing the turbocharged plane to a
gradual stop when what he wanted to do was jump out of the cockpit, run across the tarmac, sweep Nora into his arms like some crazed guy in a shampoo commercial and never let her go again. She was parking next to his new blue Jeep Grand Cherokee.
"And the price is right," the man added.
"I said, I like the plane," Caine interrupted impa-tientiy. He cut the engine, unfastened his seat belt and opened the pilot's door. "But something's come up. I've got your card. Why don't I call you tomorrow morning?"
Nora was getting out of her car. Caine saw a flash of thigh- "Make that tomorrow afternoon," he decided.
Business taken care of, he began briskly striding across the tarmac as Nora walked toward him.
They met halfway.
"Hi," she said softly.
"Hi, yourself."
"Nice plane. Is it new?"
"I'm thinking about buying it."
"Nice truck, too. Where's the Ferrari?"
He grinned. "I sold it. Figured it was time I bought a halfway grown-up car."
"It still suits you," Nora decided. Caine saw the flash of blue as she combed her left hand nervously through her hair. He caught her hand on its way down.
"I like your ring. It looks familiar."
"I like it, too." Breathless, Nora smiled up at him. "In fact, I was thinking about keeping it."
It was going to be all right, Caine realized. They were going to be all right. "Oh? For how long?"
"How does fifty or sixty years sound?"
"Not bad. For starters." He pulled her close and gave her a long, heartfelt kiss.
Nora threw her arms around his neck and kissed him back, earning a rousing cheer from the ground crew.
"Come on, sweetheart," Caine murmured huskily. "Let's get out of here. Before we have to start selling tickets."
"Which house?"
"For now, yours, because it's closer. But later, why don't we live in the cabin and save your place for your clinic?" he suggested. "Until we get you pregnant. Then we can build that house with the picket fence."
The minute he heard himself say the words, Caine realized he was pushing again. He held his breath, waiting for Nora to stiffen in his arms.
Surprisingly, the decision to have children, once Nora had accepted her feelings for Caine, hadn't proved as difficult as she'd feared. She had no doubt that Caine loved her. And she loved him.
And it was that love which made the risk worthwhile.
"That sounds like a wonderful solution," she agreed.
Relief came in cooling waves. With his arm wrapped around her waist, Caine began walking with her back to her car.
"By the way, Dr. Anderson, you owe me five hundred bucks."
She'd forgotten all about their ridiculous bet.
Happier than she could ever remember being, Nora threw back her head and laughed. "Luckily for me, I'm going to have a rich husband to pay off my gambling debts."
.............................
The ROOM looked and smelled like an explosion at a Rose Bowl Parade. Flowers were everywhere; on the utilitarian pine dresser, the metal dining tray, the windowsill, the floor.
"Wow! Look at this!"
Eight-year-old Johnny O'Halloran, wearing a blue Littie League uniform with O'Halloran Air Charters stenciled on the back in bright red letters, plucked a white card from an enormous white wicker basket overflowing with tiger lilies, creamy orchids, purple gladioli and trailing jasmine vines.
"Don Mattingly," he breathed with wonder.
"How soon they forget," Caine grumbled good-naturedly to Nora. "I can remember a time not all that long ago, when the kid had me up on that lofty pedestal."
"That was before you put him to work painting all those pickets," Nora reminded with an answering grin as she packed a box of fragrant dusting powder into her red overnight case.
Caine had surprised her with the scented powder while she'd been in labor. Using a soft, crystal-handled brush, with unerring accuracy he'd smoothed it over all her sensitive spots, making her forget, albeit for a short time, all about the pain.
"I didn't mind helping Dad out with the painting," Johnny said dismissively. 'It was cleaning up those brushes and things that was such a drag."
"I remember feeling the same way when my dad put me to work scraping barnacles off the hull of The Bountiful," Caine said.
"That sounds a lot worse than cleaning paintbrushes," Johnny decided. "At least Eric helped."
"You boys were both a big help," Caine assured him. He refrained from bringing up the slight argument over territory that had ended with both boys looking like snowmen, covered head to foot in Glacier White ten-year-guaranteed outdoor latex.
"I know." Johnny roamed the room, scanning each card in turn, reading off the names that sounded like an All-Star roster. "Gee, Cecil Fielder. Jose Canseco. Rickey Henderson."
He wove his way back through the colorful profusion of flowers and stood looking down at eight-pound, six-ounce Margaret Caitlin O'Halloran.
"You must be pretty special. To get all this stuff," he said to the baby, who looked up at him with bright blue eyes and made a soft cooing sound. "Even if you are a girl."
Sensing a possible sibling rivalry beginning to brew, Nora ran her hand down his arm. "You're special, too, Johnny."
"I know. Because you picked me out."
"That's right," Caine added, ruffling the blond hair that was only slightly darker than the fuzz atop his daughter's head.
Now that Johnny had put on some much-needed weight and his face had lost that worried, pinched expression, he looked like any other eight-year-old boy. He looked, Caine and Nora had agreed, as if he could have been their natural son.
"And you've no idea how glad we are that we did."
Last year, while flying to Hawaii for a honeymoon, Nora had tried to come up with some way to broach the ideaof Johnny becoming part of their family. She needn't have worried. They'd no sooner arrived at their Kauai hotel when Caine suggested adopting the boy the/d both come to care for so deeply.
"I'm glad, too," Johnny said.
He reached out a finger and touched one of Caitlin's tiny pink hands; the baby closed a pudgy fist around his finger and held it with surprising strength. "And I guess
I'm glad I've got a little sister. Even if I was kinda hoping for a boy."
"I didn't know that," Nora said.
"So I'd have someone to play ball with," Johnny explained. "Girls like dolls better than baseball."
"Don't say that too loudly around your mother," Caine suggested mildly, "or you'll have to listen to yet another lecture on women's equality."
"It sounds as if one is definitely in order," Nora told them. "But we'll save it for another day."
She glanced around the room, checking to see if she'd forgotten anything. "I think that's it." She frowned at the wheelchair beside the hospital bed. "I hate that thing."
"As a doctor, you should know it's hospital rules," Caine reminded. "Have
a seat, sweetheart. Your chariot awaits."
After Nora reluctantly sat down in the chair, Caine took their daughter out of the bassinet and placed her in her mother's arms.
Feeling a surge of emotion so strong it rocked him, he brushed a quick kiss atop Caitlin's head, then kissed his wife, lingering for a moment over the sweet taste he knew he'd never tire of if he lived to be a hundred.
"Ugh. More mushy stuff," Johnny groaned.
"One of these days, you and I are going to have a long father-and-son talk," Caine said with a laugh. "About girls and kissing and all that other mushy stuff."
"I'd rather talk about batting averages," Johnny replied. "Besides, I already know where babies come from. We're learning about sex in school."
"They teach sex in school these days?" Caine asked in mock surprise. "What ever happened to spelling and long division?"
"They still have all that boring old stuff, too," Johnny informed him with a definite lack of enthusiasm. "And you and Mom both signed the permission slip, remember?"
"Now that you mention it, I do," Caine replied. "And to think my favorite class used to be recess," he murmured, earning a quick appreciative grin from Nora.
Putting his arm around his son's shoulder, Caine said, "Come on, gang, let's go home."
Nora smiled up at her husband of ten months. "Yes," she agreed. Her heart was shining in her eyes. "Let's all go home."
Home. As he walked out of the hospital into the bright sunshine with his family, Caine decided there was no more wonderful word in the entire English language.
