Accidentally in Love with the Pilot

by Teri Anne Stanley

  “Do you remember where that was?” he asked.

  She sank back to her seat. “I have no idea.”

  “How do we find out?”

  “Maybe we have some paperwork?” She grabbed the tiny purse she’d been carrying and sorted through it, while he picked up last night’s pants and emptied the pockets.

  “Oh, hey. Here,” he said, finding a business card among the loose dollar bills and dryer lint. “Viva Las Vegas Wedding Chapel,” he read to her. “Elvis or Johnny Cash may have married us,” he told her.

  She held up a flier and said, “The Little Vegas Chapel.”

  “I wonder which one we went to?”

  “Well, there’s only one way to find out. Start calling around.” She picked up her phone and started typing in the number for her place, so he called the one on his card.

  “No answer.”

  “Me, either.” She stabbed at a bite of omelet and stared at it. “What now?”

  He had no idea. They were married and might be expectant parents. Well, hey. At least they were married, right? His grandmother would be pleased about the order of things, at any rate.

  A thought began to form, to take shape and glimmer with life.

  No, that was crazy.

  But was it such a bad idea? She might think so. But she might not. Before he could think himself into a whirlpool, he said, “I know we don’t know each other very well, but maybe we should stay married.”

  “What?” She paused with her fork halfway to her mouth. “No way. I like you and everything—seriously, I think you’re great”—a thought seemed to cross her mind, because she smiled and then continued—“but I have more room in my life for a baby than a husband. A baby I could deal with. My sister and brothers have all kinds of kids. One more would just get rolled into the party. But a husband? No way.”

  In spite of her I think you’re great protestation, his feelings were a little hurt, but he was realistic. She was the outgoing manager of a show-business family. He was a socially awkward loner. He was as far from her ideal husband material as he could get, and she’d already told him she didn’t have room in her life for a guy. And yet the thought wouldn’t leave. “I get it, but hear me out. If there is a baby, we can stay married, and I’ll claim you both as my dependents. My job doesn’t give me many choices about scheduling, but there are pretty good benefits. Not just health insurance, either. If something happens to me, you’d be taken care of.”

  She gaped at him. “Wow. That’s…I don’t know what to say, except you’re too good to believe.” He could disabuse her of that later, because now she was leaning toward him, wrapping her arms around his neck. He was just about to kiss her when her back pocket started playing “Wind Beneath My Wings.”

  She sighed, digging out the phone. “That’s my brother. I’d better take this.”

  She tapped to accept the call, and the voice on the other end was loud and clear. “First of all, you’re on speakerphone because everyone is worried. Second of all, where are you? We’ll come rescue you.”

  Chapter Four

  “But Meg, when you didn’t come to Lexxie’s recital this morning, what else were we to think?”

  “That it’s my birthday, and I wanted to sleep in?” Megan was afraid she sounded bitchy, but sometimes her brother forgot his daughter wasn’t the center of everyone else’s universe.

  She shot a sideways glance at Ben, who sat at the breakfast table sipping orange juice.

  ”Where are you?” Craig asked.

  “I’m—”

  “Your bed hasn’t been slept in.”

  “You’re at my apartment?” She tried not to squeal.

  Ben shot her a surprised look, which morphed to concern. She gave him a tight, hopefully reassuring smile.

  “Mom was worried when you didn’t answer your phone. She gave us your key so we could check on you,” Craig told her.

  She sighed and rubbed at the tight spot between her eyebrows. “I’m sorry I missed Lexxie’s performance. You videotaped it, right?”

  “That’s usually your job,” her brother pointed out, then admitted, “Yes. Mom got it. A little shaky, but she got it.”

  Oh, good. Because the kid had a dance recital every other week, heaven forbid Megan skip one.

  She did her best to convince the dance dad that not only would she be at the next recital no matter what, but that she wasn’t being held hostage, all the while wondering what Ben thought about her meddling family. She finally convinced Craig that she was fine and hung up.

  “Everything okay?” Ben asked.

  “Yep. Just taking care of a little family business.” She smiled weakly.

  And then her phone rang again.

  “I’m sorry. It’s my other brother. I’ll just get this real quick.”

  Ben nodded, but she was sure he was annoyed. Who wouldn’t be?

  “Hey, Paul.” She went through a nearly identical conversation with him, while Ben’s forehead gained a few creases.

  She cut Paul off. “Okay, well you can hear that I’m fine, so I’m going to go now. I’ll see you at dinner later, okay?”

  Paul kept talking.

  Clearing her throat, she raised her voice and said, “I’ve got to go.”

  Ben stood, seemed to hesitate for a moment, then with “May I?” raised eyebrows, reached for the phone.

  “Hi,” he said. “My wife and I would like to finish our breakfast if you don’t mind.”

  …

  “Wow, honey. You don’t say much, but when you do, it certainly packs a punch,” Megan said, slipping the phone back into her pocket with a sideways smile.

  Ben ran a hand over his head. He should have kept his mouth shut—most days, he couldn’t say what he was thinking to save his own life—but something about the tension in her shoulders during that conversation had set off alarm bells, and he wanted to protect her.

  Embarrassed, he shrugged. “Sorry about announcing it like that, but you looked uncomfortable.”

  She laughed. “No, actually, that was pretty great. I only wish I could have seen the looks on their faces.” She kissed him then, pressing her soft lips against his, sending tendrils of heat through his nerve endings. While he was trying to recover his breath, she pressed her soft curves against him. So of course, her phone started to buzz and chime.

  “You could tell them it’s a joke.” He hoped she didn’t. He told himself it was because he’d gotten more than a hint that her family was all up in her business like nothing else, and for her sake, he thought they should twist in the wind a little.

  He caught a flash of regret in her eyes. Was she thinking the same thing? No, he wasn’t going there. He was hungover—probably still a little drunk—and had arousal hormones running through his system, clouding his brain in a “Paradise by the Dashboard Light” sort of way. His common sense would come back once he had a little distance and fresh air.

  “Give me a second to send an ‘I’ll explain later’ text, then we can talk about what’s next.”

  She sat on the bed and typed out a message. Her “sent” sound wasn’t a normal whoosh, it was more of a diesel revving. She smiled up at him.

  “What now? I guess I should get your number so I can let you know—you know. And an address? I promise I won’t show up on your doorstep unannounced, but…” She put her hand on her belly, down low, and he imagined a baby growing there. “And we’ve got to figure out what to do about this married thing, unless you meant what you said about staying hitched for a while?”

  His future flashed before his eyes—Megan with her long dark hair and bright eyes, belly swollen, red lips laughing…then a tiny baby cradled in her arms, his arms around her…then the first day of kindergarten…

  He had to clear his throat to say, “I meant it.” Then he added, “This is gonna sound lame, but I’m in address limbo. All I’ve got right now is a post office box. I was going to be camping all month… Anyway, there’s an address at the base where you can reach me.”
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br />   “You don’t have a place to stay? Aren’t you staying here for your vacation?”

  He looked around at the lavish hotel room and laughed. Mostly at himself, because he didn’t want to sound like a cheapskate. “I’m not exactly destitute, but I will be if I stay here for a whole month. I could head back to the base, but I”—kind of want to stick around and find out if I’m going to be a daddy—“I think I should stay in town until we find out if…”

  “If I’m knocked up?”

  “Yeah.”

  She held up a hand, and he remembered what she said about needy guys.

  Before she could speak, he said, “And I promise I won’t bug you. I’ll be your no-strings-attached temporary husband. You don’t even have to see me if you don’t want to.”

  “That’s not what I was going to say.” That little crease was back between her eyebrows as she stared at him, considering, but it disappeared when she said, “You know, I’m almost never home, and I have room. Not a lot of room, but there’s a pool outside and lots of places within walking distance to check out. You can stay with me for a few weeks if you want. It’s also kinda centrally located as a base for ‘Operation Find the Wedding Place.’”

  “Oh. I—” That sounded really good, actually. “I don’t want to impose.”

  She laughed. “You’re apparently my husband, and quite possibly my baby daddy, so I think it would be cool to get to know each other a little better, don’t you think?”

  He couldn’t argue with that.

  Chapter Five

  “Ta-da!” Megan did an exaggerated Vanna White reveal thing, gracefully waving her long, elegant fingers as she opened the door to unit 18. She’d directed Ben to a modest strip of apartments in what was once a 1960s-era motel, complete with a neon sign at the entrance flashing “no vacancy.” The retro kitsch made him smile.

  The inside was cool, bright, and comfortable.

  “They took two adjoining rooms and converted this one to a living area. The couch folds out into a futon, and it fits me perfectly.”

  He nodded. That made sense.

  They’d had incredible sex last night, and the spark was definitely still there this morning—at least on his side—but they were both 100 percent sober now, and in an awkward situation. It made sense to slow things down. After all, his continue-this-marriage proposal had come without strings.

  Although she might decide she wanted full benefits, and he was totally on board with that.

  Oblivious to his thoughts, she went on. “The bedroom’s through there.”

  The bedroom. Where she slept, changed clothes, where she might want him to join her at some point.

  How he’d love to refresh his memory of the flavor and texture of her skin under his lips, the way her back arched as he kissed her neck while he touched—okay, time to start thinking about trigonometry or wind resistance, or… Or polka-dots and paisley, because this apartment—wow.

  She’d carried the exterior sixties theme into her decorating, with blob-shaped tables and square seating. He half expected Mary Tyler Moore to come out of the bedroom. The back wall, where a bathroom would have been located if it were still a motel room, had been converted into a kitchenette. The only modern item was a flat-screen TV mounted on the wall opposite the couch.

  “There are only the two rooms, but I’m not here a lot, and—” She shrugged, fidgeting with her keys.

  “It’s cool,” he said. “I mean—your place. It’s cool. I like it.”

  She smiled, and he found himself wondering what else he could do to see that smile.

  He walked across the room to look at a framed photo on her built-in bookcase. There was a pretty blonde woman standing next to a dark-haired teenager who looked a lot like Megan, in a room that bore a striking resemblance to the one he and Megan were in. “Is this Sam from Bewitched?”

  “Yep. And my now-mom. She had a small part in an episode.”

  “That’s pretty neat.”

  She nodded, twisting her fingers in the hem of her shirt. “Yeah. Mom was an actress before she met my dad. So, anyway, you can put your stuff in my room if you want.”

  “I don’t mind sleeping out here.”

  Her smile flickered a little, and she looked at the couch. “But it’s so small—”

  “I live on an aircraft carrier. If the couch is uncomfortable, the floor will be fine.”

  Unless you invite me to sleep with you again. He couldn’t stop thinking about the way her nipples beaded, the sound of her sigh when she tightened around his fingers as he stroked her to orgasm, and the way she tasted when he repeated the process with his tongue… Well, he was well-stocked with memories to carry with him for the next nine months at sea. Nine months. If she was pregnant, he probably wouldn’t be back in time for the birth.

  She yawned and covered her mouth with her hand. “I’m sorry. I think last night’s catching up with me. Give me a minute to freshen up, and then I guess we should go visit wedding chapels.”

  They should. They really, really should. But the feeling was contagious, and his own jaw started to stretch. “Maybe we should take a nap first.”

  “That’s a great idea,” she said, eyes already at half-mast.

  She was really cute like that, all sleepy. He smiled at her. “Don’t let me keep you up. I can just—”

  “You can sleep with me, if you want.” She didn’t look at him as she said, “I mean, no strings, of course. But it’s a big bed, and I’d have to dig out extra blankets and stuff from the back of my closet, so…yeah. If you want to crash—you know, nap—with me, you can.”

  No strings. Which meant she didn’t want him to be naked in that bed with her. Just to sleep. Probably he should say he’d take the couch, in order to avoid any accidental body parts touching, thus taking the awkwardness factor from its current six to eleven.

  So naturally, he said, “Okay.”

  “Okay. Good.” This smile was a little shy and embarrassed before she turned to lead him through the door to her room.

  He dropped his bag next to a beanbag chair. The bedroom was done up in bright yellow daisies and black-and-white checks.

  “You might want to change your mind again.” She laughed self-consciously. “It’s a little bright.”

  “It’s…energetic.”

  “That’s a nice way to put it. I copied it from a picture I found in an old Seventeen magazine from 1975.”

  “And there’s—who is that?” There was an enormous poster of a lounging, blow-dried guy in shiny pants and a shirt opened to show a disconcertingly hairy chest and eyes that said, “Do me, big daddy.”

  “Andy Gibb,” Megan said, and pointed out a couple of framed magazine covers on the wall next to him. “And that’s Donny Osmond and Shaun Cassidy and Bobby Sherman and Michael Jackson. He was so cute.” She ran a finger across the late King of Pop’s ten-year-old face.

  “Interesting.” That was all he could think of to say. Half of these guys were probably dead or senile by now.

  “I know,” she said. “I found those in my mom’s stuff when I was little and fell in love with all of them. I didn’t understand they weren’t exactly real people—at least, that they weren’t really that age, and I couldn’t date them when I was old enough, because—gross, right?”

  “You still have them up because…”

  Now her creamy skin was bright red, and she didn’t look at him when she said, “Because imaginary boyfriends stick around longer than real ones, in my experience.”

  “Ah.” His heart gave a thump. For all her big, crazy family and protestations about not wanting a guy in her life because she didn’t have time for one, could she be lonely?

  “And they’re way lower maintenance.” She cleared her throat. “Okay, so do you want the bathroom first? I need to take a quick shower before I crawl between the sheets and possibly sleep until dinner time. Which reminds me. There are about twenty frozen entrées in the freezer and delivery menus for everything you could imagine on the front
of the fridge, so help yourself if you get hungry and I’m still comatose.”

  He’d had a shower before leaving the hotel, so he told her to go ahead.

  The bathroom door shut behind her, leaving him alone with the seventies teen idols as he kicked off his flip-flops and pulled off his T-shirt. Well, guys, he thought at the posters on the wall, this ought to be interesting.

  …

  Ninety minutes later, and Megan was no closer to sleep than she’d been…ninety minutes ago. She’d dozed at first, but snapped awake a moment or two after Ben fell asleep. It wasn’t because of the softly buzzing snore of the man sharing her suddenly very small queen-size bed. It had a little more to do with the way he’d flopped over and wrapped himself around her. Now her behind was pressed up against his front, and that big brown hand was back over her breast. Maybe she should start thinking of that one as his breast, since he seemed to like to hold on to it in his sleep, even armored behind her oldest UNLV sweatshirt—her sleepwear of choice when she had the air-conditioning cranked, as she did now. Why had she thought cooler air would cool her jets? Or his jets, heh, heh.

  She tried to hold in the snort-laugh that rose from her gut, but must have jerked, because Ben muttered something like, “Yeah, okay, give me a few more minutes,” and then gave his breast another squeeze before starting to snore again. Even in his sleep, her pilot was turning her on like no one ever had before. Her nipple swelled under his touch and sent pulses directly between her legs.

  This arrangement wasn’t going to work. If it kept up, she’d be so distracted by the throbbing in her crotch she wouldn’t be able to keep her hands off him, and he seemed to want to keep some distance between them. Which was a good idea, because this whole situation was nuts. Unless he did want to get naked with her again, which would be awesome.

  Except she didn’t have time for a lover, much less a husband. Not even a one-month-long boyfriend. He’d start to get annoyed by how much time she spent with her family, and she had to focus on whatever the next Waltzing Wallaces’ crisis might be.