Sam inhaled Megan’s fragrance, wanting the reminder of life around him, not death and destruction. “Melody is a fighter,” he said.
“She’s going to need that kind of courage if Jack remains paralyzed.”
Agreeing, Holt allowed Megan to rest her head against his shoulder, and felt all the tension she’d held dissolving beneath his hand as he stroked her shoulders and back. “He’s lucky to be alive,” Sam finally said. “God, that was a long fall.”
“I thought he’d die.”
“You ready to go home?” The words sounded good to him, and Sam wondered what the end result of the crash would mean for them. Fear ate him up inside.
Megan stepped out of his arms and went to retrieve her purse from the chair. “Yes. We’re both in shock and just don’t know it yet.”
“I think so. Your house or mine?”
She stood there, absorbing Sam in his flight suit. He looked incredibly handsome, shoulders thrown back, so strong-looking when she presently was not. A warmth flooded her, and Megan whispered, “I don’t care, just as long as I’m with you.”
Sam understood, moved to her side and drew Megan against him. “I feel the same way,” he admitted hoarsely. Inwardly, he was shaky and unsure. The crash had torn through all his carefully made plans. How much trust was left between them, if any? The urge to talk to her at length, explore her and find out where she was at, was almost tangible.
“Let’s go home,” Sam coaxed.
Megan watched the white sand of Lake Rosamond flash by them as they drove toward Lancaster. Sam’s brow was furrowed, and she knew something was bothering him.
“What will happen Monday when Lauren finds out about the crash?” she asked.
“Plenty,” he growled. “Stang took that plane up without authorization, and lost it. Do you know how many millions of dollars we’re talking about?”
“Too many for me to fathom. Do you think they might court-martial him?”
“Maybe.”
“What about Curt?”
“He’s an accessory. I doubt if they’ll court-martial him.”
“Becky said he was going to resign.”
“I know.”
Megan looked at his profile, the thinned line of his mouth. “How do you feel about that?”
For me or you? Sam wanted to ask her. He didn’t, though. “I think Curt did the right thing for all of them.” Would she ask him to quit flying? To give it up for her?
“That means you’ll become chief test pilot on the Agile Eagle project,” Megan said softly.
“Yes.”
“When do the canards go on the plane?”
“Two weeks from now if everything goes according to schedule.” Sam gave her a strange look, wondering what was going on inside that head of hers. The crash had brought back to life Russ’s untimely death. It was a living thing within him, and tore savagely at his confidence. Emotionally, he seesawed between losing Megan and having to face his fear of death.
“And then you’ll fly it?”
“Yes.”
Megan looked out the window for a long time. She could feel the heaviness between them, the fear and anxiety palpable. So much of it had been caused by the crash. Straggling to keep her fear in the context of what happened, that Sam hadn’t been involved, Megan said, “Now I know how a goldfish feels in a small bowl of water.”
Sam forced a slight smile and held her hand momentarily. “We both feel that way, Red.”
Megan wandered around Sam’s huge, sprawling home. It was only 10:00 a.m., the morning clear with a breeze, the sky a dark blue. She stood on the sun deck, hands resting lightly on the cedar railing, and looked out toward the desert. Although it was only in the sixties, she was warm in the lamb’s wool jacket. Restless, Megan had avoided Sam since they had arrived home. He’d taken a hot shower and changed. She had paced.
The glass door slid open and closed. Megan looked across her shoulder. Sam was now in civilian attire, a blue plaid cowboy shirt, jeans and his boots. His hair had been recently washed and combed. He looked worse, in her opinion, completely exhausted.
Coming over, Sam stood next to Megan. Afraid of the forthcoming conversation, he didn’t say anything for a long time. Finally, he murmured, “Hell of a day, isn’t it?”
“Yes, a terrible one.” And then Megan cast a glance at him, a warm feeling inside her because of the look in his eyes. “It could have been worse. Both men could have died.”
Sam leaned down, resting his elbows on the rail next to her. “Curt’s lucky. He’ll walk away from this, family intact and a good future in front of him.”
“And Jack?”
“I don’t know.” Sam pursed his lips. “Funny things happen to men when they survive a crash.”
“What do you mean?”
“Some guys it doesn’t faze, and they go back to flying as if nothing ever happened. Others, it haunts. In Jack’s case, he’s probably going to have to not only come to terms with the crash, but what his actions cost him in terms of what it’s done to him physically.”
“He’ll probably never walk again.”
“A terrible price to pay,” Sam agreed softly. Girding himself, he straightened and turned toward Megan. His heart was pumping hard, and he could feel each beat against his ribs. “I’m wondering what kind of price we’re going to pay because of the crash. That’s what has me scared.”
“Price?”
He ran his fingers through her hair, the strands strong and silky. “Yeah, Red, us.” His hand stilled against her flushed cheek. “All morning I’ve been wondering how all of this has affected you, because in turn, it will affect us.”
Megan closed her eyes and rested her cheek against his palm. Holt had a quiet kind of courage, the ability to talk about things that most people would fear to broach. “I was scared, Sam. I don’t think my mother ever saw a crash. It was as if I lived out her worst nightmare today through my eyes and heart.”
Gently, Sam ran his thumb across her cheek, loving each of her freckles. Loving her so much it hurt to breathe. “She instilled a fear of crashes inside you. The truth is, your father died in one.”
“Probably very similar to the one that happened this morning.”
Throat constricted, Sam held her wide, honest green eyes. “So, where does this leave us, Megan?”
Tears swam in her eyes, his face blurring before her. “You think I’m going to ask you to quit like Becky did her husband?”
Tenderly, Sam removed the tears with his thumbs. “The thought crossed my mind,” he admitted hoarsely.
“I wouldn’t ask that of you, Sam.”
“No?”
“No.”
“What then?” Every word felt strangled coming from him.
Megan leaned up, placing a warm kiss on the compressed line of his mouth. “Something happened to me out there today,” she admitted in a low voice, feeling his arms go around her and cradle her against him.
“Tell me about it.”
“I not only got to see how the crash affected the wives, but how it affected you. Sam, you suffered no less than any one of us. Father had always been so cold and callous about these things, I thought every pilot was like him.” Her voice cracked. “I was wrong. I saw tears in your eyes there at the hospital. That’s when I knew that my father wasn’t like everyone else.” She caressed his jaw, and met his unsure gaze. “Today, I saw the man, Sam Holt, for the first time. I never saw the uniform you wore. I only saw your actions as a human being.” Touching his lips with her fingertips, she said, “I love you….”
With a groan, Sam held her tightly. “I love you so damn much,” he rasped against her hair. “I’ve loved you since the day I met you, sweetheart.” He kissed her hair, temple and cheek, holding her tear-filled eyes. “I was so afraid of losing you today, afraid that you’d leave Edwards and call off what we had….”
A sob caught in Megan’s throat, and she framed his face. “What we have is so very special, Sam. I saw that today. I—I think
that if we can always talk, always share what makes us angry, fearful, or whatever, we’ll be on solid ground with one another.”
“Even if I continue to fly?”
Megan nodded hesitantly. “I’m trying to see it as a job you have. It’s hard, because my childhood was controlled by it.”
Sam understood only too well. “But you’ve been around me long enough to find out that not every pilot lives, eats and breathes flying or testing like your father did.”
“You love flying, Sam. But unlike my father, you can separate it from the other parts of your life.”
“You’re the most important part of my life,” he told her, holding her gaze. “Did you know that?”
Shaken, Megan whispered, “No, but it feels good to hear that.”
“You’ve been number one in my heart from the day I met you. Lauren can tell you how often she saw me sitting at my desk, daydreaming. I’d catch myself thinking of you in moments when my focus wasn’t engaged on a design problem, or flying. And at night—” he leaned over, kissed her cheek and tasted the salt of her tears “—you made my nightmares seem not so bad.”
Sniffing, Megan wiped her eyes. “Sam, I have a favor to ask of you.”
“Sure.”
“You don’t have to do it, if you don’t want to.”
Giving her a small shake, he said, “I’d do anything in the world for you, Megan. You’ve got to know that by now.”
Mustering her courage, she lifted her lashes and held his darkened cobalt gaze. “I—I think I’m ready to go over to me cemetery—today. I’m ready to face my parents….”
His heart swelled with pride over her courage. The crash had ripped off a heavy scar that Megan had been trapped behind for so long. “Okay,” he said thickly, “let’s go.”
Megan stood at the gate of the cemetery. Sam was at her side. On the way out of the house he’d given her a three-day-old bouquet of flowers to put on the graves, if she wanted to. She loved him fiercely for his thoughtfulness. Swallowing hard, Megan knew what she had to do, and it had to be done alone.
The cemetery was small and beautiful, with Arizona sycamore the predominant tree. There were no fancy headstones, only small, square concrete plaques with bronze lettering to indicate the graves. It was warm, and Megan took off her coat, handing it to Sam.
“I-I’ll be back,” she choked out.
“Take your time, Red.”
Blindly turning away, Megan held the small map she’d gotten from the caretaker’s office. Her parents were buried together in the northeast corner. The walks were laid out in precise military fashion, redbrick that reminded her of spilled blood. Clutching the bouquet of roses, Megan began the long walk by herself.
As she approached the two graves, the last two in the row next to the black wrought-iron fence, tears began to flow unchecked from her eyes. She stood in front of them, sobbing. Her mother’s grave was first. Megan kneeled down in the springy grass and leaned back on her heels. All the memories surrounding her suicide came back. Megan remembered the shock of finding her mother in the bed, dead from an overdose of sleeping pills. Allowing all those terrible, wrenching emotions to come up and consume her, Megan sat there releasing tears she’d never spilled when she was eighteen.
Finally, the storm of weeping abated, and in its place, a miraculous calm inhabited Megan. With shaking hands, she took six of the red roses, now in full bloom, and laid them across her mother’s grave.
“Mom? I—I love you. I always did. I think I understand now how you felt, and why you did what you did.” Megan wiped her cheek with the back of her sleeve. “Father was wrong to tell you that you’d finally stopped running. If he’d given you support, believed in you, maybe things would have been different.” She reached down, placing the flat of her hand against the marker. It was warm and dry. “I’m sorry you had no one, Mom. I now know it wasn’t my fault that you died. For so long, I blamed myself. I loved you as much as I could, but it wasn’t enough. It could never be enough.”
Pulling her hand away, Megan managed a broken smile. “Today, I saw what you feared the most, what you hid from. And to tell the truth, Mom, it was worth running from. It was a living hell. But as I stood there, holding Becky, I realized Sam was just as shaken as we were. Mom, not all pilots are immune to human fears. Do you know how much that meant to me to discover that? All pilots aren’t like Father was. Thank God…”
She slowly got to her feet, smiling down at the six roses lying across her mother’s grave. “I’ve got a lot to work through yet, Mom. And I’m going to come back here and talk to you from time to time.”
Stepping over to her father’s grave, Megan kneeled down. Tears didn’t come, only a sense of grief and loss. “Father, I’m still angry with you. I can’t sit here and say I love you, because you killed whatever I held for you so long ago. Dammit, why didn’t you reach out to us? Why couldn’t you have helped Mom? Did it take so much from your precious love of flying to do it? You helped Mom commit suicide by the very fact you didn’t want to get involved!”
Megan looked up through the spreading arms of the sycamore, her lower lip trembling badly. Hurt soared with her pain. “I’ve met a man, Father, who isn’t like you. Sam’s taught me that not all pilots are uncaring and distant. He loves his flying, but he loves me more.” She shook her head, tears spilling from her eyes as she looked down at the mute grave. “If Sam hadn’t persisted, hung in there with me because I thought he was exactly like you, I’d have lost him. God knows, I never gave him any chances to prove he was any different.
“I’m scared, Father. Sometimes, I feel like Mom did when I think about Sam going up on a flight. But a new side of me, one that I’m learning to trust, tells me differently. You never could talk or share anything with either of us, could you? I don’t understand why! Did we mean so little to you? Were we so insignificant to what was really important in your life, that we were little more than underfoot?” Her voice broke, and Megan sat there in grief.
“It’s amazing all the fears and perceptions I’ve taken on for both of you. I’ll probably spend the rest of my life sorting them out from the real Megan Roberts. I can’t forgive you, Father. At least, not yet. Maybe one of these years I can, but not right now. I hope Sam can help me understand you. If anyone can, he will.” She laid the roses down on his grave. “I’ll be back, Father. There’s so much I have to say, have to ask you. Maybe I’ll never get the answers I’m searching for, but I’m going to try. You can’t be more silent than you were when you were living, so perhaps this is an easier way for both of us.”
Rising unsteadily to her feet, Megan brushed the bits of grass off her knees and lower pant legs. A slight breeze caressed her face, and she turned, going back to the walk. Each step away from the graves made her feel lighter, as if years of burdens were dissolving. In the distance, Megan could see Sam standing alone, holding her jacket. As she drew near, she could see the soberness of his features, the concern burning in his eyes. Each step gave her a sense of euphoria she’d never experienced.
Wiping the last of the tears off her face, Megan halted a few feet away from him. Sam offered her a slight smile.
“Have a good talk with them?” he asked quietly, handing her back the jacket.
“Yes.” She shrugged. “I’m not so sure going to the graves of your parents and talking at length with them is therapeutic, but I feel better.”
Sam slid his arm around Megan’s shoulder and lead her out of the cemetery and back toward the Corvette parked beneath the shade of a sycamore. “Doesn’t matter what anyone thinks about it, Red. It’s right for you.”
“That’s another thing I love about you, Sam Holt—you revel in my uniqueness, and you don’t try and stuff me under some convenient label.”
With a grin, he held her upturned face and those green eyes that glowed with hope. “How can you put a redhead under any label? They’re very independent, special people.”
“No,” Megan said, pulling him to a halt and throwing her arm
s around his shoulders, “you’re the one who’s really special.”
Holt held her long and hard, inhaling her fragrance, the silk of her hair against his cheek. “We’re both special,” he said thickly. “And I love the hell out of you, Red.”
“There’s just one more hurdle, Sam,” she said.
“What’s that?”
“When you fly the Eagle with the canards. I’m scared to death already.”
Shutting his eyes, Sam buried his face in her luxuriant hair. “So am I,” he admitted, “so am I.” But for very different reasons. Somehow, Holt knew he was going to have to find the courage to face the ghost from his past, just as Megan had faced hers. He kissed her cheek and held her more tightly, if that were possible. Did he have the courage to break that final barrier of fear regarding the crash and Russ’s death? Did he? His gut knotted hard, the pain soaring up through him. Holt wasn’t sure. Today’s crash stripped away the last of his bravado. He felt naked, his armor taken from him, with no way to shield or protect himself from the flight.
As Megan eased from his arms, he ached to tell her of the fears that haunted him almost nightly. For two weeks he wouldn’t be flying, and then the all-important test with the canards would occur. Not only would he have to overcome his fear of dying during a landing, but also deal with a jet that had a new design feature installed. How would the Eagle handle? The chances of stalling it would be real—just as real as it was for Stang today.
As Sam climbed in the car, enmeshed in a turmoil of emotions, he wanted to talk to Megan. But how could he? She was fragile from the crash, from finally making a breakthrough with herself and her parents. No, he couldn’t tell her. God knew, Megan had phenomenal strength, but no person should be asked to shoulder burdens like this. Especially not Megan. Their relationship had survived the crash, and Sam was positive it couldn’t withstand Megan knowing about his fears, the ghosts that haunted him.
20
“Well,” Lauren said to Sam, “tomorrow’s the big day.” She gave him a game smile as he lingered at his desk in Design.
Night Flight Page 32
