Love at First flight

by Marie Force

  “Michael, the message on the rock. What about Rachelle?”

  “I took care of it. We’ve doubled her detail. Don’t worry about her.”

  A police lieutenant approached them. “Mr. Maguire?”

  Michael looked up at him.

  “We’re going to be here a while, so we’ll to put you two up in a hotel for the night.”

  “She needs to go to the hospital,” Michael said.

  “We treated her,” one of the paramedics said. “It was a surface cut, but head wounds bleed like crazy.”

  “I’m fine, Michael, really. Just shook up. I don’t need the hospital.”

  “Why don’t you pack a bag so we can get you settled?” the lieutenant suggested to Michael.

  “Will you be all right for a few minutes?” Michael asked her, afraid that if he let her go for even a minute, he might come back to find that she wasn’t fine, that she had been hit by the rock rather than a piece of glass. He trembled at the thought of how close it must have been.

  She caressed his face. “I’m fine. Go ahead and pack us a bag. Can you grab me a shirt to change into?” The one she had on was soaked with blood.

  He nodded and kissed her before he went upstairs to pack. When he returned a few minutes later, the lieutenant ordered Tanner to drive them to the Hyatt at the Inner Harbor.

  “I’ve arranged to have two men posted outside your door,” the lieutenant said.

  Michael helped Juliana up from the floor and held her until she was steady. “Do you need help?”

  “No, I can do it.” She took the shirt he had brought her into the tiny bathroom off the dining room.

  “Can you clear the street?” Michael asked the cops. “I don’t want her photographed.” When she emerged from the bathroom, he produced a large, hooded Georgetown sweatshirt and helped her into it. “I don’t want them to know your face,” he whispered, pulling the hood up around her head.

  They were whisked down the stairs and into a waiting cruiser for the ride downtown. In the back of the car, Michael held her close to him and struggled to contain the riot of emotions that coursed through him—rage, relief, love, and fear. For the first time in his career he was afraid but not for himself. “I need to call my boss, honey.” He reached for his cell phone while keeping his other arm wrapped around her as she rested her head on his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I want to focus only on you, but I have to tell him about this.”

  “Of course you do.”

  Michael called Tom Houlihan at home and filled him in.

  “This is outrageous!” Tom said. “When I hang up with you I’m calling Judge Stein. Are you sure your friend is okay?”

  “Yes, she’s shaken up and a piece of the coffee table cut her forehead, but the paramedics said she’s okay. They’re putting us in the Hyatt for the night while crime scene does their thing at my house.”

  “Call me if there’s anything at all you need.”

  “I want you to keep her name out of the papers, Tom. I mean it. I don’t want them having her name.”

  “Of course. I’ll see to that personally. I’m sure the trial will be in recess until this is sorted out.”

  “I’d like to avoid that if we can,” Michael said. “The longer this goes on, the more danger Rachelle is in. Try to talk him into moving forward on Monday.”

  “I’ll see what I can do, and I’ll call you in the morning. I’m sorry about this, Michael.”

  “Thanks. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  “Do you really think Rachelle is in danger, Michael?” Juliana asked in a small voice. “I’m so afraid for her.”

  “She’s fine. She has seven cops with her. I don’t want you to worry.” He released a ragged deep breath. “What the hell was I thinking letting you become involved in all this?”

  Juliana raised her head to look him in the eye. “I didn’t become involved in all of this. I became involved with you.”

  Overwhelmed by her, Michael guided her head back to his shoulder.

  Chapter 17

  They pulled up to the Hyatt, and Officer Tanner turned to them. “One room or two?”

  Michael glanced down at Juliana.

  “One,” she said.

  “Coming right up. I’ll be back for you in a few minutes.”

  “I’ve always wanted to stay here,” Juliana said. The sleek black-glass hotel overlooked Baltimore’s famous Inner Harbor where the bombs bursting over Fort McHenry during the War of 1812 inspired Francis Scott Key to write the poem that later became the Star Spangled Banner. “But it’s hard to justify a night in the Hyatt when you live in the city.”

  “Too bad you had to be nearly killed to get here.”

  “Michael, stop.” She ran a finger along his jaw, which was tight with tension. “I’m fine.”

  Tanner returned and escorted them to a room on the hotel’s seventh floor.

  “We’ll be right outside, Mr. Maguire. Just holler if you need anything.”

  “Thank you.”

  “John?” Juliana walked over to the young policeman.

  “Yes?”

  “I appreciate all you did back at the house.”

  “It shouldn’t have happened.” He looked like he could cry. “I’m sorry.”

  She put her hand on his arm. “When people are determined to do something like this, they find a way.”

  “I’m just glad you’re okay,” he said on his way out the door. “Try to get some sleep.”

  Juliana attempted to pull the Georgetown sweatshirt over her head and gasped when it rubbed against the cut on her forehead.

  Michael came to her side. “Let me help you.” He eased the sweatshirt over her forehead and gently removed it. Tossing it aside, he put his arms around her. “It’s good of you to be so forgiving.”

  “It’s not his fault, Michael. He didn’t throw the rock.” She snuggled into his embrace. “I need to take a shower.”

  He tightened his hold on her. “Wait. Stay here for a minute. Stay with me.”

  She closed her arms around him and felt a tremble ripple through him.

  “When they said you were hurt,” he said, his voice hoarse with emotion, “I don’t think I’ve ever been more terrified in my life. And when I saw all that blood…”

  “Shh, Michael. Don’t.”

  He looked down at her, his eyes bright with tears. “I love you,” he whispered. “Those words seem so insignificant in light of all I feel for you. There just isn’t a big enough word, Juliana.”

  “I love you, too.”

  He seemed to stop breathing. “You do?”

  She reached up to caress his face. “I’ve known it since the last time we saw Rachelle. The way you were with her… You were amazing, and I just knew.”

  Releasing a rattling deep breath, Michael closed his eyes and kissed her slowly and deeply, as if he was trying to put all his love for her into that one kiss.

  After a long while, she pulled back from him. “I’m going to go wash off the blood. You got some on your shirt.”

  “I don’t care.”

  She reached up to unbutton the light blue dress shirt he wore to court that morning. “Take it off. I’ll soak it.”

  “Don’t worry about it. Are you hungry?”

  “I don’t think I could eat.”

  “Me either.”

  “I’ll be right back.”

  He stole one more kiss from her before he let her go. “I’ll be right here.”

  She pushed the shirt off his shoulders and took it with her into the bathroom. In the shower, she winced at the water sliding over the cut on her forehead. She watched the water in the tub turn red when she rinsed her hair and washed it. The pulsating shower helped to ease some of the tension from her shoulders and back. Stepping out of the shower, she wrapped her hair in a towel and pulled on the thick white robe the hotel provided. Wiping the steam off the mirror, she took a close look at the wound on her forehead. The small cut certainly didn’t measure up to the amount of blood it produced
. A tinge of black and blue already surrounded it.

  As she brushed her hair and then dried it, she shuddered each time she thought about how much worse it could have been. Her legs still felt like they were made of Jell-O.

  She had told Michael she loved him, which made her stomach also feel like Jell-O—not only because it was true, but because she still loved Jeremy. However, she wasn’t thinking of him just then. No, her thoughts were all about Michael and the way his face had faded to a ghostly pale when he came rushing into the house to find her covered in blood. In that heartbreaking moment, she had seen his love for her. And when he said there wasn’t a big enough word to describe how he felt about her… That had been, quite simply, the most romantic moment of her life.

  Michael ignored his ringing cell phone for a tenth time, turned it off, and went to look out at the full moon hanging over the Inner Harbor. To his right, he could make out the brick walls of Camden Yards, home to the Baltimore Orioles.

  After he’d finally managed to stop shaking, he was hit by a wave of rage so deep and so intense it took his breath away. That those fucking monsters, those fucking arrogant bastards thought they would get away with this…

  The hair dryer turned off, and he took a deep breath to calm himself down. He didn’t want Juliana to see the rage. That wasn’t what she needed from him right now. She loved him. Nothing else mattered. Not tonight.

  The bathroom door opened, and he turned to her, deciding instantly that he had never seen anything more beautiful than Juliana in the white bathrobe with her shiny dark hair flowing down around her shoulders. Her usually vibrant olive skin had a pallor to it that made her brown eyes seem even bigger than usual. His gut clenched when he remembered how the bandage on her forehead had gotten there and what might have happened…

  Pushing those thoughts aside, he held out his hand to her. “I found some medicine.” He pointed to the two small bottles of Sutter Home from the mini-bar.

  “Bring it on, but I warn you, it’ll go straight to my head.”

  “Does the cut hurt?”

  “No.”

  “I asked the cops to get you some Tylenol. It’s over there if you need it.”

  “Thanks.” She moved to the window to check out the view of the harbor. “I figured your phone would be ringing nonstop.”

  “I shut it off.”

  She turned to him. “Can you do that?”

  He handed her a glass of wine. “Tom can deal with the media tonight. That’s why he’s the boss. Feel better after the shower?”

  “Much better. Do you think it’ll be on the news?”

  “It probably already is, but your name won’t be mentioned. Tom will see to that.”

  “What does it mean for the trial?”

  “I don’t know, and right now I don’t care. I don’t want to think about that.”

  She ran a hand over his bare chest and toyed with the St. Christopher medal he wore on a thin gold chain.

  He trembled under her caress.

  “I’m frightened for you, Michael. What if they hurt you? Or worse? You’re trying to put them in prison—”

  “Don’t.” He tipped her chin so he could see her eyes. “Don’t bring them into this room with us. I don’t want them anywhere near us. Not ever, but especially not tonight.” He kissed her. “Not tonight,” he whispered. He took the wine glass from her and put it on a table. Running his thumbs along her jaw, he slid his fingers into her hair. His lips glided over hers in a soft, easy caress that quickly became passionate.

  She loved him. He didn’t have to wonder or hope anymore. And when her arms encircled his neck and her tongue met his in ardent response, he was lost. He picked her up, carried her across the room, and laid her down on the big bed. With his eyes trained on hers, he kicked off his pants, reached for the belt to her robe, and tugged it open.

  He ran his hands over her reverently. “Oh, Juliana,” he sighed, his lips pressed to her belly. “You’re every fantasy I’ve ever had come to life.”

  He cupped her breasts and had to remind himself that they had all night. She was so beautiful, so perfect in every way that he resisted the urge to devour and took the time to savor. That she loved him, too, was nothing short of a dream come true. She was a dream come true. He rolled his tongue over her pebbled nipple, and she gasped with pleasure.

  “You smell so good,” he said. “I don’t know what it is, but it turns me on like nothing ever has.”

  She chuckled. “It’s Aveda.”

  “Mmm, I love Aveda.” Reluctantly leaving her breasts for the time being, he kissed his way down, nudged her legs apart, and nuzzled her with his lips and then his tongue. He teased her with short caresses that had her panting for more and then deeper strokes that made her moan. He kept it up until she was wild beneath him. Finally, he focused his tongue on the spot that pulsed with desire and slipped a finger into her.

  Releasing another choppy moan, she lifted her hips in encouragement and grabbed a fistful of his hair to keep him there. It took only a few strokes of his tongue and finger to send her flying.

  He looked up, startled to find her cheeks wet with tears. “Juliana? Are you all right?”

  She nodded and reached out to him.

  “What is it?” he whispered against her neck. He felt her fingers tunnel through his hair and was reminded of the first time she had done that, the moment he knew for sure that he loved her. Lifting his head, he found her eyes. “Tell me.”

  Biting her lip, she studied him. “You know I want this—I want you—right?”

  “I think so.”

  “And that I love you? I really love you?”

  “I’m still getting used to that one,” he said with a smile, the wonder of it hitting him all over again. How had he ever gotten so lucky?

  She rested her hands on his face. “It’s just that I’ve never, you know, done… this—”

  “With anyone else.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re feeling guilty.”

  “Kind of.”

  Afraid she was retreating from him, he leaned down to kiss her softly, gently. Ignoring his own urgent need, he said, “We don’t have to, Juliana. Not if it doesn’t feel right to you.”

  “But it does. It feels right. You feel right.”

  Her hands traveled from his face to his back and down to clutch to his backside.

  He trembled with want, but still he held back.

  “Make love to me, Michael.” Lifting her legs up and around his hips, she offered herself to him and smiled as she took him in.

  Fully sheathed in her heat, he was swamped with the sensation of being exactly where he belonged. This was it. She was it. She was the one.

  “Look at me, Juliana.” Their first time, which could have been awkward, wasn’t. They moved in effortless harmony, like a couple together for years rather than weeks. “Don’t look away. I want you to see how much I love you.” He waited, held off, watched. He saw her eyes flutter with fulfillment even before he felt it, but still he wouldn’t let her look away, wouldn’t take the chance that she would think of anything—or anyone—but him in that moment.

  Calling upon every ounce of self-control he could muster, he drove her up and over once more before he let himself join her in the most earth-shattering, mind-altering climax of his life. It left him gasping for air, for reason, for sanity.

  So… This was what it meant to make love, to really and truly make love. He’d never before emerged from a sexual encounter feeling so irrevocably changed.

  “I love you, Juliana,” he whispered against her neck. “There’ll never be anyone but you for me. Not ever again.”

  “I love you, too.” Her fingertips trailed over his back as her lips found the sensitive place where his neck met his shoulder.

  He shivered. “What if we made a baby?” he asked, unable to believe he hadn’t thought of it before now. That, too, was a first.

  “I’m on the pill.”

  “Damn.”


  She laughed. “I thought you wanted to leave the baby-making to your sisters.”

  Raising his head so he could see her, he said, “Not anymore.” He dropped light kisses on her cheeks, her nose, her chin, and the butterfly on her forehead before he reclaimed her lips. “Tell me again, Juliana. I need to hear it again.”

  She looked into his eyes. “I love you, Michael. I love you,” she whispered, bringing his mouth back to hers.

  He rolled them over so she was on top. “Show me.”

  Her throbbing forehead woke Juliana at five the next morning. As she eased out of Michael’s embrace, reached for the robe on the floor, and pulled it on, he sighed but didn’t wake up. She found the Tylenol he had gotten for her and swallowed the pills. Taking another long drink from the bottle of water, she went over to the window.

  The sunrise flirted with the horizon, casting a warm glow over the Inner Harbor. From this vantage point, she couldn’t quite make out the salon on the far end of the shops and restaurants that lined the harbor. The normally bustling waterfront was quiet and still. Juliana had never seen it quite so tranquil.

  Off in the distance she noticed one of the party boats that populated the harbor and the Chesapeake Bay and was struck by the memory of attending her senior prom with Jeremy on one of those boats. Oh, Jer. What am I going to do?

  She turned to look at Michael, and her heart galloped when memories from their night together flashed through her mind. Her body tingled as she recalled his intense lovemaking. She couldn’t say exactly why, but being with him had been different than being with Jeremy. Maybe it was because of all they had been through in their short time together, but she’d never felt more cherished in her life than she had in Michael’s arms. He made her feel as if she was the answer to every question he’d ever had.

  Gazing back out over the harbor, Juliana summoned the courage she would need to face what was ahead. Before much longer, she would disappoint one of the two men she loved—one of the two men who loved her. Mrs. Romanello warned her it would come down to a choice, and she was exactly right.

  Juliana was startled out of her thoughts when Michael came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her. He nudged her hair aside to gain access to her neck.