His Very Own Girl (7 page)

Joe edged sideways, slipping past a dozen servicemen and their dames until he reached two empty seats on the far end of the aisle. He wanted to check and see if Lulu still followed, but he didn’t want to give her the satisfaction. She rendered him inept in surprising new ways.

Perhaps it was because she’d seen him lose his temper. Perhaps because she’d been so ready to put the kibosh on a second date, or because her passion for flying was a constant reminder of how cockeyed these times had become. Christ, she wanted to train on four-engine aircraft! The thought of it burned him with shame, as if he and every other man on the planet had let down the female sex. He curled his hands into fists.

Growing up, Joe hadn’t been the best kid, but he’d known enough to open a door for a lady. Hell, his sense of chivalry was why he’d wound up in prison. In exchange he expected certain benefits.
He
was the man. He took the chances and defeated the villains. Yet Lulu threatened that basic equation by seeking out a man’s responsibilities.

This dirty war had tipped the world on its head. He’d turned into something like a doctor, and women were flying airplanes.

Nothing was ever going to be right again, even after they licked Hitler and the Japs. Joe had no doubt that they would—by God, the Allies had worked too hard to lose—but what would civilization be when it was all over? Women in factories and in uniform and at the controls of airplanes. He cringed. It was an abomination.

But then again he should’ve known better. He should’ve known that life wasn’t exactly right or fair. Otherwise he wouldn’t have spent three years in lockup, and Sheriff Hollister Plank would’ve died a long time ago. So he’d plotted with Smitty and Paulie to drag Lulu out to the movies. Life wasn’t fair, but Joe was still convinced that it could be enjoyable.

He took his seat and Lulu joined him. Joe looked up at the cracked plaster ceiling, tracing the lines with his gaze. Occasional bombing raids over Leicester had left their mark on the large, lovely movie palace. A draft edged across his face, from where repairmen had used scrap lumber to patch a low three-foot hole in the brick outer wall. The sound of passing automobiles and the stink of gasoline fumes barged inside.

Lulu’s forearm brushed his, then settled in as they shared an armrest. The simple touch stirred his fire. At that moment Joe didn’t care what she did or believed or why he was even in England. She sat so close that he could see each thick eyelash and hear the quiet way she breathed. Her lavender scent and lustrous skin were as entrancing as he remembered.

And as much as Joe hated admitting it, her confidence—which bordered on stubbornness when it came to flying—only enhanced her beauty. She wore her uniform with as much pride as he wore his, a sort of camaraderie he’d never expected to feel with a dame.

“What picture are we seeing?” Lulu asked.

The question was so ordinary that Joe had to laugh. “I have no idea.”

“Then we’ll just be surprised.” Her smile was back, the one with the dimple. “It’s better that way.”

The fist under Joe’s sternum began to unfurl. “You enjoy that, don’t you? Surprises?”

With her expression like that of a child expecting a present, she leaned back against the drab velvet upholstery. “I like the adventure of things, yes.”

Her suggestive gaze lingered on his lips. Joe’s mouth went dry and he shifted slightly in his seat. But the last thing he wanted was to behave like any other soldier. How many fellas had stolen a kiss from her? Had any of them persuaded her to give up a little more?

“Evening, ladies and gents!”

A man stood at the front of the theater amid hoots and shouts. He wore a green-and-red plaid suit with an outrageously oversized purple tie. His hair was slicked back. With every step his tap shoes clicked against the shallow wooden stage that fronted the movie screen. “I’m Willy Williams,” he said, striding along the stage. “To all of you newcomers, I bid you a happy welcome to Leicester. Are we here to have a smashing time?”

A great hoopla of noise greeted him in return.

“Good. Hit it, Benny!”

Another man at a tiny upright started in on “There’ll Be a Hot Time in the Town of Berlin.” Williams danced and provided vocals, with his nasal voice contorting into something close to an American accent. He even dragged a good-natured lady on stage with him, whisking her around with all the speed and grace of an eggbeater. She was laughing and gasping for breath by the time the song finished, as was the rest of the audience.

Still grinning, Joe took Lulu’s hand. She gripped his fingers—a silent hello. And just that easily the tension between them disappeared like a mist at dawn.

“Well, boys and girls, enough of my song and dance. Your Uncle Willy is actually here to deliver a message. Yes, that’s right. I have a message for the Huns, wherever those squirmy little toads are hiding—whether slinking among us right now as rotten, no-good spies, or flying over the Channel to unleash hell on our cities. And that message is . . .
We’re still here!
”

The audience roared to life. Dozens jumped to their feet, whooping and cheering.

“What’s more,” Williams shouted, his words precise and theatrical, “is that each of these brave young men—from our own dear British sons, to Yanks and Parleyvoos and Canucks and Aussies and every other Allied soldier—well, let me tell you something, Jerry . . . they’re coming for you!”

Joe and Lulu were standing now. The whole room was. Joe shouted until he was hoarse and clapped until his palms went numb. It was such a welcome relief to fling the strain out of his body, to hear that wild sense of purpose given a hearty, unified voice. Lulu stood on tiptoes, holding Joe’s forearm for balance and bobbing her head to catch a better view. Her cheeks were flushed. A sheen of sweat beaded along her brow and upper lip.

“Now ladies and gents, dames and dodgers, I want you to do something for your Uncle Willy.” He crouched at the edge of the stage, his delivery more intimate now. He still looked ridiculous, but he claimed everyone’s attention. Joe watched him as if he were a preacher, a man sent to save them all. Williams had galvanized his audience—just regular people taking advantage of a night out—into a congregation. “Are you ready to do this?”

The expectant crowd replied in the affirmative.

“I want you to look to your left or your right. If you’re here with a grand girl, if you’re here with some brave boy, I want you to turn to that dear soul . . . and give them a big fat kiss for victory!”

Laughter and shouts were his reward. And then people throughout the theater began to do just as he’d asked. Couple by couple, men and women melted into each other’s arms. Some were tentative. Some were eager. Some looked as if they wouldn’t be sticking around for the feature.

Joe turned to Lulu. She was a tall girl, taller than he remembered. Her flushed-face excitement had not subsided. She was reckless and wild, reminding him of the first time he’d seen her in the cockpit of her Hurricane. Memories of that adrenaline-soaked run, an understanding of how close she’d come to death, and the unspoken fear of his own fate in combat—it all surged up inside him. Joe took hold of her upper arms and pulled her close. He gave her every chance to back away or stiffen or shake her head.

Instead, their eyes met. The packed theater disappeared.

The jolt of that first touch of lip to lip snapped through him like the pulse of machine gun fire—sharp, quick, startling. The warmth of her mouth, firm and soft and giving, blew every thought from his mind. Their tongues touched, withdrew, and then pressed onward. She tasted salty and sweet at once. Joe encircled her back, pulling her closer. Her hands wove into the hair along his nape, and her breasts pillowed against his chest.

When his body swiftly responded, eager for even more, he raised his head.

Lulu laughed. “Lipstick,” she said simply.

Couples had started to resume their seats. He and Lulu joined them.

A scattered sense of confusion clouded his return to regular breathing. All he knew for certain was that he wasn’t kissing her anymore. And any moment when he wasn’t kissing her was a moment wasted.

Using an unadorned white handkerchief she’d pulled from her purse, Lulu scrubbed her lipstick off his face. Joe was laughing, too, by the time she finished. Then he took the handkerchief and returned the favor. He had to be very careful, easing the thin fabric around the outline of her mouth. But soon he was doing more petting than cleaning. Her lips parted. She was breathing heavily.

“I’ll take that,” she said, reclaiming her handkerchief. “No offense, Doc Web, but I don’t trust chaps to know much about makeup.”

Joe didn’t know what to make of his army nickname coming from Lulu. Strange. As if he had new expectations to live up to.

“You look real fine,” he said.

“But you’d say that no matter what—messy lipstick, or wilted after a hot afternoon, or first thing in the morning.”

The image he concocted of Lulu first thing in the morning was enough to thicken his voice. “You’re not wrong.”

“Then you see why I must trust my compact, not you.”

Despite the heavy thrum of blood that had gathered into an undeniable erection, he took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The few moments she needed to touch up her lipstick gave Joe time to recover.

She had just returned her possessions to her small handbag when the lights dimmed and the tattered red velvet curtain parted. The screen glowed white in the mild half-light. Lulu threaded her arm through Joe’s and leaned in close.

Light flickered to life on the screen. The film turned out to be
Heaven Can Wait
. Joe kissed Lulu’s forehead and settled in to enjoy his own little slice of heaven on earth.

chapter six

Don Ameche and Gene Tierney were doing their best to turn on Lulu’s waterworks.
They’ll make it,
she thought. Through all the misunderstandings and disappointments, they would make it.

She surreptitiously wiped her cheeks. The last thing she needed was for Joe to think she was the kind of girl who welled up over make-believe lovers. In fact, she couldn’t let Joe get
any
ideas about her, good or bad. They were less permanent than a weekend pass.

Whispered words echoed inside the theater’s high walls. At one point the bare brick had probably been bunted with endless yards of velvet, muffling the sound and lending a graceful air, but now the space felt industrial, like a warehouse with former aspirations of elegance and culture.

She let her eyes drift shut, lulled by the film’s closing moments. In that intimate blackness the ground rushed up to meet her. Lulu fisted her hands. Her whole body tensed as she prepared once again, over and over, for impact. Breathing as if she’d just run to catch a motor bus, she sat up and scrubbed her scratchy lids. The back of her throat ached for a drink—water, ale, anything.

“You all right?”

She nodded her reply, unable to trust her voice.

It wasn’t fair. She’d saved that bloody airplane. She’d hit the ground at the gentlest possible angle, with nothing but the slice on her knee by way of injuries. She’d
won
. And ever since that unusually bright afternoon, she’d ferried dozens of aircraft with hardly a scratch of fear. Her mechanical incidents had numbered nil. Yet her resting mind insisted on playing out the blackest outcomes, tormenting her with those fleeting seconds just before she’d carried off the impossible—the seconds before she’d known whether she would live or die.

Dwelling on something so unalterable wasn’t her habit. She didn’t like it. Not one bit.

What really got her game was that she’d closed her eyes when Joe had kissed her. She’d closed them and reveled in seeing only black, no hint of airplanes or crashes or terror. Only the flash fire of his kiss had existed, transforming his embrace into happiness and his body into her treasure.

What was wrong with her? He was one of literally dozens of men with whom she’d shared time in the years since Robbie’s suicide. She’d allowed a few kisses, some more wrought-up than others, but none had affected her with the same ardency.

She wanted to do it again.

She stared down at where her hand rested on the sleeve of Joe’s uniform tunic. He was a soldier. He would leave soon. He would die, or he would return so irrevocably damaged as to become an entirely different man. She was volunteering for another colossal heartache if she spent any more time with him.

“Show’s over.” His warm breath smoothed over her cheek.

Lulu blinked. The screen had gone dark. “Sorry.”

He wiped away a tear with the same consideration he’d shown when tidying her lipstick. “Quite an ending, wasn’t it?”

It had been happy. That’s all she needed. With the gloom of real life, who needed to add fictional sorrows?

The lights came up for intermission. Soldiers left their dames to find refreshment. Lulu’s back ached and her neck muscles were bunched into knots. The evening was abrading her emotions in ways she hadn’t anticipated, wearing through her reserves like steel wool rubbed across her inner wrist. All she’d wanted was a night out. Something fun and light after a hard week in the air.

Ah, Paulie, what did we get me into?

She only had to hold tight for another few hours, through the newsreels and the second feature. Then Joe would be out of her life. She could go back to aimless fun, new soldiers, and her date with destiny at Marston Moor. She could even crook her finger at Nicky. Had Lulu been in search of a man, he was the sane choice in an insane world.

So when her traitorous heart and lonely body wanted more of Joe, she’d just tell them no. After four years of practice, she was good at that.

“You want something to drink?” Joe asked. “I didn’t bring bottles, but I could do some scrounging.”

Alcohol was simple enough to find, but the rationing of glass and tin meant occasionally providing one’s own means for carrying it.

“No, don’t bother.”

“Or maybe . . . you just want to get out of here?” His eyes were dark, clouded over with things unsaid. The passion was back. The heat. The surprising puzzle of him.

“Why did you fight that lieutenant?” she heard herself asking.

Joe flinched. Lulu swallowed the need to apologize and tell him to forget her unexpected question. Instead she laced her fingers in her lap.

Exhaling slowly, he seemed to assess his own options, motives, and need for privacy.
So little trust in these opening moments,
she thought. She’d forgotten what it was to truly open up to a man. Having gone without for so long, she’d convinced herself that she didn’t miss it. Yet she did. She missed silly jokes and bumbled talks and those embarrassing moments of intimacy one only shared with a trusted partner.

But what she missed was also what hurt the most when it ended.

“Do you need to know?” he asked.

She couldn’t find an answer that would satisfy her curiosity without sounding like a common scold. When the words didn’t materialize, she could only stare at his apprehensive face. Her question was spoiling their good time. She shivered then, her physical self demanding more than did her conscious mind. More of Joe.

Soon the newsreels would begin. They’d see footage from all across the globe—the fighting, the fear, the simple monotony of making do. She didn’t want a lick of it.

Although her knees wobbled as she stood, she forced them to shape up and fly right. Nothing about her rule had changed. She was merely stretching one night into two. That didn’t mean learning all there was to know about Joe. Chatting, dancing, kissing . . . no more was on her menu.

“No,” she said. “I don’t think I do. And I don’t think I need to see the second feature.”

Joe gave the building a once-over and frowned. The Henley Club practically glowed and glittered despite Leicester’s pervasive blackout, its music loud and its patrons spruced up real fine. But this place hunched into itself. Ratty wooden boards covered every window. The brick walls were so afflicted with moisture and tiny diffuse cracks that they leaned over, yearning toward the cobbled alley floor. A scrap of corrugated tin hung above the lone doorway. Macadam tar had been used to smear on the words
The Night Owl.

The only sign of life was not what Joe could see but what he could hear. From inside the dingy structure came the low and woeful sound of a single trumpet.

Lulu knocked on the door, which was opened by a tall man who bore a remarkable resemblance to the building. His shoulders curved like the top of the letter
C.
He had no waist to speak of; the lines of his body extended straight from armpit to ankle. Maybe forty years old, maybe sixty, he wore a flat cap and a grizzled white beard. Patches of skin poked through where the hair on his cheeks had thinned.

That they’d find some manner of diversion here was absurd.

“Lulu,” Joe said. “Let’s go.”

She ignored him and addressed the man in the doorway. “Allo, Banger, me old china! How’s your pretty young Dutch?”

“Me turtle? Always on the dog. Should give her a good kick up the April.” He squinted at Joe. “Who’s the daft ranger, briney?”

“Just a garden gate.”

“But . . . he’s wooden.”

“Aren’t they all these days?”

The man scratched his beard and offered a smile that shone with genuine affection. “You, briney, always one for a Tufnell. Fancy a Vera?”

“That’d be swell.”

Lulu gave the man a heartfelt hug and slipped inside. Joe was left in the alley, dazed, completely lost. The ogre at the door motioned him inside. Wherever they were, whatever this place was . . . how bad could it be? At least there wouldn’t be a passel full of spit-shined officers giving him the evil eye every time he ordered a beer or talked with a dame.

He followed Lulu into a vestibule at the base of a flight of stairs. A naked lightbulb hung down from a frayed electrical cord, illuminating her face like a gangster questioned by cops.

“What was that all about?” he asked.

“Cockney rhyming slang. Banger’s from London, too.”

“Did he call me wooden?”

“That just means you’re an American. Wooden . . . wooden plank . . . Yank. He was being polite, actually.” She dipped her head closer as if ready to share a secret. “He could’ve called you a septic.”

“Septic . . . as in tank?”

“That’s right.”

So not a secret then; a dirty joke. Joe grinned. “And proper London girls grow up talking that way?”

“Who says I’m proper?”

He let his eyes travel over her neat hairdo and precisely pressed uniform. “Everything about you, sweetheart.” Then he touched the gold-tone wings pinned to her left breast pocket. “Except for these, of course.”

“Keeps me from being dull. Now, shall we up the apples and have a few kitchens?” Laughing at Joe’s confusion, she said, “Apples and pears—that’s the stairs. And what can you find in a bar that rhymes with
kitchen sink
?”