His Wedding Date (The Second Chance Love Series, Book 2) (6 page)

"Brian?"

"I know. Not what I was expecting to ever hear from him, but he asked, and I promised I would," Brian shook his head like he still couldn't believe all that had happened. "I thought he'd come to see me that day to try to beat the crap out of me and tell me to stay the hell away from his wife, but that wasn't it."

"Well, that's what you wanted. That's what you would have done anyway, right?"

He nodded. "That was my plan. I think he'd already decided to leave her by then. I'm not saying he left because of the promise I made to be there for her. But I think I made it easier for him to go."

"Okay, so you might have had a little bit to do with her marriage ending," Shelly began.

"And neither Tucker nor I ever said a word about that to Rebecca."

"Oh." Shelly nodded, then fell silent for a moment.

"She found out a few months ago and was not happy with either one of us for... you know, making major decisions about her life and her child's life without her."

"I can understand that," Shelly said.

"Guess she found it easier to forgive Tucker than me." He shrugged, looking miserable. "And yes, I know it wasn't that exactly that made her take him back. I think it made it easier for her to take him back, even though he'd walked out on his wife and kid–which I think I'd find inexcusable."

"I think most women would."

"Ah, Shel... I'll admit it to you, at least, that as lousy as it was for him to walk out on her and Sammy, I do really believe he thought she'd be happier with me. I mean, I think he was thinking–at least, in part–she'd be happier if he was gone and she and I got back together. Hell, I thought she would."

"So, maybe he's not quite as awful a person as we always thought?"

He laughed. "Maybe not quite as horrible. I still don't see how she could ever trust him again."

"I don't think I could," Shelly agreed. "But they have a child together. Maybe she's doing it for Sammy. Maybe she thinks it's that important for Sammy to have his father in his life, and she's willing even to marry Tucker again."

"No. That's not why. I think she probably gave him a chance, in the beginning, because of Sammy. I doubt she would have even talked to him otherwise. But that's not all of it. I wish it was. I'd still be fighting for her, if I thought that was all it was. But it's not. She cares about him. She may even love him. I guess we're about to find out. We're almost there."

Great.

Almost there.

To what was sure to be the most awkward wedding she'd ever attended. Maybe the most painful, if she sat there and watched Brian's face throughout the ceremony and could tell he was still as hung up on Rebecca as ever.

"I'm still not sure this is the best idea you ever had," she said.

"I'm positive it's not."

"So, why are we going?"

He laughed. "We've come too far to turn back now. Plus, we wouldn't have enough fuel. We're going to land somewhere. I think it's going to have to be Tallahassee."

"Okay, but that doesn't mean we have to actually go to the wedding," she argued. "Wait a minute... I just thought of something. How did you get invited to this wedding?"

Brian didn't say a word.

Shelly couldn't believe she hadn't thought of it sooner, but the week had been absolutely crazy. "You're asking me to crash your ex-fiancée's wedding with you?"

It was laughable, really, and outrageous, from a man who didn't do outrageous things.

"I don't know," he said. "I thought, what are they going to do? Make a scene by kicking me out?"

Shelly gaped at him. "I can see Tucker doing just that."

"And then I thought... I bet Shelly got an invitation. I'll make her take me."

"That's why you asked me to come with you?" She was so hurt, she could hardly stand it.

"No, Shel. No. I asked you because you're my friend, and I knew you'd understand."

Okay, she felt a little better at that.

"Still," she said, "Rebecca will never forgive me if she thinks I brought you as my date."

"Sure she will. She's always liked you."

"Brian!"

"Look, if Rebecca's going to stand at the altar and marry that man again, she's going to have to walk past me to do it. And if she does it, well... That doesn't really leave any question about how she feels about me, does it?"

His voice had been quite calm as he said it, and determined.

God, what a mess!

What was she doing here?

She was as crazy as he was when it came to him and Rebecca.

"I told you before, I need to see her do it," Brian said quietly.

"Okay, but that's it, right?" Shelly asked. "Promise me one more time. You're just going to sit there and not cause any trouble?"

"I'm not. I swear."

"You could always talk me into anything," she complained.

"Come on," he teased. "You're easy."

"No, I'm not. Not with anybody else. It's just you," she said, before she thought through how much that might tell him about how she felt about him.
Dammit.

"I'm sorry, Shel. Really." He leaned toward her, and his breath teased her ear, leaving her more unsettled than she had been with the conversation. "I shouldn't have gotten you in the middle of this mess. But I'm glad to have you with me."

He took her hand in his, then pulled it away slightly so he could run his thumb over her sweaty palm.

She was nervous. He'd teased her about being afraid to fly. That wasn't the real problem, though she was just as happy to have him think it was.

He made her nervous. Being in his company for the entire weekend was going to be hard.

"Are we almost there?"

"Another fifteen minutes or so. Think you can hang on that long?"

"I guess I'll just have to," she said, giving up on the idea of relaxing as his palm again settled on hers and their fingers became intertwined.

"I am really glad you came with me," he said as he squeezed her hand.

"I'm not—"

Shelly stopped when she realized she was shouting and didn't need to. The engine noise that had made conversation so difficult had finally quieted. It left her feeling oddly uneasy.

Really uneasy.

Before she could ask about the lack of noise, the plane seemed to hang in the air for a moment, then began to slide downward.

She did not like this feeling. Not at all.

"Uhh... Are we there already?"

"No."

She'd been looking to the side at a fluffy white cloud in an otherwise startlingly blue sky, but something in Brian's tone made her turn to face him.

The hand that had been holding hers was busy elsewhere now. He was calmly flipping switches and turning dials, quietly cursing as he worked his way across the control panel of the little plane.

Obviously they were in some kind of trouble.

"What's wrong?" she finally managed to ask.

"The engine's acting funny," he said tersely, concentrating on the instrument panel in front of him.

She held on a little tighter, then had a terrible thought. She'd never been in a plane this small, and she couldn't remember—"How many engines do we have?"

"Just one."

One?

She turned to the window, looking to see how far they had to fall. It wasn't as far as she thought. They'd been flying low along the coastline the whole way until a few minutes ago, when they'd turned inland to head for Tallahassee. The area south of Tallahassee was mostly wildlife refuges, full of trees and swamps. There was no place to land.

"The ground's getting closer," she announced, just in case he didn't realize that.

"I know." His voice was as steady as it had been a second ago.

"Don't we want it the other way?" She fought to keep the fear out of her voice, as well. "Don't we want to stay up?"

"Not if the engine's going to quit."

And then it did.

Near silence filled the plane, the loudest silence she'd ever heard.

She made a pathetic little panicky sound.

Brian tried to get the engine to turn over again, but it sputtered a few times and died.

"See anything down there I could use for a runway?" he asked, still working quickly but calmly.

Shelly saw trees, lots of trees—thick, tall, spindly pines.

"You've got to be kidding," she said.

"I never kid when my plane's going down. Shelly, we're going down."

She should have realized that if the engine quit, the plane would go down, but now she was too busy fighting the urge to scream. She really was afraid of flying, although right now that seemed foolish. The thing she feared now was crashing.

And they would crash. Shelly looked down again. It had seemed like a long way down just a second ago, but now the ground seemed precariously close, too close to give them much time at all.

"Oh, my God! We're going to crash," she said, certain of it now as she waited for the panic to set in.

"We're going to land a little hard," Brian said, sounding so matter-of-fact she actually wondered for a minute if she was being foolish to be so scared.

And then she realized he'd made a joke. How could he make a joke at a time like this? How could he be so damned calm?

She knew they were in for something worse than a rough landing, maybe something much worse, and–dammit!–all she could think of was him! She thought about how foolish she'd been and how much precious time they'd both wasted.

Maybe she should tell him how she felt, she thought, her mind racing from one thing to another. She'd always wondered what it would feel like to tell him. Shelly waited for her life to flash before her eyes. Wasn't that what was supposed to happen? But it just didn't come.

Instead, she heard Brian say, "Shit, there's nothing but trees down there."

And then she really got scared.

Brian got on the radio and broadcast a distress call along with their location, then turned his attention back to the ground.

"Can we get back to the gulf?"

"No. There's not much of a beach out there anyway, especially not at high tide."

She tried again. "How far are we from the airport?"

"Too far."

Maybe she should tell him, right this minute, that she loved him. What harm would it do? On the other hand, what good would it do, either? It wasn't as if they'd have anything of a future together. And what did it say about her sad little life, that even now–about to crash, maybe die–she was still agonizing over what she should or shouldn't say to him!

Shelly called herself ten different kinds of a fool as the plane slowed. Brian was struggling to keep the nose up, to buy them a few more moments.

So she had time, again, to wonder how he'd react if she told him how she felt about him. He'd be shocked probably, though he'd try not to show it because he wouldn't want to hurt her feelings. And then, she feared, he wouldn't know what to say. What could he say, when he didn't feel the same way?

The plane lurched sickeningly beneath them. Her stomach turned in alarm.

Brian swore, and Shelly was scared to open her eyes, but she did. Because she wanted one more look at his face. He had dark hair, dark eyes, a hint of some Spanish ancestry that was evident in the slight darkness of his skin.

Shelly looked at the long, muscular length of his arms, now fighting desperately for control of the plane, and thought about the way she'd always longed for them to hold her. She looked at his lips, compressed into a thin line now, and she thought about the way she'd longed for him to kiss her.

She thought of all the opportunities she'd let pass her by, of all the time she'd wasted, and vowed that if they got out of this alive, she'd make the most of every moment of whatever life offered her.

She must have made some sound because Brian turned to face her for a second. He must have seen the glimmer of tears in her eyes because he took his hands off the controls for a precious second or two so he could squeeze her hand.

"Hang on. It's not over yet."

It steadied her the way nothing else could have. She'd always known she'd trust him with her life, and she did. He hadn't given up, and she wouldn't, either.

"Okay." She turned away for a moment to try to pull herself together.

That's when she saw the road.

"Brian," she said cautiously. She was afraid to believe her eyes. "Over there, to the right. That's... I think it's a road."

"Where?"

"There!"

He was practically in her lap as he leaned across her to get a better look.

"Told you it wasn't over yet." He pulled the plane into a wide, easy turn. "We're going to hit hard, and when we do, don't tense up. You'll hurt yourself even more that way. Just try to go with it."

She swallowed hard, wanting to ask just how hard it was to land a plane with no power. But if anyone could do it, he could. Brian was a rock. He always had been. When she was six, she'd been sure that nothing really bad could happen to her when he was close by. She wasn't naive enough to believe that now. But she knew there was no one she would trust with her life more than this man.