Blown Away (8 page)

He put an arm around her waist and tucked her against him like a football on its way to the end zone. This was no game, though.

“Drive!” he yelled. I knew he meant me. My truck could haul ass better than Murph's Funnel Finder.

I got in just as Tex tossed Drew into the backseat of my truck. Then he grabbed Millie and did the same. I started the truck and looked in my rearview mirror, where I spotted Murph still running. His wiry arms pumped furiously and his dark curls flew back as he sprinted toward us.

“Come on, motherfucker,” Tex said in a low tone.

“Fuck.” I smacked the steering wheel. “He's not gonna make it.” I looked at Tex. “Drive. Leave us if you have to.”

I jumped out of the driver's seat, hearing Drew scream my name. Murph was still thirty feet out. I took off toward him, not letting myself think about the swirling gray cloud of death on his heels. A small tree branch flew toward me and I raised an arm to block it, grunting as I felt it bruise me bone-deep. I was so close. Had to make it.

When I got to him, I grabbed his arm and pulled him toward the truck. When we reached the tailgate, his chest was heaving with exertion. I picked him up like a sack of potatoes and tossed him into the bed of the truck, jumping in behind him.

The truck's tires squealed as Tex peeled out. I lay on my stomach and covered my head with my arms, hoping like hell we could escape the powerful pull of the twister. Tex had to be going ninety. Despite his swagger, he was a good man to have by your side when it counted.

We'd gone a few miles when I finally chanced turning my head toward Murph.

“I have to start working out,” he said, still panting as he turned onto his back.

My laugh let out some of my tension. “It's that or smaller balls, my man. Your call.”

I raised my glass and clinked it against the other four as Murph toasted our success.

“To airborne probes,” he said, grinning. “And big balls.”

He met Aiden's gaze and they shared a laugh as we all drank the beer we'd ordered a pitcher of.

“Drew, you're officially one of us now,” Murph said, his eyes alight as he looked at me.

“Yeah, no shit,” Millie said, nudging me. “Who needs balls, anyway? You kicked ass out there today.”

“Thanks. I'm so happy we got the job done.”

Murph gave a yell and a fist pump. “Two sets of probes! Do you guys have any idea how hard it is for me to be here right now instead of on my laptop looking at that data?”

“You need to be here,” Millie said. “There's plenty of time for that later.”

Murph's smile widened. I realized we all needed to make a better effort to let him know we wanted him around when we went out for dinner or drinks. Even if he didn't come, he should know we liked it when he did.

This small group was starting to feel like a family to me. I felt the same easy closeness I had with my brother and sister. Except for Aiden. My closeness with him wasn't easy. Whatever we had was wound tight and loaded with tension.

I couldn't stop looking at him. Not just because I was getting hooked on his hazel eyes, but because of what I saw on his face right now. His expression wasn't just happy, but peaceful.

When Murph had looked on his computer and announced that the probes from Aiden's launcher and the balloon made it into the storm, Aiden's eyes had glistened. We'd pulled off to the side of the road and were waiting to go back for Murph's vehicle where we'd left it to escape the storm. Aiden had walked toward a wooded area and spent a few minutes alone.

Was he thinking about planning the probe launcher with Colby? Wishing he could have been there to see it work? Or was it about his family?

Whatever it was, it was hard for me to watch him walk away alone. I wanted to put my arms around him and comfort him. If he wanted to talk about it, I wanted to be the one he turned to.

Two enormous pizzas were delivered to our table and everyone dove in. Other than a quick stop at a gas station earlier, we hadn't had time for food today.

Murph scrolled through his phone as we ate, his brows shooting up as he read something.

“You're checking the probe readings, aren't you?” Aiden asked.

Murph nodded. “The readings are incredible. I'll make up some charts to show you guys when we get back to the motel.”

We were staying at a small roadside place with dial-up Internet and rooms with green carpet that had seen better days—likely in the 1970s. But it was air-conditioned, a bonus during this hot June, and I had my own queen bed in the room Millie and I were sharing. I planned to sprawl across it and enjoy a night away from my small motorhome bunk.

Murph had paid the check and we were all getting up to leave when Aiden turned to me.

“Ride back with me?” he said.

“Sure.”

I hoped my answer had come out sounding casual. Inside I was doing a happy dance. I'd hardly gotten any time alone with him today, and I wanted to move past our awkward encounter last night.

“You feel like making a stop on the way to the motel?” he asked.

“Um…yeah. What'd you have in mind?”

The corners of his mouth turned up in a heart-melting smile. “Something to counterbalance the excitement from earlier.”

Less than an hour later, we were lying side by side in the bed of Aiden's truck. He'd found an empty field in the country, away from the lights of town, and we were surrounded by darkness.

“They're so bright,” I said as we both looked up at the sky full of stars.

“Stargazing is so much better out here in the country.”

This was the very definition of contentment. Aiden had his arms folded beneath his head and I used a flannel shirt from the backseat of his truck as a pillow. The chorus of humming bugs was the only sound other than the occasional breeze ruffling the tall grass in the field.

But I couldn't fully relax. Aiden was more than a foot away, deliberately sticking to his side of the truck bed. I sensed he was trying to put last night behind us and get back to the place we'd been before that.

I didn't want that, though. I'd finally gotten the nerve to tell him how I was feeling about him, and having it ignored hurt.

“So,” I said, sighing deeply. “Did you bring me here to let me down easy?”

He turned his head to the side to look at me, his brow creased with confusion.

“Let you down?”

“I was pretty much hitting on you last night, yet we both went to bed alone. So…”

He let out a single note of laughter. “You're a handful, you know that?”

I grinned at him. “Like you'd know, Aiden. Your hands have never been on me.”

He stared up at the sky and gave a loud groan that sounded frustrated. “Not because I want it that way, Drew. You deserve the best, and I'm not it.”

“That sounds like a line to disguise the fact that you aren't interested. It's okay to say it. I'm a big girl.”

He scoffed. “My dick is rock hard right now just from lying here next to you. I'm a hell of a lot more than interested.”

My heart pounded with excitement. “Well, me, too. So come closer. Give me more than the smell of you on this shirt. It's driving me crazy.”

“I want to. You don't even fuckin' know, Drew. I've wanted you for so long. But what then? I fuck you into next week, and then what?”

“Hopefully you'd do it again.”

“I'm serious,” he said, an edge in his tone. “Do you just want sex from me?”

“No. I don't know. I didn't plan this…to feel this way. But I do, and…I don't know, do you think it's possible something could happen with us?”

“No. Nothing worth having, anyway. It's been
years
since I loved anyone, Drew. Many years. I'm not going there again. Even the guys who became like family to me are gone now.”

“You mean Colby?”

He looked back up at the dark sky. “Army buddies, too.”

“I didn't know you fought in a war until you said so today.” I turned on my side so I could see him.

“Yeah.” His voice was tight with tension.

“I'm sorry. About your friends and your family, too.”

He closed his eyes. “You know how my family died, don't you?”

“I know it was a tornado.”

“I was at a football game out of town when an F-5 hit the town we lived in. We were in Iowa then and it was the worst storm ever to hit there. Killed sixteen people. My mom and sister were buried by our house and my dad's body was found a quarter of a mile away. Carried there by the storm.”

My heart twisted with hurt as I listened. His tone was measured, emotionally removed, but I knew he was anything but detached.

“How old were you?”

“Thirteen. I helped dig their bodies out. Took two days to get to my mom and sister.”

The thought of thirteen-year-old Aiden digging for his family's bodies and seeing them that way made tears burn in my eyes.

“I'm so sorry.” It was all I could think of to say.

“I moved in with my uncle in Lipton after that. He was retired from the Army, never had kids. I know he loved me in his own way, but…I don't think I ever recovered, Drew. I closed up and put my head down and found a new way to be. I've jumped out of planes, climbed mountains, run through enemy fire…and none of that scares me. No one would miss me if I was gone anyway.”

“Don't say that, Aiden. All of us here would miss you.
I'd
miss you.”

He shook his head. “I'm not like Colby. He had a mom and a fiancée. His students. Lots of friends. I'm a loner.”

I leaned up on an elbow and looked down at him. “What's the point of this? Nothing's going to happen to you.”

“The point is that I've got no fear of anything but feelings. I can't go there. The way Colby used to kiss you for no reason and text you his undying love…I'm the opposite.”

“All right.” I sat up, breaking out my most serious tone. “Let's just stop right here. I need you to stop bringing him up. There are two people here right now and that's you and me. He's gone. I'm not interested in you as a replacement for him, Aiden. I like you for you.”

He cocked a brow at me. “You know what? I've never seen anything as beautiful as you are right now, with the moon behind you like that.”

I smiled, my body warming as he looked at me. “So do something about it.”

“Take your hair down for me.”

I reached up to pull out my ponytail holder and shook my hair out. He took me in, filling me with a sense that I wasn't just beautiful, but also sexy.

“Admiring you from afar is probably the closest I've come to feeling something in a long time,” he said. “I don't want to mess that up.”

I nodded, sensing that I'd pushed far enough. “I'm proud of you for today. Your probe launcher. And telling me about your family…thanks for that. It feels good to be trusted by you.”

“I'd trust you with my life.”

“I'd do the same.”

He sat up and we faced each other, the stars forgotten.

“Tell me something intimate about you,” he said.

“Intimate?”

“Something personal. Something no one else knows.”

Butterflies clamored to attention in my stomach. Aiden didn't have to touch me to melt me into a puddle.

The sadness came back in a wave, hitting me with a force so powerful it shook me inside. I knew what I wanted to tell him about, but it was hard to go there.

“My dad was always my hero,” I said, pulling my knees up to my chest. “We never had much, but I didn't know that when I was a kid. He played make-believe with us and…it's hard to put into words. He was just
there,
in a way my mom never was. He laughed at our silly stories and read to us. And he took us out treasure hunting. We'd drive around in his old truck and find good stuff that people were throwing away. We'd scrap the metal and swap other stuff. I thought it was pure magic that we could leave in the morning with no money and make enough treasure hunting to buy groceries for a week.” I shook my head and smiled ruefully.

Aiden was still, watching me intently as I spoke. I took a deep breath and continued.

“And then when school started my sixth-grade year, someone who'd seen me treasure hunting with Dad called me a trash picker. Kids can be horrible, and we never wore the right clothes or anything, so that just made it so much worse. I didn't want to go treasure hunting anymore because I was embarrassed. My dad said he understood, but…I'd give anything to go back and sit beside him in that truck again.” My throat tightened and I spoke past the lump in my throat. “I didn't know then…I just didn't know. I was thirteen when he came home from work one day saying his chest hurt and his arm was numb. My mom wanted him to go to the doctor. We all did, because Dad was never sick. He never complained. But he didn't have health insurance because we couldn't afford it. He died of a heart attack that night in his sleep.”

Aiden's expression dropped with sadness. “I'm sorry, Drew. I didn't know that.”

I tightened my hold around my legs, pulling them tightly to my chest. A couple tears had fallen, but I left them on my cheeks. “I still have so much shame over it,” I admitted. “I might not have lost my dad if we weren't poor. That's the personal thing I'm telling you. Not that I lost my dad, but that I'm ashamed. It feels like such a betrayal of him and how hard he worked for us.”

“Drew.” Aiden's tone was soft and full of feeling. It made my eyes well with fresh tears. “It's all right to feel that way. It doesn't mean you didn't love him.”

“I know. I've been telling myself that for a long time now, but the truth still cuts deep. I've never told anyone I feel this way. Not even Ashley.”

“That's your sister?”

I nodded. “I think she feels like I do, but we don't talk about it much. We both feel a lot of shame over where we came from. Not just because we didn't have money, but because our mom is…embarrassing, I guess. We could never have friends over because the house was always trashed.”

“She took the loss of your dad pretty rough?”

“Yeah.”

We sat alone with our thoughts for a minute before Aiden spoke again. “Today was a great day for me. The probes were good, but this…this is better.”

I lay back again, finally feeling content. The buzz of desire was still there, but it wasn't as loud now. Tonight's closeness wouldn't be physical, but we'd gotten somewhere.

“Can we stay a bit longer?” I asked.

“I'll stay all night if you want.” He lay down on his side of the truck's bed.

I laughed into the warm night air. “Then the others will think we slept together.”

“They're gonna think that anyway.”

I sank into drowsy relaxation, my voice taking on a sleepy tone. “Aiden, I outran a tornado today. If we're gonna top that excitement tomorrow, I think you'll have to touch me.”

He groaned and turned to look at me. “Stop that shit, Drew, it's pure torture.”

I forced myself to drop it and enjoy the time alone with him for a few more minutes. It wasn't long until we got back into the truck and drove back to the motel. Aiden walked me to the door of my room, folding his arms when I turned to say good night. He was taking this no-touching thing very seriously.

“ 'Night, Drew.”

“Good night.”

The swirling emotion in his eyes told me there was a lot left unsaid between us. But I walked through the door and closed it behind me, still giddy from our time together.

He thought I was beautiful. He wanted me. For now, that was enough.