"He"s going to be all right," Drew said fiercely.
Twisting around in his seat, he looked at her. Her eyes were ravaged when they met Drew"s. "How much longer?" she asked quietly.
"Five minutes."
"Please hurry. Please."
Drew wanted desperately to go to her. To put his arms around her and tell her everything was going to be all right. He wanted to tell her that her son was going to be all right. That he wasn"t going to lose that sweet little boy. But because he had to get the plane down safely before he could do any of those things, he turned back to the instrumentation and concentrated on landing.
He began his descent three miles from the ca.n.a.l. Drew knew it was a big risk taking the plane down when he didn"t know the condition of the water. But he figured he didn"t have a choice. Flying the Mallard in hurricane force winds might be a little on the crazy side, but he would never forgive himself if something terrible happened to that precious child because they"d opted to wait on an ambulance that might not come.
The plane jolted when they broke through a bank of clouds. To his left he spotted lights, realized they were the sodium vapor streetlights that ran along the street in front of the clinic. The swollen ca.n.a.l paralleled the street. As the plane slipped lower, he could make out the lights of a small pier.
"Strap in," he told Alison. "Keep your head down."
He glanced once behind him to see her lifting Kevin into a seat and strapping him in, then turned back to his instrumentation.
"Come on, baby," he cooed to the Mallard. "Show me what you"re made of."
The plane pa.s.sed over the ca.n.a.l at three hundred feet. There was no visible debris, but he was moving too fast to be sure. No time to change his strategy now. He turned in a wide arc for a final approach.
Wind tore at the plane, but Drew held her steady. He lined up with the ca.n.a.l banks. Brought the nose up. Held his breath. And prayed.
The floats. .h.i.t the water hard, sending water high into the air. The plane skidded sideways and for a horrible instant Drew thought it would cartwheel out of control. Instead, the plane lurched and came to an abrupt stop. Letting out a breath of relief, he wiped the sweat off his forehead with a violently shaking hand.
Turning in his seat, he looked back at Alison. "How is he?"
Tears streamed from her eyes as she worked to unstrap him from his seat. "Oh, G.o.d, Drew. He"s still unconscious."
Because there wasn"t a place for him to secure the plane this time, Drew gunned the engines and ran the floats aground on the muddy sh.o.r.e adjacent the clinic.
Breathing hard with the aftereffects of adrenaline and a new fear for Kevin, he fought off his safety belt. Alison was just finishing unstrapping Kevin when Drew stepped into the pa.s.senger cabin. "Follow me."
He unlatched the hatch and threw it open. Wind and rain whipped at him, but he didn"t care. He stepped onto the float and then jumped into waist-deep water. He reached for the boy. "Okay, give him to me."
Alison knelt and pa.s.sed her son to Drew. "Hurry, Drew. Hurry!"
"He"s going to be all right. I promise." Holding the little boy tightly against him, Drew struggled through the water toward the muddy sh.o.r.e. As he stepped onto the bank and ran toward the front doors of the clinic, he hoped he could keep his word.
Alison stood at the window in her son"s hospital room and watched the rain slide down the gla.s.s. A few feet away, Kevin slept peacefully. Every minute or so she would sit in the chair next to the bed and pick up his hand or lean over to kiss his soft cheek. She couldn"t stop touching him. She couldn"t stop looking at him. She couldn"t believe she"d come so close to losing him.
If it hadn"t been for Drew...
It had been nearly two hours since Drew had carried him into the emergency room. Alison had hovered over her son while the doctor on call and a seasoned respiratory therapist poked and prodded and administered treated oxygen through a mask. By the time the orderly rolled him to his private room where he would be spending the night, Kevin was fast asleep.
Today was one of the most terrifying ordeals she"d ever experienced. She couldn"t stop thinking about the way Kevin had looked at her, as if trusting her to reach into him and open his restricted air pa.s.sages by the sheer force of her will. Of course, she hadn"t been able to do that. And she"d never felt so helpless in her entire life.
If it hadn"t been for Drew...
It seemed everything went back to Drew. But because she wasn"t yet ready to think of him, because she didn"t have the slightest idea what she was going to do about him, about her feelings for him, Alison walked over to the bed and pulled the sheet and blanket up to Kevin"s chin. "I love you, sweetheart," she whispered.
Back at the window, she watched the rain beat against the gla.s.s. One of the nurses had given her a blanket. She"d draped it over her shoulders, but her clothes were still damp and it did little to ease her shivering. She was cold inside and out, but knew the chill wasn"t the only reason she was trembling.
She was going to have to face Drew. She was going to have to decide what to do about him. How she would handle her feelings for him. How she would handle living in San Diego when the man she loved was almost three thousand miles away.
She would never forget the way he"d struggled up that steep bank with Kevin in his arms, like a soldier carrying a fallen comrade. He"d sprinted across the street, then burst through the doors and taken Kevin directly into the emergency room. She wondered how he could see himself as anything but the hero he was.
"How"s he doing?"
She spun at the sound of Drew"s voice. Her heart stuttered at the sight of him standing in the doorway. Mussed hair. Damp clothes that clung to him. Grim expression. Even in the dim light she could see that he was watching her with an intensity that unnerved her. His mouth was set into a thin line. Someone had given him a towel, which he"d used and then draped over his broad shoulders.
"He"s doing fine," she said, amazed that her voice sounded so normal when she felt as if she were coming apart inside.
He glanced at Kevin, a sigh sliding between his lips. "He"s a fighter. Like his mom."
She didn"t know what to say about that. "They want to keep him overnight for observation."
He shoved his hands into his pockets. "Are you okay?"
She choked out a sound that sounded vaguely like a laugh. "I"m a wreck."
"You did great today," he pointed out. "You really kept your head."
"I came close to losing it." She laughed again. "I can"t stop shaking."
"Post-adrenaline jitters."
A loud and uncomfortable silence ensued. As much as she wanted him to stay and talk, having him so close was almost too much to bear. She was trying to decide if she should ask him to leave when she realized she hadn"t yet thanked him for saving her son"s life.
"Drew..."
"Alison..."
They spoke simultaneously and then laughed.
Taking a calming breath, she moved closer to him and forced her gaze to his. "Whatever happens next...I mean between us, I want you to know what you did today... It means the world to me."
He lifted a hand as if to wave off her statement, but she stopped him. She needed to say this. Not only for her and Kevin. But for Drew.
"You saved my son"s life." Her voice broke and for several long seconds she couldn"t find her voice. "He"s my whole world, Drew. I don"t know how I can ever thank you for saving his life."
His jaw flexed with tension, and he looked away for a moment. When his gaze met hers, she saw an emotion in the depths of his eyes she couldn"t quite read. Something that touched her own emotions, and she felt them building in her chest, a storm that would burst if she wasn"t careful.
Because she didn"t want to cry in front of him, she turned away to stare blindly at the rain-streaked window.
"Alison."
When she didn"t turn to him, he put his hand gently on her shoulder and turned her to face him. "Hey, what"s with the tears?" he said gently.
She raised her eyes to his. "This isn"t easy. I mean, you don"t have to do this. You don"t have to stay."
"Alison-"
"In fact," she cut in, "it might be easier if you just left."
His eyes darkened, intensified. "I"m not going anywhere. I"ve got something to get off my chest. I want you to hear it."
She stared at him, her pulse skittering wildly, her legs trembling.
"I haven"t exactly been honest with you. I haven"t been honest with Kevin. For G.o.d"s sake, Alison, I haven"t even been honest with myself."
"You"re the most honest person I know."
He looked down at the floor, as if gathering his courage, his resolve, then his gaze bore into her. "What"s between us..." He seemed to struggle with the words for a moment. "I thought my feelings for you were wrong. Because of my friendship with Rick-"
"Drew, please. You don"t have to explain-"
"Yes, I do," he interjected. "I need to say this. d.a.m.n it, Alison, I should have said it a long time ago."
Stepping close to her, he reached out and cupped the side of her face with his hand. "I came for you and Kevin today for one reason," he began. "It doesn"t have a d.a.m.n thing to do with my being a hero, or even that I felt an overwhelming need to do the right thing."
She stared at him, not understanding.
"I came for you today because I love you."
The words struck her like a gust of wind, strong enough to knock her off her feet, powerful enough to suck the breath from her lungs. She stared at him, dumbfounded, overjoyed, a thousand emotions tangling in her heart.
"I"ve loved you since the day I met you," he said. "I don"t know what that means in terms of our relationship. I don"t know where it will lead us. But it comes straight from my heart. It"s honest." He let out a breath that shuddered slightly. "I didn"t want it to happen. I fought it with everything I had." He shrugged. "It happened anyway."
"Sometimes there"s a fine line between right and wrong," she said.
"It took almost losing you for me to realize what we have is right."
She gazed into his eyes, felt the floor shift sharply beneath her. "I honestly believe that some things were meant to be."
"This is one of them," he said. "I was blind for not seeing that sooner."
"You had some issues to work through."
"I hurt you. I"m sorry. I never meant to do that."
"You thought you were protecting me." She was vaguely aware of tears on her cheeks. For the life of her she couldn"t figure out why she was crying. Kevin was going to be all right. Drew loved her.
The knowledge brought her a joy she hadn"t felt for a very long time, a peace she had forgotten existed.
Drew caught one of the tears with his thumb. "Come here."
Alison stepped closer to him. She sighed when he put his arms around her. Leaning her head against his chest, she heard the steady thrum of his heart and an overwhelming sense of coming home rippled through her.
"You were right, Alison. I hadn"t dealt with Rick"s death," he said. "That"s why I couldn"t handle my feelings for you." Pulling away slightly, he looked deeply into her eyes. "I felt guilty because I was here and he wasn"t."
"You don"t have to feel guilty for being alive. For being happy."
"I know that now."
"All of us deal with grief differently, Drew. Through all of this, there"s one thing we never doubted: We loved Rick. He was a good man. A good husband to me. A good friend to you. A good father to Kevin. And both of us loved him very much."
He pressed a kiss to her temple. "I know."
"If I"ve learned anything in the last four years, it"s that life is stronger than death. Life doesn"t wait for us. It keeps barreling on, sometimes faster than we"re able to follow."
Easing her to arm"s length, he leaned forward and kissed her. "Maybe I"ve got some catching up to do."
She smiled up at him, her heart bursting with joy. "Kevin and I will make sure you"re up to speed very quickly."
"That brings me to my next question."
"Oh, yeah? What"s that?"
"I thought it might be nice if we...you know, got married."
"Nice, huh?" She rolled her eyes. "You really know how to make a girl feel special."
He shifted his weight, looking uncomfortable and adorable, and Alison could barely withhold a smile. He grinned, but she could see the glint of emotion in his eyes. "It would make me the happiest man in the world if you said yes."
"That"s more like it." She leaned close to him and kissed him on the mouth. "Do I get to think about it?"
"The offer"s only good for the next five seconds."
"In that case I guess I"d better say yes."
Pulling her against him, he pressed his mouth to hers. Alison could feel him trembling against her. She could feel her own emotions ebbing and flowing. She was aware of her heart beating in perfect time with his. The rightness of the moment took her breath away.
"Mommy? Drew?"
Alison and Drew turned simultaneously to see Kevin sitting up in bed. His hair was mussed and he was looking at them with a combination of awe and confusion and a child"s unending curiosity.
"Hey, sprout," Drew said cheerfully.
"How are you feeling, sweetheart?"
"My throat hurts."
"The doctor said that would happen, honey. Would you like some water?"
"No." Kevin gave Drew a truly perplexed look. "Why were you just kissing my mommy?"