Then I pulled on my cutoffs, lay back on the warm wooden planks and looked out at the stark majesty of the hill country. Sandstone crags and grasslands covered with wildflowers framed the intensely blue, mirrorlike water, the surface as blank, vast and empty as an unwritten page. “That didn’t help at all.”
“Help what?” asked RaeLynn.
I combed my fingers through my damp hair. “Still thinking about my parents. I try not to let them bother me. But in their eyes,” I confessed, “I’m a failure already.”
“Listen to you, Grace,” Trudy said, putting her shades on and leaning back on the heels of her hands. “Here it is, 1985, and you’re still expected to be the little woman. It’s like you’re in a time warp or something.”
“That’s my parents. They mean well, I suppose.”
“I wish you had a racy big sister to get in trouble so you could fly under the radar,” Trudy said. “Having Paulette pave the way always helped me enormously.”
Last I heard, Paulette had turned vegetarian and was living in Austin with two guys, both of whom were honky-tonk musicians. She embodied my parents’ great fear that if I didn’t find an appropriate man, I would wind up in some terrible situation like that.
I tried not to think about the disappointment in their eyes and the displeasure in their voices when I told them that not only did I not wish to marry Travis Hunt, but I also didn’t intend to move back to my sleepy little hometown after graduation. And finally, when I made it clear to them that the likelihood of me marrying a man they approved of was slim to none.
Yet I did want things. I wanted a husband and family, I wanted a life filled with passion and purpose. Unfortunately for me, I had no idea how to go about finding it. I just knew it wasn’t waiting for me like a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, right here in Edenville.
Braving the chill water, Trudy and RaeLynn went swimming to wash off the heat of the day. I wandered back to the car to get the novel I was reading, Lucky by Jackie Collins. I sank into the story, wanting to be Lucky Santangelo, prowling the glittering casinos of Vegas and having all sorts of imaginative sexual adventures. Heavens, who wouldn’t want that?
Far in the distance, up on the county road, the rumble of a powerful motor intruded into the quiet lapping of the lake upon the shore.
I remember glancing up in the direction of the road, seeing the dark silhouette of a motorcycle rider, backlit by the late afternoon sun. The girls were still paddling in the water and chatting, but I stayed on the shore, caught by something I couldn’t quite define.
Did I know even then, with that first glance? It seems impossible, given that we hadn’t seen each other’s faces or exchanged a single word.
But there was this feeling, deep in my gut. It was a twist of certainty and I can’t say it was pleasurable, but it was very intense. At any rate, I must have sensed something. Because at that moment, my thoughts rang crystal clear.
He’s here. At last.
Chapter Three
I felt the rumble of the Harley’s engine deep in my gut, and with the sunlit dust rising in a cloud, the rider looked like something out of a dream. Down at the lakeshore, my girlfriends didn’t notice him the way I did. I think that might have been because at that point, their lives were set. RaeLynn was going to marry Dallas Sitwell, and Trudy was headed off for a summer of travel before law school. I was free, still searching for what my life was to become, and for that reason, I was open to anything.
Especially if it was a black-clad stranger on a Harley, driving straight toward me.
I had always been a rational, no-nonsense person. Raised the way I was, I learned early on to keep my feet firmly planted on the ground and my head out of the clouds. Still, at that moment, as the stranger crested the hill leading down to the lake, I felt a strange shifting inside me, a tightening in the pit of my stomach.
The girls were still oblivious, splashing water at each other and laughing. I walked toward the road, completely intrigued by the approaching rider. The dusty Harley shuddered like a live thing as he brought it to a stop a few yards away from me. Stirring up a swirl of caliche dust from the road, he planted his feet, in knee-high boots, on the ground. Despite the heat of the day, I felt a chill pass over me like a breeze.
Do men remember what they were wearing on certain occasions the way women do? I doubt it. Women always do, though. I can recall, with the clarity of a photograph, what I had on for any significant occasion of my life. I wish I could say I had on something like Lucky Santangelo might wear, a leopard print bikini and gold mules maybe. However, on this particular day, I was wearing faded cutoffs and a blue bikini top, flip-flops and a shiny coating of sunscreen. No makeup other than toenail polish, and my hair in a ponytail, which made me cringe. This was supposed to be an all-girl weekend and we had dressed accordingly.
The stranger, on the other hand, looked spectacular in black jeans and those tall boots. A shiny helmet and aviator shades gave him an air of mystery. I didn’t recognize the ganglike insignia and the logo “VAQ 465” on his black T-shirt, but the cryptic symbols only added to the enigma.
“Howdy, ma’am,” he said, polite as you please.
I asked, “Are you lost?” A mundane question on the surface, but given everything that happened after, it was strangely prophetic.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said in a voice as smooth as melted butter, “I believe I just might be.”
Then he took off his helmet and shades, and I saw his face for the first time. A light-brown beard stubble beautifully accentuated the lines of his jaw, chin and cheekbones, and even though I couldn’t tell from a distance, I somehow knew his eyes would be blue. Just as I was getting nervous—what if he’s a gang member, an outlaw? What if my mother’s right after all?—a wonderful smile unfurled, a funny half grin that caught at my heart.
“Um, can I help you? Where are you headed?” I asked.
“I’m looking for someone…” he said with an unexpected awkwardness that was curiously endearing. “But I’ve forgotten who. My God, I can’t even think straight. You are just about the prettiest sight I’ve ever seen.”
For a few seconds, it didn’t register that he was actually flirting with me. I actually whipped a glance behind to see if he was talking to someone else, but no, he was looking directly at me. Grace McAllen, Grace the invisible, Grace the overlooked. I never thought of myself as pretty, you see. Nice-looking, that was me. Nice-looking Grace, who had never done anything noteworthy in her entire life.
When I finally figured out that he was offering me a compliment, I blushed, of course. And I hate blushing. It makes some girls look becoming, but on me, it’s just a heated rush of color staining my face like a sunburn.
I couldn’t bring myself to thank him. “What can I do for you?”
What can I do for you? Lordy, Grace, I scolded myself, could you maybe be a little more obvious?
Yet somehow the stranger made it all right, letting that half smile stretch into a grin. With unhurried movements, he removed his leather gloves, took out a surprisingly white cloth handkerchief and slowly, deliberately, without taking his eyes off me, wiped his hands.
Then he stuck out one hand toward me. “My name’s
