had all she could handle with her prospective groom propping a baseball bat in the corner of her bedroom and hooking a ball cap emblazoned with 2014 Badger Bash on a corner of her dresser mirror.
“A little extra touch,” he explained. “In case you have to spin the tale of where we met.”
“Good thinking.” She eyed the almost empty carryall. “What else is in there?”
“Just a few challenge coins.”
“Okay, I’ll bite. What’s a challenge coin?”
“A sort of unit patch. Every squadron or wing has its own. Then we trade with other units. Like baseball cards from the ’50s.” He rooted around in the bag and produced a handful of disks decorated with various designs. “You have to carry a coin on you at all times or you might get stuck buying a round of drinks for the house if challenged.”
When she moved in for a closer look, he shuffled a coin out of the small pile. The enameled surface showed a four-engine aircraft painted a dull gray. “This is my bird, the MC-130J Commando II.”
Another featured a fierce-looking eagle on a field of blue with an olive branch clutched in one claw and thunder bolts in the other. The lettering around the seal widened Alex’s eyes. “Is this from the president?”
“Yeah, we hauled POTUS for a couple classified missions.”
Impressed, she fingered a colorful coin displaying an orange-and-blue-striped lizard surrounded by lettering in an unfamiliar script.
“Where’s this one from?”
“A little island off the west coast of Africa nobody’s ever heard of.” Wry amusement flickered across his face. “That was one of the hairiest approaches I ever made. A short, unimproved dirt airstrip that ended in a fifteen-hundred-foot drop to the ocean. I’d just as soon not fly in there again anytime soon, even if the locals did brew up one helluva brand of fermented guava juice.”
And Alex thought her brief stint as a Vegas costume designer had been exciting! She’d rubbed elbows with a few stars, none of them A-listers but still glamorous in their own way. She’d never hauled a president around, though, or landed on a remote African island.
But suddenly, inexplicably, she couldn’t wait to get back to Sin City. She’d only be there a few hours. Just long enough for them to pick up a license and say “I do.” Yet for those few hours in that fairy-tale land of fake pyramids and Italian castles, she could be her old self again.
Impatiently, she checked her watch. Their flight would depart in a little over two hours. Plenty of time at an airport that didn’t see anything even remotely resembling the crowds at LAX or JFK. Still, they needed to be sure to make both the outbound and the return flight later this evening so Ben could report for his deployment processing early tomorrow morning.
Worried that Dinah and her mom had been delayed by the orange road-construction cones that sprouted all over the city like mushrooms, Alex slid a hand in the pocket of her slacks to retrieve her phone. Thankfully, the Madisons pulled in to the drive just as she was keying their number.
“Sorry we’re a little late,” Pat Madison huffed when Alex opened the door to her and her daughter. “Rio Grande Boulevard’s down to one lane north of Mountain Road. Some kind of accident.”
“No problem. Thanks for keeping Maria today. I’ll pick her up around eight thirty this evening, if that’s not too late.”
“That’s fine.”
“Dinah! Look what I got.”
Maria skipped out of her room hefting her iPad, and Dinah cooed in delight.
“Cool! Now we can play Crazy Farm together. But you said you had to wait for your birthday before you got one.”
“Ben brought it for me. He’s...uh...” She swiveled to face the man who emerged from the master bedroom. Her lips pursed as she tried to decipher their connection. “When you ’n’ Alex get married, will you be my uncle?”
“I guess so.”
“Even if she’s not really my aunt?”
“Well...”
“What about when she adopts me? She’ll be my mom but you can’t be my dad ’cause I already have one.”
“How about we figure all that stuff out as we go?”
Dinah’s mother followed the exchange with considerable interest. She knew about Maria’s deadbeat dad. A single mom herself, she’d been a fierce advocate and trusted advisor in Alex’s adoption campaign. Still, she’d expressed both surprise and concern when Alex called and explained why she needed her friend to keep Maria for the day.
Pat’s concern seemed to lessen appreciably at meeting Ben. She took his hand in a no-nonsense grip and ran a frankly approving glance over his tall, lean form.
“So you’re the phantom major from Alex’s past. I’ll admit I was a little skeptical when she called last night but what the hay. The woman’s lived like a menopausal nun ever since she moved back to Albuquerque. If she’s going to discard her habit, it might as well be for someone who looks like he could make it worth—”
“Pat!” Hastily, Alex cut her off. “We have to catch a plane.”
“Okay, okay. C’mon, girls. Let’s go.”
* * *
Mere moments later Ben shoved the key in the ignition of his midnight-black Tahoe, pulled out of the drive and aimed for the airport. As he wheeled through the light Sunday morning traffic, his gaze cut to his prospective bride.
Alex hadn’t spoken more than a dozen words since she’d kissed Maria and hustled her out the door. He wouldn’t be surprised if she was having serious doubts about this shotgun wedding. God knew, he was. But he waited until he’d joined the traffic heading south on I-25 to comment on her obvious nervousness.
“There’s still time to back out.”
“I know.”
She didn’t look at him, just stared out the windshield as they cruised past the towers of downtown Albuquerque.
“It’s your call, Alex. You don’t have to do this.”
That shook her out of her funk. She angled to face him and pulled on a smile. “Yes, I do. And in case I forget to tell you later, I’m more grateful than I can say. I owe you, Cowboy.”
For some reason, that irritated the heck out of Ben. He didn’t want her thanks any more than he wanted her to owe him. The fact that he didn’t know what exactly he did want from her irritated him even more.
Oh, hell. Who was he kidding? He knew precisely what he wanted. The memory of this woman naked and languorous and stretched out in bed had kept him awake and aching for most of last night.
The plain truth was that he wanted her naked again. Sated and smiling and sleepy amid a tangle of sheets. Preferably in a luxurious suite similar to the one he’d taken her to their last time in Vegas. Instead, he was going to zip down
