Page 92 of Worth the Risk

“Oh really?” I murmur, letting him pull me close so he can brush a tender kiss on my lips.

“Yep. Is it working?” His smile is mischievous when he leans back.

“I’m not sure,” I tease, prompting him to lean in for one more kiss. This one is longer, softer, toe-curling. “Yes, now that worked. A date, huh?”

“A date on my terms.”

And there it is. The little reminder that as much as this is, it will never really be.

“Where are we going?”

“That’s for me to know and for you to find out.” Another tempting and tender kiss. “And completely off anyone’s radar.”

“Okay . . .” Excitement bubbles up. “What should I wear?”

“Dressier than what you’re wearing, but not as formal as you normally wear.” He shrugs as I take the daisies and bury my nose in them. Other than Luke, I can’t remember the last time a man brought me flowers. It seems as if the Malones are just a bunch of charmers.

“That isn’t a lot of help.”

“Jeans, but it’s a shame to cover up those legs of yours,” he murmurs as his eyes darken and run the length of my body in pure male appreciation that make this female feel desired. “Shirt, unless you want to walk around without one. I mean, I have absolutely no problem with that one.” He winks.

“Funny.”

“Always. And a jacket.”

“A jacket? It’s hot out tonight.”

“Not where we’re going, it isn’t.”

The past hour has gone by in a blur.

Sneaking out to Grayson’s truck under the cover of night. The unexplained trek across town and out to Miner’s Airfield. The shock that bled to nervousness when he pulled next to an airport hangar and explained to me he was flying me to our date in his friend’s helicopter.

Flying me.

Not a driving me through the country, not a walking me through a park, but a flying me . . . in a helicopter date.

Despite the nerves edging my laugh when he told me, I find myself calming some as Grayson straps my belts and adjusts my headset so I can hear him. Once we’re in the air and he’s maneuvering us through the dark night, I find myself completely at ease as I look out over the small towns with their glimmering lights.

“Off the radar, huh?” I ask as my stomach flops back into place when the landing skids touch down to the ground.

“You caught that?” he says, flashing me a grin before turning back to all of the instruments he’s flipping and switching as the rotors overhead begin to wind down.

“Very clever.”

He removes his headset and then mine before leaning forward and pressing a kiss to my lips. “You ain’t seen nothing yet,” he murmurs.

He’s right. I haven’t. Because when the rotors stop and he helps me from the helicopter and to the place he found, strictly by the light of the moon, my breath catches. We’re standing on a huge plateau on a mountaintop that overlooks the whole of Napa Valley below us.

He leaves me for a moment to enjoy the utterly astonishing view while he collects a few things from the helicopter. And within no time at all, we are relaxing with a blanket beneath us, a bottle of wine breathing next to us, and a comfortable silence between us.

“Napa, huh? You fly away from our own Sunnyville wine country to the one that rivals ours?” I tease as his fingertips draw feather-light lines up and down the length of my spine.

“Well, I’m not a fan of the people who own the majority of our vineyards. Since the Hoskins are that majority, they kind of took its beauty away when everything happened with Claire.”

He falls silent, and I instantly regret my question and the grief it brings him. The unimaginable heartbreak he must have endured raising a baby and losing the woman he loved. Learning that it’s, in fact, money that makes the world go ’round and not love.

“It must have been hard in those early days. Figuring out fatherhood. Dealing with it all.”