Love me till the end

Chapter 18

Charlie could hear Luke moving about in the other room, encouraging Lady to get to her feet. Soon after she heard the door open and close. Her suspicions were confirmed when she went into the living room and found it empty of man and beast. The only light in the room was provided by the fire blazing in the hearth. She inhaled the fresh scent of pine in the air. After her admission about what the scent reminded her of, Luke seemed to go out of his way to make sure to add some to the fire every night.

Several candles had also been lit, leaving the atmosphere cozy and welcoming. Intimate, if she hadn't known better. She was almost glad he'd left when he had. It gave her time to calm down and come to her senses. She'd set out to seduce him, tease him to the point that he'd take her into his arms and claim her again. To prove to him that he didn't have to be afraid. That he could stop running.

Halfway through her little seduction routine, she started to feel guilty and ashamed when she realized she was trying to control Luke with sex. She wasn't being fair to him, thankful when she'd finally begun to act with some sort of normalcy. Charlie had never been good at playing games. Besides, he'd never denied he wanted her body. His reservations were with an emotional attachment.

She grabbed the quilt off the back of the sofa and sank down into the soft folds, wondering what time Luke would return.

* * * *

Luke sat on the porch, his eyes searching the darkness for Lady's return. The snow was coming down hard and the winter wind was blistering cold. He glanced toward the black, star-studded sky wondering how long the approaching storm would last.

The year before a blizzard had hit so hard that he'd been cooped up in his cabin for a week, unable to even get through the front door. He supposed he could have dug himself out, but there hadn't been any reason. Now he wondered how long it would take because Luke knew one thing, he'd never survive being caged in with Charlie for any length of time.

His thoughts returned to the woman inside his cabin. He knew that the search for the downed plane would become more intense now, especially with the weather worsening. Even with the snow covering most of her plane from the sky, it would be obvious what had occurred there. Once the crash site was discovered and his marker seen, it would be just a matter of time before someone showed up on his doorstep to take Charlie away.

It wouldn't take much for a skilled helicopter pilot, especially one of the locals, to locate his cabin and rescue Charlie. There was a small clearing a couple miles from his cabin, so landing would be easy as long as the weather cooperated. Luke wondered how he'd feel when that day came, because it dawned on him that he liked having Charlie around. Or maybe it was just the presence of another person around.

No, it was more than that and Luke was honest enough to admit it. Charlie filled a void in his life that had become so dark and deep that he hadn't even been aware of it until now. He supposed any woman who'd been lucky enough to survive that plane crash would have done the same thing.

Liar!

He closed his eyes and leaned back against the side of the house. An unwilling picture of Charlie entered in his mind. She was beautiful to look at but Luke knew it went deeper than that. She was made up of a range of complex moods that were hard to deal with at times, making it hard to keep her at arm's length.

Images of Susan tried to materialize, but for the first time in years Luke was unable to picture her clearly. Since Charlie had come into his life he found it increasingly harder to see Susan's pretty face. Memories of them together had faded until nothing remained but a distant dream he couldn't quite grasp. She was gone and Luke vowed from that moment on he'd do everything within his power to resist dragging her memory into his daily existence. Strangely the decision didn't leave him feeling guilty like he thought it would. Charlie was right when she'd said that Susan would have wanted him to go on. He would have wanted the same thing for her had she been the one to survive.