Late-night shadows couldn't hide the determined thrust of his jaw or the ring of resolution in his voice. He wasn't going to leave her if she didn't plant perfect pansies.
Her stubborn man had decided what he wanted, and he wanted her. Forever. And she looked forward to every single day. "Where are those stars again?"
He draped an arm over her shoulder to point, his breath playing through her hair. "Right there. Cassiopeia. Just to the left of the moon."
"And we'll see those same stars in Washington?"
"We?"
She allowed her fingers the pleasure of caressing his bristly jaw, a delight and right that would be hers for the rest of her life. "Yes."
"Yes? Yes, what?"
"Yes, I'll go to Washington with you. Yes, I'll marry you and give you all the babies you want. And yes, we'll be Magda's parents. Grow old together. All of it." She arched onto her toes, breathed her answer across his mouth. "Yes."
He took her answer and her lips in the same possessive sweep, giving, receiving, loving her. Her arms looped around his neck, surely the safest place to be as her limbs hummed with the musicality of his kiss. No doubt the man was a stylist with that mouth of his.
Gray scooped her into his arms, kissing her as he walked the length of the balcony to the porch doors leading to Lori's room.
Tossing him her best wicked smile, she twisted the doorknob. "Wanna play wounded Allied pilot and saucy French nurse? I'll let you be the pilot this time."
Gray nudged Lori's bedroom door open with his foot, his beautiful smile free of shadows, full of constancy and playful promise. "And I'll show you how to see those stars with your eyes closed."
Epilogue
"I can't believe you talked me into this!" Lori puffed through the next contraction. "I'm never going stargazing with you again!"
"Push, Lori! Push!" Gray straddled the chair at the foot of the birthing bed, hands poised and ready to guide their child into the world. He wasn't Lori's OR, but the presiding doctor stood by the IV. Nerve-wracking as hell, incredible beyond belief, Gray wouldn't have it any other way. He had "caught" their other two babies, a miracle he would repeat in seconds. "Just one more push and we'll have our baby."
"We? We?" Lori barked between puffing breaths. "I don't see us birthing a Buick!"
"Just hang on, hon. You're doing great. The baby's crowned and ready. One more minute and you'll be done." Gray gave himself a mental thunk on the head for letting the we reference slip. Hadn't he learned anything from her first two deliveries? But worrying about Lori battered his defenses more than a little.
God, she was a trooper. This labor had been short but intense. She'd sworn like a crew dog during transition, and she looked ready to fling a few more curses his way.
Then she deflated back on the pillow with the end of her contraction, exhaustion stamped along the gentle curves of her face. "I wanna stop for a while." Lori gripped a nurse's hand while turning pleading eyes on Gray. "Can't we go home and finish tomorrow? I've already done this twice. Isn't it your turn yet, flyboy?"
"Next go-round, I'll see what I can do." Gray eyed the fetal monitor. Good strong heartbeat for the baby. The other line monitoring contractions inched upward, already predicting an end to Lori's brief respite. "Break's over, hon. A ten count and you're done. Come on. Bear down. One. Two. Three. Four. Good job. Almost there. Five. Six. Seven—"
He palmed the head, a rush of love already firing up his arm. Thank heaven for professional instincts. "Hold on while I turn the shoulders…"
The baby shot forward, already wailing, into Gray's waiting hands and straight into his heart. "It's a boy! We have another little boy, and oh, God, Lori, he's wrinkled, red, and scrunched but so damned perfect."
The tiny, damp body squirmed in Gray's hands and in some distant part of his mind he knew he should be evaluating. But he simply stared mesmerized until his vision blurred.
"Gray?"
His wife's voice broke through, freed a blink and a tear that Gray shrugged his shoulder to swipe away. "Yeah, hon?"
"I want to see him. Hold him."
Her whiskey warm voice drifted over Gray. Six years of marriage hadn't diluted the potency at all, merely aged and enhanced."You bet. Just a minute and we'll have him cleaned up for Mama." Gray made quick work of the umbilical cord and traded places with Lori's OR while the pediatrician checked and wrapped the newborn.
Wisps of hair escaped Lori's braid, caressing her damp brow. Purplish stains of weariness smudged beneath her eyes.
And she'd never been more beautiful.
Their four years in Washington had passed in a flurry of change, love, the occasional argument and more love. He still enjoyed the hell out of making-up sex.
Lori had taken a year off from work to play with Magda and teach her English. After Travis was born, Lori had cut back to half days and consulting, eventually adding John Grayson to their growing family.
The transition to military life hadn't been wrinkle free for Lori, but they'd worked together, talked, compromised and loved. His boots no longer restless, Gray welcomed the return assignment to Charleston Air Force Base to serve as Chief of Flight Medicine.
He'd missed his parents and was glad to have them close again. They spoiled their grandchildren shamelessly—giving Gray and Lori the occasional evening to themselves.
He lifted his son from the warmer, the baby now swaddled, the head of dark hair covered with a tiny cap. Gray passed their infant son to Lori as he'd done twice before with their boys and once with their daughter, Magda, who'd come to them older but every ounce as special. "Here's your mama, little guy."
Lori reached, happy tears already streaking her face. Cradling him in her arms, she opened the blanket to count fingers and toes. "Oh, Gray, he's beautiful."
"Yeah, pretty incredible." He stared straight at his wife. "I love you."
How easily the words flowed these days.
"I love you, too."
Lori tugged Gray down by the front of his scrubs for a kiss. Their lips met with a tenderness as powerful as passion. The baby squawked between them, and they pulled apart, laughing.
Gray sat on the edge of the bed, tucked Lori into the crook of his arm and admired all eight pounds three ounces of their latest son, a son they'd conceived on a midnight walk nine months ago. "Any thoughts yet on a name? Mom's got that charm on hold at the jewelers."
A mischievous smile played with Lori's full lips, stirring an urge in Gray he wouldn't be able to fulfill for six more weeks.
"How about Ryan? To commemorate our most recent night beneath Orion's belt?"
A smile of his own broke free along with a chuckle. "Ryan. I like it." He stroked a knuckle along his new son's baby-soft cheek. "Ryan Davis it is."
They sat wrapped in each other's arms and the moment, until Gray realized the room had been cleared and the doctor leaned against the wall flipping through a chart. A nurse poked her head in the door, "Colonel Clark, are you ready for the rest of your family?"
Family. What an awesome word. "Sure. Send them in."
The nurse stepped away, and Magda, Maggie as she now preferred, stood in the door with a brother on either side. His parents hovered in the doorway, giving the children time to meet their new brother.
Maggie's hair, longer these days, was gathered in a ponytail trailing over her shoulder like her mother. Barbies a thing of the past, Maggie now focused on basketball and boys.
She plowed forward, dragging her little brothers along. "Wow! Mom, he's so cool! He looks like Travis, don'cha think, Dad?"
"Hey!" Travis furrowed a serious little brow just like his mama's. "I don't got a funny face or a pointy head."
"Pwetty baby!" John Grayson catapulted forward, Gray catching his middle son before he tripped over his shoelaces. This one kept them on their toes, all motion, smiles and a song on his lips before he spoke his first words.
Gray reached to pull Maggie into the circle, the child who'd brought them all together, and waved his parents in. Sometimes he thought life just couldn't get any better. And then, the next day, he found out it most certainly could.
Lori's honey-warm eyes met his as their family gathered around them, and he couldn't believe he'd ever doubted.
She gave a contented-mother's sigh. "You know that bit about never stargazing again?"
Gray gave her his best bad-boy grin. "You didn't mean a word of it."
Lori laughed that great husky laugh that still rolled right into him, dive bombing his senses.
"Not for a minute, flyboy!"