She already knew that. She’d been the one to type out the orders. He would sail to England, then get on a plane and drop over Germany, hanging like bait from a parachute. If the weather didn’t sabotage him first, he would land behind enemy lines and become both the hunter and the hunted. She hated to think about any of it. What if the worst were to happen?
He placed his palm against her cheek, warm and reassuring, and she leaned into it, her eyes closed. “There’s a lot going on right now,” he said. “If there was ever a time for me to admit how I feel about you, I think this is it.”
The sadness in his voice seemed to come from his longing for her to understand. But she didn’t. For so many years, she’d buried her feelings for him so deep she didn’t even remember they were there most of the time. She hadn’t expected them to bloom that night, and she didn’t know why they held her captive now. Dot needed logic, and it wasn’t coming to her.
“You have to know, Dot, how I feel. How I’ve always felt. Please. Look at me.”
She feared she might break apart from the sheer force of emotions rising to the surface. Like the explosives she’d learned about so long ago.
“What are you thinking about?” he asked.
“You,” she confessed, risking a glance into his pale blue eyes.
“And?”
She couldn’t let him leave without solving this between them. He deserved an answer. She bit her lip, summoning the courage she could only seem to find when she functioned alone in the darkness, listening and tapping into the unknown. She couldn’t afford to be afraid this time, because she finally understood. What mattered most was what she felt in her heart.
She got up, her heart beating with purpose. “Come with me.”
“Where are we going?”
“Shh. Just come with me.”
She took him by the hand and led him outside, behind Hydra, where they could have a private space to themselves.
“You asked what I was thinking.” She took a deep breath and watched his expression closely. “I was thinking that if something were to happen to you out there, you’d never know how I felt, because I’ve been too afraid to tell you. It’s like when you used to ask me to play, and I’d hide in my room. Just like then, you’ve given me every opportunity, and I’ve panicked. You look at me that way, and I turn back into that dumb old dormouse and run away.”
She stepped closer to him, daring herself to ignore her head for once, and to embrace what her heart craved instead. Holding his gaze, she placed her hands flat on his chest. “The truth is, I don’t want you to go. I need you to stay here with me. But since you have no choice, I want you to go with my promise in your heart, and my kiss on your lips.”
Her arms went around his neck, and when her lips met his, the smell of him filled her senses. She felt his arms tightening around her and melted into them.This, he’d called it.Thiswas something beyond her, beyond any reason, and she needed it more than she’d ever needed anything before.
“I never believed I was good enough,” she whispered. “You and Dash—”
“Are best friends,” he finished for her. “It’s not the same. I love you, Dot.”
She kissed him again, and all her doubts disintegrated like the smoke from the bombs she’d lit during training. It was she who had caught fire now.
“I love you, too, Gus. I always have.”
She’d never seen him smile like that before. Open and honest, of course, but also… amazed. Like a child receiving a coveted gift at Christmas that he’d never dared ask for.
They spent the next few hours hidden away together, trying not to think about the possibility that they could be their last. When the sun went down, they walked side by side under a glorious full moon, then he held her in his arms beneath the parachute tower. At the end of the night, he walked her to her door and asked her not to come see him in the morning.
“Kiss me goodbye tonight,” he said. “Otherwise, it will be too hard to go.”
“Come back to me,” she whispered, her lips on his.
“I promise,” he said.
She accepted that without question. Gus never broke a promise.
The sun rose over Camp X without him in it. The day began for Dot like any other, but unlike any day in her life before last night. He loved her. She’d finally found the courage to understand that, and to tell him she felt the same. He would come back. He had promised. Until then, her heart would wait.
fifty-twoDASH— June 1944 —Southampton, England
Through the window, Dash scanned the airfield and the half-dozen airplanes awaiting pilots. She was dying to fly. Sheneededto fly. The tarmac was wet from an earlier storm, and it looked like it might rain again soon, but the weather wasn’t the reason she couldn’t go.
No one was flying. Hamble’s common room was so hushed it felt like a tomb. Dash tiptoed past sober conversations and subdued card games toward the food counter for a cup of coffee, then she turned back to the room, mug in hand.
