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He nodded. “Okay. I’ll send a car to pick you up Wednesday morning. Wear warm clothes. It’ll be snowing.”
“Snowing?” I replied. “Where?”
“The season’s nearly over,” he said, “but it’s still snowing up by Lake Geneva. I know a resort there. It’ll be a great day trip.”
“Why are we going to the mountains?” I asked. What on earth was Jake planning to do with me and my unborn child up in the snow-capped peaks of southern Wisconsin?
“Quality time,” said Jake, smiling and slapping his Macbook shut. “After all, we’re expecting.”
Chapter 8
Jake
WhatIhadn’ttoldAlicia was that I had a much better idea for getting us up to the mountains than going by car. Sure, it was only a couple of hours out of the city to Lake Geneva, but I wanted us to make the most of her day. So, at 9 a.m., I picked her up in one of my trademark black SUVs from her house in Gold Coast.
“I didn’t realize you’d be here,” said Alicia as she stepped into the car. She’d done as I’d requested by text and brought a rucksack instead of a handbag. It might be the end of the season, but the mountains up above Lake Geneva were still pretty inhospitable.
Alicia didn’t have much to say to me in the car, but I noticed, with some amusement, that she was confused we were going south rather than north. “What expressway are we getting on?” she muttered, and I chuckled.
“You thought we weredriving?”
Instead of heading for the freeway, we pulled up at an anonymous, gray tower block downtown. Once we got there, I led Alicia inside and up an elevator to the roof. At the top, we opened the door onto the rooftop, where a view of the city greeted her. Painted in yellow on top of the roof, atop a gray, metallic circle, was an enormous capital H.
“We’re going by helicopter?” she asked, bewildered.
“Of course,” I laughed. “You didn’t think I was going to make you drive up there, did you?”
I wanted it to be nice, but Alicia was still pouting. I guess all the money in the world couldn’t convince her that I wasn’t a bad guy, for whatever reason. But as the ‘copter thundered out of the clouds and set itself down before us, I grinned as I heard a gasp of excitement escape her body.What I wouldn’t give to be making her gasp like that, I thought to myself,before I remembered with a slow, steady sigh of regret, that the woman standing next to me was carrying my child.
As the blades of the helicopter slowed, the pilot got out and shook my hand. “The yaw’s a little tight, Jake,” he yelled over the whirring hum of the blades. “Take it easy.”
“Always do, John,” I replied.
“You’re flying us up there?” asked Alicia once I’d given her a pair of headphones and affixed the microphone to her head. Even in the relatively well-soundproof cabin of the helicopter, it would be impossible to hear each other normally over the screaming of the helicopter’s rotary blades.
“Of course,” I quipped. “You got a problem with that?”
Alicia stared at me, then relaxed. I wasn’t some billionaire who’d bought himself a ‘copter with money, of course. I was a trained pilot, with experience flying everything from helicopters to fighter jets that could break the damn sound barrier. I’d wager that, with the possible exception of Sam, there wasn’t a single person within the city limits of Chicago who could keep her safer in the air than I could. But she still crossed her legs in the seat and folded her arms, looking like a disobedient teen being dragged in the car to parent-teacher evening.
Meanwhile, we sped on through the sky, as land and Lake Michigan below us gradually drifted and faded into almost indistinguishable green and gray blobs. “Enjoying the view?” I asked.
“You know, I do fly in planes for a living,” retorted Alicia. “I’m not exactly wowed just because we’re in the air.”
“Really?” I replied. “How about if I make this thing pull a 360-degree spin?”
Before Alicia ever had a chance to scream, I tugged the helicopter around, spinning us in the air as though the heavy chunk of metal I controlled from a joystick in my hands weighed nothing more than a kid’s spinning top.
“Holy cow!” screamed Alicia. “Youmaniac! I’m pregnant.”
“And?” I said, laughing. “You think there’s a risk of us crashing? I graduated top of my class from the Air Force Academy, Alicia. I’m one of the best pilots in the states, and I’ve made a career of flying, maintaining, and buying planes.”
“What’s the point, if not to scare me?” said Alicia. She might have been whining, but there was still a strange smile playing on her lips when she thought I wasn’t looking. I was doing my best to keep my eyes on the skies, but I was still drawn to the sight of her and eyed her legs beneath their woolen stockings and her cute maxi skirt as I charted a course slightly northwest of Chicago.
It was a matter of minutes, not hours before we were landed on a private pad up in the snow-capped hills just across the state border, a parking spot that had taken no small fee to secure for the afternoon. We exited and made our way down a narrow wooden walkway. The snow crunched on my boots as we made our way toward a building, which resembled a large log cabin.
“This is the Walnut Lodge Resort,” I explained, as Alicia followed me, adjusting her steps as she got used to the crunch of ice and snow beneath her feet. “I like to come here for a walk and some lunch, sometimes.”
“Are they skiing?” said Alicia, as my eyes followed hers and fixed upon a tiny set of dots descending the valley below.
