Daughters of the Night Sky(15)

“I do want to make you one promise, Katyushka,” Vanya whispered in my ear. “One I am certain to keep.”

“Go ahead, then,” I said, looking up into the dark pools of his eyes.

“I won’t do anything to keep you from getting your wings,” he said, planting a kiss on the tender skin just below my earlobe. “Just the opposite. I’ll do everything I can to make sure you’re in the cockpit at every opportunity.”

I put my hands on either side of his face and pulled it down to mine, my lips eager for his as I wound my fingers through his hair.

“Vanyusha,” I whispered after I found my breath some moments later. “My Vanyusha.”

“Really?” he asked, a slight tremor of disbelief crossing his face. “Do you mean it?”

I nodded, feeling not a trace of regret. “We all need something to fight for, don’t we? Mama was a good reason, but so is this.” I took his hand in mine. “The chance to find out if we can make a life together.”

“The best reason I can think of,” he said, taking our entwined hands and kissing the back of mine.

“I’m not ready to go back,” I admitted. “I want more time like this. No uniforms. No books. No commanders. Just us.”

Vanya paused, pensive a few moments. “The hotel?” he suggested, studying my face for a reaction. “I can’t think of any other place to be properly alone—if that’s what you wish.”

Mama had explained to me the nature of things between men and women and warned me that men could not always be trusted. But this was Vanya. I trusted him with my life each time we went up in the air. To withhold my trust with this seemed ridiculous. All the same, I had no experience with such things and felt as green as I had on my first day at the academy.

“Let’s go,” I whispered, feeling my color rise.

“We’ll take things slowly, my darling Katyushka,” he said, taking my hand and leading us back to the center of town.

I stood back in the lobby, pretending to admire a painting as Vanya went to the desk and requested a room. He came to me, key in hand, and offered me his arm.

“Shall we, Comrade Soloneva?” He winked at me as I took his arm.

“That does sound lovely,” I said, caressing his arm. I wondered if the war, by some miracle, didn’t separate us, what it would be like to settle into a domestic life with him. Most women my age thought of keeping a house and enjoying the early months of marriage before children came. Such dreams would be a long way off for us.

Vanya opened the door to a lovely room, decorated in deep reds and golds. Plush, warm, and inviting as his embrace.

“We’ll go slowly, my darling,” he repeated. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me to his hard chest. I felt my pulse quicken in response to his touch. “We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

“I want to do this with you, Vanyusha. Show me . . . how.” I’d rebuffed every boy who’d expressed any interest in me for so long, I wasn’t sure how to say yes. I wrapped my arms around his neck, taking all the kisses I’d denied myself for years.

“As my lady wishes,” he agreed, holding me tight in his arms and burying his face in my hair. His hands found the zipper at the back of my dress and lowered it into a pool of turquoise at my waist. With delicate movements of his fingertips, he caressed my arms, my back, and eventually the tops of my breasts, his eyes once again studying mine for any sign of hesitation. The more he touched me, the more I knew I could not refuse myself the pleasure of his embrace.

He freed my breasts from the brassiere I wore several sizes too small to minimize their appearance in my uniform. He took them in his hands, massaging them until I felt myself going limp with pleasure against him. I removed his shirt, longing to feel the warm skin of his muscled chest against my own.

Excited by my boldness, he lowered my dress completely and removed my garter belt and stockings—slowly, as though he were unwrapping a much-anticipated gift on New Year’s Morning. I tried not to tremble as his fingers tucked into the front of my undergarments—my last vestige of modesty—and lowered them to the floor. His eyes scanned every centimeter of me, but I didn’t feel the color of shame rise in me.

“I take it you’re pleased?” I whispered.

“So beautiful,” he whispered, his breathing ragged. “I only wish I had my canvas and paints.”

“You’d rather paint?” I asked, finding some bravado in his reaction to my nudity.

“Excellent point,” he chuckled, his hands lowering, gripping my buttocks with his strong fingers, his mouth on mine.

“Vanya,” I said, forcing myself to step back one pace. “We . . . there can’t be a child.”

“No, not with things as they are,” he said, reaching into his pants pocket and retrieving a small tin with three rolled-up bits of rubber bound in the middle by strips of white paper. “Condoms. They will protect us from a baby.”

I nodded, not fully understanding how they worked, but trusting him to do what was right. He took me in his arms again, and I lost myself in his kisses. He was chiseled and strong, though not hulking with muscle as Stalin’s posters showed the ideal Soviet soldier. He was real, and he was mine. My initial nerves had worn off, and I wondered why I wasn’t shaking, why I didn’t feel the urge to cover myself. Wasn’t that how it was supposed to be the first time? Instead it felt as natural as breathing.