By Break of Day (The Night Stalkers) (12 page)

Justin suddenly felt like a target had just been painted between his shoulder blades.

Justin walked into the bay of the
Calamity Jane
as the sun was setting toward the unseen Israeli coast. The
Peleliu
was single-footing her way west. Not fast, but definitely on the move toward whatever her next assignment might be. When they arrived where they were going, Justin wanted to make sure his bird was ready.

He had to take off his hat at the head of the ramp or risk knocking it off. The cargo bay of the MH-47G was one “Justin” high, as his old crew had called it. Carmen had rediscovered that one recently, coming up with it on her own, which had both hurt and helped with the old memories.

Inside he could walk about safely enough, but not with the extra three inches of cowboy hat. The cargo bay was head high, a Humvee wide as he’d proved the night before, and long enough for a pair of them though it would certainly cramp the two crew chiefs at their forward miniguns.

He’d expected some maintenance personnel to be aboard. His crew was out for some practice time on one of the Black Hawks; the 5D was big on cross-training.

But the only one there was Sergeant Connie Davis. She was so unlike Kara it was hard to equate them as being in the same service. Connie looked like the pretty girl next door, not the genius mechanic of the entire regiment. Her husband, a massively built crew chief called Big John for a reason, also flew on the Black Hawks and was as gregarious as she was silent. It was generally acknowledged that he was the second-best mechanic in all SOAR. Hell of a couple.

“So, is she back together?”

Connie preceded to rattle off the maintenance, inspections, and impact of his unusual flight on the
Calamity Jane
’s mechanical well-being. He considered himself well versed in the components of his helicopter, better than most pilots, but he was still barely able to follow the list she read off from some mental file; she used no paper references.

“I’m takin’ it that all in all I didn’t bust up my sweet ride none too bad.”

Connie stared at him for at least a count of ten, then nodded. Maybe she figured that was the most complex information a pilot could be expected to process.

He liked that quiet bit of sass, so different from Kara’s, but still there, deep and strong.

“I’ve been thinking about something Michael said.” He watched her and saw that he suddenly had her full attention. Yes, Michael commanded that kind of respect. Something Justin wouldn’t mind having himself some day. Not the respect itself, but being worthy of it. And to start that process, he’d have to track down Kara and soon. But not yet.

Besides, Connie waited.

He posed the problem of the chaotic weight shifts he’d experienced while picking up The Activity team.

They discussed wheel chocks, ones that could be slammed onto the cargo deck at a moment’s notice to stop an on-boarding vehicle. The problem was if the vehicle jumped the chocks due to its initial momentum, then its weight would be trapped too far forward.

Then he suggested a net, and they began discussing stress loads on hull-frame anchor points. It was a different problem because the
Calamity Jane
wasn’t an upgraded MH-47D, but a purpose-built MH-47G. His Golf had monolithic framing—rather than individual components riveted together, large sections were machined as single pieces. It cut the helicopter’s weight by almost fifteen percent, which was a huge payoff in performance. They debated those differences back and forth for a bit.

They spent most of the shift working the problem, and he was pretty pleased with the results. It was also his first time working with Connie, and he came to appreciate quite how skilled the woman was at what she did. She was as focused on the machines as a quarter horse was on the home stretch, perfectly made for her passion.

There was a change, as abrupt as a wind shift ahead of a squall line. He almost looked up to see if there were clouds gathering, but he was still inside the
Jane
, still on the
Peleliu
’s hangar deck.

Then he spotted the cause. Kara Moretti stood at the foot of the ramp, arms crossed over that lovely chest, watching him.

Connie tapped her tablet computer to save their notes and calculations.

Then she looked at him. It was an appraising look. One that speculated whether or not it was safe for her to depart. It struck Justin that as a DAP Hawk crew chief, Connie would have as exceptional facility with weapons as she did with machinery. The Direct Action Penetrator was the most lethal helicopter ever designed, exclusive to the 160th SOAR. And Connie flew on the only stealth one in existence.

Her look took on new significance.

He offered a careful nod and a soft “ma’am.” He would be careful with Kara.

Connie acknowledged his intent and then departed, pausing by Kara to rest a hand on her shoulder before walking off.

Now, Justin wondered, just what defenses was he going to have to round up to survive Kara Moretti?

* * *

Kara was startled by the sympathy from Connie, though she tried not to show it.

Connie didn’t say a word as she passed, but she’d passed some kind of a silent warning on to Justin. That much was clear.

Kara didn’t need someone else to fight her battles, but Connie clearly understood Kara’s inner turmoil of the moment and had let her know she’d be available if Kara needed someone to speak with afterward.

The silent kindness heartened her, far more than her mere inclusion in the circle of the women of the 5D. And coming from the quiet Connie Davis made it all the more powerful.

Justin started toward her, until she held up a hand.

The hangar deck was the biggest open stretch on the ship for running laps. Even with her coffin in one corner and the massive Chinook in the other, it was a quarter-mile around the deck’s perimeter. As night shift was ending, runners were starting to hit the deck. Running the hangar deck was the most common workout on board ship other than free weights.

Already a dozen Rangers, several SOAR, and tight group of Navy were working their way around the deck’s perimeter.

SOAR ran loose, some pairs, some singly.

Navy hung together, jostled about but in a cluster.

The Rangers could be spotted miles away, three neat rows of four Rangers each. As more showed up, they fell in behind and made another neat row. They started up a chant that was already echoing louder off the steel walls than the runners’ feet pounding the deck. The Rangers could make the deck ring so loudly that it shook the coffin until she thought she’d lose it and go completely bonkers.

Instead of letting Justin come to her, she walked up the ramp and into the cool darkness and sound-buffering structure of the helicopter. The few interior work lights that Justin and Connie had been using barely lit the cavernous interior.

“It’s more comfortable and quieter up in the cockpit.” He waved her forward.

At least the man knew she was here to talk.

“Goddamn horse-whisperer tricks,” she muttered at him as he let her lead the way forward.

He laughed dutifully, but not much spirit behind it.

She chose the left-hand, copilot’s seat; no way was she going to sit in Justin’s position. She considered it, putting him at a disadvantage, but her heart wasn’t in it and she didn’t want the reminder of sitting right where his body spent so many hours.

“Pretty comfy,” she noted as she settled into the chair. It was well padded and plenty wide. She’d sat in Black Hawks, which were markedly less cozy. The Little Birds that Trisha and Claudia flew forced you to rub shoulders while flying together, and not an extra ounce of the tiny craft was wasted on comfort.

“Armchair pilots,” Justin agreed as he settled into his own seat, “that’s us. Though it does grow old after the first dozen hours, doesn’t it?”

She hadn’t thought about that, but it was one of the things that her slender Gray Eagle had in common with the massive Chinook: long-endurance flight.

A Little Bird had to land every couple hours for a refuel. A Special Ops Black Hawk could go three hours and then do a midair refuel for another three. At three hours a Chinook was simply warming up. It could cross the U.S. with only two four-minute refuels. Though it would be crazy to try the twenty-hour flight with only one set of pilots. Her Gray Eagle could go for thirty if she had to; Kara had flown a few missions like that where handing it off to a relief pilot simply wasn’t an option.

Both of their craft offered comfortable seats for their pilots, and she knew only too well how little that helped on the longer missions.

“I was about to come looking for you.”

“So that y’all could round me up?” Kara gave it a Texas twang. “I don’t round up so easy, you know.”

Justin grinned at her. “Y’all’s accent sucks. But it is easier to understand than that straight Yankee you normally sling around.”

She didn’t smile back and he didn’t appear surprised. Instead he stared straight ahead out the broad windshield. The open fantail of the
Peleliu
offered a broad view of the night ocean—the green phosphorescent wake stretching for a long way behind them.

Parts of this cockpit were familiar, and parts of it were so foreign, much like Captain Justin Roberts. His response to her body was so gloriously male, but his response to her, and hers to him, was territory she’d never experienced before.

The Chinook’s dashboard had broad glass displays the size of a laptop screen ranged low in front of both pilots. Where she had larger screens, they had a sweep of bulletproof glass laminate that afforded a wide view. A panel of radio gear separated the two seats, which was all familiar.

Where she had a few simple settings for her craft’s electrical and engine systems, the Chinook had a broad switch panel mounted in the ceiling. And for the Gray Eagle her simple joystick was mounted to the right, with fire controls for the four Hellfire missiles she could carry, and throttle control to the left. The Chinook’s joystick standing between her knees had far more buttons than she had fingers, and another button-covered control that almost looked worse where her left hand would naturally fall beside her.

This was a terribly complex machine that Justin flew into the fray of battle.

Like his aircraft, Justin was turning out to be much more complex than she had first thought.

She looked back over her shoulder and down the long cargo bay where just last night a Humvee had roared aboard
at full speed
—a vehicle that fit with only inches to spare. Had it barreled forward, it would have killed the crew and the pilots before crashing the helicopter.

And five years ago, a bomb in a cargo bay just like this one had killed Justin’s entire crew.

Maybe she understood a little more of why he’d left her this morning so abruptly. That he flew at all wasn’t just a surprise—it was a miracle.

“How did you get back on the horse?”

* * *

It wasn’t a question that Justin had been expecting. He’d been rehearsing different ways to explain how dangerous he was when the black memories washed over him. He had tried losing himself in a willing woman just the once, only to terrify her. He’d almost worked out how to explain that…

But it wasn’t the question Kara was asking.

He rested a hand on the controls. Slowly whirled the cyclic around, odd without the power-assisted back pressures to give him a feel for the flight. It was loose, felt disconnected without the feedback.

“Sometimes you get on a horse because you refuse to give up.”

“Was that what you did?” Her voice was so soft, he almost looked over at her, but he couldn’t. There was too much he didn’t want to see, too much he didn’t want to show.

“No.” It wasn’t. He’d… “Other times you get back in the saddle because you have no choice.”

He could still hear them. Mariko Hosokawa had the most beautiful singing voice. It was she who had started the tradition of music in flight, one Justin did not participate in until he’d healed and once again sat in the right-hand seat. They hadn’t been lovers, but now he wished they had been. The mutual heat had been there, but she’d been on his crew and was therefore inviolable. He missed the whole crew, but she’d left a hole in his heart.

“I owe a debt,” he managed with his eyes closed, his hands still light on the controls as if he were flying them to safety before the suicide bomber could blow his crew and his aircraft off the face of the planet.

There was the softest of sounds beside him and then a fingertip traced along the back of his left shoulder. Despite the T-shirt he wore, Kara traced the worst of his scars where the seatback had not wholly protected him from the initial blast.

He couldn’t speak.

Justin thought of himself as a brave man, but he didn’t dare try to speak.

Not with what his heart was feeling for Kara in that moment.

Like blessed water, her warm fingers traced the scar as if offering a benediction.

* * *

They didn’t go to dinner.

Instead, they sat and held hands above the central radio console that divided their seats, Justin’s clasp alternated between a desperate hold as old memories took him and a clasp so soft that Kara wanted to cry over the conflicts inside the man.

The morning light drove away the stars and filled the sky outside beyond the fantail of the
Peleliu
with a thousand shades of orange, then blue.

When Kara led Justin from the helicopter, he still hadn’t spoken.

They exited the hangar deck, now silent with everyone at their meal or their duty stations. Passing the officers’ mess, neither of them turned aside.

Instead, she led him back to her quarters where they had parted so poorly in the middle of the previous night.

With the door secure behind them, Kara finally turned to look up at Justin. His blue eyes watched her, almost numb.

What could she say to this man? Kara had lost aircraft before, in addition to the sacrifice of the ScanEagle at Ramon Airbase. Each had entailed a pile of paperwork, an investigation, and then she’d been cleared and issued another bird. Justin had lost his crew and nearly his life as well.