Wait Until Dark (The Night Stalkers) (15 page)

All afternoon they worked together on the tractor. The silence of the farm a background to Grumps’s gentle snores. John enjoyed the easy rhythm as he and Connie worked back to front, breaking the beast down to parts.

John dragged over an old milking stool and started cleaning the parts with a splash of diesel over an old bucket. No holds barred in the design of this machine. They’d planned for it to last by building it heavy and building it big. Not even twice the horsepower of a modern push-around lawn mower engine, yet she could deliver it year in and year out through the worst mud and hard-baked soil Muskogee could hand out. And a big enough bore that it took more than hard winter soil to slow the machine down. Not fast, but it won the race of sheer stubborn endurance.

Grumps had never let him fix up this tractor, though he’d started at it a time or two. The old man had always chased him off without ever explaining why. Yet here he’d fallen asleep perched on an old milk crate while watching Connie break it down.

John continued to clean the subassemblies as she dislodged them from the frame. Take ’em apart, clean ’em up, and reassemble ’em. It was soothing, easy work. A real pleasure.

Another pleasure of his current occupation was his excellent view of the woman at physical labor. Her hair pulled back through the hole of an old John Deere cap Grumps must have dug up for her. If you saw her on the street, you might not look twice except for the beautiful face and fine figure. Mr. Civilian, if he noticed her shoulders at all, might think “gym queen.” Whereas John couldn’t look away.

It was when she leaned in, when she flexed hard to drive some resistant part into submission, that the difference showed. She didn’t wear her muscles on her sleeve, so to speak. But when those long womanly arms flexed, the muscles stood out in clear and surprising definition. Her strength lay beneath the surface, closer to the bone.

“Are all women like that?” he asked before he had a moment to think about it.

“Like what?” She had the front steering assembly on the run. At this rate they’d start building her back up in another hour or so. Though the transmission would take some serious time tomorrow.

Now that he’d asked, he wasn’t sure of his question. He hunted around the barn seeking the answer but not finding it. The next stall down had the big combine, more power in its power steering than in this whole tractor. The other direction, in the next bay, an old GTO hunkered on blocks. He and Paps worked on it together when they were bored or Mama told them to get out from underfoot.

“Keep their strength hidden?” That was about the best he could find for it. He didn’t wait for her answer. He’d learned that conversations with Connie, especially while she was mechanicking, moved at a serious mosey. Words clearly took second place to machinery. He had the carburetor more than half torn down before she answered.

She stood up for a moment to stretch, cricked her neck off to one side.

“I don’t.” She squatted back down.

His hands were moving slower and slower with the more time he spent watching her. Squatting on the concrete inspecting the bearings on the front axle.

He couldn’t imagine a woman who kept more pieces hidden. And each time he learned one piece, he wanted to learn two more.

“Hey, Connie?”

She didn’t look up but instead reached in with a pair of needle-nose pliers and began extracting ball bearings from the thick grease in the steel race.

“Yes?”

“How about going out to dinner with me tonight?”

“Don’t you want to be with your family?”

He did want to be with his family, but also, “I want to be with you.”

“It’s gonna piss off your sister.”

John expected she was right.

“She’s used to it.”

And he just didn’t give a damn.

Connie looked at herself in the mirror. At least as well as she could between the football trophies. She’d showered off the grease, even dug the worst of it out from beneath her nails.

Tan slacks, a gray cotton blouse, and a jeans jacket. She didn’t have a parka with her, didn’t own a dress except for her U.S. Army Class-As, and those were in a storage locker back at Fort Campbell where they’d been for over a year.

She looked ridiculous. Her friends, well, the flight crews that were still in Bati, were wearing armor and fighting for their lives in a country where both sides would prefer they were all dead. She shouldn’t be here. She should—

She spotted Noreen’s reflection in the mirror as the girl came to lean against the doorjamb to John’s room. Arms crossed tightly over her chest.

“John’s wearing a jacket. Only one place in town you can wear a jacket without getting laughed out. He’s never taken a woman there.”

Connie simply watched her in the mirror.

“You can’t go dressed like that.”

Connie inspected herself once more. “I look fine. Besides, it’s the best I’ve got.”

Noreen looked up at the ceiling, either counting to herself or cursing, it was hard to tell. She refocused on Connie.

“C’mon.”

When Connie didn’t move, Noreen took three quick steps into the room, snagged Connie’s arm, and began to drag her out of the room toward the stairs.

Noreen’s room was small, tucked partly under the eaves of the old house. The closets were low built-ins decorated as you’d expect with posters of bands. In contrast, a big quilt draped the bed nearly to the floor, lending the room a deep, homey feel. An old rug showed age, wear, and care. It was the insides of the closets that were a surprise.

They weren’t packed with glitz or leather or any of the dozen other variations Connie had expected. They weren’t packed solid with a disorganized array of items. Neatly arranged, there was space to see what hung in each spot, and the clothes were beautiful. Jewel tones that would offset Noreen’s complexion. A neckline with an elegant, draped design to it. Pastels that would accentuate and warm her tones. A small rack of cozy sweaters and practical but feminine shoes.

Connie would expect someone of Noreen’s beauty to have closets of slinky or… Well, there was more to the girl than first appeared.

In moments Noreen selected a forest-green top and handed it to Connie.

Connie stripped off her top, because it was clearly expected.

“Oh, give me a break.”

Connie froze. “What?”

“You can’t wear a sports bra.”

“Why not?”

Noreen dropped onto the bed. “What hole have you lived your life in?”

“The U.S. Army and it isn’t a hole.”

“A deep and dark one, apparently.” Noreen turned to a small dresser and dug around. Then she held out a pair of bras. “Blue or sunshine yellow?”

“What’s wrong with—”

“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Noreen muttered at the ceiling before focusing back on Connie. “First, it will make you look nicer, give my brother something he’ll enjoy looking at from across the table. Second, I really am going to say this, crap! Second, if he gets that blouse off you, he should find something a little more interesting than a faded-out sports bra.”

Connie looked down at herself.

“That’s not going to—”

“Don’t!” Noreen stopped her. “If it doesn’t, fine. I’ll sleep better. But you don’t want to promise something that might make you feel guilty later and end up being even weirder around me than I’m already making you feel. Take the blue one. It’s a good thing we’re the same shape.”

“You’re kidding!”

“What, you want the yellow one? They’re both fresh washed if that’s what’s worrying you.”

Connie took the blue one. There was no possible way she was the same shape as this perfectly proportioned girl. Yet with just a few minor adjustments, it fit her neatly. The green pull-on blouse hugged her form and left Noreen nodding.

“Now a skirt. How are your legs?”

The first one she pulled out of the closet would barely cover Connie’s underwear, a red leather miniskirt made with less material than her gun holster. She couldn’t even answer.

“Just kidding. Wanted to see your face. I bought this the day after I broke up with Jeff to punish him.”

Connie could feel herself smiling. “Did it work?”

“It was awesome! Six months and he’s still begging to get me back.”

“Does he stand a chance?”

“Not even a little bit. Total slimeball. I was young and foolish when I fell for him.”

“Young and foolish six months ago?”

She grimaced, “Don’t remind me.”

“This is you.” She held out a mid-length skirt with broad strokes of forest colors. They washed across the skirt and reminded Connie of that first refreshing break after a hot summer.

Connie stripped off her slacks and Noreen whistled.

“Damn! You got serious legs, girl. You sure you don’t want the mini?”

Connie laughed. “Not even a little.” She pulled on the skirt and swirled right and left. It made her feel light, even… she couldn’t find the word.

“You clean up nice, girl. You are all woman. Wouldn’t think it with what you usually wear.”

Feminine, that was the word. She felt oddly feminine. This was a long way from jeans and a work shirt.

“You’re fixing Grumps’s tractor.”

“Yes.”

Noreen’s tone had shifted. Enough for Connie to stop admiring the skirt and look up at her.

“Why?” Noreen’s voice was carefully neutral.

Because Connie could. Because it got her out of the house when the people pressure built too high and squeezed in on her. Because…

“It wanted fixing. He’s a man surrounded by home and family. It seemed like something I could give to him.”

Noreen studied her for a long moment, started to speak, then changed the topic before she voiced it.

“Shoes. You need shoes.”

“No heels,” Connie had tried her grandmother’s once, that was enough.

“You sure? Your legs in heels. They’d be awesome. And John being so damned tall…”

“As my commanding officer recently told, er, someone: not no way, not no how.” Would it have been a breach of black-in-black operations to say that Emily Beale had been shouting it at the President of the United States? Probably.

Connie opened a cupboard in search of shoes and stopped dead.

“Hey! Don’t!” Noreen rushed over and slapped the door shut.

Connie very gently pushed her aside and reopened the cupboard.

“Class-A uniform in Army green. ROTC.” She turned the left sleeve outward to see the patches sewn there. “Noreen, that’s a Ranger Challenge tab.”

“Yeah. So?”

“With a Superior Cadet award on the left breast along with Dean’s List and Shooter and a Cadet Captain epaulet.”

Connie turned to face her.

The girl was looking at her feet.

Connie reached out and lifted her chin.

Noreen was blushing furiously.

“You don’t blush about this. Not ever.”

Her eyes were wide and watery.

Connie could only imagine the heckling and teasing such a beautiful young woman had taken wearing this to class and around a college campus in this day and age. She thought back to her own first uniform. How hard she’d had to fight to get it. How many back-breaking hours she’d spent working harder. Working smarter. In pain beyond speech. Heckled by every bonehead that had ever worn civvies. Harassed by any man-jerk who thought he could get away with it.

“Noreen!” She snapped it out, and the girl jerked upright.

“Don’t you ever dare be embarrassed about that uniform. If you do, I’ll come back and kick your ass worse than the Ranger trainers.”

Noreen cracked a weak smile. “They were pretty damn tough.”

“And they’ll hand that out tenfold in the regular Army. But you earned it. If you ever doubt it, that’s a Ranger Challenge tab right there on your sleeve.” Connie didn’t have to close her eyes to picture her own badges. Even as a technical specialist, you didn’t get through five years in active duty and into SOAR without earning at least a few medals the hard way.

Her proudest possession, the SOAR patch, was almost never worn by any flier. In public, you wanted to blend in. On a mission, you didn’t want to be downed and captured while wearing one. Enemy forces were not big fans of the U.S. Special Forces. Rangers wore their insignia everywhere. SOAR, Delta, SEALs, not so much.

“What do your parents say?”

“They’re so proud that it’s killing them not telling Johnny.”

“He doesn’t know?”

She shook her head in misery. “Graduation is tomorrow. I’m a semester ahead, so they’re going to have a special ceremony tomorrow at the banquet. Please keep it a surprise? Please?” The young woman slid back into the girl begging a favor.

Connie pulled her into her arms and held her tight. She kissed Noreen on the cheek and whispered into her ear.

“He’s going to be so proud of you, he’ll just die.”

John watched Noreen hug Connie before his sister closed the front door behind them. He took Connie’s hand and led her down the front steps, almost falling down them himself because he was too busy puzzling over what he’d just seen.

“What did you do to her?”

“Nothing.” Connie climbed up into the truck easily, despite the skirt that flashed a fascinating bit of leg he’d never noticed in camp shorts.

“You did something. Whacked her on the head? Alien abduction? What? Just this morning she lectured me on how she didn’t trust you. Now she’s hugging you like I don’t know what.” John climbed in and cranked the engine over. He turned the heat up right away. She was gonna freeze without pants despite wearing his sister’s long coat.

“Your sister’s a very smart girl.” They pulled out of the driveway onto the road. Two miles later he turned left on the highway.

“You’re not going to tell me squat.”

Her silence was eloquent. He glanced over and she was staring straight ahead. Staring and smiling like the cat that ate the blasted canary.

Shit, he wasn’t going to get another word out of her on the topic.

Well, he’d wait her out. She’d have to give in at some point.

“I bet we could get the tractor running tomorrow.”

Or not.

“Grumps would like that,” was all he could answer.

Damn her.

***

He’d thought about taking another swing back to the topic of his sister as they arrived at Dave’s, but was distracted by the aroma. Straight out of high school, he’d gone Army and Dave had gone cook.

“Best steaks in all of Oklahoma.”

“Do they serve whole sides? I’m starved.”

“Just smell that.” He pulled open the door. A warm wave of broiled steak and garlicked mashed potatoes, of winter squash and herb dressings washed over them. They stood just inside the softly lit entry and inhaled the smell of heaven.

“Oh, that’s so good!”

“Wait till you taste it. Let me take your coat.”

He took her coat and made half of the turn toward the coat check. Then he cranked back, turning his whole body like a tracked tank, to face the spectacle that was Connie Davis. Her clothes clung to her in sumptuous delight. They accented curves he’d never seen, even in the minimal camp clothes of desert heat. The lines of form were accented in shadows of a green so dark that her eyes shimmered with the warmth of window lights guiding you home.

The neckline didn’t plunge, but it felt as if it did. Where he was used to seeing her dog tags, a simple golden necklace with a teardrop stone the color of her eyes accented the fine definition of her collarbone and her long neck. Then the skirt made her light and airy. And legs. He wondered if his heart was going to pound this loudly all night. Connie Davis had amazing legs.

***

By the end of the soup course John’s brain came back into gear. Or at least partly into gear. Enough that he paid more attention to her conversation than her eyes in the table’s candlelight.

He was in so much trouble.

“Doesn’t feel right, does it?”

John had to think if he’d missed the beginning of some topic change while drinking in the woman across from him and admiring the massive slab of Oklahoma beef spread before him. No. Connie’s comment was out of the blue, except it wasn’t. He knew what she meant.

“You’re right. Funny how it hits you at strange times. It’s about 6 a.m. there. Crews are probably just dragging into Bati after flying through who knows what shit in the ’Stanis.” For a moment he inspected his plate and his appetite was gone. All those friends crawling hot and sweaty into the shower after a whole night of flying. Hopefully none of them on the way to medevac or the morgue.

“Suckers.”

He jerked up to look at Connie in surprise. He could see by her expression that she was joking. Covering over the heavy thought with something light. She’d found some easy way around the pain that plagued every SOAR flier when on leave and their friends weren’t. Knowing that not being there increased the risk for all of the others. Knowing there was some teammate that you might never see again because they’d been shot while you were gone.

“Yeah,” he said, trying to think of why they were suckers. “Because, ah, there’s no way they were smart enough to eat this good a meal last time they were stateside.”

“Exactly.” Connie punctuated the thought by waving a fork at him with a small scoop of mashed potatoes from heaven on it, though neither of them ate for a few moments as they sent good hopes winging back halfway around the globe.

Then they chewed in silence for a while.

“I didn’t start out aiming for the Army.” For Connie, this was actively gregarious, starting a conversation topic on her own.

“So…” He sliced into his porterhouse, which he almost could’ve done with the side of his fork. Dave was so frickin’ good. “Where’d you start?”

“Where did you?”

She’d been doing that to him all night. By now she knew about his boyhood passion. He’d built go-carts, racing bikes, later rebuilt motorcycles. He’d paid for his own cars by fixing other students’ cars for half the garage rates and still pocketing a tidy sum. Then the Army gave him the chance to work on helicopters and he was a lifer.

But Connie’s past remained elusive. This time he waved a forkful of steak at her.

“Nope. I asked you a question, girl. Now you’re going to answer it.” He almost added, “or quit talkin’,” but with Connie that just might get him nothing but silence for the rest of the night.

She shrugged acquiescence. “I grew up at a dozen different airfields from Podunk, USA, to Ramstein, Germany. My dad got me cleared into the hangars, what with being a single parent and all. He taught me helicopters. I knew an awful lot before I was tall enough to get myself in the cargo door of a Huey UH-1.”

She spent some time trimming a bite from her slab of prime rib and getting a little fresh ground horseradish on it.

“I started high school working part-time for a Boeing maintenance squad as a gofer. Dad didn’t live long enough to see me airframe-certified at sixteen. Sikorsky hired me straight out of school, which was good because Dad’s Army pension didn’t go very far.” She shrugged and started chewing.

He decided to try her tactic and let the silence grow until it filled the room around them. Until they sat in their own private world in the midst of the dark-paneled and candlelit dining room. Until—

A hand smacked him on the back so hard he almost fell into his dinner.

He didn’t need to turn to know who.

“Dave! You son of a—” He caught himself before more than half of the dining room was facing him.

Dave’s powerful hand clamped on John’s shoulder, but he addressed Connie.

“Only guy I know who orders my fine porterhouse done Chicago-rare and then orders a root beer with it. Knew who it was the second I saw the ticket.”

John tried to speak, but Dave ran right over him, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. You never know when you’re gonna have to fly. Heard it a thousand times.”

He reached out and shook Connie’s hand.

“She’s a keeper, John. Don’t be stupid enough to throw this one back in the pond. A real stunner with a serious grip. And doing yeoman service to my prime rib. Damn fine beef, isn’t it, ma’am? What are you doing hanging with this big lummox? Your car break down? You can stay with me while he gets out of his one and only suit and fixes it for you.

“Aren’t you gonna introduce me to your lady? Nah, you get all tongue-tied every time a good one is slow-witted enough to get caught in the honey trap of those gooey, big browns of yours. I’m John—He’s Dave. No, wait. Reverse that. Unless you’re John and he’s Dave. But then who does that make me?”

***

“That would make you a U.S. Army sergeant,” Connie offered. It was easy to return the chef’s smile. Though she had to wonder why she introduced herself as a soldier rather than by her own name as a person.

“I’d introduce you,” John clambered to his feet and wrapped Dave in a bear hug, “if you’d shut your damn face long enough to let a buddy get a word in edgewise.” Dave stood only an inch and a half shorter. They crushed each other around the ribs in a way that would break a lesser man in two and then slapped each other’s backs loud enough to startle the diners seated nearby.

A lot of history there. Connie felt the pinch. She didn’t have history with anyone.

John wrapped Dave in a headlock and turned him to face her. “Connie, this useless piece of trash is Dave. Dave, Connie. He was my center for two years of football, we made a hell of a pair.”

Dave poked John in the ribs and pulled his head free. “Center. A fancy way of saying that he kept running his hands over my butt to warm ’em up and then fumbling the football anyway which yours truly had to save.”

He shoved John back into his chair.

“Stop messing with the chef. I’ve got steaks cooking. And no, you can’t feel up my butt for old time’s sake. Nice to meet you, Connie. Hang tough one more day, then I’ll take you off his hands tomorrow night.”

“You gonna grill?” John brightened up even more.

“Wouldn’t be The Night Before The Night Before Sub Fest if I didn’t have my smoker fired up.” And with a running stream of words and greetings at half the tables in the place, he moved back toward his kitchen.

“The Night Before The Night Before?”

John dove back into his porterhouse. “The night before Christmas Eve. We always have a big feed out at the Sub.”

Connie dug into her winter squash. This time she heard the capital
S
. She’d missed that in the truck.

“Sub Park. It’s not a small section of another park.”

John looked at her crossed-eyed for a moment and then laughed.

Connie loved that laugh. John’s voice was always filled with it. Telling a story in the chow tent or in a full-on firefight. About the only time it disappeared was when he was focusing on some mechanical puzzle. And then it was only because his whole body went quiet as his brain and his hands took over.

“It’s—No, if you—Hmm, no, that’d spoil it. Tell you what. I’ll show you on the way back, we go right by it. Big moon tonight, should be a stunner.”

She considered pushing, which was surprising in itself. She usually only pushed when a technician was busy assuming she was a girl first, rather than a mechanic first and second and third. But John made her want to know things, about him, about his life, even about his family. She wished she had someone to talk to about the way he spoke of his sister.

“So, what were we talking about before Dave showed up?”

“Sikorsky hired me straight out of school, which was good because Dad’s Army pension didn’t go very far.”

“Right. After that you…” He forked up some mashed potatoes and chewed for a moment. “That was word for word, wasn’t it? How do you do that?”

Connie had thought it would be obvious. Maybe it was only obvious inside her head.

“Photographic memory. Or near enough as doesn’t matter. If I see it or hear it, I don’t forget it. Sometimes I need a refresher, but not often.” Most people looked at her strangely once they became aware of it. Like she was an automaton freak. She steeled herself inside to take the blow of John’s shift. She knew she’d be able to see the shift away in his eyes first. Damn, she was enjoying herself. Liked talking to the man. Liked being on the inside of the warmth that poured out of him.

He sipped his root beer and stared over her left shoulder for a long moment.

She should have kept her damn mouth shut. It was the first time, maybe in years, that she’d felt relaxed enough to just talk. She didn’t want John to shut her out. Wouldn’t like how that felt at all. She did her best to raise her personal shield, which she hadn’t noticed sliding down since the moment he’d invited her to his home. Since she’d kissed him out by the fence.

“Wow! That’s why you never use the manual to fix the chopper. You worked at Sikorsky, so you know every subsystem. Because you can see it.”

She nodded. Still waiting. Still waiting for the rejection.

“And the ADAS, you’ve already memorized the plans.”

Connie blew out a breath. In for a penny… “Not the plans so much, but I can see the whole system and how it fits with all of the others.”

Again that unfocused gaze aimed off into space somewhere behind her. So intent, she almost turned to look even though she knew the only thing behind her was a lush, burgundy curtain draped over the generous double-paned window she’d spotted when they drove up. It was easy for her to juxtapose the exterior and interior to line up where the windows were in the length of the drape-covered wall.

John was processing. Juggling pieces into place. Reliving their past conversations in light of this new data. Trying to figure out how to pigeonhole her in some place comfortable for his fragile male psyche. She’d seen it a thousand times or more over the years.

Then his focus snapped onto her face.

Her stomach gave an ungainly churn. Here it comes. The dismissive, “you freak” attitude.

“Does that mean you can’t forget either?” Instead his eyes were filled with compassion.

“Not much.” It took all the strength from half a decade of Army training to keep her gut tight and her voice steady.

“The bad parts with the good, huh?”

She couldn’t answer. No one had showed understanding. Ever. There hadn’t been all that many good parts. Some came to mind. Her father, her instructors, her first flight. And just about every moment she’d spent with John, especially since they’d started flying together just twenty-three days ago. Those memories stood out with near-crystalline perfection.

He reached out and took her hand. That great warmth wrapped around her chilled fingers. His thumb rubbed over the back of her knuckles.

“Such a gift isn’t allowed without its downside, I guess.”

A gift. She’d thought it was someone’s idea of the best way to torture Connie Davis. Never let her forget anything.

Especially not the pain.