by Lucy Farago
She yanked her sweatshirt over her head and tossed it to the corner mat, leaving her only in her sports bra. Even if he had a brain, which he didn’t, she didn’t mess around with dogs…or Siberians.
She slipped on her gloves, thinking it was kind of a shame. He was older than the men she dated, but damn, the silver streaks at his temples were super sexy. Plus, whenever she ticked him off, his eyes did that change-color thing. Calm, they were sky blue, pissed, chocolate brown, but when she got off a good one, they shimmered in between. She gave the punching bag her best right hook, enjoying the impact to her shoulder.
Now she’d be stuck with the canine. Stubborn beast. Siberians didn’t take orders well. But it made them excellent trackers. They relied heavily on instinct, along with their senses. If their gut told them something, good luck convincing them otherwise. They had that in common with huskies. In his defense, and she’d deny it if anyone ever asked her, they were rarely wrong. Her left fist nailed the bag, sending it whirling on its chain.
If there was a shifter setting fires in the Canadian Rockies, she’d find him, before the fires got out of hand and humans discovered their existence. The dog better not screw up. Right jab, left, right, right. It was good to hit something, to have sweat trickle down her back. And she was good at hitting things. Screw the shrink. She was not an overachiever, and maybe, just maybe she held people to an impossibly higher standard, but not the dog. The dog she hated.
She’d taken an instant dislike to him. He hadn’t even opened his mouth and she’d wanted to smack him down. When she’d learned the idiot preferred his greasy abode to the well-appointed room the Academy provided all the instructors, she’d felt vindicated in her initial assessment. The jerk was a loner. She wiped her sweaty brow with her forearm, resolved that she wouldn’t waste any more energy thinking about him. Nodding to seal the agreement with herself, she stripped off her gloves and headed for the showers.
She wasn’t supposed to fly out until late tomorrow, but she honestly didn’t see the point in not being there when the ATVs were tested. She couldn’t wait to see the look on his face. Screw the dog and his petulance with having to go. Loner or no loner, he’d signed up to work with FUC. There was no bloody friggin’ I in FUC, and if he didn’t learn that soon, she’d be adding another U to that silly acronym.
Loki stared at FUC’s Cessna and wondered what the hell he’d done to deserve this. He vaguely made out Sheena, getting ready for takeoff. Part of him hoped she wasn’t going to be all chatty. Part thought that dreaming up ways to shut her up would be preferable to envisioning his body scattered over the Rocky Mountains. He despised flying…and with good reason.
He wasn’t a particularly religious person, but would he be jinxing it if he said a prayer as he boarded that he’d be getting off this steel coffin? After dumping his bag, he made sure the ATVs were secured then made his way to the cockpit to greet his assistant. If he was lucky, he’d sleep the hour. At least with his eyes shut, he wouldn’t see his gruesome death coming.
“Hey, Sheena.”
“You’re late.”
“What the…?” She wasn’t his assistant. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m getting ready to fly this plane,” Mia said as she flipped the master switch. “There’s a storm coming in, so I’d like to be up and down before it reaches us. Getting there before sunset would be a bonus.”
The hatch closing preceded the growing whistle of engines. He debated telling her to open the door, that he was not flying with her, but that would prove him childish. He reminded himself, for the umpteenth time, that the flight wasn’t that long. Doable…but in close quarters with a cat?
“Ass in seat,” she shouted over the hydraulics kicking in.
“Fine,” he replied through gritted teeth. He’d turned to get as far away from her as possible when she snagged his T-shirt.
“Where do you think you’re going?” she said, slapping his stomach with headphones.
“I’m doing as you asked,” he said, catching the headset before it fell.
“Oh goodie, I get to enjoy your dull sense of humor.” She tapped her mouthpiece, indicating he should put his on, then gave him a cat-who-ate-the-canary smirk before she pushed down on the throttle.
She couldn’t want him to copilot? The Cessna 208B Caravan Amphibian didn’t take two people to fly. But if he refused, with her stupid feline inquisitiveness, she’d poke and poke until she discovered he hated to fly. She’d never let him live it down. As the plane taxied, there was no going back. He knew it, and she knew it. But he also was smart enough to understand she was getting off on having caught him off guard. And she would take even more pleasure in knowing how off-balance she’d made him. Therefore, he switched courses.
“I didn’t know you flew,” he said, swallowing back his stomach as the wheels left the runaway and they were airborne. It was a short flight. There was only one pussy in the cockpit, and it wasn’t him.
“Yup.”
“Where did you learn?” He really hoped her experience wasn’t fly-by-night.
“Air Force.”
Loki shut his eyes on the sudden flashes of unwelcome memories. This wasn’t that plane, he told himself, and kitty was never on his team.
“If you’re going to toss your cookies, do it in the back.”
Her vitriol was exactly what he needed. Better to focus his energy on the cat. Given she wasn’t scheduled to leave today, she was here to screw with him. Well, that wasn’t going to happen. If anyone was screwing someone, it was him screwing her. Inwardly groaning, he turned his head and stared out the cockpit window. This was the second time his words had conjured her in his bed.
He needed to get laid. That was it. It wasn’t the cat…or the way he’d enjoyed her ass as she’d demonstrated the climbing wall to the new cadets. It had nothing to do with how hot she looked in those yoga pants she always wore. Foolishly, he’d snuck a peek at her legs and was disappointed to see she’d switched to cargo pants. No, he scolded himself. Any attractive female would trigger his hormones. Yeah, that was it. He took a satisfying breath, convinced he’d nailed it, but got a whiff of her scent. That damn sugar-and-cream sweetness that made him want to bury his nose in her hair. No, he repeated, no. Any female, any female with a heartbeat, would give him a hard-on. Any female, except the cat. But shit, that wasn’t the case, was it? What the hell was wrong with him?
“Is there a problem?” she said, drawing him out of his pathetic musings.
“No. Why would you ask that?” Was she a fucking mind reader?
She nodded to his hand, the hand he hadn’t realized was white-knuckling his seat. “Are you afraid of flying?” she asked, sounding far too hopeful.
Like he’d ever admit it to her. “My mind just wandered,” he said coolly. “Did you know there truly is more than one way to skin a cat?”
Her brown eyes flashed gold, and he thought she might lose it. But she kept it together and, much to his disappointment, did the mature thing.
“Seeing as how it’s just the two of us, are we going to try and get along?”
For a split-second, he’d genuinely regretted his peevishness. Then she opened her mouth.
“Or do I have to smack you with a newspaper?”
It was going to be a long trip, and a part of him, the deranged part of him, was actually looking forward to sparring with her. Who didn’t enjoy a good smackdown? Hers, not his. And by the time the rest of the team arrived, the cat would be the one with regrets.
“What’s the matter, cat? Forget to pack your catnip?”
She turned her attention to the distant storm, ignoring his insult.
Because he preferred her focus to be on flying, he said nothing else. But after thirty minutes, he grew tired of fighting images of dead soldiers frozen in snow. He broke the silence.
“So, Air Force? How long since you been out?” Small talk wasn’t their thing. Short one- or two-word insults was more their specialty. But this plane was rehashi
ng shit he didn’t want to remember, so he needed the damn cat to talk.
When he heard no reply come over his headphones, he had his answer. She’d snubbed him. What did he expect? They weren’t friends, and chitchat was overrated. He’d keep his mind off crashing another way. He studied the controls. If he had to, he could pilot this thing. But when his stomach bottomed out, and he really did want to puke, he regretted going there.
This was stupid. He’d survived and saved his squad mates. So what if it changed everything? He was better off without them. They weren’t his family. He had no family.
Damn, he wished the snarky cat would talk. If he kept this up, he was going to toss his cookies and thoroughly make an ass out of himself. Good luck living that down.
“Two years.”
His sudden rush of relief would be embarrassing if she ever caught on. “Two years?” he said, feigning ignorance. “I’m sorry, what was the question? It was so long ago.”
“Ha, ha. I just…I wasn’t sure I wanted to share.”
Not surprising given how much she hated him. She wasn’t on his buddy list either. “What changed your mind?”
“Like Director Cooper said, we’ll be working together. We should learn to get along.”
They’d be together for one day, two tops, but he didn’t bother to point that out. “Sure. Why not?” She’d started this whole rivalry between them in the first place. He wasn’t a fan of cats, but if they ignored him, he did the same.
“Don’t sound so enthusiastic.”
“I was the one making conversation. You were the one shutting me out. But if you’re willing to shelve the animosity, I’m willing to try.” Anything to keep his mind off frozen tundra and ungrateful friends.
“Admit it, you don’t like me any more than I like you.”
“There you go again, hurting my feelings. You should know. I don’t share your animosity.” It was true…up until she’d gone and suggested Director Cooper leash him after she’d taken the Ducati for a joyride without signing it out first. He’d had nothing against her riding the bike, but when he’d entered the garage and found it missing…. Putting it mildly, he wasn’t happy. To be honest, he’d wanted to hurt someone.
“You’ve never spoken one nice word to me,” she argued.
“You never gave me the chance. The first words out of your mouth were ‘down, dog.’ Not exactly a furry greeting.”
“You bitched me out for taking the bike.”
He’d known she’d use that as an excuse, but she’d broken the rules. She’d offered no apology, which he guessed might’ve been too much for a cat to swallow. But he’d received no assurances that she wouldn’t do it again.
“I was put in charge of transportation, and my modifications don’t come cheap. You may not get this, but they’re my babies. How would you like it if I’d gone for a joyride with one of your kittens?” Ugh. That sounded repulsive, even to his ears. “You know what I mean,” he said before she opened her mouth, “so don’t go there.”
“It was the school’s bike,” she said, ignoring his explanation for wanting to rip her head off when he’d discovered who’d absconded with the Ducati.
“But my responsibility,” he managed to get out right before they hit some turbulence.
Luckily, she was too busy monitoring the controls to notice how his right hand now clutched his armrest. The plane settled, but the frown on her face didn’t.
He’d been so busy distracting himself and avoiding looking out the cockpit window that he hadn’t seen the ominous clouds rolling in. “How much longer before we land?” he said, kicking himself for not paying attention.
“We should be down before this”—she nodded to the brewing storm— “gets worse.”
Was she right? Just how good a pilot was she? He might hate flying, but damn if he’d leave his fate to a cat. “Do you want me to pilot?”
“You can fly?” she said, as if he weren’t the transportation expert.
“You insisted I sit in the cockpit. Why keep me up here if you didn’t think I could fly?” What an absurd question? One she chose to answer with another question.
“Then why am I the one behind the controls?”
She had a point, but he had an out. “How were you going to get to the drop-off if I had the plane?” And then sadly, pathetically, it clicked. He’d been so preoccupied with bad memories and the damn cat that it hadn’t dawned on him. The Academy had one plane.
Maybe he was wrong. Maybe the urgency the director had alluded to was all bullshit and time wasn’t of the essence. “How is the rest of the team supposed to meet up with us?”
Whatever lie she’d been about to spew was cut short as the looming darkening sky flashed far too bright. It was followed by a deafening boom.
3
Mia had suspected Loki had some kind of flying hang-up. His odder-than-normal behavior had aroused her suspicion. He was a control freak. Did he simply hate that she was flying? He could bite her. He might have a talent tinkering with engines, but she was the pilot. Or was it something more? Now, however, any doubt as to his fear of flying flew out the window and joined the brewing maelstrom.
“You do know this plane can fly through storms?” she said, reaching out to touch his arm. The gesture surprised them both, but whatever stress the weather had been manifesting was forgotten as the dog turned into his usual snarky self.
“Of course, I know that,” he snapped.
She withdrew her unwelcome hand. “Sorry. I assumed when your face lost all color…well, sorry if I got it wrong.” Why was she apologizing? And to him of all people? “But like I said, if you’re going to be sick, do it in the back.”
He let out a low growl, a laughable attempt to intimidate her, but it did have the effect of drawing color back into his face, which she much preferred. She found it oddly unsettling to think him anything but alpha. His usual vitriol toward her she could handle. She knew what to expect. It had nothing to do with her feeling the least bit sorry for him. Nothing at all. “If you’re done acting all macho, I have a plane to—”
Her words were cut short by an unwelcome downdraft. Mia white-knuckled the yoke, drawing back to maintain altitude. The Cessna continued to plummet, and she prayed they didn’t crash. The dog would never let her hear the end of it. After a few heart-pounding seconds, the plane stopped its decline. While she hoped they were out of the woods, or clouds, she readied herself for another drop. She’d managed to gain a hundred feet when the next pocket hit.
“Be careful. Don’t over-control. Just fly with the altitude loss.”
“Barking at me isn’t going to help.” Punching him wouldn’t either, so she refrained.
“We’re close to the mountains,” he said, as if she couldn’t read the instruments.
“Down, dog. I know what I’m doing.” She’d had excellent training and could handle a pocket of turbulence. But when the warning horn began to sound, her air speed and altitude at a critical level, she feared not clearing the ridgeline. Her left wing tipped, and the struggle to maintain control got worrisome.
“Wind speed is doubling.”
She’d tell him what he could do with his backseat driving later. As annoying as he was, she put her energy into choosing the right escape route. Flying over a pass could easily increase the wind’s speed, and if she didn’t approach the ridge at the right angle, with the right cross point, they could easily be pulled into a stone cloud—a mountain.
She manoeuvred the plane into a forty-five-degree angle, but they continued to descend, the damn downdraft too strong. She began the turn away from the Rockies in full power and, gratefully, managed to fly at manoeuvring speed. As expected, altitude dropped, but her plan was to shorten their time in the downdraft. It worked, and the Cessna eased back into a climb.
Confident they’d escaped imminent danger, she eased her grip on the yoke.
“Good flying,” Loki said.
Not that she needed or wanted his praise, but she smiled at him any
way. He looked far more tense than she felt, and given his usual uptight scowlly face, it was saying a lot. And as the adrenaline swept out of her body, she released a calm, unpanicked breath, for his benefit. Her relief, however, was short-lived when power to the turboprop engine waned and the propeller slowed before, thankfully, kicking back up.
“What the—” She glared at the dog. “Did you do a maintenance check before we took off?”
“Of course I did. How about we focus on staying airborne before we rip into each other? You may have nine lives, but I’d like to keep the only one I have. Let me control the plane.”
“Bite me, dog.” He was seriously getting on her nerves.
“It overheated. The descent was too fast.”
“Are you blaming me for that?”
“Can we continue hating each other after we land?”
“That’s the plan, Stan. Now shut up. You wouldn’t want me losing my focus. You know us cats, easily distracted,” she said, deliberately baiting him.
“Let me help.”
Although he’d said it through clenched teeth, his half-smile indicated he was either trying not to kill her or—maybe hell had frozen over—he was attempting to play nice. Either way, contrary to what he thought, she wasn’t a bitch. If it would make him relax, she saw no harm in letting him co-pilot. “Okay. We do this together.”
If Loki was surprised by her acquiescence, he didn’t show it. He gave a curt nod and proceeded to read off the controls. And in record time, she regretted her decision. Unsettling to say the least, never had she imagined that she and Loki—a dog for Luna’s sake—would be working together. Felines and canines, no matter the breed, didn’t function as a team. It was just…wrong. And especially wrong with Loki. The man didn’t play well with others.
People who accused cats of being loners had never met this Siberian. She figured he kept to himself mostly, in her observant opinion, because he lacked social graces. But usually, Siberians stayed in packs. They survived and thrived as a cohesive group. While her kind worked hard to stay off the endangered list, his seemed to put no effort into it. It royally soured her puss. Here, her species struggled, but his, like magic, multiplied without trying. She’d bet that if Loki wanted to, he could leave a trail of pups every place he went. He’d probably shed more kids than fur.
