Life to My Flight

by Lani Lynn Vale

  I didn’t like that he was making me feel things I hadn’t felt in so long. Things that made me start hoping.

  Wanting.

  Needing.

  “You have ten minutes before we need to leave. I have to be on shift here shortly, and it’s going to be tight getting you to work and then getting to mine,” he said as he sat up from the bed and looked at me with an impatient gesture.

  I was habitually late.

  Cleo was habitually early.

  We fought over that constantly.

  The one thing he didn’t do was wake me earlier than I wanted to be woken.

  I was a bitch to the extreme if I was woken early.

  Sadly, he knew that, too. Which was why he’d let me sleep this morning instead of waking me.

  I wasn’t selective in who I was mean to.

  He knew better, having chosen to wake me early only once before, and then never doing it again.

  Knowing fighting with him about this right now was futile, I gave him my back and walked to my panty drawer.

  Smiling devilishly, I opened the door with my sexy panties and pulled out the one pair that I knew would drive him wild.

  They were white lace boy shorts that were see through everywhere but the crotch.

  They’d be uncomfortable as hell to wear to work today, but knowing that he’d know that I was wearing them would be worth it.

  I bent down, most likely giving him a good peak of what he gave up, and stepped into my pantie. Slowly.

  I heard his sharp inhalation as he saw what I’d intended him to see, and I smiled.

  I shucked the shirt from my body, tossed it on the dresser, and reached for the bra that was laying in the drawer beside where the panties had just been.

  It wasn’t the one that matched the panties, but a deep midnight blue.

  It wasn’t lace, but it was still pretty.

  I didn’t do uncomfortable bras nor uncomfortable shoes. Those were two things that I couldn’t handle.

  The scrub top came next, followed by the scrub pants.

  I shimmied my ass once I had them on to make sure I could handle the panties, and was satisfied when they didn’t ride up to no man’s land.

  I walked to the end of the bed, grabbed my shoes, and sat down on the chase beside Cleo.

  He shifted uncomfortably as I sat and shoved my feet into the tennis shoes.

  “Let me grab my lunch and we can go,” I said, before darting from the room.

  I only ever left myself twenty minutes to get ready and leave. It was always a rush in the morning.

  I assumed Cleo had to be in at the same time I did, and I didn’t even know where he had to go.

  He’d probably be late. But I wouldn’t.

  “Heh,” I grunted as I grabbed my salad out of the fridge.

  “What?” Cleo asked from behind me.

  I turned, surveying him from head to foot.

  “Do you wear normal clothes under your flight suit?” I asked.

  He nodded his head. “Yep.”

  My brows furrowed. “Well shit.”

  I’d been hoping for something more risqué, kind of like him free-balling it.

  He nodded. “You’re eating a salad?”

  I looked down at the unappetizing pile of lettuce covered in nonfat ranch and grimaced. “Yes.”

  My workouts had seen a significant drop since I’d moved here.

  I never left myself enough time in the mornings to work out and, in the evenings, I was always too tired. I very rarely had a day off that I didn’t have eighteen million things to do, so my last resort was to start eating healthy.

  After having to go up two jeans sizes, I knew I had to do something.

  Sadly, it was the good, yummy, appealing food that had to take a hike.

  “Interesting. A lot has changed with you over the last year,” he said as he took a look around my sparsely furnished kitchen.

  I didn’t have much, but what I did have was enough.

  I was renting a house in a shoddy part of town, but it was in my price range, and it didn’t leak when the rain came.

  The heating could use a little work, but that was nothing a blanket and a nice fire couldn’t fix.

  Which was what I’d done last night.

  In Natchitoches, I’d lived in a very nice place. It had hardwood floors, vaulted ceilings, and one hell of a heater. That was only because the owner, one of my grandmother’s best friends, had asked that we live there while Nonnie still needed it.

  I ignored his comment and walked out of the room, grabbed my jacket off the couch, put it on, and then went out the front door.

  I came to a stop beside his bike.

  Dammit.

  I’d done so well to avoid this very thing two days ago, and now here I was anyway.

  Fuck. Me.

  I climbed on without waiting for him, and sat back as far as I could so I didn’t touch him.

  He laughed at me, and my attempt to keep my distance.

  He didn’t try to move me forward.

  Instead, he started the bike, pushed it into gear with his foot, and eased forward slowly.

  I reluctantly let my body scoot forward until it was plastered up against his, and closed my eyes on the sheer rightness that coursed through me at being pressed against him again.

  He felt so damn good.

  As usual, he wasn’t wearing a jacket, even though it was nearing the end of February.

  It was a cool forty degrees out, but you couldn’t tell by Cleo’s short sleeves that it was anything other than perfect riding weather.

  He didn’t even have any goose bumps on his skin.

  The back of his head was trimmed neatly, leaving a clean black line of hair that was military precise.

  He turned his head, giving me an unencumbered view of his strong, square jaw and the unshaven bristles covering his cheeks.

  He looked so sexy with a beard, and my heart only hurt all the more.

  Instead of looking at anything else, I closed my eyes again, leaned my face against his t-shirt clad back, and tried my hardest not to cry.

  I didn’t succeed.

  I cried the entire way to the hospital, only managing to dry it up when he pulled into the entrance.

  He stopped next to the ER entrance, barely getting both feet on the concrete before I bailed.

  I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing me cry.

  It wasn’t until later that I realized that I left my salad.

  Oh well.

  I’d rather be fat anyway.

  ***

  Cleo

  I watched her run away from me.

  Again.

  I’d known, going into this two days ago, when I’d asked her out that it was going to be tough to win her back, but I didn’t realize it would be debilitating to see how very much I’d hurt her.

  When I’d left her, I thought that it was for the best.

  I saw how much being a PJ hurt the other men’s wives.

  I knew it wasn’t easy.

  I knew the divorce statistics.

  I only thought to save her the heartache of being saddled with me.

  Being a PJ wasn’t for the timid.

  We dropped off into the middle of warzones all in the name of preserving life.

  We knew going in that we might not make it out alive again.

  The morning I’d left Rue, after the best night of my life, I’d had so many regrets.

  However, none of those regrets compared to this one.

  Having the woman that I considered mine crying against my back for twenty minutes, because I hurt her, was awful.

  I knew her crying was because of me, too.

  I knew it from the bottom of my heart.

  I was about to put it into gear when I saw a man, wearing the same color scrubs as Rue had on earlier, walk out of the automatic doors of the ER.

  I probably would’ve left if he didn’t look like he was planning murder.

  And every bit of
his venomous glare was directed at me.

  This must be the best friend.

  I’d asked around about Rue once I realized where she’d gone.

  When I’d gotten out of the Air Force four months ago, I’d looked for her, but found her old house empty, and no indication of where she’d gone.

  The man I’d tasked to find her had done it in less than twenty four hours.

  It’d led me to Christus Health in Shreveport, or CH as the locals called it.

  I’d been watching her for nearly a month, getting all my ducks in a row before I approached her. Knowing it wouldn’t be easy.

  Two days ago, when I’d gotten the call to transport an accident victim to CH, I’d known that it was time to make my move.

  I hadn’t quite planned on her downright not talking to me.

  Everything I had planned stemmed on getting her to listen to me grovel.

  Unsurprisingly, it looked like it was already time to implement plan B.

  Shutting off the bike, I waited for the man to get closer before I spoke.

  “I’m fixing it,” I said to the man once he stopped next to the bike.

  He was tiny. Like really tiny.

  He reminded me of a rabid squirrel.

  His brown, shaggy hair was practically vibrating with his annoyance.

  “Good,” he snapped. “Cause if you hurt her...”

  I raised my eyebrow, waiting for him to finish his sentence.

  “I know people,” he finally finished.

  I laughed. “Got it.”

  I didn’t blame the man.

  I blamed myself.

  Rue was easy to love.

  I knew that.

  She inspired every protective bone in my body, and if it was possible, I’d kick my own ass for putting those tears in her eyes.

  I just needed time to fix it.

  I knew I could.

  ***

  “Hey, Cleo. You ready to fly?”

  The pilot and my partner, Cormac Reed, asked.

  Mac was a crazy fuck who I’d come to really rely on in the past three months I’d been working for Life Flight.

  “Yeah, but we haven’t gotten a call yet,” I observed dryly.

  Mac gave me a sardonic look.

  He was a big bastard.

  Not so much tall as stocky.

  He was just shy of the two hundred and fifty pound weight limit required for piloting the EC-135. The EC-135 was the brand new addition to the Life Flight fleet in Shreveport, Louisiana. The newest aircraft could now safely transport up to two patients without fear. In the old helicopter, weight was a major issue. Overloading it could be detrimental.

  Previously, there’d been a limit to the weight requirements by not only the crew, but the gear and patients as well. Before, we couldn’t transport more than one patient, and the stretcher size was minimal at best. Now we could fit a full size stretcher¸ and the EMS worker could possibly have another partner for help if it was needed. With the newest bird, we could do damn near anything.

  Mac loved the new bird, and he called her Tweety.

  Their love for each other was downright disturbing at times.

  “We have a demonstration today. Your favorite,” he said as he raised his eyebrows at me.

  He was lying.

  I hated to do meet and greets, as well as demonstrations.

  I wasn’t on this team to kiss the big wig’s ass; I was there to do my job.

  Nonetheless, he treated me as his prized pupil. I’d done a meet and greet no less than five times since I’d hired on.

  The crew, and I, had better things to do than demos for the companies that paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to this project.

  Like save a few lives for instance.

  If they wanted proof, all they had to do was read the newspaper articles on us.

  “Fuckin’ A. Where at?” I asked.

  He smiled. “Christus Health. You know, where I found you cornering that poor girl in the hallway. Was she smelling you? I couldn’t tell by the way you were towering over her like The Hulk.”

  I flipped him the bird.

  Well that changed things.

  I owed her a lunch, anyway.

  Chapter 3

  May God send you flight medics in your dreams, ‘cause seriously, they’ll bring you good luck…or maybe just wet, satisfying dreams. But who cares?

  -Text from Rue to Cody

  Rue

  “They’re shutting down the parking lot again,” Cody said from his spot next to me on the park bench.

  I glared at him.

  He was eating a bowl of leftover taco soup.

  Although he’d offered me some, I’d declined.

  Cody was all of a hundred and twenty pounds, wet. The man needed the sustenance more than I did.

  I had some body fat my cells could live on if they got desperate.

  “Fuck,” I said when I saw which helicopter was landing.

  It was the same white/green/and blue as the one that had changed my life only two short days ago.

  “There was no radio in on anyone coming here. Wonder what they’re here for,” Cody speculated as he shoved another spoonful of soup into his mouth.

  I looked away from him to the massive crowd that was crowded around the back parking lot. “I think it has something to do with the CEO’s being here today. That has to be it.”

  “Maybe,” Cody said around a mouth full of food. “Maybe it’s because that sexy man in that flight suit right there wanted to bring you some lunch.”

  My head whipped around and I saw Cleo walking towards me with a brown paper bag in his hand. “Do you think he went through the drive through?”

  Cody snorted a laugh. “No, he went to that Mexican food restaurant down the street from their building. I told him what to get you.”

  My stunned eyes turned into his direction. “What do you mean you told him what to get me?”

  “Exactly what it sounded like. He called here looking for me, asked me what your favorite food was, and I told him. Simple as that,” he shrugged.

  I turned to see Cleo closer now, but he’d been stopped by a couple of happy journalists asking him questions.

  Flight nurses and medics were like rock stars. All you could do was stare at them in awe.

  It took a special person to be a flight medic.

  You fly in the rain, snow, sleet, or shine. Then there were the freak crashes that happened every once in a while.

  You were all alone up there with literally no one to rely on. You couldn’t just pull over when the patient started going bad or it was just too bumpy to do some of the things that you needed to do. You couldn’t even have the pilot help. The companies wanted them focusing on flying the plane; not what was going on in the back. Consequently, the majority of them didn’t even have their paramedic or nursing license.

  “I can’t believe you,” I sighed. “Why does he even know who you are, anyway?”

  Cody stood up and stretched. His navy blue scrubs riding up and exposing his taught abdomen.

  Cody was a soccer player.

  He could’ve gone pro, but he’d had a calling.

  He became a nurse when he was twenty-two, and was now well on his way to being a nurse practitioner.

  “I was going to go out there and kick his ass when you came in crying earlier, but then I saw the size of him, and I changed my mind,” Cody grinned.

  I snickered, covering my mouth with my hand. “Oh, God. The look on your face would’ve been priceless. I wish I could have seen that. That’s perfect.”

  Cody grinned unabashedly at me before disappearing around the edge of the courtyard and walking back inside.

  I saw him walking down the glass hall towards the back entrance of the ER just scant seconds later.

  “Nice guy,” Cleo’s deep voice said from in front of me.

  I turned my gaze away from my friend’s retreating back to Cleo’s penetrating gaze.

  He looked sexy in his black flight s
uit and Ray Ban sunglasses, with his helmet under one arm.

  He held out the food and took a seat on the bench beside me.

  “Who is?” I asked as I took the food and set it down in between us.

  I opened the bag and nearly died at the smell of warm, melty cheese and spices drifting out from within.

  “Papa Taco is my favorite,” I said as I started lifting out the plates.

  “I know,” Cleo explained as he reached for the forks.

  I handed him over one of the aluminum containers before opening my own and taking the fork from him.

  “What’d you get?” I asked as I took the first bite of the deliciousness.

  “The same thing as you. It’s my favorite too,” he denoted.

  I didn’t comment on that.

  I was still mad at him.

  Still sad.

  Still just as broken now as I was this morning.

  Although, that didn’t mean I couldn’t eat his Mexican food, and then go about my business.

  We ate in silence, the feelings that were between us sitting there percolating just as they’d used to.

  It’d been like this before, and I remembered it all to well.

  When we’d met, it was a very trying time for the both of us; nonetheless, that didn’t stop us from first becoming friends, and then something...more.

  I didn’t know what he was to me now.

  An ex? An old friend? Nothing?

  Whatever it was, it most definitely wasn’t together.

  Licking the last bite off my plastic fork, I stood. “Thanks for the lunch.”

  I tried not to look at him. I really did. But he had that magnetism to him. The thing that drew me to him.

  His eyes were like black diamonds; glittering with something I’d never seen before.

  “What?” I asked finally.

  He shook his head. “Nothing, sweetheart. I just wanted to make sure you had lunch. I didn’t realize until I got to the station that your salad was still in my saddlebags. I didn’t want you to go hungry.”

  I nearly melted.

  Nearly.

  “Thank you,” I said quietly. “What’s going on today?”

  He was sitting on the bench, his legs spread wide with his elbows resting on his knees.

  He hung his head and rolled it, eliciting a few pops and cracks as he did it. “The boss’s boss wants to show his prized toy around. He wants to get everyone ‘ooing’ and ‘ahhing’ over us and the new EC-135.”