Silver Wings, Santiago Blue

by Janet Dailey

  “I’ll drink to that,” Eden agreed, and she lifted her glass.

  After dinner, they took their celebration into the lounge side of the club. Few tables were empty. When they appeared, officers eager for their company scrambled to pull out chairs. In a laughing eeny-meeny-miney-mo attitude, they picked a table. Once they were seated, the men fell all over themselves to crowd around it.

  Except one, Mary Lynn realized, as she recognized that hardened captain sitting on the edge of the circle and watching the other officers with a detached amusement. Then his lazy, half-lidded glance swung to her.

  “Celebrating?” The small slur in his voice led Mary Lynn to suspect the drink in his hand was not the first of the evening.

  “Is that why you’re here, Captain?” she returned instead.

  “I’m always here—from the time they open to the time they close.” He looked at Mary Lynn. “Whatever possessed your husband to let you out of his sight, Little One? If you were mine, I’d keep you under lock and key.”

  Few were so boldly disrespectful of her marital status. Mary Lynn avoided more than fleeting contact with his glance, unsure whether she should be offended or flattered by the attention he gave her.

  “That would be difficult, since he flies B-17s in the Eighth Air Force.” She took a cigarette from the pack on the table.

  Before she could strike a match to light it, a flame was in front of her, the match held between Walker’s fingers. It wavered slightly, and Mary Lynn steadied his hand with her own. The rough texture of a man’s hand was a sensation she’d almost forgotten.

  “Your husband’s a pilot with the Eighth? Where?” He watched the release of smoke from her lips.

  “In England.”

  “Whereabouts? I was stationed over there, too. Maybe I know him.” He leaned back in his chair, a complacent smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, fully aware of the carrot he dangled.

  “In the Cots wold area—somewhere near Gloucestershire, I think.” Beau had never been able to give her too much specific information as to the location or the censors wouldn’t pass the letter. Mary Lynn eyed Walker, hardly daring hope he might know Beau.

  “Well, isn’t that a coincidence,” he murmured.

  “You were there?”

  “For a while.” His half-smile became more pronounced, containing considerably less humor and warmth. “But I fooled the Army and survived all those missions over Germany.”

  That hard, embittered statement explained some things Mary Lynn hadn’t understood. Those lines in his face and the cynicism in his eyes were products of that combat experience. It had given him those silver strands in his dark hair and made him old—and hard—beyond his years.

  As she gazed at him, she wondered if Beau would come home to her like this. She felt a cold chill raise her flesh and absently rubbed a hand over her upper arm to rid herself of the sensation. She shook away the unpleasant thought and leaned forward, going for the long shot.

  “Did you know him? My husband—Beau Palmer.” The cigarette was left to burn itself out in the ashtray as her earnest gaze watched him.

  “The first time I saw you, you looked familiar to me.” Walker let his gaze wander over her face, lingering on each feature. “I’ll bet I’ve seen a picture of you. He probably has one, doesn’t he?”

  “Yes. It was taken on the beach. He has it in the cockpit.”

  “That’s it,” Walker said with a snap of his fingers. The music playing in the background changed tempo as the band, consisting of soldier-musicians from the base, began a slow tune. Taking her by the hand, he urged Mary Lynn to her feet. “Let’s dance.”

  His hand at the small of her back guided Mary Lynn through the maze of tables to the dance floor. A thousand questions about Beau raced through her mind as she turned into Walker’s arms.

  “How long has it been since you’ve seen him? How did he look?” She paused at the amused expression on his face and realized she was starting to rattle like an excited child. “I suppose I sound silly to you, Captain. But you don’t know how happy it makes me to meet someone who’s talked to Beau.”

  “Let’s drop the Captain and call me Walker,” he suggested while his arm curved around her lower back, molding her hip to thigh. “And you don’t know how happy this makes me.” That small smile on his mouth suggested many things, none of them related to her husband.

  Mary Lynn had a moment of unease as he bent his head and carried the sensitive ends of her fingers to his lips. “How was he?” She raised the subject of Beau again.

  “Fine, as far as I know.” His knowing eyes watched the growing disturbance in her expression with a certain satisfaction. He continued his absent nibbling of her fingertips. “That photograph didn’t do you justice, Little One.”

  Beyond a token shifting of feet, he was barely moving to the music. The smell of rum was strong on his breath. Mary Lynn blamed his behavior on the considerable quantity of alcohol he had consumed.

  “About Beau—” she tried again.

  “What about him?” Walker turned her hand palm upward and investigated the center with a nuzzling mouth.

  The sensuous action prompted a little quiver of pleasure to run down her nerve ends. At the traitorous reaction, Mary Lynn strained to draw her hand down. Walker lifted his head at her show of resistance.

  “Sorry.” But he didn’t sound sorry. “I got carried away. It’s easy with a little thing like you in my arms.”

  She chose to ignore his remarks. “Tell me about Beau.”

  His attention drifted from her in a bored fashion. “What do you want to hear?”

  “Anything. Everything.” It was difficult to be specific when any detail would suffice, any piece of Beau’s life held importance, anything that would make where he was and what he was doing seem real to her. “What’s it like over there?” Mary Lynn meant England, the air base, the barracks—the place where he lived.

  But Walker put another construction on the question and his expression turned cold and forbidding. “What’s any war like?” he challenged harshly. “It’s about killing and dying. It’s faceless enemies shooting at you, and bombs dropping on faceless victims. It’s a living hell.”

  Up close, she could see the graveled marks that scarred his face, recent wounds in a random pattern, like splintering glass or metal. She tried not to think how it might have happened, but a kind of terror clutched her throat. Her mind recoiled from the kind of war-horror Walker’s words depicted in favor of the glory of a Hollywood war. She wanted to believe Beau was taking part in the latter.

  “I’m sorry.” She felt so cold.

  Then her skin was warmed by the moist heat of his rum-tainted breath along the side of her cheek. “You are beautiful enough to make me forget all the ugliness.” His arm tightened around her while his mouth buried itself in the silken curls of her black hair.

  Just for an instant Mary Lynn failed to protest, letting her flesh recall the feel of a man’s body pressed against it—and letting his embrace melt that icy shaft of fear that Beau might never hold her like this again.

  “You were saying about Beau.” She pushed firmly at his chest and lowered her head to draw a few inches away from him.

  “Ah yes, Beau.” His low voice mocked her choice of subject. “Let’s see—what do I remember about him?” He lifted a shoulder in a careless shrug, then bent his head, angling toward her lips.

  “Please,” Mary Lynn protested under her breath, and turned her head aside.

  “Please what?” Walker challenged in faint amusement, not raising his head. It was only inches from her averted face.

  “You shouldn’t be making these advances to a married woman,” she said stiffly, a very prim tone in her soft, southern voice.

  “I can’t help thinking that if Beau had known I’d be seeing you he would have asked me to give you this.” As his mouth neared the corner of her lips, Mary Lynn turned, ever so slightly, to let him find them.

  But it wasn’t the shatte
ring sweet recall of Beau’s kiss that Mary Lynn experienced. The pressure of Walker’s lips obliterated any memory of her husband’s gentleness, imprinting his own rougher brand of masculinity that cared nothing about tenderness and the sweet sentiment of love. In confusion, Mary Lynn broke off the kiss, never guessing she could respond to one man’s kiss when she loved another.

  “It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?” Those lazy knowing eyes studied her.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She lied rather than admit there were physical needs, longings to be touched that had no basis in emotions.

  The song ended, but his hand kept her from turning completely away from him.

  “Yes, you do,” Walker asserted. “Your Beau is going through the same thing, only it’s worse for him because of the need to reaffirm life before he goes to—maybe—meet death. For him, there’s always that kind of woman around to satisfy his urge. Wives usually aren’t that lucky.”

  “Are you trying to tell me Beau has been unfaithful?” It seemed a cheap trick to play on her fears and jealousies.

  “Do you honestly believe he’s been celibate all this time you’ve been apart?” Walker jeered.

  “It’s none of your business what I believe.”

  He was slow to respond as his cynical gaze thoughtfully studied her defiant expression. “Maybe not, “he conceded. “But I have my own beliefs. What’s good for the gander should be good for the goose. Why should you go to sleep all tied up in knots when he doesn’t?”

  “Stop it.” She couldn’t stand any more of his cruel insinuations about Beau’s infidelity. She pulled her arm free of his hold and walked blindly toward the table.

  Pausing, Walker watched her run away without a glimmer of remorse. Such a beautiful little creature with raven hair and eyes. She was running … straight into his arms, eventually. He knew.

  Chapter XXV

  AN OMINOUS SQUALL line of dark clouds loomed in the path of the racing, sleek P-51 Mustang. Eden pulled her gaze away from them to look at charts on her lap. At her last stop, they had warned her about the summer storm front along her route from Fort Myers to New Castle, but she had decided to fly as far as she could until the weather forced her to land. Her worry faded when she saw the Army base located near her present position. It wasn’t the closest, but she could make it to Camp Davis, North Carolina, before the storm reached it.

  In the swift-running Mustang, Eden made her approach to the swamp-surrounded field. She didn’t look at that fire-scorched spot where Rachel’s plane had crashed and burned. She landed the hot pursuit and taxied to the flight line. Pilots were streaming from the ready room to stare at the fighter plane all of them ached to fly. After cutting the engine, she pushed back the canopy and climbed out of the cockpit onto the wing.

  A strong breeze ran ahead of the black storm clouds and swept thick strands of her titian hair across her face. She heard the male pilots’ murmurs of shock that it had been a female at the controls of the powerhouse fighter, but she missed the stunned look on Bubba’s face, the unbridled ache in his eyes at the sight of her, posed on the Mustang’s wing.

  Pilots from the tow-target squadron, male and female alike, crowded around Eden and the plane, asking endless questions. She didn’t have a chance to speak to Bubba at all. The first fat raindrops sent everyone scurrying for cover before the storm broke. Eden retrieved her briefcase from the cockpit and ran between the drops to the operations office.

  No improvement in the weather, she was told, was expected. Overcast skies and thundershowers were forecast for the next three days—through the weekend. She filed a RON, which meant Remain Over Night, one of the Army’s endless acronyms, adding the code for weather as the cause. All movement of aircraft was considered top secret and the ferry pilots used a code to keep their home base informed where the plane was and why it was grounded.

  After the first warning splatter of rain, it had stopped. The sky had turned prematurely dark and threatening. Eden ran across to the hangar area, scanning the ground crew working hurriedly to secure the aircraft on the flight line. Bubba was standing inside the towering doors, talking to one of the other mechanics. When he observed Eden’s approach, he said something to the young corporal and the man left.

  Conscious of the blood heating her veins, Eden stopped in front of Bubba, her brown eyes radiant at the familiar sight of his wonderful, broad-featured face. His hazel eyes smiled at her, crinkling at the corners.

  “Long time, no see,” she murmured inadequately.

  “Yeah.”

  The place was too public, too open; too many eyes witnessed their meeting. Frustrated, Eden let it show.

  “It looks like I’ll be grounded for the weekend,” she told him. After looking around to see if anyone was close enough to listen, she lowered the pitch of her voice. “Can you get a pass?”

  “Hell, I’ll kill to get it if I have to.” His extravagant assertion relieved some of the tension and brought a hint of a smile to both faces.

  “I’ll meet you in Wilmington at ten o’clock on Saturday. Where?” she asked.

  “Greenfield Lake,” Bubba suggested.

  “Okay.” Out of the corner of her eye, Eden was aware of two members of the ground crew coming their way. She backed away before they aroused too much interest and speculation. “See you then.”

  * * *

  The rain-washed air was heavy with humidity. Low clouds carrying the threat of more moisture turned the sky a dark translucent oyster gray, pearlized and thick. Eden stood on the bank of Greenfield Lake, moss-draped cypress trees rising out of the water before her on their long, sinewy roots. Diamond beads of rainwater weighted the scarlet-pink azalea blooms and they drooped on the bushes, the spring profusion of blossoms waning with the advent of summer and spreading a red-pink carpet of petals on the wet ground.

  Voices that had been a low murmur in the background suddenly broke into shrill, female laughter. Eden half turned to look their way. A trio of soldiers had obviously said something funny to two teen-aged girls sauntering by them, hips waggling invitations while their red, red lips signaled encouragement over their shoulders. Finally, the girls stopped to let the soldiers catch up to them.

  As she watched the byplay, Eden heard the whooshing run of bicycle tires over the water-laden ground. When she turned, Bubba was rolling his bike to a stop near her. Again, they were restrained by the potential onlookers, and the kiss they shared was achingly brief.

  They started walking, side by side, bodies deliberately brushing while Bubba wheeled his bike alongside. They talked about nothing that mattered. The things they were saying to each other with their eyes were more important.

  Eden released a heady sigh and looked around, expecting to see sunshine and a world bursting with the same life force she felt. Instead, clouds backed the dripping silver-green moss in the trees and a kind of stillness lay over everything. She looked at the two teen-aged girls flirting with the soldiers in the park.

  “Those girls—” she began, nodding in their direction, and Bubba turned to look.

  “You mean those V-girls?” he asked.

  “V-girls?” She frowned at the strange term. “What does that mean?”

  “V for Victory,” he said, then made a motion with his head. “Never mind.”

  “Why do you call them that?” Eden persisted, all the more intrigued by Bubba’s obvious discomfort with the subject.

  “Forget I said it,” he insisted in his heavy drawl.

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s an unseemly thing to discuss with a lady.”

  Eden laughed at the thought that she needed to be protected from talk about something evidently wicked. “What is a V-girl?” Her sidelong glance teased him. “I’m not one of your southern belles who’s liable to blush at indelicate talk.”

  “You’re Yankee-bold-as-brass, that’s for sure,” Bubba agreed, but his look was lazy with deep affection. “I guess the kindest thing to call ’em is camp followers
. Wherever there’s a bunch of soldiers, you’re apt to find them.”

  “Are you serious?” Eden took another look at the girls, trying to match what he was saying with the relative youth of these sixteen- and seventeen-year-old girls.

  “They’re crazy over anything in uniforms. Maybe they’re attracted to the glamour of it,” he suggested with a shrug. “Take ’em to a dance … hell, buy ’em a Coke and you can have what you want from them. They’re amateur whores … better than the professionals ‘cause at least they aren’t indiffernet, but … the bad thing is … a soldier’s more likely to catch something from them.”

  “How … sad,” Eden concluded finally.

  “Yeah.” In a change of mood and subject, Bubba began, “Now I know my chariot isn’t as fancy or fast as yours”— indicating the bicycle he pushed along to the side of them—“but it’s the only transportation we got. If you’d like to hop on these horns”—he patted the curved handlebars—“I’ll give you a ride to town.”

  While Bubba held the bicycle steady, Eden climbed onto the precarious perch and gingerly rested her feet on the fender. Not feeling very secure, she gripped the handlebars at a point slightly behind her and balanced her briefcase on her lap. She yelped a laughing alarm at Bubba’s wobbly push-off.

  “Hold on,” he warned.

  “I am!”

  He leaned forward, pumping the pedals hard with the added weight. “You make a helluva nice-lookin’ hood ornament,” he told her.

  “Thanks.” Eden was dubious.

  “Better hope it doesn’t rain. This convertible doesn’t have a top.”

  It was a wild ride into the town situated on the Cape Fear River. Hanging on for dear life, Eden always seemed to be gasping halfway between a shriek and a laugh. When they reached the business streets and traffic buzzed around them, she demanded a halt, shaky-legged and out of breath from the madcap ride.

  Bubba went back to walking his bike as they wandered down the sidewalk, past the window displays of merchandise in the various stores along the way. Eden glanced idly at them, only mildly interested until she saw a man’s tweed sports jacket hanging in a window.