Coming Up for Air

by Karen Foley

  Laura flipped open a flight book and consulted her watch. “Twenty minutes to unload, refuel, reload and lift off.”

  Switching off her headset, Jenna removed her helmet and climbed down from the cockpit and stretched her tight muscles, watching as her flight crew went through the routine of checking the aircraft and preparing it for the return trip. The crew chief, Sergeant First Class Samantha Helwig, began coordinating with the ground personnel to unload the supplies and mailbags that she carried in her cargo bay, while a fuel truck lumbered toward them. Nearby, the other two helicopters were undergoing similar activity.

  A soldier jogged toward her across the tarmac, a clipboard beneath his arm. Jenna returned his smart salute.

  “Hey, Corporal Garrett.” She smiled, recognizing the man from her previous visits. “Who do we have the privilege of transporting today?”

  The soldier consulted his clipboard. “A five-man unit for you, and two VIPs for Captain McLaughlin.”

  “Right,” she replied, and glanced in the direction of the other Black Hawk, where she could see the pilot inspecting his aircraft. She wouldn’t speculate on the reasons why McLaughlin always got the VIPs. Her job was to transport personnel. End of story. Her helicopter was large enough to accommodate her four-person crew and seven fully equipped troops, so the five-man team put her almost at full capacity.

  Turning away, she began a visual inspection of her own helicopter, looking for any structural damage or weaknesses in the aircraft. She’d been flying with Warrant Officer Costanza for so long now that she no longer thought about the fact that they were the only all-female crew in her battalion. Even her door gunner and her crew chief were women. They all had hundreds of flying hours under their belts, and each took their job seriously. Given a choice, Jenna knew she would choose these women to crew her aircraft over any of the guys in her battalion.

  “Just another day at the office,” Laura said brightly, climbing onto the fuselage to inspect the rotor shaft. She slanted Jenna a small smile, reading the direction of her thoughts. “For what it’s worth, I’m sure the VIPs have no clue about who’s piloting which helicopter. It’s not personal.”

  Jenna shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. I’m here to do a job, not suck up to some general who happens to be riding in my jump seat.” She cast another dark look across the tarmac to where Captain Kevin “Mongo” McLaughlin was checking out his tail rotor. “But I know he’s going to gloat over this later, and that just bugs me.”

  Laura was only half listening. Her attention was fixated on the other side of the tarmac, where a group of five soldiers were making their way toward the helicopter. Even as Jenna bent to look through the open cabin doors for a better view, Laura scrambled swiftly down.

  “Forget Mongo and his gloating,” she hissed, pretending to fiddle with the sliding door of the cabin while her dark gaze remained riveted on the men. “Check these guys out!”

  Jenna frowned. Heat shimmered over the asphalt, distorting their figures as they strode closer, and for a moment she was reminded of the iconic Hollywood scene from the blockbuster movie Armageddon, when five heroic astronauts made their way in slow motion across the flight line on a mission to save the world. Only, instead of orange space suits, these guys wore desert camouflage and carried army-issued duffel bags. But beneath the rim of their helmets, their sunburned faces sported several weeks’ worth of beard, and each wore the same don’t-fuck-with-me expression.

  “Another special ops team,” mused Jenna. In the two months of her deployment, she and Laura had transported dozens of special ops commandos from one location to another. While Jenna knew the likelihood of running into Chase Rawlins was slim, her heart did a small flip of anticipation each time one of them climbed aboard her helicopter. “Looks like they’ve been outside the wire for a while.”

  “Oh, yeah,” murmured Laura in an appreciative tone. “Looks like they could use some serious R and R, and I know just the person to give it to them. Come to Mama, boys.”

  Jenna laughed softly, no longer shocked by anything that Laura said. She knew the other woman was mostly talk and almost no action.

  As the men drew closer, conversing with each other in low tones, Jenna’s eyes narrowed. There was something about the guy on the far right. He was tall and lean, and walked with an easy, loose-limbed grace that reminded her of—

  “Holy crap!”

  Laura’s gaze flashed between her and the group of men, and back again. “What? You know one of them?”

  Quickly, before the group got any closer, Jenna spun out of sight and pressed her back against the side of the helicopter, adrenaline surging hot and hard through her veins.

  “Don’t let him see me,” she whispered fiercely.

  “Who?” Laura craned her head so that she was looking through the open doors of the cabin, just as the first man climbed up through the opposite door and into the helicopter. She straightened abruptly and snapped out a salute. “Afternoon, sir,” she said in a no-nonsense military tone. “I’m Warrant Officer Costanza, your copilot. As soon as we’re refueled, we’ll depart.”

  Jenna heard the low rumble of a reply, and then Laura stepped smartly away from the door and made her way toward the front of the helicopter, dragging Jenna with her. “Is that who I think it is?” she hissed, incredulous. “Is it the guy from Shooters?”

  “Yes. No! I don’t know! I can’t be sure.” Jenna’s heart was slamming so hard in her chest that she was sure Laura must hear it. “I didn’t exactly stop to read his name tag! God.”

  But when she pressed her fingers against her closed eyes, she could see him clearly and knew that she hadn’t been mistaken. And what were the freaking chances that she would run into Major Chase Rawlins out here, a gazillion miles from Fort Bragg, in the middle of freaking no-man’s land? There was no doubt in her mind that it was him. Even with half his face covered in scruff, his eyes hidden behind a pair of dark sunglasses, she’d recognize him.

  She’d thought of him more often than she’d care to admit—even to herself—during the past two months. The one night she’d spent with him was as fresh in her mind as if it had been only yesterday. What would he do when he saw her? Would he even recognize her? Did he ever think of her?

  “Breathe.”

  Jenna opened her eyes to see Laura watching her closely. She dragged in a deep breath. Her glance flicked to the open door of the cabin, where she could hear the men getting settled.

  “I’m okay,” she muttered, pushing the other woman aside. “It just took me by surprise, that’s all. Some coincidence, huh?”

  Laura arched one slim eyebrow. “I don’t believe in coincidences. This was bound to happen.”

  “How do you figure?”

  Laura gestured toward the surrounding mountains. “Hello! We’re in Taliban country. He’s Special Ops, which means his main mission is hunting the bad guys, and where do you think they’re hiding?”

  Jenna gave her a tolerant look. “I understand, but—”

  “We fly to damn near every U.S. installation in Afghanistan. We transport personnel, including special ops teams.” Laura’s voice was firm with conviction. “It was only a matter of time before you ran into him.”

  Jenna groaned and scrubbed a hand over her face. “But what do I say to him? How do I act? He couldn’t wait to get rid of me that night. What if he doesn’t even remember me?”

  “Trust me,” Laura said drily, “he’ll remember you.”

  “Ma’am?”

  Both women turned to see Corporal Garrett rounding the nose of the helicopter. “You’re fully loaded and refueled.”

  Jenna forced herself to nod, but it was an effort to act normal when every cell in her body screamed with awareness of the man who had rocked her world just two months ago and then vanished from her life.

  “Thank you,” she replied, and turned to Laura. “Let’s do this.”

  She climbed into the cockpit and greeted the hard-eyed men who sat in the cabin, hoping her voice di
dn’t betray the fact that she was a bundle of nerves.

  “Welcome aboard, gentlemen. I’m Captain Larson and your copilot today is Chief Warrant Officer Costanza. We’ll be departing shortly. Our ETA at Kabul Air Base is approximately seventeen hundred hours.” Her gaze touched briefly on each man in turn and then lingered on Chase. “Sit back and enjoy the flight.”

  He stared back at her impassively, and then gave her a brief nod before turning to say something to the man on his left. They might have been complete strangers, for all the notice he took of her. Jenna watched him for another few seconds, taking in the familiar thrust of his shoulders, the strong jaw beneath the shadow of his beard and the chiseled cheekbones. The only thing missing was the lazy smile and devilish glint in his eyes that had first attracted her to him.

  As if sensing her scrutiny, he turned his attention back to her and raised one eyebrow in silent query. But his light green eyes were remote, and Jenna could read nothing in their cool depths except polite expectation.

  So that was how it was going to be.

  Jenna felt her face go hot in a swift, physical reaction to his dismissal. Was he deliberately pretending not to know her in order to spare her feelings? Or did he think they needed to keep their prior relationship a secret? She gave Chase one last, meaningful look before she turned her back on him and jammed her helmet onto her head.

  Laura leaned toward her over the center controls, pretending to adjust one of the gauges. “Hey,” she said in a low voice as Jenna powered up the rotors, “you okay?”

  “Fine,” she breathed. “It’s probably better this way. I mean, even if he did remember me and was interested in getting together again, it’s not like we’d have the chance.”

  She slid a swift glance over her shoulder at Chase, sharp regret slicing through her. He had tipped his head back and closed his eyes, and Jenna could see the lines of fatigue on his face. Even with his eyes shut, the guy was mouthwatering.

  It just wasn’t fair.

  Her flight plan included dropping him and his team off at Kabul Air Base, and then spending the night in a Barracks hut with Laura and the rest of her crew. In the morning, she would return to her duty station at Kandahar Air Base, three hundred miles to the south. The chances of their paths crossing even once had been slim, but the likelihood that they would cross a second time was about one in a hundred thousand, and that was being optimistic.

  Even so, for the entire return flight to Kabul Air Base, Jenna was acutely conscious of the man who sat less than four feet behind her, the same man that she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about since that night by Pope airfield. Despite the fact that he’d claimed not to have a problem with her being a pilot, his entire manner had changed after she’d told him what she did for a living.

  Typical.

  She shouldn’t feel so disappointed, but she’d really hoped he might be different. He’d driven her back to the officer’s barracks at Fort Bragg and had even kissed her sweetly before he’d stepped away from her.

  “Maybe we’ll run into each other again someday,” he’d said, and his expression had been brooding. “If we do, I hope you won’t think badly of me.”

  She had lain awake for most of that night, replaying the events of the evening over and over in her mind and wondering what he had meant by his parting words. Did he think she would want more than just one night together, or that she believed he had misled her somehow? Did he think she would turn into one of those overly emotional women who felt that one night of sex—albeit incredible sex—entitled her to a happy-ever-after?

  As they flew south, away from the Hindu Kush mountains and toward Kabul Air Base, it took all of Jenna’s training to concentrate on doing her job and not continually glance back at Chase. She was shocked by how much she wanted to reconnect with him. For one, brief instant, she’d considered the possibility that he really didn’t remember her, but had just as quickly rejected the idea. There was no way he had forgotten her, not when the memory of that night was still so vivid for her. Something just didn’t make sense. The male appreciation that she’d come to expect whenever he looked at her had been completely absent in his eyes. Okay, so maybe her flight suit and helmet weren’t exactly sexy, and maybe he had other things on his mind, considering he’d just returned from a mission, but she’d expected to at least see a spark of recognition.

  There had been nothing.

  Logically, she knew he was sending her a clear message, but the irrational part of her—the part that apparently couldn’t stop thinking about him—didn’t want to listen. As they flew south, Jenna made up her mind; she was going to confront Chase, if only to let him know that she didn’t think badly of him, as he’d once suggested she might. She would be as cool and detached as he was, but she knew that if he gave any indication that he might be interested in a repeat performance, she would consider it.

  It wouldn’t mean anything. She was just feeling physically deprived because she hadn’t been with anyone since her night with Chase. What she was feeling was a natural physical response to a gorgeous guy, and whatever they had was definitely physical. There was absolutely no way she was in any danger of falling for the guy.

  None. Whatsoever.

  5

  AS THEY DREW CLOSER TO Kabul Air Base, it became clear to Jenna that her piloting skills were going to be tested. A sandstorm had engulfed the region, forcing her to rely solely on her instrumentation when visibility became so poor that she could no longer make out any landmarks. She knew from experience that landing in a sandstorm would produce a dense cloud that could easily disorient or blind a pilot. Attempting to land in brownout conditions was a major cause of lateral rollovers and ground collisions. She would essentially be flying a controlled crash into the ground with no outside reference.

  “Brownout landing procedures initiated,” Jenna said, flipping a gauge to turn on a small liquid-crystal display that charted velocity vector, acceleration cures, radar altimeter height and vertical speed. Laura called out the ground speed and drift, airspeed, altitude, wind speed and direction on the cockpit hover display.

  According to the instrumentation, they were directly above the designated landing spot, although Jenna could see absolutely nothing through the windshield or floor canopy of the helicopter. Thick, brown dust swirled around them, made even worse by the wash of the rotor blades.

  “Hover stabilization system activated,” Jenna said, adjusting the hover hold function in the tilt rotor flight controls.

  “Three feet to ground,” Laura confirmed, watching the hover display. “Two feet. One.”

  They came to rest with hardly a bump, and both Jenna and Laura initiated routine shutdown procedures.

  “Welcome to Kabul Air Base,” Jenna said through her intercom. “Enjoy your stay, and as always, thank you for flying with the U.S. Army. We know you have no other options, but we still appreciate your business.”

  Unlike her previous passengers, she didn’t get any chuckles from this group. As the rotor blades whirred to a stop, she could just make out the nearby hangar through the swirling clouds of dust. Pulling a handkerchief out of her pocket and a pair of goggles from her flight bag, she removed her helmet and wrapped the cloth around her face, pulling the goggles into place.

  “I hate this shit,” Laura said, doing the same. “No matter how long I stand under a shower, it feels like I never get rid of all the sand.”

  Jenna could sympathize. Even now, as her crew chief slid the cabin doors open, hot air gusted in, bringing the choking dust with it. In a matter of seconds, the entire interior of the chopper was covered in a fine coating of powdery silt. It would take her and the crew forever to get it clean again. She twisted in her seat and watched as the team of special operators made their way from the helicopter. Like herself and Laura, they had also donned goggles and scarves over their faces, but she had no trouble spotting Chase. She would recognize his build anywhere.

  “Nice landing, Captain,” Laura said, her voice muffled by
her kerchief.

  “Couldn’t have done it without you, Chief,” Jenna replied, watching Chase as he strode away and was swallowed up in the swirling dust. Grabbing her flight bag, she opened the door and prepared to climb down. “Can you finish the paperwork? There’s something I have to do.”

  “No problem.”

  But Jenna could see the speculation in the other woman’s eyes as she jumped lightly down from the cockpit and began jogging toward the hangar, holding the handkerchief in place with one hand over her mouth and nose. Inside the hangar, she could see the five-man team just ahead, and she yanked her kerchief away from her face.

  “Major Rawlins!”

  He turned and looked back at her, pushing his goggles up to his forehead. Jenna slowed to a walk, watching as he said something to the other men and indicated they should go ahead without him. He waited, hefting his duffel bag a little higher on his shoulder. She walked toward him, her heart beginning to hammer in a way that had nothing to do with her brief sprint across the tarmac.

  His sunburned face was covered in dust, making his light green eyes all the more startling. “That was some nice flying, Captain,” he said as she came to a stop in front of him. “Is there something I can help you with?”

  His tone was so cool and polite that for a brief instant Jenna couldn’t find her voice. She wondered if she wasn’t making a huge mistake. She had hoped that, once they were alone, he would drop the pretense of not knowing her, but apparently he wasn’t going to give her the satisfaction. She would have to brazen it out.

  “I just wanted to say hi, and let you know that I don’t think badly of you. Just the opposite, in fact.”

  His eyes narrowed and he looked at her uncertainly. “Okay…thanks.”

  Jenna waited for him to drop the act, but after an awkward moment where the silence stretched between them, she gave him a bright smile. “Well, that’s pretty much what I wanted to say. I’m spending the night here, so if you want to…you know…get together, just say the word. I’m sure we could find somewhere private.”