Flying Home

She blinked at him. “Of course I have. Actually, lots of times. Miles and miles and miles. How about you?”

“Obviously I’ve flown,” he countered with his version of her answer to him. He saw her grimace. “I’ve been flying since I was twenty, and soloed before my twenty-first birthday,” he added quickly. “Since then, it’s one thrilling air ride for me after another.”

“I bet,” she muttered as she compulsively twisted the strap of her purse around her forefinger.

He didn’t have the time to talk her into sitting back and relaxing so she could enjoy a “top of the world” flight that would be like no other in her life. The next couple of hours could be fun, but he didn’t say any of that. He had a gut feeling that if he did, she’d start one of her bursts of nervous chatter.

So instead he stared right in those green eyes that had flares of gold at the pupils, and said as evenly as he could, “Let’s get you home.”

Her eyes widened slightly, and he had a momentary fear that she was not only a babbler when she got scared or excited, but she was a crier. Thankfully that didn’t happen. She managed a weak smile and said softly, “Yes, home,” and went toward the side of the plane.

He came up behind her and cupped her elbow to help her up onto the wing. “Grab the door by the bottom, then ease back as you lift it.” She did as he directed and the wing door went up. He was merely helping a client into the plane. No rules, even if they were his own rules, had been broken. He almost laughed at that, remembering how she’d thought fast enough to con him into this flight with a bogus retainer.

He got onto the wing himself, let her get seated, and then warned. “Don’t touch any controls. And be careful about the foot levers, just keep your feet off of them.”

She nodded and shut the door. It only took him a minute to get behind the controls. He was aware of Merry buckling in as he contacted the tower, got his take off position and instructions for taxiing, then he started the plane. He motioned to the same set of controls in front of her. “If we have time, I’ll give you a flying lesson,” he offered to try and ease the tension.

She gasped at him with what sounded like horror, and he smiled. “Just kidding,” he said.

Within minutes, they were on the runway, positioned for takeoff. Once they got clearance, it was flaps up and trim set for takeoff. He released the brakes and with the throttle fully open, the journey began. As the motor revved higher and higher, they gathered speed. At about sixty-five miles per hour, that moment came when the tires left the ground and there was nothing but air around the plane as the earth fell away.

He loved that transition—an addiction he freely admitted to—he loved flying, having this plane at his beck and call. It was the best fringe benefit of his success. But one glance at his passenger and Gage knew she wasn’t sharing any of his excitement at all.

She sat still, her hands gripping her knees, her eyes tightly shut, and he could see her taking deep breaths. Then her lips started to move silently. Praying? Oh, boy, he thought. “You okay?” he asked as they reached cruising altitude.

“Fine,” she replied, barely breaking the rhythm of her breathing and quiet chanting. If she wasn’t careful she was going to hyperventilate.

He eyed her. “I guess no one’s pointed out to you during all those flights you had, that flying is safer than driving?”

She kept her eyes closed. “Sure, that’s what they say, but no one adds that if you’re in a car and there’s a problem, you can pull to the side of the road, even if your motor explodes, but in a plane—” Her words cut off and she started that deep breathing and lip movement again.

Some kind of Zen thing, he thought, but said, “Never mind. Forget I mentioned that. The engines are not going to explode, and I know what I’m doing. It’s all good.”

“Fine,” she muttered, but went right back to her “exercises.”

“So, you’re going to Wolf Lake?”

She exhaled on a sigh and he couldn’t tell if it was from him annoying her with questions, or that special breathing she’d been doing. “Yes.”

He’d thought he could distract her, but now he wasn’t sure that was possible. “And you know Moses.”

“I told you that already, and I can’t talk, I have to count,” she said, her arms wrapping around herself so tightly her knuckles whitened.

“Count?”

“Please, yes, let me count.” He did as she asked while he checked the GPS, banked southwest into the flight plan, then set auto pilot and sat back in the seat. Looking over at Merry again, he took in the whole picture and came to the conclusion that she was not the type of woman who would blow your socks off at first, but the kind that probably grew on you as you discovered more about her. He noticed the straightness of her nose, and the sweep of her jaw, a delicate angle. And those freckles. He’d never thought about it before, but the freckles in some way made her seem vulnerable.

He couldn’t recall ever seeing her in Wolf Lake before, although he hadn’t been back to town in a long time. Now, his older brother, Jackson, was dealing with the loss of his wife and not doing well. His other brother, Adam, had taken off for Chicago with a woman who had visited Wolf Lake around Christmas, and now he was helping the woman and father in a legal battle. He didn’t understand much of what Adam was doing, but he knew it was so important to Adam that he left his job as a detective in Dallas, Texas, to go to Chicago with this lady called Faith.

Now Gage was on his way back, but not exactly for a visit. He looked at Merry, watching her lips moving again, and realized at one time he knew everyone in town, at least by sight, but now he figured there might be a lot of people who were total strangers to him. Just like Merry Brenner. The idea she was a friend of Moses’s, well, he really did want to learn more about Merry and her association with the good doctor.

“You okay?” he dared to asked again.

“Fine,” she breathed softly.

“Counting?”

“Yes.”

“You know, I once heard that an interviewer’s worst fear was a guest who gave one word answers. I think I finally understand what was meant by that.”

He thought she might smile at that, or at least stop counting whatever she was counting, but she didn’t. The only positive change was her flexing her fingers as if to ease the tension there. But her eyes stayed shut and the counting went on.

He checked the instrument panel, and then looked back at Merry. “Is there any point in my asking what you’re counting?”

When a long moment went by with no response, Gage was ready to give up, get through the trip in silence and wish her good luck once they landed. What she counted was her own business. Then she surprised him by saying, “Bubbles.”

“What?”

She exhaled, slowly rested her hands on her thighs and leaned back in the seat. Her eyes fluttered open, but they stayed focused on what was ahead of them, a growing cloud bank and thin beams of sunlight feebly cutting through them. “You know, the kind you blew as a kid that you could make from dish soap or get in those little plastic bottles?”

“Sure, but—”

She kept talking as if he hadn’t tried to say anything. “When I was little, I’d get away from wherever we were living at the time, find some grass and blow bubbles while I laid on my back. I’d watch them float up and up and up, until they either disappeared or burst.” She stopped and he saw her bite her lip. He could tell she wished she hadn’t said that. “Like most kids,” she added quickly.

He liked the feeling of her sharing, even if it she seemed to think it had been a mistake on her part. “My method of getting away was to go up to the lake at night,” he admitted, surprising himself that he’d said that out loud to her. It wasn’t something that had been brought up in any conversation for years.

“What would a Carson have to get away from?” she asked, finally turning to him. “You know the lake?”

“I was born in Wolf Lake. Obviously, I know the lake. I didn’t see it until I was maybe six years old, just before we left, but I’d heard about it all my life. The magic of how the full moon turns that whole area of wild grass into a rippling ocean moved by the breeze.”

She was born there? He shifted in his seat. She wasn’t familiar at all. He tried to think of families he’d known in the past, but nothing came to him. “You know, I don’t remember a Brenner family.”

“How about the Casey family?”

Casey? Yes, he remembered a family named Casey, and a child, but he couldn’t recall if the child was a boy or a girl. But he clearly remembered the father, Jerry Casey, a good man who had worked on the roads, and on some of the ranches around the area. Jerry had died young, and he couldn’t remember seeing the mother or the child after that.

“Jerry Casey?” he asked.

When she looked at him, her green eyes widened. “My dad.”

“I think he worked for my dad off and on.”

“Yes, he helped with fencing on your ranch, and he ran some of your cattle.”

So, he wasn’t helping out a stranger after all, and it was indeed a small world. “So you left and got married?”

“Oh, no. I mean, yes, we left—my mother, me and my stepfather, Mike Brenner. I got his last name because he was in the Air Force, and the benefits were better if we were actually family.”