From Out Of The Blue

“Some kind of bird they shoot and eat here, but it was a joke, I think. The man, he had us carry empty coffee cans and bang on them with spoons. He said the birds would fly into the cans. Of course, they didn’t, but Hayden loved it.”

“Did you have lunch?”

“Sì, a very good lunch and Hayden is napping. He has been outside all morning. This is good for him. How about you, señora? How does it go for you?”

“So far, so good. If I don’t get back until late, don’t worry. I haven’t told him about Hayden yet, but I’m going to. I just have to pick the right time.”

“I understand, señora. Good luck.”

It seemed that Rosa was saying that more and more often. Was it luck Kate needed, or nerve? She had only a few days to tell Mitch he had a son and the sooner she broached the subject, the better. What if he flipped out at the idea? What if he met Hayden and didn’t like him? But how could anyone not like Hayden? Besides, when Mitch saw him for the first time, he was sure to recognize himself in that little boy’s grin, the mischievous flash of his eyes, the arrogant know-it-all attitude that yes, even a three-year-old can possess. He was sure to take one look at Hayden and know without her saying anything that he was looking at his own son.

She glanced up from slicing the vegetables as Mitch came back into the kitchen from checking on the grill. “This is such a great place for kids. I’m surprised you aren’t married by now, with a whole bunch of them stampeding around.”

He lifted his wineglass for a taste. “This cabin isn’t big enough for a whole bunch. Besides, a wife and kids have never been a high priority for me. I tried that once and it didn’t work. Marriage, that is. Fortunately, there were no kids.”

“You don’t like kids?” Kate asked with a twinge of unease.

“I think they deserve better than two parents trapped in a bad marriage. Besides, if anyone else moved in here on a permanent basis, I’d have to build an addition.” He regarded her steadily for a moment, long enough for her to feel a warmth flowing through her that had nothing to do with a fever. “I suppose I could do that,” he added. “I guess I’d just need the right motivation.”

Kate dropped her eyes to scoop the vegetables into the bowl he’d provided. She drizzled them with olive oil and tossed them together.

“Motivation,” he continued. “That’s the key. A man has to be motivated in order to accomplish great things, whereas a woman self-motivates naturally. She knows what she has to do and just goes ahead and does it.”

“Oh? And what does a woman know she has to do, naturally?” Kate felt herself instantly bristling at his words, the same way she’d bristled her way through ten years of Navy life.

“She knows she has to nurture and comfort and create. A woman is the heart of any home, and a man needs a woman to motivate him to build that home.

“That’s a crock, McCray. I didn’t join the service to nurture, comfort and create, and I don’t feel obliged to motivate any man to do anything.”

“No, of course not, I’m not saying you did or do or should…. I guess I’m just trying to say that the major difference between a man and a woman… That is to say, one of the major differences is…” He paused and gave her a cautious look. “I’d better go check the fire again.”

Kate held up the bowl of vegetables. “Grilling basket?”

“Look under the counter. You might find something useful, but I’ve never grilled vegetables before. I usually just wrap them in foil and lay them in the coals.”

“Nurture, comfort and create?” She couldn’t resist another jab at his chauvinism.

“I take it all back, every last word, and forget I ever mentioned motivation.”

“I suppose you’re the type who prefers their women pregnant, barefoot and in the kitchen?”

He escaped out the door and was gone long enough for her to conclude there was nothing like a grilling basket in the kitchen. She did find the aluminum foil, however, and made do with that, carrying both the foil-wrapped vegetables and her glass of wine out onto the porch. Mitch was standing over the grill with a long-handled fork, poking occasionally at the coals. “No grilling basket, I see,” he said.

“This’ll work if you like soggy vegetables.”

“Soggy vegetables are my favorite.” He took them from her and laid the packet on the edge of the grill.

Kate leaned against the porch railing with a grudging smile. “So tell me what happened after you got out of the air force.”

He narrowed his eyes, thinking back. “That’d be about three years ago. I took a job flying for a commercial carrier. Turned out to be boring as hell—passenger jet service between Anchorage and Seattle. Like driving a bus on the same route every day. I lasted only a year at that. I might have held out longer, but Wally looked me up and convinced me it was time to make the switch.” He nudged the foil packet closer to the coals and it started to hiss. “After the Mad Dog burned, he held on to the insurance money, but rather than rebuild it he decided to start up an air charter service near Denali to ferry mountain climbers, hunters and sightseers around. At first I turned him down because flying for the airlines gave me a steady paycheck, but the second time he asked I jumped at the chance and here I am, borderline broke.”

“But happy?”

“Oh, hell, yes. My long-term plan is to buy Wally out when he gets ready to retire and change the name of the charter to Arctic Air, but that’ll only happen if we can keep the business alive, and that’ll only happen if he goes along with buying this plane I have my eye on. It’s a Pilatus/Fairchild Porter. Hot plane. Expensive.” He turned to her. “So what was in all the letters you never sent me over the past four years?”

“There’s not much to tell that wasn’t in that article,” Kate responded with an offhand shrug. “I was offered permanent shore duty when my son was born, I got promoted, did a lot of recruiting PR with the colleges, then got lucky and landed an instructor pilot position at the Navy Fighter Weapons School.”

“Lady, in case you didn’t know it, that wasn’t luck. Only the best of the best end up there. The flying must’ve been great.”

Kate took a small sip of wine, surprised that the idea of never flying like that again was still so painful to her after everything else she’d been through. “It was,” she admitted. “I got to play bad guy in the air with some of the hottest young pilots in the fleet, but even better than that, I changed a lot of old-fashioned attitudes toward women in the military every time I worked with a new class.”

“That had to have been the hardest lesson for them to learn.”

“That women can do more than nurture, comfort and create?”

He raised both his hands in a mute gesture of surrender. “I’ll get the steak. The coals are just about ready and it doesn’t take long for the veggies to cook.” He disappeared inside and reappeared carrying the platter with the marinating steak, Thor padding at his heels, his yellow gaze never wavering from the prize. “How do you like yours cooked?”

“Medium rare, but it looks like Thor would take his just the way it is.”

“The only way he’ll taste this steak is in his dreams.” The meat went onto the grill with a loud hiss and savory plume of smoke. “This’ll attract every bear in Alaska, but don’t worry. Thor won’t let ’em within a mile of the porch.”

Kate glanced around, reasonably sure he was kidding, though she wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised to see a grizzly hulking through the thick willows along the riverbank. She was glad Thor was with them, standing guard.

“Must’ve been tough for you, raising a kid and flying at the top of the curve,” Mitch said, turning the packet of vegetables.

“It would’ve been, if I hadn’t found Rosa,” Kate admitted. “She was taking care of my neighbor’s three kids, and when he got his transfer orders, Rosa wouldn’t go with them. She didn’t want to leave California. I’d just taken two months of maternity leave and wanted to get back in the swing of things, so the timing was great for both of us. I lucked out and so did Hayden. She’s been wonderful with him.”

Mitch poked at the steak then reached for his wineglass. He took a swallow and then lowered it, trapping her with those eyes that even after more than four years still had the power to easily seduce her. She wanted to look away but couldn’t.

“Tell me why you never read my letter,” he said.

“I’d rather not talk about that right now.”

“I’m thinking whatever you were so mad about has to have something to do with that night at the saloon, and that’s also why you snuck off on me that way. No note. No nothing. You jumped in your plane and flew back to California without so much as a goodbye. So tell me what I did that was so awful.”

She shook her head. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“Try me.”

Kate felt her heart rate instantly double as the heat of embarrassment flushed through her. How could she explain it to him when she didn’t fully understand it herself? “It wasn’t you. I was mad at myself for going to a bar with someone I didn’t even know, and then…” Her voice faltered and she fell silent.

His gaze never wavered. “As I recall, we were properly introduced beforehand.”

“I was mad at myself for going…and at you for fixing those drinks.”

“As I recall, you polished off the first one without complaint and then asked me to mix you another.”

Kate frowned. “I did no such thing.”