From Out Of The Blue

“Not exactly. I was coming to see you.” After an awkward pause, during which she had the decency to blush, she added, “I’m sorry, I know you must be busy. You were driving somewhere in a big hurry. I probably should’ve called first but…”

“Not a problem,” Mitch assured her. “I figured you’d show up sooner or later.”

“You did? Why?”

“To apologize for not saying goodbye when you left Eielson.” Her blush deepened. Good. At least she hadn’t forgotten that part. “I’m on my way to pick up a part for Babe in Talkeetna. I’ll fix the flat on your rental car, then if you want, I’ll take you out for lunch.”

“The rental doesn’t have a spare,” she said. “I discovered that just before you arrived. But lunch sounds fine. It’ll give us a chance to talk.”

Mitch removed her flat tire in minutes, threw it in the back of the truck to drop off at the local gas station, and in minutes they were on their way.

She’d said she wanted to talk and he was kind of curious to find out why she’d shown up from out of the blue after four plus years, especially since she’d never answered his letter, but several miles passed without her saying a word. The silence between them soon became the loudest thing he’d ever heard. He figured it was up to him to jump-start this conversation.

“So, how long have you been in Alaska?”

“I just arrived last night.” She gave him a questioning glance. “Who’s Babe?”

“Babe’s the only plane owned by Wally’s Air Charter at the moment, but I have my eye on another.”

“I heard you left the air force.”

“Yeah. It was time. I started out on the career track, same as you, but I lost my enthusiasm for military life after they tried to court-martial me.” Her eyes bore into him with such a peculiar look, he nearly drove off the highway, but he wrenched the wheel and managed to keep all four tires on the asphalt. “I wrote you right after it was over. The trial was short because they didn’t have much of a case, but when the time came to reenlist, I didn’t. No regrets.”

“I see.” She sat through another endless five-mile silence before asking, “How do you like flying for an air charter?”

“The flying’s great, but business is iffy. Wally’s a good mechanic—he specialized in airframe and power plant in the military—but trying to keep Babe in the air is costing us more than it’s worth. I should be flying out to the mountain to pick up a sick German climber but instead I’m driving to Talkeetna to pick up another airplane part. Which means no groceries this week.”

Six more miles of silence slipped past before she said, “Do you have a family?”

Didn’t everyone? “Yeah. Three brothers, two younger, one older; a baby sister; and my dad. My mother died of cancer a few years back. They all stayed put in Maine. I’m the only escapee.”

This time the silence was brief. “What I meant was, are you married?”

This wasn’t quite the conversation he’d thought they’d be having. “Huh?”

“Wife, kids?”

“Happily divorced for six years, no kids.” Four more miles of silence went by. With the tension screaming around the cab of the truck, he decided they were the longest four miles he’d ever traveled. He was beginning to regret asking her to come along. Why was she here anyway? “You married?” he finally asked.

“No.”

He nodded. “I read about you in the September issue of Air Force magazine. Great article, though I thought it was traitorous that they’d profile a Navy flier. It mentioned the difficulties of juggling motherhood and a career. Since it didn’t include ‘husband’ in the mix, I figured there wasn’t one.”

“You guessed correctly.”

“But you have a kid?”

“A son. His name is Hayden. It’s an old family name.”

“What does Hayden think about his mother being a Navy pilot?”

“Hayden’s relaxed about everything. He’s a pretty cool kid.”

“I guess pretty cool women just naturally have pretty cool kids.”

He thought that might get a smile but she just looked out the window, heaved a small sigh and said, “I was lucky.”

“Somebody else sure was, too.” The words bounced awkwardly around the cab and he cursed himself for uttering them, but it was true. Somebody was. Some Navy guy, probably. Dare he ask? Ah, what the hell. “What does Hayden think about his father?”

“I told him his father died in a plane crash.”

Tragic for them both, but that explained why she wasn’t married. “I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, hoping his words sounded more sincere than he felt. “So, how long do you have?”

“Pardon?”

Okay, maybe the silence was better than talking. She was glaring at him as if he’d just insulted her. “How long are you here for? A week? Two?”

She faced front again and said, “I don’t have that long. Two weeks, max.”

“Where are you staying?”

“The Moosewood Road House.”

“Nice place. They have a decent restaurant.”

“Yes.”

This conversation was going nowhere fast. He was no closer to finding out why she was here than he had been thirty miles ago, and she hadn’t yet bothered to explain why she’d never said goodbye to him after the night they’d shared. He was beginning to wish she hadn’t interrupted his Monday, except that, damn it all, she was just as provocative as she’d been the first time he’d set eyes on her. His hormones were already at attention as he envisioned a passionate night or two tangled up in the sheets with her. So what if she hadn’t said goodbye? Maybe this time he’d be the one who flew off without a word.

Fair was fair, after all. Two could play that kind of game.

KATE REALIZED by the time they reached the tiny town of Talkeetna that she was in way over her head. While Mitch was in the aviation building at the small airport picking up his part, she sat in the truck, wondering if her erratic heartbeat had anything to do with the fevers that came and went or with the man she’d just spent the last hour with. What should she do? He was totally in the dark as to her real reasons for being here. He seemed glad to see her but he didn’t know, nor could she figure out how to tell him, that she’d never read the letter he’d sent.

Court-martial? That didn’t sound good. He obviously didn’t make much money, and his prospects for the future didn’t appear much better. He wasn’t married and had no kids, just a dog named Thor and a boss named Wally who obviously owned the charter service.

How should she proceed?

He stepped out of the hangar door and she was struck again by his sheer masculinity. It didn’t matter that he was dressed in faded Levi’s and an equally faded flannel shirt. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t shaved that morning or that his hair needed to be trimmed. He was handsome in a rugged, athletic way that matched the land he’d chosen to make his home in. Maybe he’d never be rich, maybe he’d never drive a late-model truck or fly a plane that didn’t always need fixing, but she had the feeling that somehow he’d get by. He was the kind of guy that would walk away from a hard landing with that same macho swagger and arrogant grin. Nothing would ever beat him down.

He wrenched open the truck door, tossed an object wrapped in a clean rag onto the bench seat between them and hauled himself in behind the wheel. “So, what’s your preference? There’s a deli a little ways from here or a roadhouse that serves great burgers. Your choice.”

“I’m not really that hungry.”

He fired up the engine and eased the truck into gear. “Then let’s grab a sandwich at the deli. It’s not as fancy and it’s quicker.”

He was as nervous as she was, she realized as he drove to the deli; only, when she got nervous, she got quiet, whereas Mitch couldn’t seem to shut up. The deli was rustic and charming with big baskets of bright flowers that hung from the porch eaves. He talked about fishing while they waited for their order to be delivered to the little picnic table on the porch, and in between bites of his sandwich he told her about salmon runs and grizzly bears that prowled the riverbank by his cabin and one instance when he’d barricaded himself inside while a bear chewed his favorite fly rod to splinters. And then came a long pause in the conversation and she glanced up and realized those disarming eyes were studying her intently.

“What?” she said, shifting under his scrutiny.