Blue Skies (29 page)

“They're up to no good,” Jewel said.

“Why do you say that?”

“Just a feeling. They've set themselves apart from the group.”

“So have we.”

“But we're different.” She smiled conspiratorially. “We're gatekeepers.”

Dixie was shocked. “You know you're called that?”

“I know everything. By the way, I don't see enough of the chief pilot around Riordan's office.”

“Well,” Dixie said, a tish uncomfortable at the remark, “she's been out of town, at the simulator. Plus, she works really long hours.”

“I know,” Jewel said. “But you should know, that one—” she indicated Riddle only with her eyes “—seems to have plenty of time to hang around my desk, looking for information and face time with the boss.”

Dixie absorbed this, aware her mouth was slightly open. She clamped it shut. “Thanks.”

“Hey. No problem.”

Presently Carlisle arrived at the table with two drinks. “Ladies,” he said, setting down the glasses. He noticed Jewel's was quite low. “Can I get you anything?”

“Thanks, no. I'm fine.”

Carlisle sat down across from them, his back to the room, and the two women shifted slightly because he was blocking their view. After a few moments of being ignored, Carlisle dragged his chair around to their side of the table so he could watch the show.

They entertained themselves like this for a good while. Nikki came in, but she was so busy with the pilots, she didn't seem to notice them. There was some serious drinking going on, but nothing that could keep up with Shanna, who was growing more unsteady by the minute.

“Did you see if she came in with anyone?” Dixie asked Jewel.

“No, but I'm sure she'll leave with someone. Unless there's a person with a conscience at this table.”

“Ew. Is it going to be me?” Dixie asked, feeling so much the subordinate.

“Or us,” she said.

“But aren't you here with…?” Dixie began.

Jewel tilted her head and peered down her nose at Dixie. “Don't believe everything you hear,” she said. “I have my own car here. But I will leave when he leaves.”

Dixie stole another look at Shanna. The dragon of HR was smashed and acting so very slutty. “She doesn't really deserve help, you know.”

“But she also doesn't deserve what's going to happen to her if we don't help,” Jewel said. “At least this once. Who knows where she'll wake up in the morning?”

“I love it,” Carlisle observed. “The Bed Cross.”

“Okay, then…” Dixie said.

“Your car,” Jewel told her. Dixie's head snapped around. “Seniority.” She flashed Dixie that rare smile. “Think of how easy it's going to be to work with HR after tonight.”

“All right, then. Let's get this over with.”

“I'll be saying good night,” Carlisle said. “Much as I'd like to stay and watch.”

Quite a few heads turned as Dixie and Jewel, both beautiful leggy blondes, each took an arm and walked a confused and dazed Shanna out the door of the bar. After an emergency stop at the trash bin by the side of the building, they loaded her into the passenger side of Dixie's car.

“Well, at least I'm less worried about what she's going to do to the inside of my car,” Dixie remarked.

“Sit tight, I have a couple of things in my trunk that could help,” Jewel said.

Shanna, butt on the passenger seat and feet outside, her head resting on her knees, moaned miserably. Dixie tsked. The girl was totaled.

“Here,” Jewel said, returning with a beach towel and little lunch-size cooler. “Drape the towel around her and place the opened cooler on her lap. Don't bother returning either if they're used.”

“She owes you big-time for this,” Dixie said. “If it was just up to me, I wouldn't have bothered.”

“Everyone has been rescued at one time or another,” Jewel said.

“You're actually a very nice person,” Dixie drawled.

Jewel put a finger to her lips. “Don't tell. I have a very useful image going.”

 

When Nikki arrived at the Tail Spin, she didn't notice her friends and Jewel back against the wall. She'd returned not only because she was in a celebratory mood, but because she knew the value of mingling with her people. And her people were pilots. They would definitely be here.

For whatever reason—her performance at the sim, or the fact she knew the 757 inside and out—the men she'd hired had warmed to her. She was greeted enthusiastically, and her hand immediately fitted with a beer. She'd rather have had a glass of wine, but if they were drinking beer, she was drinking beer.

Talk turned to the proving flights, then the schedule for the first month, then where everyone had worked before. By the time a half hour had passed, many of them had made connections with friends or friends of friends from other carriers. With hundreds of thousands of people in the industry, it never failed to shock Nikki how many of them knew one another.

Nikki spied Riddle and his table of pilots at the end of the room. “Save my place,” she said to the group she was standing with. She went over to his table. “Bob. Gentlemen.” They popped up like fishing bobbers. “No, don't get up. I just wanted to say hello. What did you think of the mini-evac?”

They looked at one another uncomfortably. “We didn't make it to the evac,” one of them finally admitted.

“We were here, having a beer, when the party came in,” Riddle said.

“Well, it was great. The FAA was most impressed.”

Again there were furtive looks, almost as if they'd been caught doing something wrong.

“Ah, work-rules meeting?” she asked. Only Bob con
nected with her eyes. The others looked away. At that moment she realized she had ignored his animosity for too long. He wanted her out. He'd already taken credit for her work and would do considerably more damage if she didn't figure him out. “Just enjoy your beer,” she said pleasantly. “See you later.”

That the next day was a workday didn't seem to deter anyone from staying late at the bar. In fact, once Joe Riordan left, the din rose slightly. But by the time a couple of hours had passed, the airline groups began to thin and give way to the bar's regulars. It was about ten when Nikki looked around and couldn't pick Dixie or Carlisle out of the crowd.

“I guess I should think about getting home,” she said to Sam, who was standing next to her.

“Don't,” he said. “Let's grab a table and have a cold one.”

She looked down at her beer, the same one she'd been nursing all night. It was now reduced to a half glass of warm and flat yellow brew. “Ah, to tell you the truth, I don't think I want a beer. I wouldn't fight off a glass of cabernet, though. If you're buying.”

“I am. See if you can find a table as far away from the juke box as possible.”

“You're showing your age, Landon,” she teased.

“Wasn't ever trying to hide it, boss.”

She looked around the bar for a table.
Probably shouldn't do this,
she thought. But it was still a public place and there would be no funny stuff.
Probably shouldn't. I don't need this kind of encouragement.
But she did as she was asked—she found a table away from the noise, the music, the crowd.

She watched Sam at the bar, procuring drinks. He laughed as the bartender said something funny. When he
wasn't laughing, he had an almost brooding look. When he was in training class, for instance, concentrating, he could look downright angry. But all you had to say was “Anything wrong, Landon?” and that somber expression would instantly disappear and be replaced with a grin. As he turned from the bar, looking for her, she once again admired his handsomeness. For a man of fifty he had such a boyish look, the thick, floppy hair and twinkling eyes. But it was really his smile that got to her; straight white teeth, and a small hint of the devil.

Because she enjoyed watching him look for her, Nikki didn't wave to get his attention. When he finally did spot her, he made a beeline for the table. “Here we go,” he said, putting down the drinks.

“There's that diet cola again,” she observed. “You don't drink.”

“Not much, no,” he said. He lifted a glass to her. “Here's to start-up.”

“Amen.” She sipped her wine. She'd been toasting the company all night but hadn't swallowed much beer.

“How is it?”

It was actually pretty bleak—bar-stock cabernet. “Good,” she lied.

“I heard we have something in common that I didn't realize. Your husband died recently?”

That took her so by surprise she nearly choked. “Oh, God, Sam!” She covered his hand in sudden sympathy and looked at him so earnestly, forgetting for the moment that she meant this to look to all the world as if they were just having a friendly drink. “He was my ex-husband. We'd been divorced for four years and…Well, I don't know if there's any delicate way to say this. He was a complete jerk, with a capital
J.
”

“Oh, man, that's too bad,” he said. “Rough divorce?”

“You don't want to hear all that,” she warned, giving him a break.

“I do.” He leaned toward her, his head on a hand. “I mean, if you don't mind talking about it. It won't go further.”

It brought a smile to her lips to think of him keeping a personal confidence for her, even though there wasn't any need. And it felt awfully good that he was interested. “There's no secret about my marriage and divorce, even if I haven't talked about it much. I married Drake on the rebound. He was the first guy who smiled at me after I broke up with a boyfriend I thought I'd marry. He was a difficult, negative, complaining, controlling pain in the butt, but I was pregnant with April instantly. We divorced eleven years later and he sued for custody based on the fact that I left town for a living and he didn't. But he was a lawyer and had a little edge, you see. So for four years I paid him child support while he made life miserable for me whenever I tried to see the kids. Then one morning he had a heart attack. The kids were in school, he was alone, and boom. Gone. At forty-seven.”

“Whoa. Young.”

She took a sip of her wine. “Very sudden.”

“How about the kids?” he asked.

“They loved him, of course, but they'd had a hard time with him, too. He was strict, inflexible and pretty much impossible to please. I don't know if I ever heard him tell the kids he loved them. It baffles me, because he
did
love them. It's not as though he was indifferent. He demanded custody and promised to fight me to his last breath.”

“Maybe that was more about scoring one against you than his need to have the kids live with him.”

“I've pondered that a lot, of course. But since there's no way of knowing for sure, I'm going with the idea that he loved them a lot and just didn't have the ability to express his emotions.”

“Which could certainly be true. A lot of men have trouble with that.”

“You? Do you have trouble with that?” she asked before she could reel the question back in.

He gave a chuckle. “Oh, Jesus, boss. I have too
much
emotion. Leanne's death almost took me with her. If I wasn't heartbroken, I was angry, and if I wasn't angry, I was guilty. I was not a sane man for a year. But I think we're all doing well now, the girls and I.”

“If you don't mind me asking…?”

“Really, I'm good with this now. You can ask just about anything.”

“How did your wife die?”

The look on his face was so shocked, so still, she scrambled for an apology.

“Gosh, I'm sorry, I—”

“No, no, it's not that. I thought it was common knowledge.”

“I'm afraid I don't—”

“She was an American flight attendant. She died on September 11.”

“Dear God. I had no idea.”

“And I thought everyone knew,” he said. “The victims and their families were all over the news for such a long time—I think I heard from every military friend we ever had, and then there was the airline community. I honestly didn't think there was a person around who didn't know every detail.”

“Do all the other pilots know?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Amazing. And no one said anything to me. Sam, I'm so sorry for your loss.”

“Thanks. It was a tough one. It will always be emotional for me, but because of the way she died, we were forced to talk about it a lot, and I think that actually helped relieve some of the raw pain. You know what's the strangest? She's part of this country's history. She died in a moment of violent history that spawned a war and changed the world.”