Hotshot (22 page)

TWO WEEKS LATER

Vince waited outside on the steps while Shay finished answering questions from the press after finally giving her congressional presentation.

She stood poised and in control in another va-va-va-voom suit, a traffic-stopping red one this time. Not that she needed the bold color to steal his attention.

Shay held up her hands, signaling an end to the interviews. “Thank you for your questions, for your interest, and for your support. I look forward to celebrating with you when the legislation passes, bringing a comprehensive plan to help stem this very real threat to American youths. Thank you again, and have a wonderful afternoon.”

She strode through the throng of reporters, straight to him. She’d insisted she didn’t want to ride away in a limo this time. No pomp and circumstance or affectation. The real Shay had gotten her this far, and the real Shay wanted to ride off in a style that reflected who she was.

Vince waited by the Ducati that he’d purchased, her helmet tucked under his arm. “Hey, beautiful, you ready to roll?”

“Absolutely.” She snagged her helmet and snapped it in place. “Where are we going?”

“Do you mind being surprised?”

“Bring it on.”

He wasn’t sure how she would manage straddling his bike in her pencil-thin skirt, but he had fun watching her handle it with total class. She wrapped her arms around his waist, even though they both knew she didn’t need to hold on.

He settled into the ride with the perfect bike and the beyond-perfect woman behind him. At first, weaving through traffic, they attracted stares. No surprise. A woman in a red suit riding behind a man in uniform demanded attention.

Once he left the city and opened up the engine along Lake Erie, it was only about Shay and him. Them and the road, leaving behind all the bad they’d survived to make it to this point.

The past two weeks had been packed with legalities. Beyond just stopping the arms shipment, the network they’d built from linking cell phone numbers would enable the FBI to corral enough criminals to keep the justice system busy for a long, long while.

Webber was cooperating with the police with the help of his attorney. The boy couldn’t walk away from what he’d done, but his age had been taken into account. Vince still could hardly believe the boy was only fourteen. Kids really did start younger.

The boy’s lawyer had hopes he could get Webber tried as a juvenile, which meant he could be out of jail by twenty-one. Surprising them all, Webber had made his cooperation contingent on Amber receiving placement in the witness protection program.

Brody’s fate, however, would be trickier, since he was responsible for the brutal murders of both Kevin and the young student. The terrorist-recruiting CDs in Kevin’s apartment had been intended to divert their attention away from Lewis’s shipment.

No question about it, Lewis would be spending the rest of his life behind bars. Sadly, the bastard would probably find plenty of protection, given his strong affiliation to Los Angeles and Central American gangs. As best they could tell, California Congressman Mooney had no knowledge of Lewis’s dealings, but the politician’s career was likely over, all the same. A damn shame, because Mooney had appeared to be a genuine advocate for more gang legislation.

Vince squeezed extra juice from the engine, the bike surging beneath him, putting miles between them and the mess continuing to be untangled in Cleveland. He and Shay had been neck deep in questions and aiding the investigation. Ending every day in bed together, they made love and went to sleep, too exhausted and drained to talk anymore.

Yeah, he knew it was love, even if neither of them had said it yet. Soon, though. This moment had been seventeen years coming. He intended to make it one to remember.

Two mind-clearing hours later, Vince slowed the bike at their off-road destination, a private campsite he’d set up ahead of time on the Erie shore.

Shay’s squeal as she leapt off the Ducati reassured him he’d chosen well.

“Camping?” Whipping her helmet off, she shook her curls loose again. “This is so perfect.” Her smile brighter than the sun streaking through the trees, she gestured toward the tent, the campfire pit, a bench with fishing poles and hiking gear propped against it. “You heard what I said about loving the outdoors. You really listened.”

Somehow he was the luckiest bastard on the face of the earth to have found a woman so easy to please. “I also brought changes of clothes. They’re stored in the tent.”

“Perfect. The suit is fun on occasion, but I miss my jeans and tank tops.” She kicked off her shoes and slipped out of her suit jacket.

He rubbed from her shoulder down her arm to link fingers. He raised her arm, displaying her bared wrist, no watch in sight.

Her scar had been covered earlier this morning with a tattoo of a phoenix. The bird’s body rested along the inside of her wrist, with the wings wrapping around to the front.

He squeezed her hand. “Does the tat hurt?”

“Of course it does.” She swatted his shoulder, laughing. “Only a few hours ago I had needles prick my skin in a couple of million places.”

He should have thought of that before he brought her out here. “There’s ice in the chest.”

She shook her head and cradled her wrist to her heart. “No, I want to feel it.”

“Uh, I’m not tracking here.”

“What I did with the cutting . . . ?” She turned her hands to flatten her palms on his chest. “The emotional pain became so overwhelming, the physical pain somehow canceled out any pain. A twisted rationale, and so horribly wrong to do to myself, but it’s there.”

Understanding settled inside him. “So you’re saying your wrist hurts. And that’s a good thing.”

“Pretty much.”

He held up her arm. “This is a battle scar, without question.” He blew cooling air over her new tattoo. “This says you’re a survivor.”

“That I am.” She arched up on her toes to kiss him, her lips soft and giving and a perfect fit against his.

His uniform jacket fell to the ground before he even realized she’d unbuttoned it. Not that he cared. He helped her with his shirt, then hers.

She peeled off his T-shirt then teased her fingertips along his phoenix. “We’ve waited a long time for what we’ve found together.”

“You were worth waiting for.”

She slid her hand up to cup his face. “I love it when you grow in the category one grooming facial hair.” Her smile turned serious, her hands stroking his face tender. “Actually, Vince, I love you. I always have, even back when I was too much of a mess to know how to tell you or show you, or even how to love myself.”

He kissed each palm before resting his forehead on hers. “I know you love me, and I’m so damn glad. I look forward to spending the rest of my life showing you how very lovable you are, if you’ll let me. Because, Shay, I do love you, too.”

He stared down into the brown eyes he knew he would be looking at for the rest of his life. For a guy scared of commitment, afraid of being some loser like his dad, he’d sure been healed fast by the hottest nurse he’d ever met.

She tickled the base of his scalp. “I guess this means I’m relocating to Las Vegas.”

And she surprised him yet again. He’d been wondering how he would persuade her. “Are you okay with that?”

“The good thing and the sad thing about my job is that there are teens who need me everywhere. And I trust that Eli and Angeline are here for these kids.” Her fingers played along his neck. “So, is there good camping in Nevada?”

“Absolutely.”

She eased away from him, reaching behind her to unhook her bra. “And you’re in Las Vegas.”

He scrambled to focus on her words rather than the scrap of red satin falling away from her beautiful breasts. “Not as often as I would like, but every single minute I can manage from now on.”

“Sounds good to me.” She flicked away one high heel, then the other.

“Are you ready to head into the tent and help each other change clothes?” After spending some serious naked time together.

“I was thinking”—her thumbs hooked in her waistband, and she continued to back away toward the shore—“that we could go skinny-dipping and check out each other’s tattoos.”

“Skinny dipping sounds great, but we’ve already seen each other’s tattoos.”

She shimmied out of her skirt, a fresh hint of color flashing on her hip and reminding him he hadn’t been with her the entire time at the tattoo parlor.

Blowing him a kiss, she sprinted toward the water. “
All
of our tattoos? That’s what you think, Hotshot.”

Turn the page for a preview of
the next Dark Ops Novel by Catherine Mann
RENEGADE
Coming soon from Berkley Sensation!

TONOPAH TEST RANGE, NEVADA: PRESENT DAY

For Tech Sergeant Mason “Smooth” Randolph a great flight was a lot like great sex.

Both brought the same rush, sense of soaring, and driving need to make it last as long as absolutely possible. On the flip side, a bad flight was every bit as crappy as bad sex. Both could quickly become awkward, embarrassing, and downright dangerous.

As Mason planted his boots on the vibrating deck of an experimental cargo plane, his adrenaline-saturated gut told him that today’s ultra-secret mission had the potential to rank up there with the worst sex ever.

The top-notch engines whispered a seductive tune, mingling with the blast of wind gusting through the cargo door being cranked open. Whoever came up with the idea to drop supplies out of the back of a fast-moving aircraft must not have stood where he was standing now. Of course for that matter, nobody had stood in his boots on this sort of flight. That was the whole purpose of his job in the air force’s highly classified test squadron.

He did things no one had tried before.

On today’s mission, he would offload packed pallets from a test-model hypersonic cargo jet, a jet that could go Mach 6, far outpacing the mere supersonic speed of Mach 1. The deck of this new baby gleamed, high tech and totally pristine, without the oil and musty smell that accumulated over the course of many successful missions.

The metal warmed beneath his boots as the craft ate up miles faster than the pilot up front—Vapor—could plow through a buffet. If the plane completed testing as hoped, future fliers could travel from the U.S. to any point on earth in under four hours. Entire deployments could be set up and ready to roll in the matter of a single day, rather than the weeks-long buildups of the past.

No doubt, the price tag on this sleek-winged sucker was huge, but for forward thinking strategists, it saved the expense many times over by shortening deployments. Of course, money had never meant dick to him.

However, he did care about all those marriages collapsing under the strain of long separations.

Radio talk from the two pilots up front echoed in his headset as he checked his safety belt one last time, then raised his hand to hover over the control panel. His empty ring finger itched inside his glove. Yeah, this test in particular struck a personal note for him. It was too late for him since his own marriage had already gone down the tubes, but maybe he could save some of his military brethren from suffering the same kick in the ass he’d endured six years ago.

Without slowing, the cargo door cranked the rest of the way open, settling into place with an ominous thunk. Wind swirled inside, the suction increasing with the yawning gap. No more time to consider how the drop shouldn’t even be possible. Not too long ago, going to the moon hadn’t seemed possible. It took test pilots, pioneers. All the same, this was going to be spotty.

Mason tightened his parachute straps just in case and keyed his microphone in his oxygen mask to speak to the pilots in the cockpit. “Doors open. Ramp clear.”

“Copy.” From the flight deck, pilot Vince “Vapor” Deluca acknowledged. “Thirty seconds to release.”

Mason scanned the cargo pallets resting on rollers built into the floor. Everything appeared just as he’d prepped for this final run before next week’s big show for select military leaders from ally nations around the world. Pallets were packed, evenly balanced, and lined up, ready to roll straight out over the Nevada desert. Muscles contracted inside him as the pilot continued the countdown over headset.

“Jester two-one,” Vapor continued, “is fifteen seconds from release.”

Mason focused on the bundle at the front of the pallet. A void of dark sky waited only a few feet away, ready to suck up the offload. He mentally reviewed the steps as if he could somehow secure the outcome. A small parachute would rifle forward, air speed filling it with enough power to drag out the pallet. That chute would tear away, sending the pallet into a free fall until the larger parachute deployed.

“Five,” Vapor counted down, “four, three, two, one.”

A green light flashed over the door.

The bundle shot its mini-chute into the air behind the door. As it caught the supersonic air, the first pallet began to move, rolling, rolling, and out. One gone. The second rattled down the tracks, picture perfect, and then the next in synchronized magnificence as the mammoth load whipped out at a blurring speed.

Mason’s gut started to ease. Next week’s shindig for their visiting military dignitaries could be a huge win for the home team and move this plane into the inventory. A flop, however, could mean death to their government funding, an abrupt end to the whole project. He keyed up his mic.

The last pallet bucked off the tracks.

Oh shit. The load slammed onto its side with hundreds, maybe thousands of pounds of force. The cargo net ripped, flapping and snapping through the air. Gear exploded loose, catapulting every-fucking-where. He ducked as a piece of shattered pallet flew over his head.

“Smooth?” Vapor’s voice filled the headset. “Report up.”

Mason grappled for the button to respond while sidestepping a loose crate cartwheeling his way. The mesh net whipped around his leg and jerked him toward the open back. His feet shot out from under him.

“Smooth, damn it, radio up—”

His mic went silent. The cord rattled useless and unplugged. His helmeted head whacked the deck, sparking a fresh batch of stars to his view of the night sky.

He slapped his hands along the metal grating, grappling for something, anything to slow the drag toward the back. Would the safety harness hooked to the wall hold? Under normal circumstances, sure. These weren’t normal circumstances. Everything was a first-ever test at unheard of speed.

He vise gripped the edge of a seat. The pallet dragged at his leg. He kept his eyes focused ahead, squeezing down panic, hoping, praying Vapor or Hotwire would come back to check. His arms screamed in their sockets and his legs burned from being stretched by the weight of the pallet teetering on the edge of the back hatch.

Don’t give up. Hang on.

The bulkhead opening filled with a shadow. Thank God. The copilot—Hotwire—roared into view, his mouth moving as he shouted words swallowed up by the vortex of wind.

Mason’s fingers slipped. The weight, the force, the speed, it was all too much. “Oh, shit.”

He pulled his arms in tight as the pallet raked him along the metal floor like a hunk of cheddar against a grater. Ah damn, what about his safety harness? The strap around his waist pulled taut. An image of his body ripped in half came to mind, a snapshot that would forever stay in safety manuals to warn others of the hazards of fucking up. Not that he knew what he’d done wrong. That would be for others to decide after they buried the two halves of him in a wooden box.

Hotwire hooked his own safety belt on the run and reached. So close. Not close enough.

Mason’s harness popped free from around his waist. Whoomp. The air sucked at him like a vacuum. He flew out of the back of the plane at hypersonic speed only to stop short when he slammed against the pallet, his leg still lashed by mesh. Pain detonated throughout him. Then his stomach plummeted faster than his body.

Happy Fucking New Year.

Instincts on overdrive, he wrapped his arms around the pallet. The pressure on his body eased as the pallet continued a free fall downward into the inky night. His flight suit whipped against him. Images of his ex-wife flashed though his head along with regret. A shiver iced through his veins. Was he dying?

No. The wind and altitude caused the cold. Think, damn it. Don’t surrender to the whole-life-review death march.

Either he could do nothing and pray that when the larger chute opened it didn’t batter him to death against the pallet. Or he could free his leg from the netting, kick away from the pallet, and use his own parachute, provided it hadn’t been damaged during the haul out the back of the plane.

His options sucked ass, but at least he was still alive to fight. Getting clear of the damaged pallet seemed wisest. Determination fueled his freezing limbs. Vertigo threatened to overtake him as he kicked to untangle his boot from the netting. He jerked, pulled, and strained until, yes, his leg came free.

“Argh!” Mason grunted, muscles burning.

He shoved away just as the large chute deployed. His body plummeted, pinwheeling. The pallet was jerked to a stall by the chute, tearing apart in a shower of wood and supplies. Good God, he would have been drawn and quartered.

He reined himself in, struggling to control the fall while gauging his surroundings but the solitary void was combined with an eerie silence. How much farther until he landed? If he pulled the cord too soon, he could float forever with no sense of direction, ending up lost deep in the desert.

Screw it. Better too early than waiting too long and shattering every bone in his body by not using his parachute soon enough. He reached down, feeling along his waist until he found the handle.

He yanked. Cords whistled past and overhead. Nylon rippled upward until . . . whoomp.

Air filled the chute and yanked him. Hard. The rapid stall knocked the wind out of him and, damn it to hell, crushed his left nut under the leg strap.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts, no time to piss and moan. He grabbed a riser and hefted into a one arm pull up to ease pressure on the strap. Ahh, better, much better. Pain eased. His brain revved.

Now, how did that “You just fucked up bad and are now floating towards the earth” checklist go?

Canopy. His eyes adjusting to the dark, he checked the canopy and no rips, no tears, not even the dreaded “Mae West” where a line looped over the chute for a double bubble effect.

Visor. Little chance of landing in a tree here so he pulled the visor up.

Mask. He stripped his oxygen mask off his face, unhooked the connectors on his chest and pitched it away into the abyss.

Seat kit. Strapped to his butt, it contained a raft. Not much call for that in the desert. He opened the connector and ditched the raft, too.

LPUs. Life preserver units. He thumbed the horse collar LPU around his neck and down his chest, pulled the inflate tabs and a high-pressure bottle inflated the floatie. It might cushion the landing and save a few broken ribs. Although there was no telling what he might have already busted back in the plane. Thank goodness for the adrenaline numbing his system.

What next? Oh yeah. Steer. Damn, he was punch drunk. He reached up for the risers and grappled until he wrapped his fingers around the steering handles.

The next step? Prepare. Yeah, he was so prepared to smack into the ground he could barely see. He scanned below as best he could, checking out the sand, sand, sand, and occasional bundle of desert scrub. Okay, dude. Final step.

Land. He put his eyes on the horizon and bent his knees slightly, ready to perform the perfect PLF, parachute landing fall. The ground roared up to meet him. He prepped for . . . the . . . impact.

Balls of the feet.

Side of the leg and butt.

Side of the arm and shoulder.

Complete.

Mason lay on the gritty sand, stunned. No harm in lying still for a few and rejoicing in the fact he would live to fly and make love again. There wasn’t any need to rush out of here just yet. He wasn’t in enemy territory.

Although he didn’t have a clue exactly what piece of the Nevada desert he currently occupied, his tracking device would bring help. Rescue would show up in an hour or so. Maybe by then he could stand up without whimpering like a baby.

He shrugged free of his parachute and LPU one miserable groan at a time. Already he could feel the bruises rising to the surface. He would probably resemble a Smurf by morning, but at least he still had all his limbs, and no bones rattled around inside him that he could tell.

His teeth chattered, though. From the freezing cold of a winter desert night or from shock? Either way he needed to get moving. He pushed to his feet, stumbling for a second before the horizon stopped bobbling.

A siren wailed in the distance.

Already? Perhaps this flight experience wouldn’t suck so much after all. Even bad sex could be rescued with a satisfying ending.

He blinked to clear his eyesight. Twin beams of light stretched ahead of a Ford F-150, blinding him as the vehicle approached. He shielded his eyes with one hand and waved his other arm. Ouch. Fuck.

A loudspeaker squeaked and crackled to life. “Get back down on the ground. Lay flat on your stomach,” a tinny voice ordered. “If you move at all, you will be shot.”

Shot? What the hell? Had he landed on some survivalist kook’s farm?

But that wouldn’t explain the siren. He must have drifted into restricted territory, not surprising since they flew many of their secret test missions in secured areas. The truck screeched to halt and someone wearing cammo stepped out. A flashlight held at shoulder level kept him from seeing the face, but he could discern an M4 carbine at hip level well enough.

He shouted, “Don’t shoot. I’m not armed, and I’m not resisting.”

“Stay on the ground,” the voice behind the light barked.

A female voice?

Okay, so much for his PC rating today. He’d assumed the security cop was a male, not that it made any difference one way or the other. He respected the power of that M4.

Mason flattened his belly to the packed desert floor, arms extended over his head. A knee plowed deep in the small of his back. If he didn’t have a bruised kidney before, he sure did now.

A cold muzzle pressed against his skull. All right, then. The knee didn’t hurt so much after all.

“Hands behind your back, nice and slow.” The lady cop’s husky voice heated his neck. “So, flyboy, do you want to tell me what you’re doing out here in Area 51?”