His headset crackled in his ears.
“Crusty?” Renshaw called. “Wanna finish that update, please?”
He jerked his hand away and flipped the mouthpiece in place. “The nanny opted not to join us and sent a substitute. We have a stowaway.”
“Stowaway?” Bo Rokowsky piped up. “Man or woman?”
Daniel’s hand clenched around the memory of warm silk and soft Mary Elise against his hand. “Woman.”
“Is she hot?”
Yes. Hell, yes. “Not germane to the mission, Rokowsky.”
“’Cause if she is, I’ll take over down there and you can come up here.”
“Can it, Bo.”
“Touchy, touchy. Or maybe not enough touching lately in spite of all those women wanting to cook you dinner and iron your flight suits.”
So what if he enjoyed a few casserole gifts now and again? Big freaking deal, and nothing compared to Rokowsky’s history with women.
He wouldn’t discuss Mary Elise over interphone with the squadron Casanova. A man who sure as hell wasn’t getting anywhere near her during this flight. “Keep this up and I’ll tell her what your call sign stands for, ‘Bo.”’ The guy’s real name had long ago faded from memories as he’d gone by Bo since training days. “Meanwhile, how about working on flying the plane or something?”
Daniel flipped the mouthpiece aside again. “We need to talk.”
“We are talking.” Her spine pulled straighter—which exposed a tempting patch of graceful neck.
He nodded toward his brothers. “Away from them so they can’t read your body language. I need to know more about what happened in Rubistan if I’m going to keep them safe.”
Tension rippled through her.
He resisted the urge to stroke her arm, cup her shoulder and pull her to him. Worse than wanting to palm her breast, he wanted Mary Elise to fling her arms around his neck like so many times before.
Damn, he’d missed her. Missed their easy friendship. No surprise he’d screwed it up. A slew of failed relationships since with casserole-cooking and uniform-ironing women hammered home his shortcomings in the relationship department. The latest to walk had deemed him “emotionally unavailable.”
Whatever the hell that meant.
Sure, he was sorry when each relationship self-destructed. But not one of them had left a hole in his life. Except Mary Elise.
His grip tightened as if he could somehow reinvent the past by holding tighter. She winced.
He raised his hands, backing away. “Sorry.”
For so many damned things he wouldn’t do any differently now. Emotionally unavailable worked well for him.
“Let me get the boys settled, Danny. We can talk once they’re asleep.”
At least she didn’t argue or pretend they could ignore the fact that she stood in his plane in place of the boys’ nanny from Florida.
He didn’t know why she was here. Didn’t know why it mattered so damned much to him. But he did owe her. “Thanks for getting them out of there.”
“I’d do it for anyone.”
Yes, she would. But she hadn’t done it for anyone. She’d done it for him. And just as when she’d passed him that Ho-Ho twenty-two years ago, he couldn’t walk away.
Mary Elise sagged into the seat across from the two crew bunks in the Spartan sleeping cubicle behind the cockpit. Trey tangled in the covers on the top, slack-jawed with exhaustion. On the bottom, Austin clutched his ragged sailboat quilt, sucking on a corner as if he could somehow taste home.
How much would the little guy remember of the ordeal, the crate, the escape?
Would he remember his parents?
Franklin Baker hadn’t been the best of fathers to Daniel, but he’d been trying to compensate with Trey and Austin. Their mother may have been a dim bulb, but she’d loved her boys. They’d loved her.
Trey and Austin had been shuffled so much in their short lives—born in the States, moving a couple of years ago, now back again. And the turmoil wasn’t over yet. A new home. A guardian they didn’t even know.
Their brother.
Danny.
The mammoth aircraft seemed to shrink, the gray beams and bolts closing in on her. Such a large plane shouldn’t feel so very small, nowhere to turn without bumping into him. They must be plowing through the most turbulent stretch of airspace in the sky. One more pitch against Daniel’s rock-solid chest and she would lose her mind.
Toying with her earring, she untangled threads of hair from the hoop. He should not have the ability to unsettle her so much. She wanted to exchange a nostalgic smile and hug while they both acknowledged their lives had moved on for the best.
Except she hadn’t. What about him?
A tingle started up her spine. She could feel him, standing behind her. Danny. Mary Elise glanced up and over her shoulder, already accepting she would find him.
Not Danny, but rather the stranger, Daniel, lounged in the doorway, rumpled flight suit making her long to swipe her hands over the wrinkles.
The muscles.
Silently he stared back at her. No doubt churning the whole mess around in his analytical brain, searching for a way to make sense of it all. Then opting to cover his confusion with a joke.
She didn’t want that joke. She wanted a piece of the past to replace the awkwardness. “Remember the time you painted your face and decked out in cammo to see if you could break into the Savannah River Site plant?”
The C-17 droned for what seemed like an hour, probably closer to seconds, before a slow smile dimpled Danny’s cheeks. He canted closer to be heard over the plane’s roar, the privacy curtain swaying closed behind him. “Well, hell, Mary Elise, I was doing a public service. Anyplace constructing and testing the parts for nukes needed to have stronger security if a twelve-year-old could bust inside.”
“No respect for danger, ever.” Her eyes fell to rest on the children, checking the steady rise and fall of their chests, any snuffling breaths masked by the rumble of engines vibrating the plane. With each exhalation she thanked God for their sturdy little bodies, so resilient.
Five miscarriages had taught her well how fragile young life could be.
Although, Danny had seemed to possess a godlike invincibility in his youth. Or perhaps that had more to do with how he’d never groused over a tagalong tired of tiptoeing so as not to disrupt her bed-bound mother. “You wouldn’t have been caught if I hadn’t snuck along.”
“You always did worry too much.” His shoulders filled the portal and her eyes.
Mary Elise welcomed the escape into happier times with smaller childhood worries. “You could have left me behind when the alarm went off. I wouldn’t have ratted you out.”
“Which is why I couldn’t leave you.”
But he had. Eventually. After her miscarriage, she’d seen the caged look in his eyes, the need to run once he was free of obligations. She hadn’t expected they would still get married—right away. She understood his need to finish school. But she had expected something more from him after all the times they’d made love following her pregnancy test. They’d moved past being friends, she’d thought. His need to escape her had hurt.
She’d hurt him right back. God, had she ever let her temper have its way with her as she’d sent him away.
Life