Josie was stronger than that, damn it. And thanks to an air force now more open to having female pilots, she would fly the riskier test missions for this project herself.
Shoulders squared with military precision, she approached her detachment commander beside the looming hangar. Bridges’s gaze zipped up from the conversation. Smoky eyes met hers with a steam quickly banked by professionalism.
Damn. She almost stumbled at the impact. She knew her boss was attracted to her—not that he’d ever made an overt move—and she wasn’t stupid enough to cross that line, either. No hoo-hah was worth risking her career, and apparently he concurred.
But if he wasn’t her superior? What if their paths crossed later, once she’d made major and moved on to another position? Maybe. There was much to respect about Bridges, his drive, his humor. She’d even been attracted to him the first time she’d seen him days before his command assignment had been announced.
All moot now because he was her superior and she did have a job to complete. Besides, she didn’t date guys she worked with. She’d seen firsthand with her parents’ dual military marriage how tough joint service relationships could be.
She would just continue to ignore his good looks—and the quickly disguised appreciation in his eyes. “Good afternoon, Major.”
“Captain Lockworth,” Major Bridges called, voice carrying on the tearing desert wind. “Come speak with us for a moment.”
“Yes, sir.” She closed the distance between herself and the pair.
The biker pivoted on his boot heel toward her and nailed her with brooding brown eyes that bordered on black. She didn’t stumble. She downright stopped for two seconds before regaining her balance and plowing forward.
All right, she was an adult woman with a normal sex drive, but she wouldn’t let it or anything else control her. She blinked away the haze and found the hard features in front of her niggled at her brain with familiarity.
Bridges nodded, no exchange of salutes required on the runway. “Good flight, Captain?”
“The reporter got her money’s worth.”
Chuckles rumbled from her boss. Brooding brown eyes from their guest even twinkled for a flash. Where had she seen him before?
She stared, trying to place…
He quirked a brow at her.
Josie willed away a blush too juvenile for a seasoned combat vet and thrust out her hand. “Captain Josie Lockworth.”
His hand enfolded hers in calluses and heat.
“Diego Morel. Pleasure to meet you.”
His husky drawl stirred the taste of Southern Comfort on her tongue. A strange notion for a woman who never risked the loss of control brought on by alcohol. And an unwelcome notion.
Realization clicked into a radar lock. Awe stilled her.
No wonder he seemed familiar. She’d seen him around from a distance since she’d begun working at Palmdale, even if their paths had never crossed for her projects. Diego Morel—or Cruiser, as he’d once been known—was considered a god in the testing community. A former military test pilot, he’d flown with dazzling grace, the plane such a part of him it seemed to respond to his mere thoughts.
He’d been expected to take his place in aviation history alongside Chuck Yeager, until a simple undetected sinus infection had caused his eardrums to rupture during a grueling mission that cost the life of his wingman. All was normal for him on the ground, but he suffered vertigo in the air.
The winged god was now earthbound for life.
Sympathy whispered through her like clouds dusting her windscreen. His eyes hardened.
Damn. She needed to hide her emotions better. She’d hated those pitying looks after her mother’s problems came to light.
Josie withdrew the hand she hadn’t even realized was still clasped in his. “It’s an honor to meet you in person. I flew your full-hydraulic-failure, engine-control-only approach profile in test-pilot school. That was pioneering work you did back in the day.”
Would he accept her olive branch?
His weathered features smoothed into a smile. “Yeah, ‘back in the day’ this old Mississippi dog could hunt.”
Bridges cleared his throat. “I imagine you’re wondering why we’re here.”
Josie gathered her composure. “It crossed my mind, sir.”
“I wanted to be the first to tell you.”
“Tell me what?” And why was Morel on hand to hear it?
Curious eyes bored into her back. From whom? So many people populated the runway—maintenance, security, other pilots doing a walk-around check of a plane.
Bridges frowned at the activity, then waved toward the hangar door. “Let’s step inside where we can speak privately.”
Crap. This didn’t sound good. “Sure.”
She punched in the cipher lock code and pushed through the side door, leaving the two men to follow. Silence blanketed the metal cavern, disturbed as their footsteps bounced an echo up into the rafters and down again. Her pair of modified Predators sprawled immobile, the dimmed security lights high overhead casting a night-lamp glow on the white-and-gray sleeping crafts. Not overly large, each craft measured 320.4 inches long and 580.8 inches wide from tip to tip, or approximately twenty-six by forty-eight feet.
The UAV—unmanned aerial vehicles—were medium altitude, long range. Flown by a pilot from remote control, they could be guided from countries away, data transmitted instantly through a satellite. Test models were also equipped with an outboard seat for a pilot to ride along wearing a parachute. An override set of controls had been installed, as well, so that the ride-along pilot could assume command and save the craft if the remote control went to hell during testing. Since the Predator didn’t have a traditional cockpit, the pilot perched on a saddlelike seat with a high back, straddling the fuselage. With no clear canopy covering, such as on small jets, he or she flew out there in the open, as flyers had done in the old days.
Prior to entering test-pilot school, Josie had flown the U-2 Dragon Lady spy plane. She’d donned her space suit and popped above ninety-five percent of the earth’s atmosphere, penetrating enemy air space to gather intel. And while she would do it again in a heartbeat if called in defense of her country, the Predator’s intelligence-gathering methods didn’t risk lives.
Except the pretty baby was damn noisy. Actually only a whisper of propeller engines, but still enough to announce its arrival if the heat of battle didn’t mask the sound.
That flaw made it the perfect craft for continuing her mother’s theories, since her mother had been part of the early work on improving stealth for bomber aircraft. Other testers had taken another scientific path after the fatal failure, and a different form of improved stealth was added to the inventory.
Zoe Lockworth’s input was no longer needed in the bomber world. But here with the Predator, Josie could use a piece of her mother’s idea involving acoustic stealth. If proven, it would be invaluable to the nation’s defense.
Josie stroked a hand along the Predator’s sleek white side. Clearing her mother’s name wouldn’t give Zoe Lockworth back her ruined military career. It wouldn’t give her two daughters back the lost years with their mom as she’d drifted deeper into depression over the loss of her life’s dream.
But it was the only present Josie could offer a mama who’d been too medicated to enjoy the gift of a clay handprint from art class. Her mother