“Got it.” Linc had to hold on to his blue beret to keep it from blowing away. “Let’s get inside before we end up taking to the air, too.”
A dash for the closest hangar with open doors brought them relief. No mechanics were working on the various aircraft housed there, which was a good thing because an exposed engine full of grit due to the open bay was far from acceptable.
She pointed to an office. “Daily rosters are posted over there. I’ll go check.”
“Where you go, I go.” Linc fell in beside her.
It only took her a few seconds to spot familiar names. “We must be living right. Ahern and Orleck are both on duty in hangar seven.”
“Okay. Before we go talk to them, let’s set some ground rules.”
“A pilot term. Nice.”
Linc was chuckling and shaking his head. “Total accident, I assure you. Tell me more about your dealings with Ahern first.”
“He’s a disgusting braggart. If he was one tenth as wonderful as he thinks he is, he’d have made chief master sergeant by now. That said, he’s a wiz with engines. Not as good on advanced avionics but not bad, either. I think younger guys like Orleck handle most of the electronic testing for him.”
“Speaking of Orleck, what’s the deal with him?”
“He pitched a fit when I washed him out. Once he’d blown off steam, however, he seemed to settle right down. I heard later that he was grateful for the change of direction. That’s the beauty of it. We have a variety of great jobs in the air force and if a person tries, he or she can be very happy, successful and satisfied.”
“What about you? Are you happy?” Linc asked.
She huffed. “I was, until they unfairly sidelined me. Now not so much.”
“What about in the rest of your life?”
Her eyebrows went up as her suspicion increased. “Are you asking about my brother again? Because if you are, remember what I told that nurse. I am not like Boyd. Never was, never will be. I’m not sure why he turned out so twisted, but whatever happened to him, I escaped that negative influence. Maybe it was because we had different mothers.”
“I wasn’t asking officially,” Linc said. “That was more of an existential question. I know you have Freddy and you love him to pieces, but what about the rest of the time? Are you generally happy?”
Deciding how to answer delayed her response. Finally, she paraphrased Scripture. “‘I have learned that whatever state I am in, for whatever reasons, to be content.’ The apostle Paul wrote that in his letter to the Philippians. He said it much better than I just did, but you get the gist.”
“You don’t wish things had been different, could be different?”
Zoe wasn’t sure what he was actually asking, but she didn’t intend to fall into the trap of assuming his query was personal. They had been discussing air force careers, so she replied in that vein. “There were times I thought I wanted to be a combat pilot. Now that I’m a mother, I’ve decided it’s too dangerous. My son only has me.”
“No grandparents?”
She shook her head and made a derisive sound. “My late father ruined Boyd by setting a terrible example and being totally convinced his only son could do no wrong. My mother is still living near the old Wadsworth family place in Dill, but she never had the backbone to stand up to Dad. She’s even worse in regard to my brother. Maybe she overcompensates because she’s his stepmother. All I know is, I would never give her another child to raise. Uh-uh. No way.”
“I get it. I love my mom dearly, and she did manage to get me through my teens, but it was more by accident than from making good choices.”
Smiling at him, Zoe spoke her mind. “I don’t like giving random credit. You can say I’m deluded if you want. You won’t be the first. But I firmly believe that God knew us when we were first being formed and becoming babies, just like the Bible says. He saw where we were going and what we’d become from the beginning.”
“Then why didn’t he stop your brother before so many people died?”
“I don’t know.” She refused to let him rile her. “I’m clueless about far more than I dream of ever understanding. But that doesn’t change my opinion. I can look back and see times where God intervened and saved me. I imagine you could, too, if you’d do it with an unbiased attitude.”
“For instance?”
“How should I know what’s gone on in your life? As for mine, I’ll tell you this. Boyd was already scary when we were kids. I loved him dearly, but I still wonder how many times he thought of murdering me in my sleep.
“And then there was my husband. John was a handsome smooth talker who had me thoroughly convinced he was some kind of super patriot—when he was exactly the opposite. If he had not died when he did, there’s no telling how deep into the pit he’d have dragged me and if I’d have been able to climb out, let alone make the air force my career.”
“Do you believe his death was accidental?”
Zoe sobered and her eyes flamed with repressed emotion. “That was the official finding.”
“And...?”
“It’s my belief that his traitorous cohorts got him out of the way when he made the mistake of bragging to me that he was getting away with breaking the law. How they found out doesn’t matter. What does is that I went to my commanding officers and reported it. John was dead within a week.”
“Then you can’t be sure.”
With a telling sigh and shrug of her shoulders, Zoe said, “I’m as sure as the encrypted files on his personal computer can make me. If I had not preempted that discovery with my initial report and John had not been removed from my life, I could have been charged with treason or even have met the same fate he did. Then Freddy would have died, too, because I was carrying him at the time.”
“So, you really think God rescued you?”
“It makes more sense than random choice, just like knowing the alphabet and being able to spell makes more sense than closing your eyes and banging on a keyboard until a bestseller emerges.”
Linc stared at her for the longest time before he said, “Know what scares me?”
“What?”
A lopsided smile began to lift one corner of his mouth. “You’re actually starting to make sense.”
Her smile mirrored his, then surpassed it. “Of course I am. That’s because I’m right.”
* * *
Along with a half dozen other mechanics, Jim Ahern was working in hangar seven, as scheduled, when Linc led the way with Zoe behind him.
Linc kept it casual as he approached them. “Jim Ahern?”
The senior mechanic laid aside a socket wrench as he turned to face the Security Forces man. “Yeah.”
Smiling cordially, Linc offered to shake hands. Ahern swiped his palms against his oily coveralls before accepting.
“Which one is Orleck?”
Ahern snorted. “Why? What’d he do?”
“Nothing that we know of. I just figured it would save time to speak with both of you at once. Were you both here working all morning?”
“Yup.” He cupped a hand around his mouth and called, “Hey, Mike. C’mere a sec.”
The younger man who emerged from behind the plane was scowling until he saw Zoe standing behind Linc. Then he began to grin. “Hey, Sarge. What brings you here? Are we late getting a trainer ready or something?”
Rather