The Night Is Mine

Chapter 19

19

It was beautiful. A Bell 430 VIP Executive model. The Rolls Royce of helicopters. Not a piece of history like the Green Hornet, not heavy or dangerous like her combat Hawk, nor massive and solid like either of the Marine One aircraft, the VH-60N Black Hawk, or the VH-53 Sea Stallion monster sitting in the center of the hangar.

The Bell was a pretty craft. She wasn’t painted Marine One blah, but the cheerful blue and white of the White House seal. And luxurious. Two pilot seats forward were designed for comfort, not for fourteen hours behind the lines. They were more like Barcaloungers for pilots.

The cabin sported four seats facing each other in a space that would fit eight. Between the forward pair hunkered a minifridge and an entertainment center. The aft seat was actually a small leather couch with two seatbelts. Very cozy.

“I’m not checked out in this craft, sir.” Emily eyed it carefully. Of course she could fly the pretty thing, but that wasn’t the point.

“You will be today if you intend to fly with the First Lady aboard. The bird’s already preflighted.” He waved a hand toward the three Marines who were finishing with her.

Another a test of her arrogance?

“I wouldn’t fly a bird I hadn’t checked out myself, sir. Or personally knew the crew chief.”

“Good girl. Have at it.”

For the next ten minutes, the lead sergeant led her through the preflight checklist and the basic emergency procedures. For the forty after that, the three men led her through everything that wasn’t on the list.

“Watch for airframe corrosion, especially along this joint.”

“In the first two years’ models you can’t see the control-cable routing bracket and you need to run your fingers along like this to check that it’s tight.”

“She’s a light craft, jumpier than you’d expect when hovering in a tailwind.”

When they started talking about how different engine modifications behaved over ten thousand feet altitude, the General broke them up. Too bad. Once they’d accepted her, they’d been a font of information. Manly handshakes all around replaced any wasted words. Her grip told them she knew they were good. Their solid grips returned the compliment.

Powering up the Bell was preschool compared to her Hawk’s graduate course. Everything was labeled in plain English. Every switch was large enough to toggle with two fingers—because there were about a tenth as many of them. It was such a simple toy, but at least it was a helicopter. Each stage of the startup sequence made her smile bigger until her cheeks were positively aching.

The momentary flash of the red warning lights flickered when she turned the key. The thing had a key like a car—so cute. The throttle twisted slick and smooth beneath her left hand. First, the high turbine whine struggling to get the rotor through its first rotations. Then the thrum of the accelerating engine so deep that it was almost s****l. Finally, the turboshaft engine’s roar became overshadowed by the beat of the blades slicing the air, a warm buzz transmitted through her hands and the seat of her pants as the bird came to life. The hiss in the headset as she powered-on the radios, then the abrupt click to silence as the squelch circuit kicked in.

The strangest feeling was freedom of motion. No heavy, flame-retardant flight suit. No thirty-pound survival harness and flak armor. No machine gun strapped across her chest with a half dozen ammo clips in her vest’s pouch. Flight suit and vest were still in her flight bag, now tucked in an actual baggage compartment. The only item she’d kept out was her helmet. Well worn from hard use sporting the sword-wielding Pegasus beneath the crescent moon. Silver on a field of sunset purple. And only two words: “Night Stalkers.” It was her single proudest possession.

She’d stroked it once for luck as she did before every flight. And caught General Arnson staring at her intently. Maybe he didn’t like the Night Stalkers. The Marines weren’t alone in that, a lot of regular Army didn’t either but she was used to it. Her helmet reminded her that chef or bodyguard or whatever to the First Lady was not her. Night Stalker. That was her.

In moments they were off the wheels and hovering along at three feet as she slid out of the hangar. It wasn’t until she was clear that she spotted the soldier inside the doors with a small tow cart. She glanced over at the General, but he didn’t make any sign that you weren’t supposed to lift off inside a hangar.

There were no tow carts in Forward Ops scenarios. And you didn’t merely taxi, because you wanted to be accelerating hard when you first became visible from your hidey-hole, usually a camo net strung between trees, or aluminum poles if you were encamped above the tree line.

She kept her three-foot hover and floated to the center of the helipad. There she settled back to the tarmac for a quick run-up and control test before she called the tower for clearance to go. When it came, they went. No radio contact needed once clearance was issued. All the tower ever wanted was to see your tail feathers moving out of their traffic pattern. Fast.

This machine weighed barely a third of her Black Hawk armed and manned for serious havoc, light on her rotors and remarkably responsive. The foot-pedal control was practically delicate, more a ballet step than the rock ‘n’ roll downbeat of the Huey or the bad-ass hip-hop of the Hawk. They slid out over Chesapeake Bay and, receiving a nod from the General, Emily laid down the hammer.

She climbed, stalled, simulated turbine failures, clawed her bird sideways across the sky, and managed to coax it through a loop. She never got to fly a DAP Hawk for fun, whereas this machine had been made for nothing but fun.

Not offering a word, the General finally pointed her down the Chesapeake and out toward sea.

The sun glistened off the shining water as if it went on forever, not merely to the shores of Europe and Africa. If she had the fuel, she’d fly straight across and drop in on her unit. Maybe fly a few missions…except Major Jerk would be there.

First, she’d kick his butt around the field for putting her in such a damned awkward spot. Then once more for making her feel as if she were less of a pilot. Then yet another time around for kissing her and screwing with her head.

“My nephew speaks well of you,” General Arnson’s first comment since they’d left the hangar.

After she’d kicked his butt good… An image of Mark Henderson lying back on the sand, looking up at her with those soft gray eyes. Waiting for… something. That smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. Traveling up to his amazing eyes. Wanting… something.

“Your nephew, sir?” Emily shook her head for a moment to clear away thoughts of what her body apparently would like to do to Mark Henderson. She definitely didn’t want to talk about that.

And it was a checkout ride after all; she needed to control her helo and her hormones. But how did he keep sneaking out of her mental footlocker?

“Major Mark Henderson says you are an exceptional pilot.”

The collective actually slipped from her nerveless fingers. The blade angles flattened, and the helo plunged a couple hundred feet before she regained control.

“Major Henderson? Your nephew?” Was this whole disaster a setup by Henderson? No, that didn’t scan. He’d been furious about her orders.

“He said you were the first pilot, over his wing commander, he would choose if he had to go in somewhere truly nasty. My nephew doesn’t give compliments lightly.”

She opened her mouth. And closed it again. Nothing had come out. She wished she could restart her brain as easily as a turbine engine.

“Mark Henderson? Major Mark Henderson? He doesn’t give compliments—ever.” Her spine felt positively tingly. The Major thought she was good? So careful not to compliment the female to avoid showing bias. It fit. Nothing underhanded about it. Emily decided that the compliment was intentional.

“Said you had a real habit of coming back with your bird and your crew intact from particularly messy places,” the General continued.

Most likely, that meant the kiss was equally intentional.

“I like that in a pilot.”

So did she.