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“No,” he growled, keeping his voice low so he didn’t draw the attention of the gossips.
“You haven’t heard me out. The military has to train raw recruits, right? What better selling point? It’s a sure bet, good for both sides. The army can train all the aviators they need in minimal time, and the company sells hundreds and thousands of planes.”
She held her head high, doubtless expecting him to agree or even applaud her logic. Though her argument made some sense, the answer was still no. Even if he was willing, the Curtiss executives would never agree to it. Women didn’t fly in the war. They sure didn’t test warplanes.
“It’s not possible,” he said. “Sorry.” Best to crush her hopes now.
“You promised.”
Those two tiny words smashed through every argument Jack could devise. He’d promised. With painful clarity, he recalled the exact moment. It did not include flying.
“I promised to let you and your mechanic friend work on the engine.” He rubbed his aching head. Never let it be said that Jack Hunter reneged on his word. “I did not agree to give you a ride or lessons.”
If she was disappointed, she didn’t show it. “Very well. That’s why I’m here.”
“Give me an hour.” With luck, he could stretch that to two and prevent this woman and her friend from damaging his plane.
“One half hour, and I’m waiting right here.”
“Suit yourself.” Stubborn was too mild a description for Darcy Shea. Before entering his room, he made sure she understood. “Under no circumstances will you be flying.”
“But—”
He bolted for his room before she could finish protesting.
Jack should have known this little project would end in disaster. He shouldn’t have given in to those pretty eyes, but Darcy Shea had a talent for talking him into doing precisely what he didn’t want to do.
Thus, one day later the motor lay in pieces on the ground, with Burrows due on the three-thirty train. Jack did not want to witness the explosion when Burrows saw his motor torn apart. He hoped Darcy’s powers of persuasion also worked on fiery mechanics.
“I don’t suppose you can finish before three-thirty,” he asked Simmons, who was standing on a ladder propped against the fuselage.
The kid grunted and pulled a valve out of the number three cylinder. He handed it to Darcy, who then placed it in order on the white sheet she’d spread on the barn floor. Rows and rows of parts, each carefully cleaned and labeled.
She stepped back to survey Simmons’s progress. “Don’t worry, we’ll have it apart by then.”
“And repaired?”
Darcy blinked slowly, taking it in. “You said not to fix it. Just take it apart. That’s what you said.”
Her voluminous overalls left everything to the imagination except two delicate ankles, and her hair had been braided and coiled so tightly that she looked like a spinster, but her smile could charm a dead man. It sent prickles across his skin.
“Are you listening to me?” she demanded.
Jack nodded.
“Well, don’t change your instructions halfway through the project.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He was tempted to salute. She certainly acted like an officer. “I’m just anxious to finish.”
She cocked her head. “It would go faster if you helped.”
“I’m no mechanic.”
“Neither am I, but I’m helping.” Her long eyelashes brushed the top of her cheek when she blinked.
“You’re doing fine without me.” He nodded up at Simmons. “Besides, three’s a bit crowded.”
The Simmons kid glared, reinforcing Jack’s opinion that he had eyes for Darcy. Anyone could see it. Except Darcy.
Jack downed the last bit of coffee from his vacuum bottle and checked his watch. Nearly one o’clock. He yawned and stretched. Maybe he should help. But then he’d miss watching Darcy.
Simmons suddenly cried, “Found it.” The kid climbed down the ladder and waved the oil screen under Jack’s nose. “Plugged.”
“Huh.” Jack didn’t dare comment, or he’d give away that he knew more about the motor than he’d let on.
“What Hendrick means is a plugged screen stops the oil from flowing,” Miss Shea explained with unnecessary pertinence. “Without lubrication, the engine locks up.”
“Leave it for Burrows,” Jack snapped, irritated at being tutored like a novice. He’d been flying almost ten years. He knew more about planes than the whole population of Pearlman put together. “I’m going to get some lunch.”
Simmons stood dumbly staring at his feet, as if he expected something more.
“Repairs have to be made by the company mechanic,” Jack explained. He screwed the top on the vacuum bottle. “Thanks for the help.”
Simmons gulped and nodded, but Miss Shea braced her hands on her hips, oblivious to the grease she was depositing there. He could tell by the set of her mouth that she was angry.
“What is it?” Jack asked.
Her lips worked a full minute. “You know what.” She nodded toward Simmons, who was packing up his tools.
He hated when women assumed he could read their minds. “Humor me.”
She whispered, “Hendrick Simmons put in a lot of time on your plane, when he could have been working at the motor garage. He deserves some…compensation.”
“Why didn’t you say so?” Though it irritated him that she expected payment when they’d volunteered, he pulled out his wallet and settled with Simmons.
“Want a ride, Darcy?” asked the kid, pocketing the money.
She shook her head. “Brought my lunch.”
Simmons hesitated. Clearly, he didn’t want to leave Darcy alone with Jack, nor should he.
“I’m locking the barn.” Jack put on his cap. “I’m afraid you can’t stay, Miss Shea.”
Jack’s words spurred Simmons on his way, but Darcy took her time gathering her lunch basket. “I’m going to eat under the big oak. I brought roast beef sandwiches. There’s enough to share.”
“Share?” Jack wasn’t so sure that was wise.
“What’s wrong? You don’t eat beef? Or is it the company you find objectionable?”
“Not at all.” He searched for an excuse. “I wanted something hot.”
“I can set your sandwich in the sun.”
He had to double-check, but sure enough, Darcy Shea was teasing. It had been a long time since a woman had teased him, and it felt good. “That won’t be necessary.”
“Then you’ll join me?”
“After an invitation like that, how could I refuse?”
She unpacked the basket beneath the big oak: sandwiches wrapped in paper and a mason jar filled with a pale yellow liquid that had to be lemonade. His mouth watered. He hadn’t sipped a lemonade in years.
“What else do you have in that basket of yours?” He made sure he stood a good ten feet away.
“Dill pickles, boiled eggs and blackberry pie, but you’ll have a hard time eating them from there.” She plopped to the ground and pointed to the grassy expanse in front of her. “Plenty of room to sit.”
He dropped to the grass and bounded right back up. The ground was littered with thousands of acorns. “I don’t suppose you remembered a blanket and wine.”
“It’s lunch, not a picnic. Besides, Michigan happens to be dry, Mrs. Lawrence’s notwithstanding.”
“I know that,” he said, though he found the tone a bit too temperance for his liking. Jack didn’t drink alcohol for personal reasons, not due to some self-righteous cause. He brushed the acorns away so he could sit with reasonable comfort.
“How do you know Michigan’s dry? You’re from New York.”
A wet state doesn’t need blind pigs, Jack wanted to say, but that was a conversation Jack did not care to have, so he turned its direction. “I live and work on Long Island, but I grew up in Buffalo.”
She gave him a peculiar look. “Buffalo? You’re from Buffalo? How odd. Everyone seems to be from there these days.”
“Who is ‘everyone’?”
She shrugged. “No one important.”
After an awkward silence during which the ants made progress toward the lunch basket and Darcy fussed with her napkin, Jack ventured, “Did you make the pie?”
“What if I say I did?”
“It’s not a competition. I don’t care who baked the pie. I’m just making conversation.”
“Oh.” A lovely, dusky blush rose in her cheeks. It was nice to know Miss Darcy Shea could be embarrassed. “I thought, well…never mind.”
He stretched out on the grass, leaning on one elbow, and tipped his cap back so he could watch her every move. If she’d give up that defensive shield she put around herself, she’d be downright attractive.
She unscrewed the lid on the mason jar. “We’ll have to share, unless you still have coffee.”
“Tough luck. It ran out a half hour ago.”
“I suppose I have enough for two.” She set the jar between them and took a bite of her sandwich. She even looked attractive chewing.
He checked the sandwich. Beef and mustard. Homemade bread, with its rich, yeasty aroma. It had been ages since he’d eaten anything other than bakery bread.
“What happens when your mechanic arrives?” she asked while he was chewing. “Will he have the replacement parts? Does he know what to bring? What did you tell him when you talked on the telephone?”
Jack choked down the food. “Is this an interview?”
This time no blush, just an enigmatic twist of the mouth. “I’m just curious.”
Jack ripped his gaze away. “He’ll bring everything he can. But if he doesn’t have a replacement part, we’ll have to wire the factory.”
It looked as if she perked up, but maybe it was his imagination.
“Where is the factory?”
He poured some lemonade into his coffee cup. “Do you have a cup? I’ll pour.”
“Oh, yes.” She dug around in the basket and came up with a glass.
While he poured, she repeated her question. “So where is the factory?”
“The main plant is in Buffalo, but all the prototypes come out of Long Island, under the direct supervision of G.H. himself.”
“G.H.?”
“Curtiss. Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of G.H. Curtiss.”
“Of course I have,” she said rather quickly, and for a second he thought she was lying, but she followed with a litany of facts that would impress anyone. “Flew the Rheims Racer to the Gordon Bennett trophy at Rheims. Winner of The Scientific American Cup and the New York World prize for flying between Albany and New York in less than a day. Maker of the JN biplanes.”
“All right, all right. I don’t need a history lesson.”
“So he designed this plane?”
“At least in part.” He sampled the lemonade. Tart but refreshing.
“I’m guessing it’s designed for distance flight.”
What was she getting at? “The plane’s ultimate use is not my concern.”
“You just fly them, right?”
“That’s right.” But there was something about the brightness of her eyes that got to him, that made him say things he shouldn’t. “This flight was a special test.”
“For distance.” She leaned forward. “It had to be. How far can it go on one fueling?”
He shrugged and picked up a hard-boiled egg. “Farther than here.”
She laughed at his joke, but he could see her calculating. “To Chicago and back is a long way. Hundreds of miles in each direction. How many miles can a gallon of fuel go? Not that many. Oh, my. That’s a lot of fuel. The military must be spending a fortune on this.”
He rolled the egg between his hands. “I wouldn’t know.”
“Do they know you’re here?” she asked breathlessly. Her lips parted, moist from the lemonade. She couldn’t possibly know what that did to him.
