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The ticket agent’s magenta nails poised above her computer keys.
“Sir?”
“Don’t give her a ticket. I don’t want her going with me.”
“You can’t tell her what to do.”
“Ma’am?” He pleaded.
“I want to go with him!” Chessey wailed.
Derek shook his head. Considering this woman was a maximum of five-five and had less than half his weight on her frame, she wasn’t intimidated and certainly didn’t back down.
The third man in the line waiting to buy tickets harrumphed.
“If she loves you and is willing to make a go of it, you should give it another chance, young man,” he offered. “Too many young people think that they can just walk out on marriages without—”
“I’m not married to her!” Derek roared. “She’s a protocol specialist at the State Department who’s aching to make a promotion on baby-sitting me for a month. She followed me in a cab and talked my ear off all the way here about duty to my country and freedom meaning that she could go anywhere I went.”
For emphasis, he jabbed his fingers in Chessey’s direction and wasn’t comforted by her smile.
On any other woman it would have been a come-on, but on this protocol specialist he figured it was pure trouble.
“Why, Lieutenant Derek McKenna,” she said, slowly and carefully enunciating every syllable of his name. And she added for the benefit of the few people in the line who didn’t immediately do a double take, “Derek McKenna. It must be the stress of being a hero that’s making you act so erratically. You need rest. And some reassurance that America loves you. Oh, Lieutenant Derek McKenna, we all think you’re wonderful!”
“Derek McKenna?” The woman behind Chessey repeated.
“Derek McKenna,” Chessey confirmed.
The woman stared. Derek felt a queasy feeling in his stomach as he watched her dawning recognition.
“Derek McKenna!” she shrieked. “I’m so delighted to meet you. Could I get your autograph?”
As the woman yanked apart her carry-on luggage to find something to write with, the man who had given him a lecture on marital behavior pumped his hand.
“Just shaking hands with you is a privilege,” he said.
The rope-cordoned line surged toward Derek, with requests for autographs, kisses, pictures and handshakes running pretty much even. Derek craned to catch Chessey’s eye, to give her some indication that he held her directly responsible for this calamity or at least to make her feel miserable about herself—as she should! But Chessey coolly turned her back on him and pulled out her employee ID card.
“State Department, official business,” she said briskly, holding her ID out to the ticket agent. “I need a spot on the plane next to him.”
“One way or round trip?”
“Actually, let’s start talking flights from Elizabethtown to New York three days from now.”
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