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She blinked at him. “Of course I have. Actually, lots of times. Miles and miles and miles. How about you?”
“Obviously I’ve flown,” he countered with his version of her answer to him. He saw her grimace. “I’ve been flying since I was twenty, and soloed before my twenty-first birthday,” he added quickly. “Since then, it’s one thrilling air ride for me after another.”
“I bet,” she muttered as she compulsively twisted the strap of her purse around her forefinger.
He didn’t have the time to talk her into sitting back and relaxing so she could enjoy a “top of the world” flight that would be like no other in her life. The next couple of hours could be fun, but he didn’t say any of that. He had a gut feeling that if he did, she’d start one of her bursts of nervous chatter.
So instead he stared right in those green eyes that had flares of gold at the pupils, and said as evenly as he could, “Let’s get you home.”
Her eyes widened slightly, and he had a momentary fear that she was not only a babbler when she got scared or excited, but she was a crier. Thankfully that didn’t happen. She managed a weak smile and said softly, “Yes, home,” and went toward the side of the plane.
He came up behind her and cupped her elbow to help her up onto the wing. “Grab the door by the bottom, then ease back as you lift it.” She did as he directed and the wing door went up. He was merely helping a client into the plane. No rules, even if they were his own rules, had been broken. He almost laughed at that, remembering how she’d thought fast enough to con him into this flight with a bogus retainer.
He got onto the wing himself, let her get seated, and then warned. “Don’t touch any controls. And be careful about the foot levers, just keep your feet off of them.”
She nodded and shut the door. It only took him a minute to get behind the controls. He was aware of Merry buckling in as he contacted the tower, got his take off position and instructions for taxiing, then he started the plane. He motioned to the same set of controls in front of her. “If we have time, I’ll give you a flying lesson,” he offered to try and ease the tension.
She gasped at him with what sounded like horror, and he smiled. “Just kidding,” he said.
Within minutes, they were on the runway, positioned for takeoff. Once they got clearance, it was flaps up and trim set for takeoff. He released the brakes and with the throttle fully open, the journey began. As the motor revved higher and higher, they gathered speed. At about sixty-five miles per hour, that moment came when the tires left the ground and there was nothing but air around the plane as the earth fell away.
He loved that transition—an addiction he freely admitted to—he loved flying, having this plane at his beck and call. It was the best fringe benefit of his success. But one glance at his passenger and Gage knew she wasn’t sharing any of his excitement at all.
She sat still, her hands gripping her knees, her eyes tightly shut, and he could see her taking deep breaths. Then her lips started to move silently. Praying? Oh, boy, he thought. “You okay?” he asked as they reached cruising altitude.
“Fine,” she replied, barely breaking the rhythm of her breathing and quiet chanting. If she wasn’t careful she was going to hyperventilate.
He eyed her. “I guess no one’s pointed out to you during all those flights you had, that flying is safer than driving?”
She kept her eyes closed. “Sure, that’s what they say, but no one adds that if you’re in a car and there’s a problem, you can pull to the side of the road, even if your motor explodes, but in a plane—” Her words cut off and she started that deep breathing and lip movement again.
Some kind of Zen thing, he thought, but said, “Never mind. Forget I mentioned that. The engines are not going to explode, and I know what I’m doing. It’s all good.”
“Fine,” she muttered, but went right back to her “exercises.”
“So, you’re going to Wolf Lake?”
She exhaled on a sigh and he couldn’t tell if it was from him annoying her with questions, or that special breathing she’d been doing. “Yes.”
He’d thought he could distract her, but now he wasn’t sure that was possible. “And you know Moses.”
“I told you that already, and I can’t talk, I have to count,” she said, her arms wrapping around herself so tightly her knuckles whitened.
“Count?”
“Please, yes, let me count.” He did as she asked while he checked the GPS, banked southwest into the flight plan, then set auto pilot and sat back in the seat. Looking over at Merry again, he took in the whole picture and came to the conclusion that she was not the type of woman who would blow your socks off at first, but the kind that probably grew on you as you discovered more about her. He noticed the straightness of her nose, and the sweep of her jaw, a delicate angle. And those freckles. He’d never thought about it before, but the freckles in some way made her seem vulnerable.
He couldn’t recall ever seeing her in Wolf Lake before, although he hadn’t been back to town in a long time. Now, his older brother, Jackson, was dealing with the loss of his wife and not doing well. His other brother, Adam, had taken off for Chicago with a woman who had visited Wolf Lake around Christmas, and now he was helping the woman and father in a legal battle. He didn’t understand much of what Adam was doing, but he knew it was so important to Adam that he left his job as a detective in Dallas, Texas, to go to Chicago with this lady called Faith.
Now Gage was on his way back, but not exactly for a visit. He looked at Merry, watching her lips moving again, and realized at one time he knew everyone in town, at least by sight, but now he figured there might be a lot of people who were total strangers to him. Just like Merry Brenner. The idea she was a friend of Moses’s, well, he really did want to learn more about Merry and her association with the good doctor.
“You okay?” he dared to asked again.
“Fine,” she breathed softly.
“Counting?”
“Yes.”
“You know, I once heard that an interviewer’s worst fear was a guest who gave one word answers. I think I finally understand what was meant by that.”
He thought she might smile at that, or at least stop counting whatever she was counting, but she didn’t. The only positive change was her flexing her fingers as if to ease the tension there. But her eyes stayed shut and the counting went on.
He checked the instrument panel, and then looked back at Merry. “Is there any point in my asking what you’re counting?”
When a long moment went by with no response, Gage was ready to give up, get through the trip in silence and wish her good luck once they landed. What she counted was her own business. Then she surprised him by saying, “Bubbles.”
“What?”
She exhaled, slowly rested her hands on her thighs and leaned back in the seat. Her eyes fluttered open, but they stayed focused on what was ahead of them, a growing cloud bank and thin beams of sunlight feebly cutting through them. “You know, the kind you blew as a kid that you could make from dish soap or get in those little plastic bottles?”
“Sure, but—”
She kept talking as if he hadn’t tried to say anything. “When I was little, I’d get away from wherever we were living at the time, find some grass and blow bubbles while I laid on my back. I’d watch them float up and up and up, until they either disappeared or burst.” She stopped and he saw her bite her lip. He could tell she wished she hadn’t said that. “Like most kids,” she added quickly.
He liked the feeling of her sharing, even if it she seemed to think it had been a mistake on her part. “My method of getting away was to go up to the lake at night,” he admitted, surprising himself that he’d said that out loud to her. It wasn’t something that had been brought up in any conversation for years.
“What would a Carson have to get away from?” she asked, finally turning to him. “You know the lake?”
“I was born in Wolf Lake. Obviously, I know the lake. I didn’t see it until I was maybe six years old, just before we left, but I’d heard about it all my life. The magic of how the full moon turns that whole area of wild grass into a rippling ocean moved by the breeze.”
She was born there? He shifted in his seat. She wasn’t familiar at all. He tried to think of families he’d known in the past, but nothing came to him. “You know, I don’t remember a Brenner family.”
“How about the Casey family?”
Casey? Yes, he remembered a family named Casey, and a child, but he couldn’t recall if the child was a boy or a girl. But he clearly remembered the father, Jerry Casey, a good man who had worked on the roads, and on some of the ranches around the area. Jerry had died young, and he couldn’t remember seeing the mother or the child after that.
“Jerry Casey?” he asked.
When she looked at him, her green eyes widened. “My dad.”
“I think he worked for my dad off and on.”
“Yes, he helped with fencing on your ranch, and he ran some of your cattle.”
So, he wasn’t helping out a stranger after all, and it was indeed a small world. “So you left and got married?”
“Oh, no. I mean, yes, we left—my mother, me and my stepfather, Mike Brenner. I got his last name because he was in the Air Force, and the benefits were better if we were actually family.”
He glanced at the control panel, then back at Merry. She seemed a bit less tense now. “So, you left and came back?”
“I left because I had to, and I came back because I wanted to.”
“Why did you want to?”
“We were constantly uprooted. The air force reassigned my stepfather to lots and lots of places in this country and Europe,” she explained. “A year here, a year there, and no real home.” She grimaced slightly. “I hated it. Some people would love to roam the world, but all I wanted was some place to call home.”
His choice would have been the roaming, going where he wanted to, exactly as he did with his business. “So, you returned to Wolf Lake?”
“Yes. When I graduated with a degree in Child Psychology, I did some clinical work, and met a lady who had a clinic in Arizona for Native children. It fascinated me, really making a difference and not being in an office setting.”
She hadn’t glanced out the front window for a few minutes, and Gage saw that as a positive step in keeping her calm. Especially since the clouds were starting to show signs of high wind, and he could feel the tugging at the plane.
“I’m certified to work with developmentally delayed children, and put in for several grants. Fate stepped in and I got an offer from The Family Center to work with the Native children and anyone else local in Wolf Lake.”
“So you took the grant offer?” Gage asked a bit distractedly as he felt another tug at the plane and he checked the control panel. The sky around them was steel gray and darkening while the wind was gaining speed and changing direction. He flipped off the autopilot and took control again just as snow began to show up in the wind that was driving at them.
“Yes, I did, and moved back to town about six months ago.”
“I was there when they put in The Family Center,” he murmured, keeping a close eye on the sky in front of them. He flipped on the radio, got an update through his earpiece, and felt a bit uneasy when he heard that the storm, predicted to curve to the east and go south, had changed course to the west, almost curling around to get ahead of them in their flight path.
“Moses told me that when I arrived, he supervises the grant, as I told you before. I’m there for two years to study the effects of certain therapies that are being developed. There are about ten kids right now in the program and...”
Gage adjusted their speed and banked slightly away from the wind. He didn’t realize that Merry had stopped speaking and was staring at him until she touched his arm.
“What’s wrong?” she asked tightly.
CHAPTER THREE
GAGE FELT THE pressure from her fingers through the denim of his jacket. “Nothing, it’s just a shift in the wind.”
“What does that mean?” she demanded.
He glanced at her fingers on his jacket sleeve, then over to her green eyes growing wide with concern. “The wind shifts in direction, and that’s what’s happened. I have to compensate for it.”
“And?”
“I’m compensating for it,” he repeated, feeling her touch disappear from his arm.
“Didn’t they tell you this could happen at the airport?”
“I was more worried about my plane,” he admitted and immediately regretted that statement.
“What was—or is—wrong with it?” she asked, her low voice belying her growing panic. She laced her fingers tightly in her lap, but never took her eyes off of him.
“I had to check a few things,” he said evasively. He wasn’t about to tell her about the minor electrical problem that had been corrected. He could only imagine what she’d do if she heard that right now.
“What things?”
The plane was flying smoothly now, more at ease with the wind, but the clouds were getting thicker toward the south, and the heavy darkness that warned about coming snow, was ominous. “It was an easy fix. I was only down for a few hours.”
She didn’t respond, just wrapped her arms around herself again and closed her eyes. The counting started again.
“You know, I’ve been meaning to ask you something...”
The counting stopped and then she opened her eyes and turned toward him. “What is it?”
“Well, I was wondering why you keep counting the bubbles when it doesn’t seem to be working for you?”
“Because I never mastered yoga or meditation. A therapist I trained with used it in therapy, and suggested it to me. Plain old diversion.” She was rocking a bit now. “Count something that is beautiful and gentle and calming to you, and match the counting to your breathing, and...” She sighed. “It’s supposed to work. It did work on the commercial flight today, but...it did work, it can work, but it’s not working now.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, having no idea what it would be like to be scared of something as incredible as flying.
“Now, can I ask you a question?” she said almost in a whisper.
“Go ahead.”
“Why did you buy such a small plane when you’ve obviously got money and could get one of those big silver corporate jets?”
He wanted to laugh at her question, but he bit it back, instinctively knowing that really wouldn’t go over well with her at that moment. “It’s what I wanted,” he said, not about to start discussing runway length and the fact that he liked it smaller so he could fly alone as much as possible.
“Why?”
He stared at her. “It’s green. My favorite color,” he said, referring to the panel again. The storm was approaching faster than he’d anticipated, but worse than that, he could feel a catch in the rhythm of the plane. A blip of some sort.
The plane shook against resistance then, and she exhaled on a long sigh. “I feel a bit green myself,” she muttered, eyes shut again, and he just bet those bubbles were being counted, too.
“Listen, I’ve flown this route many times with no trouble. I know it so well I could close my eyes and land us safely at the landing strip on the ranch. I’ve done it before.”
“You what?”
“I’m kidding,” he said quickly. “It’s just a joke. I’m wide awake, always am when I’m flying, and we’ll be in Wolf Lake before you know it.” Platitudes, he admitted to himself, but he was at a loss to figure out anything he could say that would put her at ease. That didn’t mean that he’d stop trying, however. “We have radar, a flight tracker, GPS.” He tapped the screen in front of him. “Every gadget we need to get there is in this panel and on this plane, so don’t worry. It’s all good.”
The wind buffeted the plane to one side and she gasped, “What about that?” She pointed an unsteady finger at the storm clearly gathering in the distance. “That looks horrible.”
He scanned the screen and said in what he hoped was a reassuring voice, “It’s not pretty, but it won’t get to us before we get to where we want to be. If worse comes to worst, we’ll fly around it and take a bit more time to get home, or if it gets sloppy and spreads out, we’ll climb high enough to go over it.”
She was trembling slightly, he noticed, and he was flooded with a foreign feeling of protectiveness. He didn’t like that at all. He didn’t want to be totally responsible for her safety. He went through a lot on his own, answering to no one but himself, but this would be different.
Everything he’d have to do from here on out would be done for both of them, not just him. The usual rush he got from danger, or uncertainty, was gone since it wasn’t only his life at stake anymore. Not by a long shot. One glance at Merry and his stomach clenched. He turned away from the sight of her before he gave in to an overwhelming need to touch her and say, “We’ll make it.” He wasn’t a good liar, and he couldn’t say those words with any conviction right then.
So Gage did what he knew, and got on the radio, trying to make contact with the nearest tower to give them his coordinates. How he wished he’d never listened to Merry in the terminal and never said he’d bring her back home to Wolf Lake....
When he heard a report from the tower through the static about the changing direction and speed of the winds, and the mess they were heading right into, he knew he had to think fast.
“What are we going to do?” Merry asked in an unsteady voice.
If she hadn’t been with him, he would have made an immediate decision and never second guessed himself. Never. But with her, he was going back and forth, contemplating about going up or heading off to the side. He hated uncertainty, knowing that his slightest hesitation could mess things up for them. “We’ll go up,” he said with more conviction than he felt.
