Hold 'Em: Vegas Top Guns, Book 3 (18 page)

“Ah,
fuck
, Leah.”

Nothing mattered because she was there with him. She’d taken him into the abyss with her, where they floated together.

Chapter Twenty

The excitement of his first Red Flag as an Aggressor crept up on Mike like a slow fever. The days became a countdown as the time remaining for him to prepare dwindled to nothing. Even the weekend he should’ve spent with Leah in bed was traded for hours on base.

He’d graduated from the simulator to an F-16 on the previous Thursday. Fang, Kisser and Dash had all blown him out of the sky. More hours of practice. More time in the air.

Finally his brain stopped fighting the wrongness of flying as the enemies he’d fought for years. Whether Iraqi or Afghani or any other possible hostile, his reflexes became attuned to those unfamiliar nuances. He’d always flown by gut instinct and, to Mike’s surprise, this was no different. Just someone else’s guts.

At oh four hundred on the Monday of the Red Flag against the NATO pilots, Mike was called into Fang’s office where he soaked in the sight of Leah decked out in her flight gear. She looked as cold and calculating as Mike had ever seen. At that moment, on the verge of taking to the skies, he found nothing but appreciation for her skill. To be honest, he wouldn’t be flying so soon without her constant, rapacious prodding.

This was no time to probe deeper. His feelings about Leah—and about women flying—would wait. Everyone had a job to do.

“Princess says you’re ready for this, and I’ve seen real growth,” Fang said. “Are we all on the same page here?”

Mike nodded. Leah’s approval did uncomfortable things to his body, coalescing in a hard pulse at the pit of his stomach. “Absolutely, sir. I’m ready to be bad.”

“Good to hear that, bandit. You’re on her wing. Stay cool, keep your eyes open and watch out for that steep learning curve.” The major gave him an abrupt nod. “You’ve done well.”

“Thank you, sir,” he said with a nod.

“Now, if I’m not mistaken, Princess has something to show you. See you in the air, Strap.”

“This way, Captain.” She led him into the corridor.

Mike followed her through the offices and toward the darkened airfield. Floodlights illuminated where ghost-on-gray F-16s lined up like huge, menacing toys. His fever of excitement rushed back. When he’d participated in Red Flag training exercises in the past, he’d done so as a member of the allied blue force. Bandit pilots wearing enemy colors had seemed larger than life, full of tricks and skills that repeatedly hammered him down. Each failure on his part had woven into the learning process. He’d become a better pilot every time he flew against those wily, faceless opponents.

Now he was one of them.

Best of the best.

The spring in his step should’ve been annoying as hell, but he deserved it after so many hours of brain-bending work. That he got to take this walk with Leah was especially satisfying. He couldn’t face that emotion, not yet, but it was there anyway—proud excitement right beneath his sternum.

“Here ya go,” Leah said.

She stopped before one particular jet, hands propped on her hips.

Mike blinked out of his thoughts. God, she looked amazing. Sleek. Mysterious in the dawn shadows. Somewhere along the way, a woman with a ballerina’s build had become a fighter pilot. The combination of soft and feminine, hard and competent, made his blood fizz.

“Show me what?”

She flicked her eyes toward the plane, specifically the seam where the cockpit’s glass met the fuselage. “It’s yours.”

Capt. Mike Templeton.

That pride behind his sternum swelled to something painful but something glorious at the same time.

“Damn,” he whispered. “I like the look of that.”

Leah’s distant expression eased. They hadn’t slept together since the round that had started with karaoke and finger-fucking in the women’s bathroom. The whole weekend had been theirs to indulge. Each encounter became easier and more pleasurable. The novelty remained—at least, it seemed to for her—just as their roles had become decidedly more confident. They’d mainlined each other for forty-eight hours.

Ages ago, it seemed.

“You’ve worked hard for this, Mike. I’m proud of you.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

Her eyes widened. The courtesy had slipped from his tongue without thought. If Mike pleased her, Leah told him as much. That was how their time as lovers went. God help him, he
really
enjoyed pleasing her. He’d just never reached a point where his professional and sex lives bled so heavily into one another.

Leah glanced around. The menacing Aggressors were emerging from the hangar. Fang led the way, looking all sorts of in charge, with arrogant Tin Tin a half step behind. Dash and Eric followed, both shooting the shit in the early dawn quiet.

Fully twenty pilots in total. Badasses, every one of them.

Mike had been sure Leah would cut off their personal vibe. In the face of her friends and squad mates, why wouldn’t she? But she cleared her throat.

“Pet?”

The twitch in his dick had to be from the excitement of their pending objective. Surely. Yet he couldn’t find it in himself to pretend.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Give ’em hell.”

She sauntered toward her own jet. Crewmen wheeled out ladders and helped prep the pilots for flight. Mike held his arms out as a flushed-faced Airman First Class double-checked the loops and harnesses.

The young man slapped Mike on the shoulder. “All set, sir. Good hunting.”

Mike climbed up the ladder and into his cockpit. He brushed his fingers along the freshly stenciled letters of his name. Fucking A. What a power trip.

Thirty minutes later, his jet was in line for takeoff. The leashed power of the F-16 raced like fire up his forearms. Incendiary. He’d launched in combat sorties more times than he could remember, but this moment held a weight he couldn’t ignore. He needed to prove himself. Leah and the others still thought of him, rightly, as the new guy. He refused to be the weak cog in their practiced machine.

The sun had barely tipped up from the flat, desolate Nevada horizon. Somewhere out there were fuzzy-minded tourists and hangovers and fortunes won and lost. That was Vegas.

This was Mike on the verge of a fantastic Monday morning.

Voices clicked and sniped in his radio as pilots checked in with the tower. Leah was next to take off. He watched her jet turn on to the runway. Its nose aligned with the painted guide strips and winking lights. A roar of sound washed back toward him as she screamed down the tarmac. She flew as gracefully as she breathed.

Out across the desert, where they encamped in their temporary Red Flag barracks, the NATO pilots were lining up on their own runways. Nervous as hell. Cocky. Ready to make mistakes that could one day cost their lives.

Time to learn them a thing or two.

“Standby, Strap Happy,” came a voice in his ear. “And…go.”

He punched the throttle and owned the sky.

The after-flight briefing, Mike decided, was designed to reinforce the fact of solid ground beneath his feet. Pilots on both sides of the exercise had congregated in a darkened lecture room to review video footage, key computer data and expert tactical observers’ conclusions. Seated next to Eric on an uncomfortable folding chair, Mike took careful notes, both mentally and on paper. Adrenaline and excitement waned with every passing minute, but not his sense of accomplishment.

Nor his determination to improve.

He’d not only survived his first official day as an Aggressor, he’d taken down two opponents—one just as the NATO hotshot had swooped out of Leah’s line of sight. The coordinated punches they’d delivered were nearly as invigorating as sex.

That shouldn’t have been the case. Not even close. He’d never flown with a woman on his wing, and certainly not one who evoked such possessive feelings.

Once released from their classroom obligations, pilots streamed back toward the hangar. Congratulatory bullshit followed—the standard trash talk that followed a good day in the air. Mike smiled, oddly at peace to be in such a place in his life.

“Hey, wait up,” Leah called. Jogging to catch up with Mike, she wore darker-than-night aviator shades that reflected a goofy-ass picture of his smile.

“Thanks for that, up there.” She lifted her face toward the patch of sky they’d just owned. “You saved my butt.”

“Not bad for my first day up?”

“Not at all.”

Mike rubbed his neck, which was filthy with sweat and desert dust. “Shit, I need a shower.”

He hadn’t meant it as a come-on. Not really. The quirk of her mouth, however, turned his simple declaration into one. Still, he wasn’t going to be the one to push. That wasn’t their MO. He wouldn’t say no to a Monday night quickie. He wasn’t going to ask for it either.

He didn’t beg while on base. Period.

“What are you doing tonight?” she asked, taking off her sunglasses.

The fire was brighter there, making her dark irises irresistible. A certain vulnerability waited too.

“Tonight? No plans.”

“Want to make some?”

The leap in his blood was a damn fine way to counter hours of debriefing. He’d spent the day zipping through clouds at Mach one. That power roared back at the thought of spending the rest of the night at Leah’s command.

Yet he didn’t want regrets. Not from either of them. He flicked his gaze around the parking lot. Tin Tin’s Aston was nowhere to be seen, and the rest of the vehicles were fast departing for off-duty destinations.

“You sure?”

Leah shrugged. “It’s been hard, you know? With you training and me needing to be the one to ride you about it.”

Mike grinned, but she only gave him a
bite me
look.

“You know what I mean,” she said. “I didn’t… I didn’t like mixing the two. Does that make sense?”

He nodded. While forced into near-adversarial roles in the simulator, he hadn’t felt able to let go of his off-hours resentment of her seniority and skill. He loved the idea of being her colleague in full now. No sticky egos to get in the way.

“Yeah, it makes sense.”

He edged closer, trying to keep his body language from spelling out too many obvious truths. That he wanted her. That he wanted her to take control. She smelled of sweat and jet wash, but his cock didn’t give a right damn.

“But, Leah?”

“Hm?”

“If we do this, we’re going to have to tell people eventually.”

She made a sour face. “We don’t have to do anything, Mike.”

Bristling, he realized how little he liked the short form of his name coming from her. Too casual. It turned him into just another guy she knew.

“I keep enough secrets,” he said slowly. “I don’t want to be your dirty one.”

“Why not?” She glanced around the parking lot. Her eyes were as quick as her reflexes in the sky. “Secrets are fun. For example, tomorrow I’ll know that under your flight suit are red stripes from your nape to your fine, tight ass.”

Mike’s mind fuzzed at the edges. “You know that, do you?”

“Yes, pet. I do.”

Shit. She was hardcore. Suddenly he was a hot ball of fire. Whatever she imagined was crystal clear in her mind, although he wouldn’t know until it happened. The devious thirst for what they shared was there on her face, curling those crooked lips into a smile made for sin. There in the hangar parking lot, Mike could only lock down the way his flesh washed with hot and cold, all sensation, all anticipation.

“You know best, ma’am.”

She tossed her head with a laugh then straddled her bike. She kicked it to life. “Race you, Michael.”

Chapter Twenty-One

As Leah stood in line beside Mike, then watched him pay for entry to the Las Vegas car show, she realized she was a little slow—possibly verging on dumb, despite what the US Air Force seemed to believe of her.

Because she’d accidentally ended up on a date.

She knew for sure when Mike turned away from the ticket window and his side-quirked grin made her stomach flutter.

Damn it.
A car show shouldn’t have been a big deal. She and Jon had gone the year before. He’d zipped around the venue with surprisingly unchecked enthusiasm. Instead of feigning the bored playboy, he’d spouted car facts and engineering numbers like a Class-A gearhead. A great time, overall.

So when Leah had spotted the full-page ad in the paper, she hadn’t thought it a huge deal to turn to Mike and suggest they go. After all, a drizzly rain meant no bike rides for entertainment. They’d come to enjoy sharing long, aggressive rides along endless desert highways.

Now
it sank in that she’d been wearing only a tank top and a pair of panties while sitting at Mike’s counter, trying to swig down a cup of his atrocious coffee. After yet another night of smokin’ hot sex, that sure sounded like the best way to arrange a date.

Whoops.

That wasn’t to say she was
opposed
to the idea of dating Mike. It was the next logical step after how much time they’d been spending together. Leah was so one of the guys that no one would think it strange if she went to look at fancy cars with a squad mate.