Pilot Error (19 page)

Whether or not Luke would mind became a moot point. Crumpling his empty MRE packaging into a ball, he winced. As he dragged over his camera bag, which was never far from his side, and pulled out his watch, Micki caught a glimpse of his blistered palms. Her own blisters from rowing, while not as extensive, burned like fire. She knew Luke's had to be worse.

Her gaze traveled up to the bump on his forehead. The swelling from his knock on the plane seemed to have subsided some and there was no abrasion to the skin. The blisters on his hands, though, were another matter. They needed attention, and doing something useful would help her relax.

Giving what remained of her dinner to Fizz, she rose and crossed to her backpack to search for her first aid kit. Luke moved to the nearest window and cautiously peered out. The lightning flashed. Untroubled by it, he folded the interior board shutters across the pane and slid down the latch to protect them should the glass break, never knowing how much that simple act greatly helped ease her misgivings.

Moving to the next window to repeat the action, he said casually, "You know, those field rations aren't too bad. The 'Chicken Alfredo' almost tasted like chicken."

"The 'Beef Stew' wasn't much better," she agreed.

"Fizz didn't mind it."

Micki cocked an eyebrow at him. "Yeah, well, if you could see some of the things Fizz gets into when we go beachcombing, you wouldn't think his taste buds were so impressive."

Luke laughed.

The conversation was light; this was her opening. "Since when do JAG officers eat field rations anyway?"

It was a wild guess, but from his expression, she knew she'd hit the bull's eye. Luke tried to cover, and she might have been fooled if not for the dogtags nestled against her skin.

"JAG officer? Is that some kind of Coast Guard slang?" Luke looked at her as he crossed back to the blanket, but his gaze didn't quite hold hers long enough to be convincing.

"The Judge Advocate General. You're a military lawyer, and my guess is you're here undercover to investigate Razor's crash." Pulling the beaded chain from under her sweatshirt, she pitched the dogtags at him. "The Navy didn't have enough planes to check out these guys, so they decided to sacrifice mine?"

Luke hesitated a moment. "Yes and no," he finally admitted, slipping the ID tags about his neck. "I am Navy JAG, but I'm not here officially—just following a hunch. NCIS would be crawling all over this place otherwise." He pulled the blanket around his shoulders again, meeting her gaze directly. "Besides, they wouldn't give an investigation like this to a relative of the deceased."

The grief in his expression stayed Micki's retort. Leaving him to his thoughts, she took the first aid kit and settled back under the blanket. She swiveled to look at the man sharing its warmth, unaware the movement brought the outside of her thigh snugly up against his. "What made you first suspect it wasn't 'pilot error' that killed Ray?"

Luke hiked up his knee and rested his elbow on it. The light was failing steadily, cloaking them with twilight brought on early by the storm, but from her close vantage, Micki could still see his unguarded expression. When he finally spoke, his answer seemed to neglect her question.

"You know how Ray just took things as they came, with a joke or a line so thin no one in their right mind would fall for it?"

Micki smiled faintly, recalling the night at
The Sandpiper
when Razor's easygoing manner had saved Tex and Padre from a stomping by a group of visiting Key West jet jocks. "I remember."

"Well, there's another side to him too." Luke's lips tightened slightly as he corrected his statement. "There
was
another side to him. I never once saw him lose his head in an emergency. If there was one thing he took seriously, it was flying. The moment I heard about the crash, I just knew in my gut that Ray couldn't have possibly panicked and lost control the way they said he did."

"Me neither." Looking down, Micki selected a packet containing an antiseptic swab and tore it open. She needed something to do—anything to give her an excuse not to look at the pain in her companion's eyes.

Luke's gaze was on her hands but it was obvious he wasn't focused on what she was doing. "Pilot error did not down that helo, Micki. They were twenty feet above two men in the water. I think Ray knew he was going down, so he ditched as far from them as he could. He saved their lives, at the cost of his own."

"How'd you know about those engine spacer things? You said you'd seen stuff like that before?"

"Yeah. My department has prosecuted other aviation crashes involving sub-standard bearings and spacers. I never made the connection until after Ray..."

Micki spared him from having to say the word again. "What connection?"

"This," Luke said, moving the arm still balanced on his knee and indicating the gold timepiece on his wrist. "Your pal Jurgensen was right, you know, it is a fake."

"I don't get it. How is that a connection to anything?"

"Ray gave this to me," Luke said of the watch. "He told me he bought it from a friend for a really good price. I think he believed it was the real deal."

Not liking the implications of that, Micki reached for Luke's right hand. She still refused to believe that Dirk was anything other than misjudged.

Turning Luke's palm up, she examined the damage the oars had inflicted. As she gently applied the cool cleanser to his blisters, she said, "I guess you mean he gave that to you when he went home a couple of weeks ago, for his big brother's birthday." She looked at him as it dawned. "Wait—it was your birthday."

"Yeah, and I have to admit, fake or not, Ray's present was the talk of the evening. Mom and John were real impressed." Luke flinched as she swabbed a tender spot but did not reclaim his hand.

"You got together with your folks on your birthday? Wow, that's nice."

"All my brothers were there. And my sister-in-law. Birthdays are a big deal in my family."

Micki felt a pang of jealousy that surprised her. A beer party with the guys in Dirk's backyard had celebrated her last birthday. It had been a 'big deal,' but nothing like the images Luke's family gathering conjured up. Keeping her eyes diverted from his, she reached for his other hand.

Luke looked at his watch and continued his story. "I never told him or anyone. Didn't want to spoil his present. But after the crash, I knew I had to get down here and do a little snooping. So I took some personal leave and... here we are."

Micki traded the swab for some antibacterial ointment. "There'll be a thorough investigation, Luke, just as soon as the weather permits. When they dredge the helo, they'll find the same evidence you did and then Ray's actions will make sense. They'll change the ruling. I know they will."

"Yeah, I know that, too. I just hope they're not too late." He gestured at the empty shanty around them. "These guys are clearing out, and I want to make sure the right people go to jail."

"You will." Careful not to hurt him, Micki smoothed the ointment over his left palm and then covered it with sterile gauze.

Luke's eyes followed her progress as she bandaged his hands. "I'm sorry I got you into this, beautiful."

"Don't call me that," Micki returned automatically. She concluded her ministrations with a teasing smile to show she wasn't really angry.

Luke held her gaze with a sincerity that stirred her inside. A retreat to establish distance seemed a good idea, but before she could move away he caught her wrist and turned her palm up for a look.

She protested at once, trying to pull her hand free. "No, don't... it's not too bad. I can take care of it myself."

"It's getting dark in here. You won't be able to see what you're doing." Luke caught up the flashlight at his side, flicked it on, and handed it to her. "You hold this with one hand while I work on the other."

Micki wanted to refuse but he had a good point. Reluctantly, she stayed put. Luke's touch was gentle and, in the semi-darkness, it seemed all her focus was on the soft feel of his fingers on her skin. Her breathing quickened as he applied the antiseptic ointment with feathery strokes. His ministrations were cooling one fire, but kindling another of quite a different kind. Worse, she couldn't pull away without letting him know.

When he had bandaged the first hand and indicated she should switch the light over, she made sure to keep the beam well away from her face. The darkness was her only defense, the only way to hide the color he had brought to her cheeks.

Luke was about halfway through attending her other hand when the closeness grew uncomfortably intimate. He'd been so talkative while she was tending his blisters; why didn't he say something now? Why was she so tongue-tied? Micki forced her gaze from her hand being held in his strong fingers, but the feel of him smoothing ointment across her palm with the ball of his thumb made her want to wriggle in delight.

Desperate, she tried to defuse the rush of temptation with some idle banter. "I sure hope the Navy is offering some kind of reward for catching these creeps. As it is now,
Jacinto Scenic Flights
is permanently grounded. I need a new plane."

Luke grunted, unfazed. She caught sight of his profile as he reached for some sterile gauze... and had a sudden, insanely passionate desire to kiss him. How could he be so blind to what he was doing to her?

Securing the bandage, Luke lightly slipped his fingers around her injured palm. "There now," he said, taking the flashlight from her and flicking it off. In the dimness, Micki watched him lift her hand to his lips for a gentle kiss, and was captivated by the thought of his kisses falling elsewhere. "All better."

His breath was warm on her cool skin, making her shiver. A moment stretched between them, changed, and became mutually understood. Suddenly they both wanted the same thing. Micki wasn't sure which of them moved first, just that they were both slowly leaning toward each other. The anticipation of feeling his lips on hers was almost unbearable when, from one heartbeat to the next, she realized what she was doing. She was supposed to be maintaining distance here!

Pulling away, Micki scrambled to her feet and switched on the flashlight. She glanced at Fizz, who whined and cocked his head to one side as he studied the situation. "I've, um, got to put these supplies away."

Equally flustered by what had almost happened, Luke began gathering up the bits of trash left from their meal and the first aid supplies. "I'll help you."

For several moments, there was no conversation. Micki crossed to the table and there, from a safe distance, reorganized the first aid kit. Luke neatly compacted all the trash into a small pile then went to check on the storm through the shutterless window near the sink.

Sneaking a look at his back, Micki hoped that rescue was as close as the morning light, because her instinctive dislike of Luke Hardigan seemed to be fading as fast as the twilight. She had thought the day had been a long one. The way things were shaping up, the night promised to be even longer.

***

The storm peaked fifteen minutes later, with thunder like the rustle of sheet metal, sky-splitting forks of cloud-to-ground lightning, and enough rain to float The Ark.

Hovering over the rusty sink, Luke gazed out through the only window without a shutter. Lightning allowed him only subliminal images of the tiny key taking a pounding, making him hope that, in the morning, their sole way off that spit of land would still be tethered where they left it, and in one piece.

Grimly, he decided he didn't like the odds, but they would deal with that situation when they got to it. Right now, they had to deal with the current one. Correction:
he
had to deal with the current one, namely the hot-blooded yearning that the simple act of tending Micki's blisters had summoned forth.

Groaning to himself, Luke used the cover of darkness to glimpse his seemingly unflappable companion. She had unpacked her survival gear onto the rickety table and proceeded, under flashlight, to reorganize the contents with stoic military efficiency. Not, judging from the present disarray, that she was doing a real good job of it. What she was doing was handling the situation a hell of a lot better than him. Clearly, their almost-kiss hadn't breached her inner defenses the same way it had his. She was still secure behind that wall of hers, having patched the cracks caused by his momentary nearness with some more rock hard Jacinto Stone.

The lightning flashed at the small window at Luke's back and he watched Micki stiffen until it passed. Whatever she said, however much she denied it, lightning was the one thing that could crumble her private wall to rubble.

And his. The pure elemental fury of the storm made her look so afraid that every time she balked, he wanted to take her in his arms and never let her go. Luke wanted to fight the demons that hounded her there in their lightning-torn refuge, if only she would let him. All around raged forces that dwarfed them with their immensity and, if that weren't enough, somewhere within the dark maelstrom were men who wanted them dead.

At the thunderclap, Micki shuddered so violently that even Fizz lifted his head with a soft sound of concern.

"It's okay, boy," she said to him, a telling quaver in her voice. "We'll be all right."

"What do you say we try to get some sleep?" Luke suggested. Leaving the window, he crossed back to where they had left the thermal blanket after their meal. She'd come to his side once before, although she had denied it was for anything other than warmth. Perhaps he could again ease her distress under the pretense of a sensible idea. "Nobody's coming out in that—the Good Guys or the Bad Guys. We may as well rest while we can."