Take Over at Midnight (The Night Stalkers)

by Buchman, M. L.

  “Normal.” He rested his hands back on his thighs. Not folded together. Not arms crossed. Just resting on his thighs. A position from which he could move to defense or offense most rapidly. She hadn’t even seen it and he lived that way. In a world where that was required. “You’re faster than most.”

  “Didn’t work though, did it?”

  He offered her a soft smile. A smile on a face so grim seemed out of place, the scar-puckered skin along his jawline pulling his lips off center, but the eyes, the ever-present mask that somehow clouded the crystalline blue eyes, uncovered to reveal an absolute genuineness. Contrasted with his Irish black hair, he was, in this moment, handsome enough that she almost wished she’d met Michael before Tim.

  Almost.

  And there was the real problem. It was Tim she wanted, she simply couldn’t live with that truth.

  “You’re right,” she finally answered in little more than a whisper. “It’s not even a little bit comfortable.”

  Chapter 50

  Again they were waiting. Made Tim more than a little bit crazy, but it was most of what they did in Special Forces.

  Train and wait.

  At the moment, the Black Adders team wasn’t training.

  The eight of them were sitting around Fort Rucker, waiting for the mission “go.” On a lot of Special Forces missions the “go” never happened. This probably wasn’t one of those. It wasn’t an “if,” more of a “when.”

  Normally you only returned to Rucker for one of two reasons, either you were gonna “go ACE” or “have a heart-ATTC.” Either you were shipped to the U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence for more training, or to the U.S. Army Aviation Technical Test Center when helping test new gear. SOAR fliers were often here for both.

  But with neither happening, just squatting on hold in southern Alabama, Mother Rucker had way too much moist heat, far too many hurricanes, and not a damn thing to do. Which was okay, usually. Neither the training nor the test staff had any idea what the words “reasonable workload” meant. Mother Rucker busted your behind either way. So spare time wasn’t an issue.

  Except this trip.

  They were there to squat out of sight and await orders. SOAR didn’t like their stealth birds just hanging out for anyone to see, so they were tucked away deep in a hangar vacated just for their use.

  The first night, they’d long-hauled down from D.C., midair refueling en route.

  The second night they’d flown out to the firing range and kicked off a couple of the nano-thermite-rigged Hellfire III missiles at a derelict tank. Tim had thought the fire had been pretty impressive, until they landed to inspect the remains of what they’d shot up. They’d all sobered when they saw the results. The damned missiles had melted whole sections of the tank. As if it had been made out of butter and someone had dribbled boiling water all over it. Anything they hit with a couple of those Hellfires was done for. And they were going to be flying over U.S. soil.

  But the two days and nights since, all they’d done was waited.

  Still, even here, waiting didn’t usually get to him. Hang out, lift some weights, maybe pick up a likely lady or two.

  Right now was exactly the right kind of environment for that last activity. He and Kee were shooting some pool. At the next table Lieutenant Trisha O’Malley was working the balls and clearly trying to work him as well. Just his type—smart, sassy, cute as hell, a flier deep in SOAR training, and tough as an Abrams tank.

  Not much taller than his shoulder, with flaming red hair and a toothy, come-and-get-me smile, she also shot a fine game of pool. She’d wiped the table with Connie, and now Big John was getting his face smeared into the green felt. She’d kept teasing them about being the toughest bitch left alive in the mud hole, which actually raised a rare laugh from Connie and simply left Big John looking ill. Clearly Connie and John had been part of her SOAR interview week.

  And somehow, every time he went to line up a shot, there she was in the space between their tables, lining up some trick shot that it was hard not to be impressed by and watching him with those electric blue eyes.

  He could take her. He’d hustled enough pool to know he could. Unless she was even more of a hustler than she was pretending to be.

  Kee got him off to the side after he’d screwed up an easy two-bank shot.

  “What the hell are you doing, Maloney?”

  “What?” Did she mean mooning over Lola? That was a tender point. And he’d rather Kee didn’t pound on it with her sharpshooter targeting.

  “Why are you flirting with that LT? You know that’s not what you want.”

  Of all damned things. Kee had made it abundantly clear that she despised Lola, and now she was defending her?

  It would have helped if she hadn’t been right.

  Sergeant Crazy Tim enjoyed flirting with the cute Lieutenant O’Malley.

  But Tim Maloney only wanted one woman and it wasn’t the cute lieutenant.

  Kee rested a hand on his arm. A hand of comfort.

  “Do you want her badly enough?”

  Tim nodded even as his brain tried to shake his head in denial. All the pain of being rejected. All the anger he still felt. All of it was nothing compared to the bald truth. He’d only be happy if he was with Lola LaRue.

  Kee nodded solidly. “Archie wanted me that way. I fought and struggled against him, almost broke his arm in the process. But he knew. And he finally convinced me. So if you want her that badly, get out of here and go be stubborn, right-in-her-face stubborn.”

  “I…” Tim had thought of a dozen, a hundred different ways, but Lola had said no in no uncertain terms and still hadn’t spoken to him since. “I don’t know how.”

  Kee rested a hand on the center of his chest and looked up at him. “Don’t think, flyboy. Just go do it.”

  Tim spotted Trisha O’Malley swinging back around her table, setting up the final shot that would knock Big John out of the game, put another twenty dollars into those tight jeans pockets, and leave him a wide-open opportunity.

  He handed his cue stick to Kee as he turned for the door.

  Colonel Gibson wandered in through the door and held it for Tim.

  He nodded to Michael, then thought of the look that the disappointed lieutenant was probably aiming at his back.

  “Colonel, there’s a lady over there looking for a worthy opponent.”

  Michael glanced over Tim’s shoulder, then offered him a nod and a thin smile before moseying over to the table Tim had just abandoned.

  So that’s how Archie had caught Kee, sheer persistence and determination. He’d always wondered. Well, Tim knew how to do that. He was a Night Stalker, and Night Stalkers Don’t Quit.

  “NSDQ,” he said as he stepped out into the heat blast of the day and the blinding sun. He did know who he wanted. Now he just had to find out where in Mother Rucker she was hiding.

  He leaned forward into the humid air, like a helicopter tipping down its nose to gain forward speed, and set out to find her.

  ***

  Tim spent the morning and part of the afternoon trying to track her down. He even wandered into the Army Aviation Museum to catch a break from the heat. He’d never had time to go there before, but without Lola, it wasn’t particularly fun. Now he stood outside the door wondering what to do next.

  Two days and nights without a single word. Not a single sighting. He didn’t even know where to begin.

  He’d never considered himself a deep person. Pretty happy just going along living his life. Damn good life, damn fine family, and the best team ever to fly the skies. All a man needed.

  But the more Tim thought about it, the more he knew what a complete crock o’ crap that had become. He was miserable. If he didn’t know it himself, he’d seen it reflected in John’s eyes. And Connie’s. Even Kee appeared ready to cut him some slack about Lola, and he wasn
’t ready for that either.

  He didn’t need slack.

  He needed Lola.

  Knowing that somehow made it easier. A clear target now in his sights, it was only a matter of getting there.

  He considered a strategy.

  He considered making a plan.

  Instead, he set out to just find her.

  Mother Rucker was only eleven square miles, five thousand full-time residents, and another couple thousand transients.

  How hard could it be?

  ***

  Half a stroke before she hit the wall, Lola executed a somersault flip-turn and headed toward the other end of the pool with a mile-eating freestyle stroke. She’d lost count around fifteen laps but had swum a long way since then. At least two miles were gone, maybe most of three.

  She was no sprinter, never was built for that kind of hundred-meter speed. Lola was fast but not that kind of fast. What she had was serious staying power. Could outlast any field of competitors on a long swim. She’d already burned out half a dozen grunts who thought they could rule the pool and the woman in it.

  Male egos didn’t take well to being lapped. Especially not in their first five. After their macho sprint burned out, Lola just ate ’em alive. Don’t be no messing wit’ da Creole lady, mon. One Army grunt became so angry at not being able to outpace her that he’d punched the wall at the end of the lane. By his scream and rapid exit, probably busted his wrist. Be funny to hear him explain that one to his buddies.

  After a while the pool emptied and it was just her.

  Back and forth.

  Just her.

  Usually this kind of a long swim charged her up. Made her feel strong, capable, and tired enough to know she’d sleep well.

  At the moment all she felt was wound up, cranky, and exhausted in a way that would just leave her tossing and turning.

  She spotted some movement at poolside when she turned her head for air.

  No longer just her. Another contender.

  The figure loomed at the end of her lane as she swam toward it. Not moving. Not getting into the pool to try and swim her down. Just standing there, arms crossed, silhouetted by the lowering sun. Watching her.

  She didn’t need the broad shoulders or unconsciously arrogant, shoulder-wide stance to know who stood there. His body knew he was better than most men, even if he didn’t act that way.

  Lola did another turn and headed back up the pool as if she hadn’t seen him to give herself time to think.

  Maybe after another lap he wouldn’t be there.

  Maybe she’d just climb out at the far end of the pool, sending a clear message that she didn’t want to be with him.

  But that was the problem.

  She slapped the far wall, flip-turned, and headed back.

  That was the real problem.

  She arrived at the end of the lane by his feet and drifted to a stop. Crossed her arms and hooked her elbows on the gutter to hold her in place as she pulled her goggles down around her neck and looked up at him.

  The problem was that she did want him.

  Chapter 51

  “How do we do this?” Lola broke the silence that had lasted since they’d climbed up onto the Aviation Center of Excellence hangar roof to watch the sunset.

  Spread out below them were two dozen Chinooks. She’d never seen so many of the giant choppers gathered in one place. Like a Chinook convention all sitting around the bar telling tall tales of mountaintops and drug lords, of massive troop loads and extended over-water flights, and maybe a quiet one, sitting in the corner, never talking about a certain nighttime trip into the Iranian desert.

  Next week it would probably be all Black Hawks with their war stories, or OH-6 surveillance Kiowas chattering like magpies about “you’ll never guess what I saw.” “No, no, first guess what I saw.”

  Thankfully, it hadn’t been all silence with Tim as they’d walked halfway across the base, but they sure hadn’t known what to say to each other. They’d talked of the mission. He’d told her about his first trip to Mother Rucker. She talked about SOAR interview week. Harder in some ways than the monthlong hell of quals for Ranger school.

  Talking with Tim had been easy, comfortable, and she’d missed it. Terribly. When she toyed with the phrase in her head—“Missed him. Terribly.”—it didn’t sit so comfortably.

  “How, Tim?”

  He sat beside her, looking out at the world that was Fort Rucker. Close, but not quite touching. Both facing out at the world, but focused on each other.

  “I don’t know. I honestly don’t. But I can tell you that being apart doesn’t work.”

  It didn’t.

  “Not for me anyway. I’ve never wanted a woman in my life the way I want you. The longest I ever had a girlfriend was about six months, no, nine.”

  “Who was she?” Lola found herself curious. Not jealous. It was far longer than any of her relationships had ever lasted.

  “Bess Thompson. Half of senior year of high school and a great summer while I worked the restaurant. Then she ‘Dear Tim’ed’ me during Basic. I’d told her I was going real Army, not just a two-year tour, and she didn’t want that. Can’t blame her. Her dad was on Navy subs, gone six months at a time. Hard life for the woman and impossible for the kid.”

  “Were you that serious?”

  Tim inspected the sky awash with orange and gold for a while. “We thought we were. But we were eighteen. What did we know.”

  “A whole decade older, are we any wiser?”

  That got a laugh. A warm, gentle sound that included her.

  “I like to think so, but I sure buggered it, didn’t I?”

  No need to question what “it” was.

  “No, Tim. You did perfect.” A helicopter, the closest she had to a home. A sunset picnic, so charming and cozy. The flowers and teapot were the perfect touches. How much time had she spent sitting on her bunk these last three days, just holding the damned broken teapot handle while she tried to figure out the mess going on inside her head.

  “Guys always make me feel like a female of the species. They can’t help it with the way their bodies react to mine. You’re the first who ever made me feel feminine. No one ever gave me such a gift.”

  “Then why? Can you help me understand why?” He was begging.

  Lola had been trying to avoid that question herself for days. But he deserved an answer, even if she didn’t have one to give.

  “Every time I answer that one in my head, I just sound stupid or petty. All I know is that I can’t. My past—”

  “Is the past.” His voice sounded soldier rough. “My past is a loving family. Your past isn’t. My past was most of the way to prison, yours just as close to being a hooker. Does it matter? What really matters is now!”

  Again she didn’t know how to respond. How could she explain to someone who had so much what it was like to have nothing?

  She’d run into the same problem with the swim girls at college. They’d go out on team shopping sprees, waving their parents’ credit cards like magic wands. She’d gone along once or twice, but never bought anything. Even with ROTC, the swimming scholarship, and waitressing, she barely made ends meet each quarter.

  When cornered about it, she’d tried to explain. Other than her dress uniform and one new swimsuit a year, her clothing budget was spent at Goodwill. The other swimmers had nodded in understanding the one time she tried to explain, but were confused on the next trip when again she’d try things on but buy nothing. She’d stopped going.

  “You’re right, Tim. Only the here and now should matter. But it doesn’t work that way. I wish it did, but it doesn’t.”

  They sat in silence as the oranges faded to reds, the reds to dusky gray. On the verge of true darkness, a dozen crews came running out of the building below them, sixty men and women sprinting toward t
he dozen machines for some simulated combat alert. Within minutes, she and Tim couldn’t have spoken even if they wanted to. Each Chinook spun up a pair of five-thousand-horsepower turbine engines.

  Lola realized she was counting seconds in her head from the first alert. One minute… Two… Three minutes beyond when they should have been airborne, the first bird wallowed into the night sky. It was a full thirty seconds before the next was away. Their ascents were spread over the next four minutes instead of the group departing in a single clean flight, the last bird seven full minutes slower than it should have been.

  She shared a glance and smile with Tim in the dim light cast up from the lit field below. There were gonna be some very unhappy trainers during post-flight debrief. Even for regular Army, they’d been sloppy. Definitely not SOAR.

  “Rooks.”

  Lola could read the word on Tim’s lips as the final Chinook roared close overhead, its turbines definitely past yellow line as its crew abused the machine to try and make up for their own lateness. Definitely rookies.

  “Probably visiting Air Force.”

  They were all going to catch hell at the debrief. The last guy for abusing the equipment and the first one for not waiting to form up. She remembered that lecture with soft nostalgia. First didn’t matter. Team mattered.

  Together they waited, listening to the choppers fade into the night.

  She’d come a long way since those days. Lola remembered the struggles to remember the preflight checklist that was now instinct, hunting for the right switches for startup that she could now hit every time in blackout conditions with incoming live fire while attempting to restart a flamed-out turbine.

  She’d come a long way since those days.

  Tim’s head was still turned to the northern sky though the choppers were long gone.

  When she rested a hand on his shoulder, he faced her.

  Their faces inches apart, she could read the question in his eyes in the reflected light and shadows.

  “No promises.”

  He waited the length of a long breath and release before answering with a slow nod.