Some of the tension flowed out of his shoulders and the back of his neck. Clay rubbed his neck, studying her ruefully in the thickening silence.
“If you could try and judge me on my own merits, not my family name, it would help both of us,” Aly whispered in a strained tone.
“As far as I’m concerned, you’re Morgan Trayhern’s sister. That’s all. Your gender or first name has nothing to do with anything.” He stabbed a finger at her again. “You’re the sister of a murderer and traitor.”
Blood sang through Aly, heated and furious. She stared at him. God, but he could be one cold bastard when he chose to be! She tried desperately to remember their first meeting, remember his warmth and openness. “I won’t respond any longer to your name-calling, Cantrell.” Aly leaned forward, only the desk separating them. “Whatever ax you have to grind with me will be done in private. I won’t tolerate this kind of behavior in front of our crew or the enlisted people. I don’t like this situation any more than you do, but let’s try to make the best of it.”
Clay smiled lethally. “You can bet your sweet face that I’m not having my fitness report screwed up because of you. Don’t worry, Trayhern, our private war will stay private. I have one of the best crews in VP 46, and they aren’t going to know how I really feel about you.”
Aly nodded. “Fine, I can cope with that.” But could she cope with his continued nearness? Dear God, Clay affected her powerfully. She was hurting. Aly wanted to see that carefree smile, to watch his gray eyes glimmer with sunlight. She was so tired of fighting…of defending Morgan and her family name. “Look,” she uttered, “all I want to do is get along, Lieutenant. I don’t expect any favors. I’ve worked hard all my life for everything I’ve ever gotten. I’ll do my best to weave into the situation here at the squadron. You give me orders and I’ll die trying to follow them.”
The sudden exhaustion in Aly’s voice caught Clay off balance. He saw the bleakness in her blue eyes and heard the raw pleading in her husky voice. For a split second, Clay felt guilt. But just as quickly as it came, he smashed it. “As I said—I’m not screwing up my career because of you.”
“Likewise.”
Clay almost smiled. What a little hellcat she was. For her size and weight, which couldn’t be more than 120 pounds, she was a fighter. He allowed himself to admire her for that. “Okay,” he muttered, looking around his desk, “let’s get this miserable show on the road.”
The puncturing of the tension nearly unstrung her. Aly sat down, her knees shaking. She hoped Clay hadn’t seen it, because he’d probably wonder if she was up to the task of flying as his copilot on the multimillion-dollar aircraft.
Tossing a file folder across the desk, Clay said, “I’ve been ordered to set up your Link training for the next quarter. You’ll start tomorrow. Aviation Engineer Chief Random is assigned to start running the computer programs for you. I’ll be ‘flying’ as your IP and take you through an introductory phase on the P3.” His eyes grew dark. “And I hope for your sake you’re a fast learner, Trayhern.”
Aly opened the folder, quickly scanning the first page. Link training would take place every day, five days a week, for at least two to three hours at a time. She began to sweat as she had before every flight at Pensacola. It was a fear sweat. “Isn’t this schedule a little demanding?”
“Yes, it is. But so is the position the squadron’s in. VP 46 flies from the Bering Strait of Alaska down to the tip of Baja, Mexico. We protect the entire West Coast from Soviet subs that ply off our twelve-mile limit. I’m sure Commander Horner told you that there’s been a lot of unusual activity in the Baja California area lately. More Soviet subs are in that region. Civilian shipping is frantic because the Reds are ghosting their movements. There have been some close calls.”
“In what way?” Aly was relieved to get on a neutral topic. But it in no way lessened the hatred she saw burning in his eyes every time he glanced over at her.
Clay moved to a wall map of the West Coast and Pacific Ocean. He circled an area with his index finger. “We’ve got Soviet freighters plying their trade to the Central American countries here. The Soviet subs dogged the heels of friendly U.S. freighters in that area. One Red sub took a torpedo shot at an American-registered ship last week.”
Aly’s eyes widened. “And they got away with it?”
With a slight, triumphant grin Cantrell said, “No. We dropped a depth charge from the P3 I was flying, right in front of the bastard’s nose, to let him know we weren’t going to allow him the privilege of a second shot. The ship wasn’t in any real danger. It was only harassment by the Soviets. But we’re there to make sure they know we’ll interdict any game they want to play with U.S. shipping.”
Excitement thrummed through her. “Then what happened?”
“The sub dived and hightailed it back out to sea.”
“Does this kind of thing happen often?”
Clay tried to ignore the sudden enthusiasm in Aly’s voice, the shine in her azure eyes. What would it be like to see that same warm glow in them after he’d made love with her?
Where the hell did that thought come from? He gave himself an internal shake. Alyssa Trayhern was doing things to him he had no control over, and that shook him. No woman had held that kind of power over him. Ever! Angry at the train of his thought, he snapped at her.
“It happens a lot. And for your sake, Lieutenant, you’d better be up to the demands of it. Flying a P3 at fifty feet over a raging ocean and knowing that any second a down-draft could suck you and your entire crew into a watery grave isn’t for weaklings. Or women,” he added viciously.
Chapter Three
Clay’s words haunted Aly. It was a barely veiled threat that if she screwed up, he’d be the first to point out her error and log the mistake into her fitness report. And blots on her fitness report, issued twice a year on every officer, could hurt, even destroy, her budding career. No, Clay held the sword of Damocles above her head and they both knew it. Aly hefted the three large manuals he’d given her just before she left the training office. They were manuals that covered cockpit procedures, emergency procedures and defense measures for the beautiful, graceful P3.
It was noon, but Aly had lost her appetite. If she studied nonstop over the weekend, she might gain an edge on cockpit procedure for Monday morning so that she’d impress Clay. The plan was a lot better than the opposite possibility—disappointing him.
As Aly hurried down the safety walk toward the side entrance, she heard a long, loud wolf whistle. She ignored it. Probably some enlisted man, she thought, irritated. But again came another long whistle.
Slowly, Aly turned and saw a pilot in a green flight suit, his garrison cap at a cocky angle on his head, following close behind her. He was smiling, his brown eyes sparkling. His walk was jaunty, self-assured. Aly saw a patch on his olive-green flight suit that identified him as an F-14 Tomcat pilot. And then she saw the inspector pilot’s patch on the other side of his chest. She frowned as he ambled up to her and threw his hands on his hips.
“Hi, there. The name’s Starbuck. Jeff Starbuck. Scuttlebutt was flying around the hangar this morning that a good-looking lady was on the premises.” His grin deepened as he met and held her defiant gaze. “I said, ‘Nah…’ And they said, ‘Yeah!’ So the chief of maintenance said he saw her go into that lucky bastard, Cantrell’s office. I decided to scope it out for myself.”
Starbuck drew himself up and snapped off an impressive salute. “You’ve got to be Alyssa Trayhern,” he said and offered his hand. “Damned glad to have you on board.”
Aly refused to take his hand. “Lieutenant Starbuck, your manners are not impressive.”
Starbuck looked crestfallen, his oval face losing some of its joviality. “What?”
“I’m sure you’ve been in the Navy long enough to realize that whistling at an enlisted woman or a woman officer is considered sexual harassment.”
His mouth tightened. “Well, gosh, I meant it as a compliment, Miss T
rayhern.” He cocked his head to one side, deliberately checking out her legs. “I mean, what a set of legs!”
He was irrepressible, Aly decided, and she relented. Starbuck’s demeanor was typical of fighter jocks. Typically male chauvinistic, egotistical and self-serving. Despite that, Starbuck was a bright spot in her gray day. His brown hair was neatly cut, and he had large, hawklike eyes. The devil-may-care smile on his full mouth enhanced the youthful appearance of his face, although he had to be in his late twenties. There were crow’s-feet crinkling at the corners of his eyes and deep grooves around his mouth, indicating that he smiled and laughed a great deal.
“Okay, Mr. Starbuck, thank you for the compliment.”
“But?” His smile deepened.
“Look, I just spent four years at Annapolis and a year with you guys at Pensacola.”
He rubbed his chin. “Hmm, sounds like something serious. Betcha you’re going to tell me I’m just like all the rest, eh?”
“Roger that.”
“But,” he said dramatically, “I’m the best-looking F-14 driver at Moffett.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “The trash haulers who fly the P3 are a pittance compared to me. I got the looks, the time and—” he held up his left hand for her to observe “—I’m free.”
“And I’m not. Sorry, Starbuck, I’ve got things to do. If you’ll excuse me?” Not waiting for his response, Aly turned and walked toward the mouth of the hangar.
“Hey! Wait up!” Starbuck trotted up alongside and grabbed the manuals she was carrying. “At least let me help the lady with her books.”
Aly groaned, wavering between stopping to wrest the books from him and giving in. Starbuck wasn’t going to be easy to get rid of. “If I didn’t know you had ulterior motives, Lieutenant, I might be impressed with your thoughtfulness, but I’m not.”
“Can I at least carry these to your car—ulterior motives or not?”
He was an engaging character, Aly decided. “Oh, all right.” And she took off at a fast walk. Her red Toyota was parked halfway down the other side of the hangar, a long walk to endure with the fighter jock.
“Beautiful day, isn’t it?” Starbuck asked, gesturing to the sky. “Man, I just got done flying up there. Air’s smooth as a woman’s—” He flushed. “Sorry, I’m used to talking to male pilots, not female ones.”
Aly gave him a flat look of disapproval. “I can tell, Lieutenant.”
He grinned self-consciously, color heating his neck and cheeks. “Sorry, Alyssa. Do you mind if I call you by your first name?”
“No, I don’t care,” she answered. Her mind, and if she was honest with herself, her heart were dwelling on the confrontation with Clay Cantrell. They were at a terrible impasse with each other. How could she overcome the barriers he’d thrown up and get him to wave a white flag of truce so that they could survive their time together?
“Well,” Starbuck said, noticing she was ignoring him, “as I was saying, it was great flying up there this morning. We’ve been hearing about a woman pilot being assigned to Moffett for the past two weeks. I was really excited about the opportunity.”
“I’ll bet you were,” Aly answered dryly. Probably thought he was going to be the first to bed her down, and then go around strutting and bragging about his latest conquest to every man on the station who would listen.
“Ahh, there you go again, Alyssa. You don’t trust my intentions, do you?”
“Not in the least, Lieutenant.”
“You can call me Jeff if you want. My buddies call me Iron Eagle.”
“In or out of bed?” Aly flinched inwardly. Now she was trading tit for tat. Offense was the only defense against someone like this arrogant jock.
Laughing heartily, he said, “Good sense of humor, too. I like that in a woman.”
“I’m not keeping score, and neither should you.”
“You must have met that sour bastard, Cantrell,” Starbuck said, glancing at the stack of manuals under his arm. “And it looks like he’s thrown the homework at you.”
He was right on that account, Aly acknowledged silently. “Lieutenant Cantrell is my mentor for my training-in period.”
“Yeah, I heard you got stuck with him.”
An ocean-scented wind blew in off the bay, and Aly inhaled the fragrance. She could see the salt marshes that grew right at the end of the airstrip. A lot of sea gulls were wafting on the unseen currents over the station. Right now, all she wanted to do was fly. Fly and forget. Let the sky take her into its arms and hold her for a while.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she retorted sharply.
Chuckling indulgently, Starbuck watched a sea gull sail overhead. “Well, sooner or later you’re going to hear about the infamous Cantrell.”
“From you, no doubt, whether I want to or not. Isn’t that correct, Lieutenant?”
He curbed his smile, seemingly struggling to remain serious. “What I’m going to say isn’t gossip, Alyssa. These are things you should know. I mean, after all, you’ve been assigned to fly with him, right?”
“Yes.” She shot Starbuck a warning look. “I don’t like gossip, mister. Especially the malicious variety. If that’s what you’ve got on Lieutenant Cantrell, you can stow it.”
He nodded, growing somber. “Fair enough. I imagine you’ve had plenty of gossip about yourself, so you’re a little sensitive in that area.”
Aly was stunned by his sudden insight. “Well—yes,” she stammered.
“See, we aren’t all the insensitive jocks stuck on our egos that you thought,” he teased, smiling again.
Aly smiled unwillingly. “You’re a big tease and I know it.”
“But a harmless one,” he pleaded. “Really.”
“Sure.”
“You know how we fighter jocks talk. I mean, we’re bred to have confidence. You gotta have a healthy ego in order to lift a fifteen-million-dollar aircraft off a pitching carrier deck in the middle of an ocean.”
“That’s the truth,” Aly agreed. She pointed toward the Toyota. “That’s my car.”
Starbuck drew to a halt while she fished around in her purse for the keys. “Look, I meant what I said about Cantrell. There are some things you need to know. It might save that nice-looking rear of yours, someday.”
Aly ignored the remark and jammed the key into the lock. “I don’t want to discuss it.”
Starbuck handed her the manuals, which she stowed in the rear of the sports car. “Give me just five minutes, okay?” He held up his hands in a sign of truce. “I promise you, everything I’m going to tell you is true.”
Sighing, Aly muttered, “Five minutes, Starbuck, and that’s it.”
“A year and a half ago, Cantrell was an F-14 driver like me. We flew off the Enterprise together. He was one of the hottest pilots in our squadron, and we were both vying for the top-gun slot at Miramar. Then he screwed up on a deck landing. Cantrell ended up crashing the bird he was flying into the deck. He ejected, but his radar officer bought it.” Starbuck’s voice dropped with feeling. “Cantrell ended up in the hospital for a while, and the flight surgeon grounded him. He’d lost his nerve. Every time he tried to requalify as a carrier pilot, he failed. The Navy finally rerouted him to a land-based aircraft. He’s been here at Moffett for a year.” Starbuck pointed to the P3 parked closest to them. “That’s his bird. It’s been downed. Three days ago he made a rookie pilot’s landing and did some major damage to the port landing gear. The whole strut is going to be replaced later today.”
Instead of being worried about Clay’s past, Aly felt her heart ache for him. She’d heard of fighter pilots losing their nerve out on the carrier. They flew under the toughest, most demanding of flight conditions possible. “Look, Starbuck,” she said coolly, “his past is no concern of mine.”
“It is if you’re sitting in that cockpit with him,” he challenged, his eyes flashing with irritation. “Look, you’ve worked hard to get this far. I’d hate to see your career screwed up because that guy’s
in the process of losing his touch.”
“You don’t know that—you don’t fly with him!” What the hell was she defending Clay for? Aly didn’t have time to analyze her response.
Starbuck lifted the garrison cap off his head and settled it back on with feeling. “His crew knows it. His copilot, Randy Hart, just transferred out of here to his next assignment. Hart is a damn fine pilot. Every once in a while we’d have a beer or two over at the Officers Club after a mission, and he’d tell me what it was like to fly with Cantrell.”
Aly threw her purse into the passenger seat. “That’s enough, Lieutenant. I told you: I won’t listen to gossip.”
“This isn’t gossip! Cantrell’s hands shake so bad after a mission that his entire crew thinks he’s close to the edge. All he does is bitch at them. He doesn’t have a kind word for anyone.”
“I suppose next you’re going to tell me that he’s a heavy drinker, slopping them down at the O Club after every mission?”
With a groan, Starbuck held up his long, expressive hands. “Whoa, sweet thing. I’m just trying to prepare you for what you’re up against.” He grinned slightly, his eyes taking on a familiar twinkle. “I just found you. I don’t want you run off by a sourpuss like Cantrell.”
Aly couldn’t decide what Starbuck’s motives were. He’d flown with Cantrell in the same squadron, and Aly knew that competitiveness was the chief gestalt between fighter pilots vying for top-gun selection. Starbuck might hate Clay because Clay was a better pilot than Starbuck before the crash. She didn’t know, and at this point, didn’t care.
No Surrender Page 4