by Susan Grant
Was she here to fly? Blast it all—he hoped not. Ian had assigned him this mission with minimum instructions: “Tell me if they spend time together, and how much.” But in Muffin’s mind, his job was to protect Ilana from Ché, and he didn’t like the idea of the Vedla prince forcing her up into one of those flimsy flying contraptions. Should he break cover to save her?
Not without earning the wrath of the crown prince. It was a dilemma indeed.
Ilana and Ché stopped at a blue-and-white two-seat airplane. The plug in Muffin’s right ear brought the sounds of their voices to him: “We’re just going to sit in it today,” Ilana confirmed. She sounded nervous, unhappy.
“Yes. You on the left side, me on the right.”
“Cool,” she said. “The position of power.”
“No. I will be on the copilot side.”
“I meant me.”
Ilana gave Ché a cheeky smile and walked over to the door on the left side of the plane. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.” She put her foot on the step-up and reiterated. “We’re not going anywhere, right? We’re not flying?”
Ché groaned. “Ilana, I will not trick you. If you take this plane into the sky, it will be by your own hand, and by your own decision. Did you not say the same to me on the teacup ride in Disneyland?”
“That’s different. You weren’t scared. You were embarrassed.”
“And for good reason.”
Muffin heard Ilana giggle. Then there were clanking and shuffling noises as the pair climbed into the craft.
Muffin inched forward, as close to the tarmac as he dared without being in full sight of the plane. But a man his size was hard to hide.
Ilana’s voice sounded muffled. “Well. This is…okay.”
“Then let go of the yoke,” Ché told her.
There was some rustling. Then a nervous laugh. “Ouch.”
Muffin’s neck prickled. He looked over his shoulder, but no one was there. To be safe, he slid the computer into his pocket. In his earpiece, Ché continued to describe the instrumentation and the design of the plane. But when he got to the altitudes and air speeds, Ilana stopped him. “Stop! I’m breaking into a cold sweat. I don’t mind the tech stuff—just don’t tell me how far I’ll fall before I hit the ground.”
“You will not fall, Ilana.”
“I know that. But the brain doesn’t.”
There was more conversation. And laughter. Muffin noticed the easy banter between them. There was tension, too, but not the unpleasant kind. It was the anticipation of two people who were attracted to each other but who were not yet sleeping together. He’d add that to his report when he next contacted Ian.
Again Muffin sensed something. The prickling on the back of his neck came with a rush of sweet-scented wind. Before he could turn around, a foot hooked his ankle and threw him off balance. An arm came over his chest and finished the job.
Muffin landed hard on his back. It knocked the air from his lungs. He lay there like a landed fish, eyes watering and gulping for air.
“Don’t move!” a woman’s voice ordered. “Show me your ID.”
Hell and back! A female. He couldn’t believe it. In all his missions, no one had ever made such easy work of him. The bright flashes of light in his eyes faded. Blinking, he stayed where he was, taking a moment to ascertain his foe.
A shadow moved over him. His eyes traveled up a pair of sturdy, brown-clad legs. The copper hair he recognized at once.
She appeared as startled as he was.
“Trouble,” he muttered. She lived up to her name.
He started to sit up. “Wait!” she yelled. “I need to see your ID first.”
“Must I lie down to do that?”
Her eyes narrowed, and he saw that they were green—angry green. “You’re not a gardener.”
“I am so.”
She made a derisive sound that rivaled any of Ilana’s. “Tell me another story.”
“I can tell you, Miss Trouble, that you do not have a weapon, and that you are not a member of this airport security. You give me no reason to believe you are anything but a maintenance worker here.”
“You were aiming something at that Cessna. We’re taught to challenge any suspicious characters.”
“Challenge means”—Great Mother, he couldn’t say it; it was blasted embarrassing—“knocking a man to the ground?”
She appeared so chagrined, he couldn’t resist adding, “Interfering with a gardener—it is a capital offense.”
She recovered. “It is not! But a terrorist act toward a civilian aircraft will get you life in prison.”
“I am not a terrorist. Look at my ID. My name is there.” His assumed name.
“Take it off your neck and throw it to me.” Her work boots crunched past his ear as he lay there, waiting for her to make a mistake and come too close. His hand shot out and snatched her ankle. Before she could utter any sound at all, he had her pinned beneath him on the ground. He caught the back of her head in his open palm to cushion her from the pebbly cement. Then he smiled. “Gotcha.”
He’d been dying to use that particular bit of Earth slang he’d learned from Ian.
She squirmed beneath him, trying to get her knee into his groin and her hands free. She didn’t have a chance. That he’d overpowered her so easily made it even more humiliating to admit she’d knocked him flat on his back. That, he decided, was not going in the crown prince’s report.
He kept one of her hands pressed to the ground above her head, the other pinned between their bodies. Her breasts strained against the bodice of her jumpsuit, and her body beneath him was equally ample and soft. It was nice to have a bit of flesh to lie on rather than what, in his opinion, amounted to a bag of bones. Why thin women were attractive to so many men, he’d never know.
“Let me up,” she said.
“Aha. You see? It is no fun lying on the ground.”
“Okay! I get the point, big guy.” She wriggled. Arousal flared, he felt himself harden. He was not a small man. She’d feel him swell. But he wouldn’t intentionally force himself on a woman or intimidate one sexually. His size was usually daunting enough. He released her and pushed away before, he hoped, she realized why.
She sat up and pushed dirt off her jumpsuit. Her skin was pale, dotted with faint coppery freckles. She had a heart-shaped face with the slightest of double chins and lips that tempted a man for a kiss. “You are true to your name,” he told her. “Trouble.”
Her mouth twisted. “Yeah. I can’t seem to escape it lately. I just got this job washing planes. I need the money.” She glanced sideways. “You’re not going to turn me in, are you?”
“Not when you thought you were defending the airport.” That’s what he liked—a woman who stood up for what was right.
“Let me see your pass, anyway. I gotta be sure who you are before I let you go.”
Let him go? He smiled to himself and showed her his airport pass. He didn’t want to cause “Trouble” any trouble, lest she complain to the authorities. He was certain his background could withstand a cursory check, but why invite the risk?
She studied his airport pass. “John Black.”
It was strange hearing his assumed name on the woman’s lips. Then she stuck out her hand, and he took it. “Copper Kaminski.” She took her hand back and waved it over her head. “The hair,” she explained in a way that told Muffin she’d been doing it all her life. He’d been explaining “Muffin” to the Earth-dwellers for far less than that, but it still tired.
“ ‘Bright as a newly minted penny on the day I was born,’ my mother said. I don’t see why she just didn’t name me Penny.”
“I like Copper.”
She lifted her eyes. “Really?”
Nodding, he smiled. This one was easy to please. And all he was doing was telling the truth.
“Taxi? Ché, I’d love it. Can we?” Ilana’s voice.
Muffin jumped to his feet. Whipping the computer out of his pocket, he aimed it at the plan
e and listened to the princess’s voice coming out of his earpiece. Ché spoke next: “I have a flight plan on file. I need to add your name to it before we move.”
They were going to move the aircraft? With Ilana in it?
Ché hopped down from the craft and strode into the operations building where pilots checked the weather, maps, and completed their flight preparations.
Copper peeked past his arm. “What is that thing for?”
“Solitaire.” It was not so much of a lie. He’d become addicted to the Earth game during his long hours alone in his room.
“That’s not true. You’re using it to listen to that plane.”
“Yes, it’s a voice amplifier.” No use lying about everything. The more you did, the deeper you got, and he was in too deep as it was.
“Is that legal?”
Muffin heaved a great sigh. “As much as I like to look at you, Copper, I wish you would go away.”
Her eyes opened wide. If it were possible to appear wounded and flattered at the same time, she’d managed it.
“I have work to do,” he explained, weakening somewhat.
“So, you are a spy.”
“I’m not a spy.”
“Hmm. I guess if you were, you wouldn’t have gone down so easily. I never knocked anyone down in my life!”
Muffin winced. If she didn’t have such a sweet, innocent face, he’d…he’d…“I’m the gardener.”
“Sure you are.” She looked him up and down. “If Dolph Lundgren and Arnold Schwarzenegger had a lovechild, it’d be you.”
Muffin shook his head. “I do not know this couple.”
She gave him a disbelieving look. “The actors. You know. Those old action movies. And, by the way, you have a weird accent. German?”
“Ah…”
“And you hardly ever do any real work, except for trying to fix the mess you made of these hedges.”
Muffin squared his shoulders. “I have done more than that,” he insisted. “I have weeded all the beds.” He might only be posing as a groundskeeper, but he tried to do a good job. He came from a family with a good work ethic.
“You’re after them, aren’t you? That couple. You’re one of those reporters who’s always bothering celebrities. Paparazzi. There have been a lot of them sneaking around here lately. We’ve seen them from the wash shed. Photographers, too.”
Ché returned to the airplane. “We will need to make an exterior inspection. Then I’ll get us cleared to taxi.” Muffin’s hand shot to his ear, cupping it. He stared at the ground, concentrating.
“That’s him. He’s famous, right?”
Muffin shrugged. “Hollywood.”
“I figured. We always ask whenever someone brings us a plane to wash, but no one seems to know, or want to say, but everyone’s watching. And you’re one of the snoops.”
She made no secret of the fact she didn’t approve. Muffin almost confessed that he didn’t do this for a living, that he used to be proud of his role as bodyguard to the ruler of the galaxy, but here we was, reduced to snooping as she put it.
Now Ché and Ilana both appeared outside the airplane. Muffin went flat against the wall and inched closer to get a better view without going too far past the hedgerow, which was no where near as ragged looking as Copper seemed to think. Shaggy, but not ragged. He’d had haircuts worse than that.
He watched as Ché took Ilana on a walk-around check of the outside of the airplane. Periodically, they’d crouch close together while Ché explained how a piece of equipment worked.
Copper peeked around Muffin’s arm. Her breasts brushed his elbow. He tried not to look. All women were petite to him—but if this one were in his arms, at least he’d have something to hold on to.
In no time at all, it seemed, Ché and Ilana had climbed back inside the aircraft. “Cessna one-four-five-alpha-kilo request taxi.”
A female voice answered over the craft’s radio speakers. “Five-alpha-kilo, cleared to taxi. Hold short runway two-five.”
A drumming roar burst into Muffin’s ear as the craft’s propeller began to turn, drowning out any further conversation. Muffin yanked out the earpiece. It would be impossible now to hear the voices. The engine was too loud, and soon they’d be too far away.
Muffin watched helplessly as the little airplane taxied away. He could barely see it now. Sunshine reflected off the white paint, and it suddenly looked very small. He couldn’t listen and couldn’t see. Glumly, he trudged back to his cart and grabbed a pair of pruning shears.
“Wait, John! Don’t take it out on the hedge. The people in the Cessna, they’ll be okay. I know. I washed their plane this morning.”
Muffin jerked his gaze around to Copper. She looked even prettier with the concern for him that she wore on her face. She wasn’t a space-hand or a jaded frontierswoman. She reminded him of the women of his homeworld, the homeworld he hadn’t wanted to return to because he didn’t want to live there alone while drowning in his family’s good intentions.
“Washing gives me a close-up look at the airplanes,” she explained. “If I think the maintenance isn’t being kept up, or if anything’s loose or too dirty, I yell at the owner.” She swallowed. “I lost my parents and my brother in a crash that shouldn’t have happened. I figure it’s the least I can do.”
A shadow passed over Muffin’s mind. It had been a long time since he thought of the war, but Copper’s words spurred a memory of that time. “I flew in combat,” he said, almost without realizing it. He did have the good sense not to say more, that his last mission was part of the raid to free Queen Jasmine. That they were running to their starfighters on foot when the young pilot he was paired with took a shot in the abdomen. Muffin had got the lad off Brevdah Three, but he’d bled to death during their escape. “I haven’t had the heart to pilot a craft since.”
Copper waited for him to say more, but that was all there was to tell. “I am not a man of many words,” he apologized, opening and closing his fists.
Her gentle smile told him she’d already figured that out. “Do you want to get a Pepsi or something? There’s a machine over by the wash shed.”
Nodding, Muffin put the shears back in the wheelbarrow.
“I don’t think you should be snooping, anyway,” she scolded. “No matter how good it pays.” Her expression pleaded with him. “If it’s not right.”
Suddenly he was less motivated to follow Ché and Ilana as carefully as he’d been doing. What was the point? Their relationship was going exactly as Ian wanted. Perhaps Muffin should step back a bit, notifying Ian only if things changed for the worse. Maybe he’d been following the couple so closely because he’d had nothing else to do. But now there was Copper. She might be a better way to fill his time.
He answered her with a broad smile. “Show me the Pepsi. I will buy it for you.”
She gave her head a shake as they walked. “Nah. I’m buying this time. It’s the least I can do for you after throwing you down on the ground.”
Muffin cringed. “And she’s such a little thing, too,” he muttered.
Copper’s mouth fell open. “What did you call me?”
Had he said something to hurt her? Blast the language barrier. He was not swift of tongue in his own language, let alone in a difficult and confusing one like this English. “Little?”
“Bless you. I’m five-eight, and two hundred pounds. No one has ever called me ‘little.’ Forgive me if I swoon.”
As far as Muffin was concerned, she could faint away right into his arms and he wouldn’t complain. But she looked too steady on her feet for that. “Where I am from the people are big. Trust me, Copper, you are not.” He brought his fist to his chest. It made a solid thump. “We grow large and hardy in the cold crisp air, the bright sunshine, and our bountiful food supply, all of it homegrown and hunted locally.”
Copper said, “You can tell me more over a soda.”
“If you buy me the beverage, it is only right that I buy you dinner.”
Her gree
n eyes swerved his way. “Dinner?” Her cheeks turned pink. “You mean…like a date?”
“I think so.” He hoped he’d gotten the translation right.
“Okay.” She looked happy and stunned. Muffin was delighted he had made her that way, because it was exactly the way he felt. All the more reason to take a little more free time.
But at one p.m., he’d intended to follow Ché and Ilana to their next destination, wherever that might be. But was it necessary? Would Ian have asked it of him? Muffin doubted it. Clearly, Ilana and Ché could get into no worse trouble than taxiing, and there was nothing he could do about that now that they’d taken to wheeling around the tarmac.
No, this afternoon Muffin was free. Work, work, work made him an unhappy boy, Muffin thought, grinning at Copper. “We have arranged for Pepsi, and for dinner. Would you like to share lunch with me?”
“Share? Mmm. No. But I’ll eat with you if I can have my own plate.”
Muffin laughed, a deep and rich sound, even to his own ears. But ever the dutiful guard, he couldn’t enter the wash shed, a metal-sided hangar that smelled like soap, without turning to look toward the runways one more time.
Copper snatched his sleeve and tugged. “They’ll be fine.”
Sighing, he turned back to her. On a normal day, he’d not have taken his attention away from a woman like Copper for a single moment, but the prickling in his neck wouldn’t go away. He knew it had to do with the flying.
Chapter Fifteen
Forty-eight, forty-nine…
Klark Vedla hung upside-down from an exercise bar. His arms were crossed over his chest, and his feet were held snug by ankle restraints. With each silent count, he lifted his upper body from the vertical.
Fifty, fifty-one, fifty-two…
Sweat dripped onto the mat below his head. An occasional drop entered his eyes and burned. He kept his eyes open, however. Guards watched him around the clock, but one must never become complacent or trust fully the so-called unbreakable security of the palace. His ancestors had made that mistake, and they were slaughtered, nearly all.