Point of Departure

by Lindsay McKenna

  Callie moved to the table, which had been set with her good china, pink linen napkins rolled neatly beside the plates. A cup of recently poured coffee and a small glass of orange juice awaited her. Everything was perfect. She sat down and set the crutches aside.

  “I’m in shock,” she said.

  Ty twisted to look over his shoulder as he added cream cheese and bacon bits to the scrambled eggs. “Over what?”

  “You. This.” Callie waved to the table. “Everything is so neat—thoughtful, I guess….”

  “Brother, you must have had some bad experiences with men,” Ty teased as he whipped the scrambled eggs furiously. “Some of us are kitchen trained.”

  His heartrending smile shattered her tension, and Callie laughed lightly. “I guess I had that coming, didn’t I?”

  “I don’t know,” Ty said smoothly as he brought the skillet over and served half the scrambled eggs to her and half to himself. “Maybe you haven’t run into very many thoughtful men of late.” He put the skillet in the sink, ran water into it, then quickly brought over the just-popped-up toast. Untying the apron, he laid it on the drainboard, then sat down at her elbow and grinned. “A meal fit for a queen. Dig in, Callie. You need some color back in those cheeks of yours.”

  Nonplussed, Callie picked up the knife and buttered her toast. Ballard seemed like a happy little boy instead of a serious navy pilot. “I don’t know what to make of you,” she muttered between delicious bites of the scrambled eggs.

  “Why?”

  “You’re different.”

  Shrugging, Ty launched into his meal with gusto. “My ex-wife said the same thing.” She might as well know he had a failed marriage. If nothing else, he had learned to be honest and keep all his cards on the table when it came to relationships. He knew he didn’t want to make the same mistakes twice. Especially not with Callie. Even as the thought passed through his head, Ty wondered what kind of crazy magic had come over him. From that first moment of seeing her helpless in the parking lot, something had sprung loose deep within him. What was it? Loneliness? God knew, he’d been like a lost wolf without a mate since the divorce.

  It was impossible to ignore Ty’s upbeat presence. Callie glanced over at him when he mentioned the divorce. “You’re single now?” she asked pointedly. Once, she’d fallen in love with a pilot who’d said he was divorced. It had been a lie, but he had strung Callie along, getting what he wanted from her. When she’d discovered the lie, she’d confronted Mark. He’d laughed and shrugged it off as if it didn’t matter—as if she didn’t matter.

  Ty held up his left hand to show the absence of a wedding ring. “Single.”

  “How long were you married?”

  “Five years.”

  She pushed the eggs around on her plate. “That’s a long time for a navy pilot. Most of them seem to get married and divorced in two years.”

  “Or less,” Ty agreed. He saw the wariness in Callie’s face again. There was a lot of unspoken pain there, too, and he surmised that she’d been burned by a pilot at some point. “I liked marriage,” he went on. “I liked the idea of having a home.”

  “Do you have any children?”

  He shook his head. “No….”

  “Is your ex-wife a civilian?”

  “Yeah. She lives in San Diego. She’s a bright, intelligent woman.”

  Callie heard the hurt in his voice, although he tried to hide it with bravado. “You said she called you ‘different,’ too.”

  “Well,” he sighed, “‘different’ wasn’t used in a complimentary way, Callie.”

  Callie thrilled to hear her name slip from his lips. Trying to ignore the feelings it invoked, she found herself wanting to continue pursuing Ballard’s past. Why? she asked herself. Callie had no answers, and it left her feeling terribly vulnerable.

  “Five years is a long time to spend with someone. You must have meant a lot to each other,” Callie hedged. She saw her comment strike Ballard with a direct hit. His smile slipped, and a shadow came across his eyes.

  “Jackie wanted the divorce,” he said quietly. “I didn’t.”

  “Oh.”

  Ty felt Callie’s interest. He hadn’t meant to get into a discussion about his personal life—at least, not this morning. He’d wanted to come over, cheer Callie up a little and head to work. He frowned, pushing the last of the eggs onto his fork. There was pain from the past to deal with, now, too.

  “I guess I wasn’t around when she needed me,” he began. “I was gone a lot. Most of the time I was out on carriers—I didn’t get the land-based assignments I’d hoped for.”

  “That ruins a lot of marriages,” Callie agreed soberly. She reached over, placing her hand on his arm for just a moment. “I’m sorry. You seem nicer than most of the navy pilots I’ve known. It’s too bad it had to happen, Ty.”

  Ty rallied under her soft, hesitant touch and the use of his first name. It was a start, and for that he was grateful. “Yeah, well, as the saying goes, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Look, I gotta run. I’m due to teach a class at 0800 over at Fightertown.” He pushed the chair away and stood up. Before he left, he placed his dishes and silverware in the sink.

  Callie blinked at the abruptness of Ty’s departure. She sat back and watched a mask drop over his rugged features. Unable to take offense at his sudden retreat into silence, she felt deeply for him. Ty had really loved his wife. That was a new twist for her. Most navy pilots loved ’em and left ’em without so much as an “I’m sorry,” in her experience.

  “Thanks for coming by…for everything,” she managed in a small voice. She wanted to apologize for raking up the painful coals of his past. His suffering was obvious.

  “Thanks for letting me barge into your life,” Ty said. He picked up his cap and settled it over his military-short hair. “I’ll be seeing you around. Maybe I’ll call you in a couple of days—see how you’re recuperating?” He’d never wanted anyone to say yes as he did now. Callie’s upturned features were bathed with a pink blush that made her blue eyes sparkle with life—and suddenly Ty realized that his presence had helped her a bit. He felt good about that. He was just sorry he couldn’t hide his hurt over the divorce. He cursed himself for bringing it up in the first place.

  “A phone call would be fine,” Callie agreed quietly. She saw a fierce longing burning in his gray eyes as he stood so proudly before her. The aura of a navy pilot was enough to knock any woman off her feet, she thought dizzily. And Ty Ballard was a very special man. Very special.

  “Great.” He smiled and lifted his hand in farewell. “I’ll see you later, Callie. If you need anything, just call me at the office.” He pointed to her ankle. “With that injury, you aren’t going to be able to get to the commissary to buy groceries. Sure you wouldn’t like me to help in that department, now that I’ve proved myself in the kitchen?”

  With a laugh, Callie shook her head. “No, thanks, Ty. Maggie is going to shop for me after she gets off work this evening.”

  “I’ll be seeing you around,” he promised thickly.

  Chapter Four

  “Ty, Captain Martin wants to see you,” Jean Riva said.

  His cup of coffee in hand, Ty halted in the passageway of the Top Gun facility. He had exactly fifteen minutes before he was scheduled to start class. As always, the facility buzzed with muted excitement. Still euphoric over the possibility that Callie might actually like him, he nodded and stepped toward his commanding officer’s office.

  A short, dark-haired woman with piercing brown eyes that missed nothing, Riva was a GS-12 in Civil Service and was Captain Martin’s very able assistant and secretary. But right now she looked unhappy. Ty halted at her desk.

  “What’s up, Jean?”

  “A lot,” she muttered. Leaning over, she announced Ty’s arrival to the CO.

  “Send him in, Jean,” the gravelly voice on the other end ordered.

  She straightened and nodded. “Go right in, Commander.”

  “No hints
?” Ty teased. The woman was a no-nonsense, strictly-by-the-book civil servant of the best kind. She was famous for her organizational ability, because it was she, more than anyone else, who kept the facility glued together and functioning properly.

  “No hints, Commander,” she announced brusquely and gave him a cardboard smile.

  Ty never liked that smile when Jean chose to use it. It meant she was holding back a lot of feelings about something—and usually it meant bad news. Girding himself, he sighed and opened the door. Bob Martin was one of the youngest captains in the navy. He was a highly decorated Vietnam veteran—an ace with six kills to his credit—and was even more no-nonsense than his vaunted assistant.

  Martin’s head snapped in his direction as Ty closed the door behind him. “Come in, Ty.” He gestured toward one of the two chairs in front of his large walnut desk. “Have a seat.”

  “Yes, sir,” Ty murmured, sitting down and balancing the cup of coffee on his left thigh. He often thought that Martin looked snakelike—but in the most positive way. He could keep his narrow face absolutely devoid of expression, and he had coal black eyes that never seemed to blink. They just stared down the other party with such an intensity that Ty figured Martin could mesmerize them into immobility—much the way a cobra would hypnotize its prey.

  Martin’s black hair was peppered with strands of gray at the temples, and now he was wearing his summer white uniform, the four gold stripes on black boards positioned on each of his shoulders shouting his authority.

  “I understand you were a witness to the assault on Lieutenant Calista Donovan?”

  Ty felt as if a bomb had been dropped in Martin’s office. He straightened unconsciously. His CO must have received Dr. Lipinski’s report via the legal department, he realized. “Er…yes, sir.”

  “Tell me exactly what you saw and what happened,” Martin demanded in a clipped tone.

  “Yes, sir,” Ty said, and he launched into a brief sketch of the incident. He watched Martin’s thin, black brows dip lower and lower as he completed the report. The man’s mouth was a flat line by the time he’d finished, his dark eyes flashing with anger.

  Leaning back in his chair, Martin turned and looked out the window that viewed the revetment area where the jets used for training sat. “Commander, I was hoping against hope that Dr. Lipinski was embellishing this whole damn thing.” He turned around and placed his hands on the desk. “Obviously, she wasn’t.”

  “No, sir.”

  “You’ve recently returned from a two-week stint at the War College, where you took accelerated courses in the Uniform Code of Military Justice, right?” he barked out, so abruptly that Ty almost jumped.

  The UCMJ, as it was known, was a huge, legal compendium of articles that applied to every phase of military organization. Ty nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  Picking up a file near his left hand, Martin opened it. “And you were number one in standing, out of fifty attending officers?”

  Flushing a bit, Ty murmured, “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you realize that somehow, by someone, this incident involving Lieutenant Donovan has been leaked to the major newspapers in San Diego and Los Angeles, as well as to press organizations around the United States?”

  Stunned, Ty sat frozen, his grip on the coffee cup tightening. “No, sir, I hadn’t.”

  “Any idea who did it? Not that it matters anymore—the horse is out of the corral now.”

  “I have no idea, Captain.” Ty began to sweat. Did Martin know that he had fraternized with Callie after the incident? He felt as if the walls had suddenly grown eyes and ears. The discussion was on shaky ground, and he didn’t know what Martin wanted from him.

  “Well, within the next couple of hours, our station is going to be inundated with media attention. After that newspaper article by the Donovan sisters, things were already explosive.” With a shake of his head, Martin muttered, “We’ve got a real problem, Ty, and we’ve got to move quickly to institute damage control, or the navy could end up looking very bad—not only to our own tax-paying public, but around the world.”

  “Yes, sir.” Ty sweated a bit more. He no longer chafed over the fact that he was going to be late starting his class.

  “Here’s what I’m authorizing. I’m convening a board of inquiry regarding this matter. Each of the officers listed in Dr. Lipinski’s report will be given counsel by a fellow officer. Obviously, I can’t assign just any officer to Lieutenant Donovan, or the press will cry foul play from the outset.” Martin jabbed his finger in Ty’s direction. “I’m ordering you to become Lieutenant Donovan’s counsel. I can hold up your credentials as the officer at Miramar who has the most familiarity with the UCMJ. If I do less than that, the press will tear us apart. I’m not going to have someone accuse us of giving Lieutenant Donovan less than the best we have for her defense. Not on my station, and not on my watch.”

  Openmouthed, Ty stared at his CO. Never in his wildest nightmares had he thought he’d become a counsel in a board inquiry. It was something any officer could be ordered to do, however, and he quickly realized that by having the UCMJ training, he’d made himself eligible.

  “But, sir, I’m teaching two classes a day here at the facility. To become a counsel is going to require a lot of time and effort.”

  Martin stared at him. “This is a UCMJ, Article 133 problem, Commander. Conduct unbecoming an officer. In this case, potentially three officers. I don’t have a choice. We’ve got to move quickly to convince the press and everyone else, specifically Congress, that we are putting teeth into this board of inquiry. I know you have a stacked schedule, but if necessary, I’ll relieve you temporarily and pull in someone TAD, to take over while you conduct the investigation on behalf of Lieutenant Donovan.”

  “But…I’m a witness to this, too.”

  “There’s nothing in the UCMJ that says a counsel can’t be a witness. When it’s your turn to testify, you’ll do exactly that. This isn’t a civil case out in the public, Commander. I already checked to make sure it was all right for you as counsel to testify.”

  Ty was reeling. “This board will determine whether or not Commander Remington and the other two pilots should be disciplined. Is that correct?”

  “This board will determine who is guilty,” Martin snapped. “You’re the best man for this assignment, Ty, so I want you to teach your classes today. After that, come and tell me whether you can balance both responsibilities. If you can’t, you’re temporarily relieved of duty as an instructor at Top Gun until the board is completed.”

  “When will the board convene, Captain?”

  “In one week. You’ve got seven days to get whatever evidence, witnesses and information you can to present on behalf of Lieutenant Donovan. The board will be made up of three officers from your peer group. I won’t be one of them, since it happened under my command. I won’t have the press crying foul on that, too. Rest assured, we will gather three men with unquestionable backgrounds.”

  Dizzied by the news, Ty nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  “You’ve got exactly five minutes until your class starts, Ty. I don’t want you or Lieutenant Donovan to speak to anyone from the media—is that understood? I’m putting a gag order on Commander Remington and the counsels involved with their side of this incident, too. The media must go through channels or all hell will break loose, and I will not permit that. Is that understood?”

  Standing, Ty came to attention. “Very clear, sir.”

  “Good. Dismissed.”

  Callie was preparing a salad for her lunch when the doorbell rang. She wiped her hands on a nearby towel and settled the crutches beneath her arms. Who was it now? All morning, her phone had been ringing off the hook. Somehow, the incident involving her and Remington had been leaked to the press. Shortly after Ty had left, she’d received a call from Public Affairs at the station, ordering her not to talk to the media. They’d told her that more information would be forthcoming.

  Opening the door, she once again saw Ty Ballard, hat
in hand—but this time he looked very unhappy. A pronounced frown creased his broad brow, and his mouth turned down.

  “Ty…”

  “Hi, Callie. May I come in?”

  She saw the briefcase in his hand and felt tension radiating around him. Her heart pounded briefly and she moved to one side. “Sure, come in.”

  “Thanks,” Ty muttered. He shut the door. Callie was looking much better. Color showed in her cheeks and her blue eyes were no longer so fearful. He saw redness in them, however, and wondered if she’d been crying. The thought needled him. “We have to talk.”

  “Talk?”

  “Yes. Business, Callie. I wish it wasn’t, but it is.”

  She gestured toward the kitchen. “I was just fixing myself a salad for lunch. Would you like some?”

  “No…thanks. I grabbed a hamburger on the way over here.”

  “Okay, you can talk while I eat. How about a cup of coffee?” She couldn’t understand the tension in Ty’s posture, or his abruptness.

  “Sure, a cup of coffee sounds good.” A drink would be better right now, he thought balefully: a stiff belt of whiskey.

  In the kitchen, Callie finished preparing her salad and placed the bowl on the table. Ty poured them coffee and sat down opposite her. She hobbled to the chair and placed her crutches against the wall.

  “I didn’t expect to see you so soon,” she said, drizzling Italian dressing over the salad.

  “I didn’t, either,” he admitted ruefully. Opening his briefcase, he drew out a sheaf of papers and then took a pen from his breast pocket. “Look, you need to know what’s going down, Callie.” He hoped she wouldn’t be upset, but that was fooling himself. “Has anyone from Miramar contacted you about what’s going on?”