Sandra Brown - Low Pressure

“So you believe that part, that Susan came on to him sexually.”

“Yeah, I believe it.”

They lapsed into silence. Eventually she said, “She was selfish and vain. But I had no idea that she could be that cruel-hearted.”

“Didn’t you?” Speaking with quiet intensity, he said, “Your quest for the truth could turn up more ugly surprises, Bellamy. Are you sure you want to continue?”

“I have to.”

“No you don’t.”

“I won’t stop now, Dent.”

“Maybe you should. Why keep going when there may be other land mines out there?”

“Nothing could be as bad as the secret we uncovered today.”

He looked at her for a long moment, then, without saying anything more, faced forward.

“The other boys,” she said haltingly. “The ones she boasted having been with…”

“What about them?”

“You didn’t know?”

“Sure I knew.” He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. “I didn’t care.”

They spent the remainder of the flight in pensive silence and didn’t speak again until they exited the Austin-Bergstrom terminal for the parking garage where he had left his Corvette.

Bellamy offered to call a car service to take her home. “If you’d rather not drive me all the way to Georgetown.”

“I’ll drive you. But Gall’s airfield is between here and there. I’d like to stop on the way.”

Gall’s pickup was the only vehicle around. The wind sock hung limply on its pole in the late evening heat. Dent drove his car into the hangar, and, as he and Bellamy climbed out, Gall walked toward them, wiping his greasy hands on a faded shop rag.

“How is she?” Dent asked, referring to his airplane.

“Coming along. Want to take a look?”

Dent peeled off in that direction. Gall looked at Bellamy and angled his head toward the office. “It’s cooler in there. Air’s on. Watch the back leg of the chair when you sit.”

“Thank you.”

She went into the office and gingerly lowered herself onto the seat of the chair with the unreliable leg. As she watched Dent and Gall discussing the airplane, she took her cell phone from her shoulder bag.

It had logged three missed calls from her agent, two from the publicist. She could only imagine the tizzy the new edition of EyeSpy had caused. They were probably celebrating the boost in publicity.

She hadn’t yet read the copy Dent had given her that morning. She admitted to a morbid curiosity about what Van Durbin had written, and only if she knew the content of his column could she prepare a rebuttal against any untruths, but she couldn’t bring herself to read it now. After the visit with Steven, she felt emotionally whipped.

Disinclined to return the professional calls, she punched in Olivia’s number. An automated voice mail answered. She left a message. It still seemed underhanded that she’d gone to see Steven without his mother’s knowledge. Olivia made no secret of missing him terribly and often lamented that she didn’t see enough of him.

Bellamy wondered—well, she wondered many things. But there were questions she couldn’t put to Olivia without breaching Steven’s confidence. As curious as she was to know what Olivia knew about his private life, she would abide by the pact they’d made as preteens to keep each other’s secrets.

Gall and Dent were now looking at another airplane that was parked inside the hangar. Gall motioned Dent toward it. He seemed to hesitate, then walked over to it.

Gall stood with him for several seconds, then turned and, leaving Dent, came into the office. He was chuckling to himself as he moved behind the desk and sat down. “Knew he couldn’t resist.”

“Is that a new airplane?” Bellamy asked.

“Less than fifty hours on it.”

“Who does it belong to?”

He told her, and she recognized the name. “He’s a state senator, isn’t he?”

“Yep. Plus he owns about a third of the land between Fredericksburg and the Rio Grande. Beef cattle.”

“Oil and gas, too, if I’m not mistaken.”

Gall nodded. “He’s offered Dent a job as his private pilot, but he’s too stubborn and too proud to take it.”

She looked out into the hangar, where Dent was running his hand along the wing of the airplane, following its curvature. Rather like he had run his hand over the shape of her hip last night, outside and inside her pajamas. His hand had been as unshy as his kiss, both taking what they wanted.

The recollection made her face feel hot. Caught in a fog of erotic memory, she missed Gall’s question the first time and had to ask him to repeat it.

“I asked what you thought of him.”

She tried to regard Dent objectively, which was impossible. “I’m still forming my opinion.”

“Your folks didn’t like him.”

“I’m not my folks.”

He didn’t remark on that.

“You’ve known him for a long time.”

“Sure have.” He tossed the soggy remnants of his cigar into the trash can and unwrapped a fresh one.

“Do you ever light those?”

He frowned cantankerously. “Haven’t you heard? Smokin’ is bad for your health. God knows he drummed that into my ears till I either had to quit or kill him just to shut him up about it.”

“Dent lectured you on smoking, when he’s so reckless in his own right?”

Gall fixed his rheumy gaze on her. “Reckless? I guess in some areas of his life he could exercise more caution.”

“He drives way too fast.”

“Yeah, he likes speed. And on occasion he drinks too much and wakes up in a bed he ought not to be in. But I’ll tell you one damn thing.” He held the cigar between two fingers as he wagged them at her. “He’s the best damn pilot I’ve ever run across.”

When she didn’t comment, he took it as an invitation to expand.

“Some pilots are taught to fly, and they learn good enough to keep the airplane from crashing. If the machine is in working order, and the pilot doesn’t fuck up, the thing will fly. You gotta use your hands and your feet and you gotta have a pretty good head on your shoulders and at least a little common sense, so you don’t make a stupid mistake or take a gamble that gets you killed. But even the smartest of men can be the lousiest pilots. You know why? They make it mental. They don’t do it from their gut.”

He gave his belly a loud smack. “The good pilots do it from here. They feel it. They know how to do it before they ever take a lesson. Sure, you gotta learn about the weather, how to read instruments. There’s a lot that can be taught to improve natural skill, but, in my book, that skill—something you’re just born with—is essential. I don’t have it. But I know it when I see it.”

He removed his cigar from his mouth and studied the end of it as he rolled it between his fingers. “I got to shake hands with Chuck Yeager once, out at an air base in New Mexico. I was just a kid, a grease monkey, but in my work I got to rub elbows with lots of flyboys who later became astronauts and such. Damn good pilots. The kind I’m talking about. The ones who do it by instinct.”

He tipped his chin down and looked at Bellamy from beneath the shaggy line of his eyebrows. “But I wouldn’t trade ten of them for one Denton Carter.” As though to underscore the statement, he jammed the cigar back into the corner of his mouth and anchored it there with his teeth.

Amused, she said, “I don’t intend to dispute you.”

“Well,” he grumbled, “just in case you were of a mind to.” He looked beyond her. She turned so that she, too, could see into the hangar where Dent was still inspecting the airplane. “Only a nekkid woman would hold that much fascination for him,” the old man remarked with a cackle.

“When he first started coming out here, he was a moody little bastard, full of piss and vinegar and lots to prove, ready to take offense at the drop of a hat. But when he got around the airplanes, I saw the look that came over his face. There’s an expression for it. Uh… What’s the word?” he asked, rapidly snapping his fingers.