Sandra Brown: Low Pressure

“I wanted to see how you’d fared. I hadn’t heard anything about you since the airline… thing.”

“Ah! So you know about that?”

“It made news.”

“I know,” he said drily. “You gonna write a book about that, too?”

She gave him a look.

“I can supply you with lots of material, A.k.a. Let’s see.” He stroked his chin thoughtfully. “How about the time the young widow chartered me to fly her to Nantucket? Long way from here. By the time we got to the Massachusetts coast, it was a dark and stormy night. Nobody got murdered, but the lady tried her best to fuck me to death.”

Bellamy flinched at the word, but refused to let him rile her, which she knew was his intention. Keeping her features schooled, and with deliberate patience, she said, “I hired you because I wanted to learn if you’d read my book and, if you had, what your reaction to it was.”

“Well, now you know. Cost you two-point-five grand plus fuel costs to find out. Was it worth it?”

“Yes.”

“Good. I want my passengers to feel like they get their money’s worth. The widow sure as hell did.” He gave her a goading grin, which she ignored. Then his grin reversed itself and he swore under his breath. “If Gall thinks he’s getting his broker’s fee off this charter, he’s sadly mistaken.”

“Maybe he didn’t tell you because—”

“Because he knew I’d say no.”

“Because he thought it would be good for you to see us.”

“How could it possibly have been good for me?”

“It gave us all an opportunity to mend fences.”

“Mend fences.”

“Yes. To put it behind us. To forget—”

“ Forget ?” He leaned forward again, this time with such angry impetus he made the table rock. “That’s what I’ve been doing for the past eighteen years. At least it’s what I’ve been trying to do. You said it happened a long time ago. Well, not long enough, lady. Not long enough for me to put it behind me. To forget it. To have everybody else forget it. And now you, you come along and write your freaking book about that Memorial Day—”

“Which was published as fiction. I never intended—”

“—and the whole ugly business is out there again for everybody in the world to gnaw on. If you wanted to write a story, fine. Why didn’t you make one up?” He thumped his fist on the book. “Why did you have to write this story?”

She resented having to account to him and let him know it by matching his anger. “Because I want to forget it, too.”

He gave a bark of humorless laughter. “Funny way of forgetting, writing it all down.”

“I was twelve years old when it happened. It had a dramatic effect on me. I overcame a lot of it, but I needed to expunge it.”

“Expunge?” He raised a brow. “That’s a five-dollar word. Did you use it in your book?”

“I needed to write it all down so it would become something tangible, something I could then wad up and throw away.”

“Now you’re talking. Be my guest.” He gave the book another shove closer to her. “You can start with this copy. Pitch it in the nearest trash can.” He stood up and turned toward the door, saying over his shoulder, “Let’s go.”

“Do you see…? Dent? Are we okay?”

Those were the first words his passenger had uttered since she’d climbed aboard. In case she needed to talk to him during the flight, he’d instructed her on the use of the headset. “All you gotta do is plug this into here, and this into here.” He demonstrated with the cords attached to the headset. “Put the mike near your mouth, like this.” He moved it to where it was almost touching her lower lip. “And talk. Got it?”

She nodded, but he figured it didn’t matter if she understood or not; she wouldn’t have anything to say. Which was fine with him.

But now, about twenty minutes into their forty-minute flight, they had encountered some light turbulence and she was speaking to him in an anxious voice. He turned so he could see into the cabin. She was gripping the arms of her seat and staring anxiously out the window. Heat lightning was showing up on the western horizon, revealing a bank of thunderclouds. They were flying parallel to them, but she was on edge.

He was well aware of the weather system, knew from consulting the radar where it was and the direction and speed at which it was moving. He had filed his flight plan accordingly. “Nothing to worry about,” he said into his mike. “Those storms are miles away and won’t amount to much anyway.”

“I just thought… maybe we could take another route?”

“I filed a flight plan.”

“I know but… Couldn’t we fly farther away from the storms?”

“We could. But I’d rather dodge a thunderstorm than have an MD80 that doesn’t know I’m there fly up my ass.” He turned around so she could see his face instead of the back of his head. “But that’s just me.”

She gave him a drop-dead look, yanked the cords from the outlets on the wall near her chair, and removed her headset. He focused his attention on the job at hand, but when the turbulence became even rougher, he looked back to check on her. Her eyes were closed and her lips were moving. She was either praying or chanting. Or maybe cursing him.

Gall, whom he’d notified of his approach, had turned on the runway lights. He set the airplane down with the ease of long practice and skill and taxied toward the hangar, where he could see Gall silhouetted in the open maw of the building.

He brought the airplane to a stop and cut the engines. Gall came out to put chocks on the wheels. Dent squeezed himself out of the cockpit and into the cabin, opened the door, then climbed out first and turned to help Bellamy navigate the steps. She ignored the hand he extended.

Which piqued him. He reached for her hand and slapped a sales receipt into it. “You owe me for the gas I got in Houston.”

“Mr. Hathaway has my credit card. Excuse me. I need the restroom.”

She hurried into the building.

Gall rounded the wing and glanced into the empty cabin. “Where are her folks?”

“They stayed in Houston.”

“Doesn’t surprise me. The old man looked like he was on his last leg. Otherwise, how’d it go?”

“Don’t make nice with me, Gall. I’m mad as hell at you.”

“You’re richer tonight than—”

“I want a straight answer. Did you know about her book?”

“Book?”

“A book. You know, like people read.”

“Does it have pictures?”

“No.”

“Then I didn’t know about it.”

Dent searched Gall’s eyes, which were rheumy but free of deceit. “I’ll kill you later. Right now, I’m ready to put up my airplane and call it a day.”

While he was going about it, Bellamy and Gall conducted their business in the hangar office. But he kept an eye on them, and, as she came out of the hangar, he placed himself directly in her path.

Stiffly, she said, “Thank you.”

He wasn’t about to let her getaway be that easy. “I may not use words like ‘expunge,’ but I know how to fly. I’m a good pilot. You had no reason to be scared.”

Not quite meeting his gaze, she said, “I wasn’t afraid of the flying.”

Together Dent and Gall got the airplane into the hangar. Dent climbed back in to retrieve his sunglasses and iPad, and spotted the copy of Low Pressure lying in the seat Bellamy had occupied. “Son of a bitch.” He grabbed the book and, as soon as he cleared the door of his airplane, made a beeline for his Vette.

Gall turned away from the noisily humming refrigerator, a six-pack of Bud in his hand. “I thought we’d crack a couple of—Where are you going?”