K. Weiland - Storming

He was in way over his head with this deal with Campbell. To pull this thing off, he needed to fix his plane, smuggle Campbell’s booze, win the airshow, and find the flying mystery in the sky—all in less than a week.

A dog barked.

He looked up. “Taos!”

The dog didn’t come bounding out of the trees. But a human head—the very same one that usually wore that red kerchief—poked around one of the trunks. The low profusion of branches sagged with green apples just starting to blush to red. Jael blinked out from the middle of them.

She straightened up from leaning against a sturdy branch. Almost self-consciously, she pushed her hair behind her ears. “You are here? Your friend Nan Carpenter tells me I am to stay with her now.”

He stopped short. “What? Why?”

“I do not have knowledge. I tell her I do not work for you, and she tells me that was good.”

“Ah.” So long as Jael wasn’t connected with Hitch, then she wasn’t quite the no-account Nan had taken her for. He frowned. “I thought you liked it out at camp.”

“I thought you did not want me at camp. You asked Nan Carpenter if I can stay with her.”

“That was then. Didn’t I say you could stay with Earl and Rick and Lilla and me for as long as you wanted?” It was stupid, but her leaving without a word felt like a dismissal. And after all the stuff they’d been through yesterday and today, he deserved at least a goodbye. “Where’d you run off to anyway? You could have told me—I mean, all of us—you were leaving.”

She frowned. “I am in hurry. I must find pilot to take me home.”

“I never said I wouldn’t take you.”

“Yes, you did.” She jutted her jaw. “More times than once.”

He bit back a retort. He was cranky and frustrated and more than ready for this day to end. And he had been dancing all around her requests for help getting back home. But how was he supposed to have known she wasn’t crazy after all?

He made himself relax, and he put on his best grin. “Look, how’d you like to come back? There’s a job for you if you want it. Wing walking in the show. You’re a natural for it.”

“Wings?” Her face lit up, and she stepped forward. “You are saying go up in plane? You will take me home?”

“Yeah, I’ll help you go home, if you’re sure that’s what you want.” The evidence seemed to indicate she’d be a whole lot better off down here, where Zlo couldn’t electrocute her. “But maybe not right away. I mean, I could use your help. You heard Livingstone this afternoon. If we could find Schturming and make sure it doesn’t damage the town again”—or even just explain what it was—“then that could be a big deal, for both of us.”

That was going to be the pill for her to swallow. He kept his posture casual. In her excitement over going home, maybe she’d skip right on by that part.

She knit her brows. “You will not take me home now?”

Or maybe not.

She leaned back. “What is this you are doing? You are being”—she waved her hand, searching for the word—“not real with me.”

His grin slipped. “What?”

“You smile same at me as when you tried to keep Livingstone from giving you to custody man.” She crossed her arms. “Why do you change your mind about taking me to home all of this sudden?”

“It’s not exactly about changing my mind. I didn’t know you before. Now I know you.”

“You are wanting my help now for something. That is why you do this.”

“Well—”

“You think because I do not say your language well that I am stupid.” Red spots appeared on her cheeks and neck. “I am not. I see your face, I hear your words. I am not needing days to have knowledge of who you are. I have seen you this few days already, and I have knowledge of you.”

Like tarnation she did. “And who am I?”

“You are man who gets into trouble. Maybe you do not mean to be causing harm, but you cause it anyway.”

“Look, you do not know me. It’s only been two days. You don’t know anything about me.”

“And you have no knowledge about me either.” She tossed her hair. “But here is something both of us are knowing. I can do something for you that you want, and maybe I am only person who can do it for you. But what I want is something any pilot can do.” She raised her chin. “And they will have happiness to do it for me, after what Livingstone is saying to them about finding Schturming .”

He stared at her. She might have seen right through him from the beginning, but it seemed like he had barely scratched her surface.

She was right, more or less, about almost all of it. He was always getting himself into trouble—he could hardly deny that right now—and save for the fact that he sort of had dibs on her, he’d given her no absolute reason to help him.

“I don’t think you’re stupid. I never did.” He looked her in the eye. “I think Matthew was right—you’re heaped with brains.”

She widened her eyes. Then she looked away, anywhere but at him, before finally settling her gaze on the ground between them. Carefully, she pushed her hair behind her ear again and peeked up at him.

Did that mean maybe she didn’t think he was so bad after all?

He took a step. “Listen, I deserved some of what you said. I admit I don’t have a right to your help. But I sure could use it. And you’ve only met the one pilot—and that’s me—and he’s downright likable once you get to know him. So why not at least think about this job? Until we find Schturming , you’ve got nothing to do in the meantime.”

She slanted a glance at him, another one of those studying looks. But the furrow in her forehead was gone, and the corner of her mouth almost hinted at a smile.

Doggoned if she wasn’t human after all. Except for the lightning and the dead bodies and the bruised shins, he might even be more than a little sorry when the time came to hold up his end of the deal and send her on her way.

He smiled back.

From the direction of the house, footsteps crunched through the grass.

A slender redhead—Molly—ducked a tree branch and stopped at the sight of them. “Oh. I was coming to say it was suppertime.” She looked back and forth between them. “I’m sure you could stay for dinner, Mr. Hitchcock.” She did that slow blink again. She’d probably modeled it after moving-picture stars like Clara Bow and Mary Pickford, but it was so obvious, it would have been worth laughing at—if it wouldn’t have hurt the kid’s feelings.

“You could regale us with your stories of the sky,” she said.

“You can call me Hitch. Nobody I like calls me Mr. Hitchcock. And thanks, but I seriously doubt your mama would appreciate—”

“Molly, did you find them?” Nan ducked around the tree behind her daughter. She caught sight of Hitch and froze.

“I’m just leaving,” he said. “Thought my dog might be out this way. He was with your son last I saw. Walter, I think his name is?”

Nan wrung her hands in the pink floral print of her pinafore apron. She came forward to stand beside Jael. “If your dog’s a brown collie type, he’s around someplace. Call him and I expect he’ll come. You’d best chain him after this.” She opened her mouth like she wanted to say something, closed it, then opened it again. “I allowed as Jael could stay with us now.”

“If it makes any difference, you should know I’m giving her a job. If she wants it.”

“That’s her choice, I’m sure.” Nan drew a breath. Her voice was grim, but her eyes weren’t—quite. “I don’t want to have to be hard about this, Hitch. But you’re not welcome on this farm. It just… isn’t the best thing.”