LITMIR.BIZ

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once today and it’s not even 0600. He’s all yours, Marietta.” Skeeter got up, leaving the rest of her breakfast untouched.

      Plucking the dusty plastic rose from the bud vase, Zach held it out to her. “Are you sure you have to go?”

      Skeeter rejected the faux flower and his insincerity by turning away.

      “I don’t think she likes me,” Zach confided in his RIO once the other navigator was out of ear-shot. Not that he cared. Sticking his gum on the side of his plate, he picked up his glass.

      “Aren’t you barking up the wrong skirt?”

      Zach almost choked on a swallow of chalky milk headed down his windpipe. He coughed to clear his throat.

      Steve offered a sheepish grin. “So Skeeter doesn’t like you and Michelle is pissed at you—what else is new?” Steve sopped up the gravy on his plate with his last bite of biscuit, a Navy specialty called SOS.

      “‘Pissed’ is an understatement.” Zach dug into his pancakes. “Michelle acts as if I’m out to destroy her career,” he managed to say between bites.

      “And you probably will. Admit it, Prince, you’re a nonconformist. You don’t give a damn about your career. But you’re a helluva F-14 pilot, which is why the Navy puts up with you. Your call sign isn’t Renegade for nothing, you know.”

      “Yeah, I know.” Even before this latest ass-chewing, he’d been thinking about what he had to offer the Navy and what he wanted in return. But despite what anyone thought, it bothered him that Michelle thought he was out to destroy her life when all he wanted to do was be a part of it. Maybe he’d have been better off following in his father’s footsteps to the SEAL teams, instead of pursuing Michelle into aviation.

      He loved to fly, but his laid-back approach in a world that moved at Mach II sometimes made him look indolent. Maybe he’d be better off out of the service altogether. “If I start submitting my résumé now—”

      “Whoa. Back up.” Steve pushed aside his plate. “You want to fly for a commercial airline?”

      “Why not? I’m at the end of my obligated service. I could have a civilian job by the end of the cruise.”

      It was no secret the airlines recruited military pilots right out of flight school. He and Michelle could both easily get real jobs. Was that what he wanted to do with the rest of his life? A commuter run between Sioux Falls and Cedar Rapids? Two point five kids? A white picket fence?

      He wasn’t sure.

      But sometime during the past four months the idea had taken hold and wouldn’t let go. Now all he had to do was convince Michelle.

      “Wipe those thoughts right out of your head. Talk about conforming—” Steve reached for Skeeter’s bowl of unfinished cereal and started shoveling soggy shredded wheat into his mouth “—that is not what’s going to make you happy, my friend.” Steve let his less-than-objective opinion be known between swallows of slop. Zach was used to his friend’s garbage gut and his convictions.

      Steve’s eyesight had kept him from becoming a pilot and fulfilling his own dream of becoming a Blue Angel, the Navy’s elite exhibition fliers. Even after laser surgery corrected his vision, the Navy rejected his request to retrain from a designated NFO—naval flight officer—to a pilot. Retreads, as the Navy liked to call them, had a higher percentage of crashes. But that didn’t stop Steve from trying to cut through the red tape, however.

      “Don’t take it personally, Magic Man. You’re the best radar I’ve ever had in my back seat. And you’d make one helluva pilot. Even Greene is pulling for you on this one.”

      Beyond that, Zach didn’t offer any encouragement. Whether or not Steve would ever find himself behind the controls of a jet all depended on the needs of the Navy.

      “You can’t be serious about giving up jets, Prince.”

      Do you have any idea how serious this is? We were lucky to get off with just a warning.

      “I’ve never been more serious about anything in my life.” Or anyone. His deepest personal thought caught the tail end of his sentence and went along for the ride.

      It didn’t matter what he did as long as they were together.

      If he and Michelle married while in the service, they’d see less of each other than they did now. There’d be long separations. Restrictions when they were together. And he didn’t have a clue how they’d ever manage a family. But if he could convince her they had other options…

      The ensign leaned forward in his seat. “Take my advice, Prince. Forget about it. You’re a naval aviator, there’s JP-5 running through your veins. If the Navy wanted guys like us to have families, they’d have issued a wife and kids along with the seabag.”

      Steve spoke the truth. Not too very long ago the Navy hadn’t even allowed married men to train as pilots. Single guys were discouraged from tying the knot. Firstborn sons from two-parent families with stay-at-home mothers and domineering fathers were considered ideal candidates, according to one Navy study, because of their natural arrogance.

      Opportunities for women, once nonexistent, were just now opening up. Michelle’s pride was all wrapped up in being among the first female fighters. And he was going to ask her to give that up?

      She’d never go for it. Even he had to admit how much she loved flying.

      What had he done?

      “I appreciate the warning, Magic Man. But it’s too late.” He’d already popped the question, so to speak. But he was no longer sure about her answer.

      A CORNER OF the squadron changing room was sectioned off by a hanging bedsheet. The easy locker-room banter subsided as Michelle entered, then picked up again as she crossed to the other side of the jerry-rigged drape.

      Since her introduction to the Fighting Aardvarks of VF-114, she’d seen as much of these men as their wives and proctologists. Yet the barriers remained.

      The partition only served as a reminder.

      It certainly wasn’t there to protect her already compromised modesty.

      Michelle grabbed her G suit from its hook and put it on over her flight suit. In the post-Tailhook era male fliers acted with caution around their female counterparts. When asked, they dutifully acknowledged women as their equals, but resentment brewed beneath the surface.

      Michelle shut out thoughts of equality as she shrugged into her survival vest. She had a job to do. The same as the men. For better or worse, for now at least, she was a Vark.

      Hearing Zach’s familiar voice from the other side of the curtain, she realized he’d come into the room and wasn’t attempting to sweet-talk her out of her bad mood. In fact, he ignored her altogether as he carried on a conversation about weather conditions with the rest of the guys.

      Michelle paused in putting on her gear.

      What did she expect? She’d made it clear she wanted him to leave her alone. Even if deep down that wasn’t what she wanted at all. She’d made her choice, the right choice, and now she had to live with it. Still, it would be tough going on without him. He’d always been a part of her world.

      He’d smoothed over the rough waters of squadron life. And she credited him with the fact that the men even tolerated her at all. His easy acceptance of her as his wingman made them all more comfortable.

      It was her job to ride his wing. Follow his orders. But she’d always felt as if he didn’t mind being the one watching out for her, something she didn’t always appreciate, but remained grateful for nonetheless.

      There were pilots who considered it bad luck to have a woman walk the wings of their parked planes, let alone ride in them.

      Michelle’s gaze involuntarily darted to an eye-level rip in the sheet, searching for Zach on the other side. Some smart-ass had printed the

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