Crusty groused, "Can't believe she called our jokes lame, Bronco."
"Well there aren't privates in the Air Force. Just airmen."
"Details, details..."
She whipped off her headset and unstrapped from the copilot seat. Double-timing, she descended the narrow stairwell into the cargo hold before the pilots could razz her again. The cavernous belly swelled with the tinny echo of activity and engine drones. A red glow hovered throughout, the low lighting set to calm the dolphins during flight. Temperatures had been lowered, as well, per the good doc's instructions.
Scanning for Max, she rubbed her hands along her arms to ward off the chill but found no sign of him in the dimly lit craft. Her stomach lurched with anticipation as it hadn't done since her early days in flight training.
Two rectangular fiberglass tanks lined the center like train carts. The briefings she'd received provided a mental picture of what filled them. A dolphin lay in each one, cradled in a mesh sling. Around ten or eleven feet long, each dolphin rested partially submerged in water.
By the tank farthest from her, the professor's assistant stood beside the loadmaster. Master Sergeant Jim "Tag" Price passed a walk-around oxygen bottle to the assistant. Darcy wasn't fooled by Tag's smile. The seasoned loadmaster ran a tight ship in back and didn't take well to having his rules ignored.
The dolphins were in safe hands. So where was Max?
Bracing a hand along the cool fiberglass, she strode toward Tag. A burst of air whooshed from the dolphin's blowhole. Startled, Darcy jumped, looked around.
Her gaze traveled up until she found Max on the edge of the tank spraying a mist inside. With smooth agility, he swung a leg over, straddling the wall, muscles flexing as he steadied himself.
Rubber boots covered up to his knee, but his toned thigh stayed in plain sight. God, that leg looked good encased in well-worn denim. If she walked a few steps forward and reached up, just a bit...
Darcy hooked her hands on her h*ps before they turned traitor. Her eyes, however, she allowed free rein to rove before he noticed she'd joined him.
A yellow slicker masked most of Max's chest, protecting him from the backspray. She detected a hint of chambray shirt peeking through the unbuttoned coat.
His rebellious hair spiked, calling her hands to bring on the finger comb. Not that she would with a cargo hold full of people watching. But what should she do? Her experience ranked somewhere between nil and nonexistent, unlike her confident older sister.
Maybe that was it.
She would just think like Alicia. Act like Alicia, who'd moved from being president of her senior class to the cockpit of an F-15 in less than a decade.
Being a virgin with next to no experience in the flirting arena didn't mean Darcy hadn't seen others in action. How hard could it be to lift a few of her sister's simpler moves?
Preflighting her plan with a hefty dose of bravado, Darcy braced her shoulders and launched phase two of Operation Dolphin Doc.
"Is it okay for me to be close like this?"
Darcy's husky words punched the air from Max as effectively as a surprise swipe from a powerful dolphin tail. He closed the valve on the hose and looked down into the belly of the cargo plane. "Say again?"
Strolling toward him, she trailed her fingers along the fiberglass tank. "I wouldn't want to upset them by standing too close."
Close to the dolphins. Max swallowed a laugh at himself. Damn, but he was so used to looking for hidden agendas in undercover assignments he'd missed the obvious.
Accepting words and a person at face value.
Max hefted himself over the edge of the transport tank and to the ground, gaining his footing not more than a few inches from her. Darcy Renshaw was a rarity. A good, honest person. He didn't doubt his assessment for a second. He'd seen enough corruption working CIA ops to recognize innocence.
His own thoughts were far from innocent as he wondered what it would be like to drag down the zipper on Darcy's flight suit. To reveal every inch of what waited hidden beneath that bulky green uniform.
He patted the side of the dolphin tank instead to keep his hands occupied. "You're fine standing where you are. Sorry if she startled you."
"I thought you said she would sleep for most of the flight. If so, that's quite a snore she's got going."
"She's just breathing." While he was doing his damnedest not to breathe in the Darcy-scent of baby powder and soap mixed with a hint of hydraulic fluid.
"Well, that's a hefty exhale." Darcy scratched a hand along her collarbone, drawing his attention straight to that zipper and the translucent skin on her neck.
Time to roll out some boring academia to send her sprinting back up to the cockpit. "Dolphins exhale at over a hundred miles per hour."