Their fights about his committing more of himself to his job than he did to her. Gray was the king of keep-it-simple. Keep relationships light.
She'd needed more. She still did.
Throughout the flight, Gray had walked back to talk with all the passengers, as had the rest of the crew. Nothing special, just shooting-the-breeze chitchat. His deliberate refusal for any real conversation with her was conspicuous, thought provoking. Painful.
Damn, but she wanted to see him and have it mean nothing. She didn't want awkward avoidance that hinted at unresolved issues between them.
Meanwhile she was stuck in a webbed military seat surrounded by her co-workers, Gray's co-workers and her memories. Thank heaven in a few minutes she would have more than enough to think about assessing and loading the children.
Were her memories of Sentavo's lush, mountainous landscape accurate, or confused with other childhood "nose pressed to the car window" recollections of a different Eastern European city? Her gypsy childhood trailing her artist parents had left her with a blur of memories from cities all over the world. And a fierce need for roots that had increased with her thirtieth birthday.
A light tap gave the only indication they'd landed, followed by the drag and whine of the engines slowing the aircraft until they taxied to a stop. She gathered her backpack and trailed the others down the load ramp, her stomach flipping another loop-de-loop. Because of the mission, not the man. Right?
Liar.
Old buses littered the tarmac, parked alongside the hangar and shaded by maple and pine bowers. The hangar loomed, nothing more than a rusting warehouse with an oversize door. The children would be waiting inside, her reason for being here, and she couldn't forget that for a minute. Lori strode forward.
Dappled sunlight threaded through the dense trees, patterning lacey shadows on the pitifully thin and cracked asphalt. They'd landed on that? She shivered in spite of the near eighty-degree summer weather.
"Lori."
From behind her, Gray's voice encircled Lori like a warm blanket, like his solid, strong arms. She put two more steps between her and those hot tones before turning to face him. "Smooth flight, Major. I'm impressed."
"Thanks. Lancelot and Bronco put her down, though. The commander and I just relieved them for a few hours over the Atlantic while they snagged a nap." His eyes searched her face as if he might finally say something else, something substantial, then he held fast to his standard behavior for the day and smiled lightly.
Nothing deep.
And absolutely no touching.
"Regardless of who flew when, we're here and those children have waited long enough for a home, for families," Even with a set of affluent parents, she'd waited her whole life for a home, and the ache had sometimes seemed to consume her. God, what must those children, with such greater concerns and fears, be feeling?>His strong, square jaw, set and thrust, already carried the black stubble of a five o'clock shadow, although they'd only just reported in. Of course Gray had always looked like he needed a shave ten minutes after he put down his razor.
An image of him leaning over the bathroom sink wearing nothing but a towel as he shaved flashed through her mind, drawing all the air right out of the cavernous aircraft.
Lori's hand clenched on the oxygen tank. "Hey, Tag. How long's this bottle good for?"
"You only need to carry it around in case there's a rapid decompression and you have to get back to your seat." Tag rapped his knuckles against the yellow canister. "So don't worry. This baby carries fifteen minutes worth."
"Fifteen minutes," Lori echoed, watching Gray disappear into the cockpit to prep the plane for their thirty-hour mission. Her lungs already burned.
* * *
Gray angled into the cockpit, frustration firing to life like a C-17's jet engines. Bronco and Lancelot bantered checklist call and responses into their headsets.
"Circuit breakers in," Bronco said into the microphone.
Lancelot ran his hands along the circuit breaker panel. "Checked in pilot."
Bronco mirrored the gesture with his panel. "Checked in co."
Gray grabbed Bronco's headset, snapped the earpieces and barked, "What the hell did you think you were doing?"
Bronco yanked around with a shout, eyes blazing, then relaxed into his seat, the blaze dimming to a mischievous sparkle. He swept a hand across the instruments. "Running the checklist, of course."
"Yeah, right. Try again."
"Running the checklist, sir," he added, not in the least daunted.
Gray braced a hand across the bulkhead blocking any possible escape route for his so-called friend. "You'd better have a good explanation for this one, pal."