Paige started to tell him the dog's name was Butterscotch, but stopped, tugged by the way he cradled the puppy and talked about someday having a pet when he could give it the attention it deserved. "We haven't named her yet. How about you decide on something before you come back Monday?"
She braced for another of his killer smiles—a smile that never came. He just returned her stare with somber intensity that stirred more of that dry lightning inside before he set the soon-to-be-renamed dog on the ground beside her and stood.
"Yes, ma'am. I'll see you then."
And for some scary reason when he said ma'am this time, she didn't feel at all old.
Chapter 5
Bo felt the music soak into him, resonating through the strings into his fingers. Playing the guitar—or the piano, drums, even some saxophone when the mood called— brought the world back into focus for him by paring everything down. Only notes at his command remained.
Sprawling back on the lumpy sofa at the Minot AFB temporary lodging facility, he propped his tennis shoe against the coffee table, flight suit exchanged for jeans and a Tshirt. His right hand plucked while his left fingered along the frets in routine scales that somehow became a song of their own in the rhythmic musicality of warming up. His buddies didn't seem to object to his tunes, so he kept picking away, scales shifting to Bach on the guitar.
Rather than separating the crew into officer and enlisted quarters, they'd been bunked together in a suite with four rooms attached to a common room, as per the flight orders, maintain crew integrity. Not that Quade's closed door invited much camaraderie or bonding as called for in the orders.
Tag's door, however, stayed open while he sprawled on his bed talking to his wife on the phone. Mako perched on the edge of the sofa, his boots and polishing kit spread out over the coffee table in front of him. Bo let his fingers find their way along the strings until Bach morphed into a calypso beat that sounded a little too much like a tropical tune ready-made to serenade a luscious lady sunbather.
Nu-uh. Not gonna go there.
He forced his fingers to hammer out some Rolling Stones. Damn straight he wasn't getting much satisfaction these days. Sexual or practical.
Jansen was keeping an eye out for suspicious strangers around his sister, but didn't have any helpful insights. Bo's computer search on his laptop about Paige's dead husband hadn't brought any new info other than the standard questions about identifying the rest of the man's contacts, which shouldn't have surprised him. He'd spent countless hours over the past year researching the bastard.
And Paige.
Damn. He forced his strumming to segue into vintage Carlos Santana. A guitarist for the ages.
His soul settled.
At least something was going his way. He'd already spoken to Quade about taking leave while he waited around for the plane to be repaired. The commander had glowered and nodded, then headed into his room. Door closed. No chitchat.
Mako unwrapped the torn T-shirt rag from around two fingers. He tossed aside the polish-stained cotton cloth along with the small round tin. "Figures you would find the lone tree here in North Dakota."
"Tree?"
"You know—woman behind every tree." He swiped the buffing brush along the sides of his boot. "Apparently from what I saw at the air show, you found that tree."
It took Bo a second to remember that Mako wouldn't have recognized her. While they'd partied together on TDYs over the years, the jokester tech sergeant was new to Charleston Air Force Base, a recent transfer into the maintenance squadron from McChord AFB in Washington.
"I already knew her from when she used to live in Charleston." Enough on the subject to cover his butt if someone filled in Mako, but not so much as to offer up more about Paige's past than she would want out there.
"Cute kid she's got," Mako pressed, awful damn nosy all of the sudden. Buff, buff with the brush along one side. Buff, buff along the toe with a reminder of puked-on boots that needed polishing. "Single mother, I assume?"
"Uh-huh. Widowed." His thumb slipped on a string.
"Pretty lady."
"Uh-huh." Understatement. Blond and lush even in jeans and no makeup, Paige resembled one of those WWII pinup posters he'd once seen in an Air Force museum.
"Are she and her kid the reason you're asking for leave while you're here?"
Bo set aside his guitar. "Something wrong with sightseeing? God knows we've all got leave time coming out of our ass since they keep us too busy to use it."
"So you're planning a trip down to Mt. Rushmore with that leave you asked the colonel about."
Why the hell was everyone pushing him to Rushmore? "Are you looking to start a travel agency? Next thing we know, you'll be passing out leis and discount booklets."
Mako tossed down the buffing brush, with a smirk. "That's a lot of defensive bad attitude over just hanging out with an old friend. I smell a story here."