I grab my board and walk back across the street. I pull on a shirt and grab my wallet and keys. I check my phone just in case I missed our chance to connect, still no call. There’s an almost nervous jittery anticipation that wells up inside of me while I wait to hear from her.
I jump in my truck and find a taco stand up the coast on the beach. That’s the one thing Virginia Beach doesn’t have like San Diego does—real Mexican food. I order what Mack would call a ridiculous amount of tacos and eat them sitting at a table that overlooks the water.
The cool ocean air is crisp and refreshing. I didn’t think I would miss San Diego, but I do. I’ve never known anything other than the east coast and the places I’ve been stationed. I let myself wonder what the Texas town Mack grew up in looks like. I don’t even know what it’s called. The fact that I know so little about her when I want to know everything, and anything, burns in my gut like acid.
I pull my cell phone from my pocket and slide my finger across the screen to unlock it. I google her brother, Ryan Black, who is well known in the media as President Chancellor’s aide-de-camp. His Wikipedia page lets me know he was born in a small town in East Texas called Tall Pines.
I immediately pull up another browser tab and google Tall Pines, Texas. It’s a small oil and gas town on the Louisiana border. It’s full of cattle ranches, pipelines, and gas plants. Not to mention hundreds and hundreds of pine trees as far as the eye can see. Coming from New Jersey, it’s not what I expected. But then again, I’ve never been to Texas so other than cowboys and cattle I’m not sure what to expect.
It looks beautiful, peaceful almost, and I hope MacKenzie will want to show it to me someday. I want to see where she was born and went to school. I want to know who took her to prom and if she was the homecoming queen. I want to know everything almost as much as I want her to share it with me. I’m a desperate fuck like that.
I finish my dinner, pick up my trash, toss it in the trash can, and climb back in my truck. When I get back to the condo, I stand under the hot spray of the shower and wrap my hand around my stiff cock like I do every night to get myself off. Afterward, I towel off, climb in bed, and drift off to sleep.
The next day, I head into the San Diego offices to get caught up to speed on the job, and I happily hit the ground running. I’m getting the feel for the way the company runs, and I like it. It’s a lot like the teams, and it definitely helps me transition.
When I get home, I hit the beach, this time for a run, and then grab a burger down the street from the condo. When I get back, I shower and go to sleep, but this time, sleep doesn’t come as easy, because in the back of my mind, throughout the day, I did it with the knowledge that Mack never called.
And I can’t help but feel like something is terribly wrong.
Chapter Sixteen
MacKenzie
Nothing is ever free
Not free.
Nothing is ever free. That’s a lesson I’ll have to remember, but something tells me it’s also the last lesson I will ever learn before I die.
As a pilot, we know it’s always a possibility. We wear a target on our backs, and even though we fly some of the hardest to find aircrafts with the most advanced technology and avionics, it’s always a possibility.
Especially when there’s a double agent involved.
I greet my plane happily and accept the clipboard from Woody.
“It all looks good,” he says, and he watches me as I look over the checklist. He’s giving me a weird look. I smile at him. Maybe I was frowning. I’ve been a little melancholy being away from home. My brother always says that my resting bitch face is ridiculous. My sister just laughs and says that if looks could kill, my RBF definitely would do. Just in case I’ve made him feel like something’s wrong, I smile a friendly, reassuring smile at my favorite mechanic.
“Thanks, Wood.”
“Have a safe flight,” he says and there’s something weird about his tone of voice but I pay it no mind. I’m about to do my favorite thing in the world, fly.
“I always do,” I reply, and then I climb in the cockpit, and the glass dome comes down.
I pull on my helmet and hook up. The touch screen lights up, and I begin to check the gauges and avionics. Like the other day, Cinco, Hooter, and I line up but in reverse order from last time. Now I’m bringing up the rear in line for takeoff.
“S-2-Hooter to Tower, request permission to take off,” I hear him say over the coms.
“Tower to S-2-Hooter, permission to take off granted.”
Hoots lifts into the sky and takes off back toward the mountain range we’re patrolling again. The original site we found turned out to be nothing, so now we’re going back to see if we can find anything else.
“S-2-Cinco to Tower,” I hear Cinco say. “Requesting permission to take off.”
“This is Tower to S-2-Cinco, permission to take off granted.”
And then he’s gone, into the sky, following in Hooter’s trail.
“This is S-2-Lone Star,” I speak into my coms. “Requesting permission to take off.”
