Page 16 of Falling for the Playboy Pilot

7

DALTON

Iwas in a shitty mood. Shittier than normal. It had been a shitty day.

The hangar lights hummed overhead as I crouched under the belly of my S-2. My socket wrench slipped again.

“Come on,” I growled, jamming the tool back into place.

The stubborn metal refused to budge. I put more weight into the bolt, sweat trickling down my back beneath my T-shirt. It wasn’t even all that hot out anymore. The sun was almost down, giving a nice reprieve from the heat of the day. It certainly felt like it was going to be a hot summer. Hot and dry. The worst combination.

It was going to be a busy season, which meant I needed the fucking doors to open. And I was choosing to do my own maintenance. Tyson and his guys had proven to be incompetent. I reached for another tool and moved back under the plane.

A rustling sound made me pause. I glanced over to see a scraggly orange tabby cat stepping on some manuals I had opened on the floor. The damn thing had been showing up for weeks now, always when I was trying to work in peace.

“Not tonight,” I muttered, turning back to the bolt. “Find someone else to bother.”

The cat ignored my annoyance, padding closer and stepping around the tools on the cement floor. I could feel its eyes on me, judging my mechanical skills probably. And me.

“What?” I snapped, looking down at it. “You got something to say?”

The cat blinked slowly, then started cleaning its paw with the kind of casual indifference that reminded me of Chief during one of my rants. Chief was one of the only people in this world that seemed immune to my attitude. He always acted like I was an annoying gnat. It really could have been a blow to my ego but thankfully everyone else was afraid of me when I was on the warpath.

I went back to work, but every few seconds I’d catch movement in my peripheral vision. The cat had crept closer and casually rubbed its face against my legs. It slid between and around my ankles while purring.

“This isn’t entertainment,” I told it. “Go catch a mouse or something useful.”

The cat meowed once. I couldn’t tell if it was arguing with me or demanding. Hard to tell with cats. They were such little demons. But I could appreciate their independent natures.

I managed to loosen the first bolt and moved to the second. The cat followed, repositioning itself to be as close as possible to me.

“You know what your problem is?” I said, grunting as I put my full weight behind the wrench. “You got nothing better to do than watch other people work. Maybe get a job.”

Another meow, this one definitely sounding like attitude.

The bolt finally gave way, and I nearly skinned my knuckles on the housing. “Son of a bitch!”

The cat’s ears flicked back at my outburst, but it didn’t move. Just sat there with that superior cat expression that said it had never struggled with basic mechanical tasks in its life.

“Easy for you to judge,” I muttered, fishing around in my toolbox. “You don’t have to worry about drop doors or hydraulic pressure or mouthy new recruits⁠—”

I stopped. The cat had moved again, this time close enough that I could see it was skinnier than I’d first thought. Ribs showing through the orange fur. One ear was torn, probably from a fight or a close call with something bigger.

“When’s the last time you ate?” I asked, despite myself.

The cat tilted its head, as if considering whether to answer. I had a protein bar in my back pocket, left over from lunch. I pulled it out, unwrapped it, and broke off a piece. The cat looked at, sniffed, and then flicked its tail.

“Oh, you’re going to be picky,” I said. “What the fuck do you want? Do you see cat food around here?”

The cat meowed again. It wasn’t going to go away. The damn thing was obviously starving. I didn’t want to take responsibility for the creature but I couldn’t just let the poor thing starve.

“Fuck. Come on. I’m sure someone left something in the fridge.”

I dropped my wrench and headed toward the mini fridge in the corner with the cat trailing behind me like we’d been best friends for years.

“Stay here,” I told the cat, though I had no idea why I was bothering to give it instructions.

The fridge held a couple energy drinks, a half-eaten sandwich wrapped in plastic, and a container of leftover Chinese takeout that smelled questionable. I grabbed the sandwich and sniffed. It was turkey and cheese and looked fresh enough.