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This woman. She’d gone right back to being wary and suspicious, which was not what he’d expected. Not that he could really blame her. She only had her friend’s boyfriend’s opinion to recommend him to her. And Lena’s… but she was friendly and bubbly and open. She liked everybody. The opposite of how Carissa seemed.
He pulled his wallet out of his pocket, opened it, and held it out to her, so she could see his license. “I was a pilot in the Royal Australian Air Force. I promise I’ve flown in much more dangerous conditions and lived to tell the tale.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to question your skill. It’s just...” She trailed off and he decided to spare her from admitting anything she didn’t feel like telling him.
“You’re thorough. I get it.” Now it all made sense why Lena had told him Carissa was a “planner.” She’d been giving him a warning, in the nicest possible way, about what to expect. “And you’re in luck, because I’m as skilled as they come.” It wasn’t a lie. Or even an exaggeration. He had the medals and commendations and accolades to prove it. He flashed her his winning grin again, but if it made her feel any better, he couldn’t tell. “Let me take your bags and—”
She’d already grabbed her carry-on and hooked the strap over her elbow. “I’ve got it.” And now he saw the control freak tendencies Lena had also mentioned.
“Where’s the rest?” He’d met plenty of light packers, but all Carissa had was a purse and a backpack.
“In Tamworth, supposedly. My luggage flew, but I didn’t.”
“Lucky for you, Tamworth is where we’re headed, so we can pick it up when we arrive. Come on, then.” As he brushed past her, he swiped her bag up and off her arm, swinging it over his shoulder. When her mouth popped open to protest, he filled the space before she could. “It’s a bit of a trek to the plane, and my mum would be appalled if she found out I let an exhausted woman carry her own luggage all the way out onto the tarmac.”
“So you’re a gentleman then?”
“You’re in Australia, sweetheart. You’ve got the wrong country, if it’s a gentleman you’re wanting.” He didn’t know what made him say it, but he liked the way her cheeks flushed when he teased her. She took a breath, like she was winding up to make some kind of retort, but he went on before she could. “But I try to be a good man. I like to think my family is proud of me. And Pickle seems to like me.” He held the door leading out onto the tarmac open for her.
“It’s definitely saying something if you can get a cat to like you.” She slipped past him as a gust of hot wind lifted the tendrils of her hair framing her face. The scent of her shampoo wafted his way. Something botanical.
“Do you have a cat?” He came up alongside her and gestured across the airfield to where all the small planes were parked.
“None of my own.”
“Lena says you ride horses. Are you a jockey like she is?” He didn’t know much about horses, but he did know they were unpredictable. He couldn’t quite wrap his head around how a control freak could ride racehorses.
Carissa laughed. “Not a jockey. I’m not that crazy. I was—Iaman exercise rider.”
“What does that entail?” Given that his best friend’s girlfriend was a jockey and his home base of Bindarra Creek was often described as “horsey,” maybe he ought to know more about racehorses. But he didn’t, and he didn’t mind asking stupid questions, especially if they kept her talking. The more she told him, the less crabby she seemed to be.
“Riding ten to thirteen horses a day, six days a week.”
“That’s a lot of horses.”
“Yep. It’s kind of like doing squats for four to five hours every day.” That explained her wiriness. “Only better, because you get do it while riding a horse.”
“Do you have favourites?”
“That’s a forbidden question. They’re all my favourites.” Some emotion he couldn’t name flickered across her face—sadness? Uncertainty?—but just as quickly it was replaced with another of her smirk-smiles. “Except the really naughty ones.”
“Which ones are the nice ones?”
“The ones who are easier to ride.” Her whole face lit up, and then she was off, talking about the horses she loved.
She kept chatting about Satsuki and Clever and TaTa and Salty, all the way across the airfield without a single complaint about the blazing hot sun and the even more scorching wind. But when he set down her bags on the tarmac next to his Cessna Skyhawk, whatever she was telling him about horses died in her throat. “That’s your plane?”
“Yep, this is her.” He gave the passenger side door a pat, not unlike the way he imagined Carissa might pat one of the horses she rode. Then he beamed his brightest smile at her. “Welcome to Devine Air.”
“Absolutely not.”
“What?” He’d heard her perfectly fine but he didn’t know what she was objecting to.
“I’m absolutely not flying in that.” She’d gone pale, which kept him from feeling more than mildly irritated that what he’d thought was going to be a simple flight ferrying a friend of a friend was turning out to be a lot of work. It was a good reminder of why he wasn’t a private pilot. He flew for charity or fun now, or not at all.
He did the math on what he knew about her: crabby napper plus control freak plus pale plus arms crossed. It all added up to one thing: anxious flyer. It also made him keep his tone gentle. “All right, then. What do you propose instead?”
“Something bigger?”
