Her fingers jerked free.
Panic popped through Gray like a semiautomatic. He spun to find her darting away.
Toward a weaving toddler heading for the trees. Mortar rounds shattered the asphalt inches from her feet. She stumbled, righted herself and plowed forward, her body curved protectively around Magda.
Fury and fear discharged within him. "Lori!"
She didn't hear, or chose to ignore him, damned reckless, selfless woman.
He dodged left, putting his body between her and the spewing rounds. His boots pounded pavement in time with his heart. His left calf stung. Pain spread into a flame he had to ignore for now. He ran faster, frustration clawing through him.
She scooped up the child, balancing one orphan on each hip. Already her eyes scanned the cracked runway as if searching for someone else to save. Did she intend to carry them on her back?
Gray skidded to a stop beside her. He whipped the extra kid from her arms. He crowded behind her, nudging, urging, shielding her back with his body. "Go! Go! Go!"
"Wait!" She pointed across the runway at another group of children. "They need—"
"Damn it, woman! They're fine. Tag's got 'em. Now move!" he shouted over the mayhem. Hours of restraint expanded within him as he raced a serpentine path. The percussion from another blast slammed Lori back against his chest. She staggered, paused.
Hesitation could kill them. He chose words he knew well would fire her feet and distract her while they ran. "Why couldn't you have stayed home and baked cookies?"
"Fat chance." Her chest pumped for air as she shouted over the latest whistle. Explosion. Trees falling, burning. More running. "There's no one around to eat them."
Her accusation sprayed him like shrapnel. He'd fired her more than he could have hoped. Restraints fell away on his control in the madness of the moment. "You walked. Not me."
"I just," she gasped, cradling Magda's bandanna-covered head to her breast, "got to the door first."
And Lori was right.
His feet found purchase on the load ramp. More relief than he wanted throbbed through him. He plopped the toddler in a seat, then reached for Magda. She plastered herself to Lori, bandanna and Barbie secure.
"Stubborn women." Gray twirled Lori by the arm onto the red webbing. She sat, still and poised, with Magda in her lap. Both sets of wide brown eyes promised one great big distraction.
He jabbed a finger in Lori's face. "No more saving the world today, lady. Sit. Don't move until we get this plane off the ground."
Not waiting for any argument, he shouldered through the swell of bodies crowding onto the aircraft.
Lori's whisper dogged him all the way to the cockpit. Be careful.
Operating through life solo was a hell of a lot easier.
* * *
Gray stared out at the night stars blanketing the sky beyond his windscreen. The bombing in Sentavo was a world away. Or at least ten hours past.
Lori, little Magda, everyone had made it out unharmed. Gray didn't let himself dwell overlong on those seconds he'd stood horrified, watching Lori sprint into a shower of shrapnel. He focused on the plane, stick in hand, rudder pedals beneath his boots.
Only the fluorescent glow of the green instrument panel lit the confined space. Bronco sprawled to his right in the copilot's seat reading a paperback. The aircraft hummed contentedly across the Atlantic.
Forget autopilot, he loved to fly.
The sky had been his salvation for years. As a child he'd dreamed of flying with his bomber gunner father. Later Gray's dreams had shifted to piloting a rescue for his POW father, easing the strained lines around his mother's eyes, bringing back her smile.
But he couldn't.
He'd settled for earning her smile in other ways. He was good at that, joking, keeping things light.
After his father's return, his mother still hadn't smiled. No one did. Before long, Gray traveled the skies in his mind to escape.