Explosive Alliance (Wingmen Warriors 9)

Understanding.

Then his face smoothed back into the charmer smile, and he lifted the puppy to eye level again. "What's this fella's name?"

"Fella? You'd better brush up on your male-female anatomy lessons, pal, because that's a girl."

"Ahh. I should have guessed. Girls always are much more fun to hang around with than guys, anyway."

She rolled her eyes. "Do you always lay it on this thick?"

"Pretty much."

Honesty again. She liked that. She let herself lean back against the chain fence and enjoy the moment, sitting alone in the dark with a handsome man who thought she had a nice ass and was worth the effort to charm. She'd spent so many hours as a teenager sitting in this same yard dreaming of a man who would wine and dine her as a break from shoveling manure out of stalls.

She'd been a fool in the making even then. "I really didn't know what he was doing."

Nightmares still woke her in a cold sweat, horrific dreams where people pointed accusatory fingers at her. Kurt Haugen had been her husband, the man she'd chosen to give her body and life to, and he'd become scum. There must be something bent or twisted within her since she'd chosen him. She must have known and just turned a blind eye. Surely she knew something more even now, since he'd died without fingering all his connections.

Her only defense? She truly had been a blind idiot. "I was stupid and too trusting, but I swear to God, I didn't know," she vowed again.

"I never thought you did."

An exhale rattled from her, and she wondered why it mattered so much that he believe her, this man who would mean nothing to her, a man who would be gone in a couple of short weeks. But she needed to hear the words and hope maybe tonight she could sleep with the peaceful assurance that somebody other than her family really believed her. She didn't bother to say thank you. The words probably would have slammed to a halt against the lump clogging her throat, anyway.

Bo's hand slowed along the sleeping dog's back. "You never did say what her name is?"

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."