“Is she going to die?”

Tristan ignored everyone. She’d have to face the reporters soon enough, but it wasn’t going to be out here. She had far more important things to do than worry about the hospital’s PR.

Jett checked her gauges in preparation for takeoff while she waited for the medcrew to return with the patient. She hated this part—the waiting. She wanted to be out there in the field, doing something. But her job was to get her crew out and back again as quickly and as safely as possible. She could and had assisted in retrieving the wounded. But that had been under different circumstances.

“Chief, you shouldn’t be out here! Get back to the chopper.”

The major had to scream in Jett’s face to be heard above the rattle of small arms fire and the explosion of mortar rounds that came with such rapidity the air reverberated with the continuous roar.

“The incoming fire is getting worse. We need to get the wounded aboard,” Jett shouted back. She helped the major roll an injured soldier onto the stretcher, grabbed the other end, and lifted. “Another few minutes and we might not be able to get airborne.”

“If we don’t have a pilot, it won’t matter how long we take.”

Since the major didn’t actually order her to drop the stretcher, Jett just put her head down and ran for her Black Hawk. They loaded the injured and raced back for more. After that, there wasn’t time for talk.

The medevac crew finally cleared the field of injured and Jett somehow got them up and out in one piece. As soon as she’d landed at the field hospital and the wounded were offloaded, she’d gone back out again.

The hours ran together until finally she was off duty and she staggered, weak-limbed and numb, away from her aircraft for some much-needed food and rack time. She slumped down at a table in the mess tent and mechanically shoveled whatever was on the plate into her mouth, not tasting it, not caring, just knowing she needed it if she was going to wake up in a few hours and do it all again.

“Nice flying, Chief,” a dark-haired major a few years Jett’s senior said as she sat down across the table from her. She wore medical insignia in addition to her oak cluster, and Jett figured her for one of the medcrews.

“Thank you, ma’am,” Jett said, trying to put a little enthusiasm in her voice. She was so tired she could barely see her plate.

“You ought to stay with your aircraft, though. We can’t spare any of our pilots.”

Jett recognized her now from the first run of the day, which seemed like a week ago after the night she’d had. “Sorry. I didn’t recognize you, Major.”

The major smiled, and Jett tumbled into the warm blue depths of her eyes. Quickly, she looked away.

“But not sorry you put yourself in the line of fire, is that it, Chief?”

“I was only thinking of the wounded.”

“I know.” The major extended her hand across the table. “Gail Wallace.”

Jett took her hand. Her skin was smooth and warm. Warm like her eyes and her smile. Jett couldn’t remember ever seeing anyone so beautiful.

She jolted back to the present as Linda rapped one hand on the side of the helicopter. “All set, Cap.”

Jett watched the team lift the stretcher into the aircraft, and when she was sure her crew was secure, she took the helicopter up, Gail’s face still vivid in her mind. She couldn’t remember how many times she’d glanced back to see Gail behind her, tending the wounded or leaning out the door, manning a gun while Jett took off under fire. She didn’t want to think about Gail, not now, not while she was flying.

Flying had always been her escape. As soon as she was airborne, she was free—free from the memory of her father’s anger, her mother’s misery, her own helplessness. Behind the controls, she was in control.

Even in the midst of combat, she felt only exhilaration, not fear. She made choices, and no matter the outcome, she would live or die by them. No regrets. Except one.

Ignoring the familiar ache in the pit of her stomach, she gave herself over to the strong, steady hum of the rotors above her head, like the heartbeat of a lover in the dark. Even knowing it wouldn’t last, she welcomed the few moments of peace and headed toward home.

Chapter Two

Jett circled the hospital rooftop, checking her speed, her angle of approach, and the wind direction. The trauma team ringed the circle of light below, waiting to converge on the aircraft. Gently, she set her aircraft down precisely in the center of the landing pad. The doors flew open and the medcrew jumped out, guiding the stretcher out as the trauma team raced forward to meet them, heads lowered beneath the sweep of the still-turning rotors. Within a matter of seconds, Jett was alone on the rooftop, her job done. Adrenaline still surged through her bloodstream, and her hands trembled as she locked down her aircraft.

With her helmet tucked under her arm, she strode to the stairs and hurried down a level to the suite of rooms reserved for the flight crews.

She had her own small on-call room and private bathroom. The door from the hall opened into the room on one side and, opposite, another door led to the lounge area where the pilots and medcrews waited until a request came in. In addition to her bed, her room held a dresser, a small TV with only intermittent reception, a single straight-backed chair, and a tall narrow bookcase. She propped her helmet on her dresser, stripped off her flight suit, and draped it over the back of the chair. Then she went into the bathroom, ran cold water, and doused her head and face.

“Tough flight?”

Jett lifted the tail of her Army-issue green T-shirt and wiped her face, then turned to find the major standing just behind her. “Hot and dusty.”

Gail smiled. “Just routine, then.”

“Yeah.”

“How long have you been here?”

“Four months,” Jett said. “This time.”

“Regular army?”

“Yes. You?”

“Sixteen toward my twenty,” Gail said.

A career Army officer. Jett had thirteen years in herself, but she’d come up a different route. She didn’t often have casual conversations with other soldiers. She talked to her fellow pilots, but mostly about the flights or their aircraft. She’d always been a solitary person; living in close proximity with men and women with whom she couldn’t be completely honest only made her more reluctant to make connections.

That’s why it was so odd that she felt comfortable talking to the major. Gail. Her name was Gail.

“Do you want to grab something to eat?” Gail asked.

Jett hesitated, uncertain if she wanted to say yes because a little friendly company would help take her mind off the horrors she witnessed every day, or because Major Gail Wallace made her heart beat faster. Because the last thing she wanted was to want something she couldn’t have.

“I should probably catch some rack time,” Jett finally said.

Gail studied her silently. “Another time, then.”

Jett hesitated a beat or two as Gail turned away. “On the other hand, I can sleep later.”

“Wonderful,” Gail said, smiling back over her shoulder at Jett. “Come on, then. I’m buying.”

A knock at her door brought Jett upright, icy water streaming from her face. She grabbed a towel on her way out of the bathroom.

“Yeah?” she called.

The door opened and Linda stuck her head in. “Do you want to pitch in for pizza? We ordered a bunch.”

Jett rubbed her face vigorously and shook the water from her hair.

“Okay. Sure. I’ll be right out.”

“Don’t wait too long or there won’t be anything left but the boxes.”

The door swung closed and Jett sank down on the side of her bed.

In the six weeks she’d been at PMC, she hadn’t gotten friendly with anyone. The first few weeks she’d spent riding with other pilots to get used to the system and the crews, rotating shifts until her mandatory probation period was over. For the last few weeks she’d been on a regular rotation and flew with the same crew more often than not. Without the division of rank, the civilian crews were more relaxed and informal than she was used to in the military. Until now, she’d been able to avoid a lot of the socializing that went on, but she couldn’t keep ducking the people she worked with without being rude. As much as she wanted to stretch out on her bed with her eyes closed and just wait, with her mind blank, until the next call out, she pulled the door open and stepped into the lounge. She could pretend to enjoy herself for a few minutes of meaningless conversation. She was good at pretending.

Tristan piled her beepers and the rest of her gear on the dull brown metal cabinet that served as a bedside table in her on-call room. After calling the page operator with her extension, she kicked off her running shoes and socks, and crawled under the sheet, still in her scrubs. The adrenaline rush was tailing off, and she was hovering on that edge between exhilaration and exhaustion. She needed to get some sleep, but her mind was racing.

More reporters had been waiting when Healthstar arrived back at the hospital. Apparently someone at the scene had called the hospital’s powers that be, too, and the chief of anesthesia had been rousted from bed and had met them on the roof with the trauma team. He was in the OR doing the case right now. Tristan wasn’t insulted that she’d been bumped, since she would have had to call in backup if she’d gone to the OR. Considering the extent of the patient’s injuries, she’d have been in the operating room all night long. Unfortunately, Tristan had been delegated to feed the reporters something so they wouldn’t begin gnawing each other’s arms off.

After fielding questions for fifteen minutes, she’d finally escaped.

The state police had verified that the woman was indeed the governor’s daughter-in-law, which meant this story was going to be top news for the foreseeable future. If she was lucky, someone else would have to deal with the press after tonight. With a sigh, she closed her eyes and tried to relax. She could feel her pulse racing, and with nowhere to divert all those jumbled hormones, her body channeled them elsewhere. She felt a familiar stirring between her legs. Great. Wired and horny.