Obi-Wan lit up like a night stadium as he rattled off specs to Vince regarding his Bell 429, which he had aptly nicknamed, Belle. And Zita was a hoot, regaling Lace with a few hair-raising stories of Hollywood, and the entitled actors she’d encountered there as an on-scene paramedic.
Fascinating.
Zita had lived a completely different life than Lace, who’d spent all her years in Maine, and it was exciting to hear from the other woman.
As they approached “Belle”, Lace immediately fell in lust with the craft. She’d been assessing and cataloguing boats and ships all her life, and knew a solidly built, high end machine when she saw one. This baby was all that and more. Painted a sleek silver, black, and white, she was clearly well maintained, and also a lot larger than Lace had imagined.
“Why so big?” she asked, once they stopped and Obi-Wan opened the huge clam-shell doors into the rear compartment.
“Have a look inside,” Obi-Wan suggested, “and I’ll explain.”
Nobody had to tell Lace twice.
She stepped forward, and Vince, always attentive, gave her a boost up until she stood inside an area that had plenty of headroom and seated six; three facing forward and three facing aft, with lots of space in between.
“This baby,” Obi-Wan explained, “as you can clearly see, has seating for seven passengers. Six here, and one up front with the pilot.”
Obi-Wan had hopped up easily to join her inside. “But if the need arises…”
While Lace stood and watched, he swiftly and expertly unhooked the back-most seats to show how the passenger compartment could easily be converted into a space for emergency operations. With the seats out of the way, Lace recognized a rescue basket, as well as lines and winches that had been stored in the very rear. The space Obi-Wan had opened up would easily accommodate thoseanda stretcher if a crisis emerged.
“You still go out on rescue missions?” she asked.
“Not as often as I used to, but it never hurts to be prepared,” he nodded sagely.
Lace poked around, happily. She was familiar with the Coast Guard’s search and rescue birds; NOAA employees having been given tours a time or two, but she hadn’t expected the same from such a pretty-from-the-outside helicopter like Belle.
As questions flew from her mouth, Lace was almost bouncing up and down on her toes in excitement. Some of the things she asked had everyone laughing, but Lace wasn’t deterred. She was damned curious, and wasn’t to be denied.
Some kind of look eventually passed between Vince and Obi-Wan that she couldn’t interpret, but then…
“I don’t suppose you’d like to go up for a spin?” Obi-Wan asked with a huge smile on his face.
“Oh my God, yes,” Lace squealed with excitement.
She couldn’t believe her luck.
Tooling around in the skies today, then sex with Vince tonight?
This was going to be the best day of her life.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Vincent loved being in a helicopter again. It was something he’d missed, no longer being in the military. But his greatest joy today came from watching Lace’s face as Obi-Wan put his craft through its paces.
She was eating it up.
Obi-Wan had grinned when Lace hadn’t balked as he’d asked if she wanted to get a little more…adventurous.
When she’d agreed wholeheartedly, he’d sent them into a series of turns and spins that had even Vince’s stomach doing flips.
In a good way.
What Obi-Wanhadn’tdone, were any of the more complex things Vince knew the man was capable of.
Vince was thankful there were no rolling rainbows, which were some dizzying, continuous rolls, no pirouetting flips, no traveling corkscrews. Not that Vince hadn’t experienced and enjoyed them before, but being a Navy SEAL, he’d take forty-foot ocean swells over those kinds of aerial acrobatics, any day.
Still, he’d found himself laughing out loud more than once as they’d swooped through the sky.