Chapter 23

The next week was a bit nuts. A Fed-Ex package flew back and forth with notaries at each end. My namesake, Dan Richards, Cindy's husband, was named CEO of our new corporation by virtue of the fact that he was going to be in Auburn next week and he could close on the new building.

New building. This was first. Friends told me I needed to have my head examined since I was buying an apartment building for almost a million dollars and moving into one of those apartments having never set foot in the thing. I talked with Nikki about this. We pored over the blueprints and the floorplans.

"Just so you get there and make 'em do OUR kitchen right," she said. "And Tina and Cindy and Susan say THEY will not let you guys decorate. Ever." Giggle.

I remember the comments about 'Decorating for Engineers'. "Just don't use too much pink," I'd said.

That got me a twisted look from my little lover. "Dan Granger, do I even ACT like I'm a 'pink' kind of girl?"

My turn. "Oh, you're plenty pink in all the proper places."

And she bounced up and wrapped her arms around my neck and kissed me. "Well, you can make me all pink, and I know a part of you that I can make turn purple," she giggled. "Wanna give it a try?"

"What about dinner?"

"Grilled cheese sandwiches and canned soup." She gave me that cutey twinkly-eye thing. "Or is a full-blown meal more important than observing the color changes that take place in an aroused female? Hmmmm????"

I hooked my hands under her thighs and picked her up off of the floor. She squealed happily as I carried her to the bedroom.

I was still experiencing aftershocks when I put the griddle on the stove for the grilled cheese sandwiches.

Nikki was right about the thing between Slade and Kellen. When they showed up on Tuesday they were both in Slade's pickup truck. Kellen snorted over my observation.

"He's gonna have to get it steam-cleaned to get the smell of cheap perfume out of it," she said.

Slade smiled sheepishly. "I'm just a commodity, Mister Dan."

"As are we all," I laughed. "Although I must commend you on your selection of owners this time."

Other thing in my life. I was doing three hours a week at the local airport. I'd gotten half-way to a private pilot's license right out of college, but dropped it when the ex kicked up too much fuss. In a few hours behind the controls, I reestablished old skills and I was about five hours shy of going for my flight exam. The written exam was different than it was fifteen years ago, but hey, a little study, particularly with a brunette cutie studying with me, and I passed the written again.

Worse than that, you just KNOW that almost every trip I made to the airport, I was accompanied by Nikki. She cadged rides on more than one occasion, which bothered me not at all until I landed one day and she grabbed me by the hand.

"Come see this!" she said excitedly.

"What?"

"Just come see!" She hauled me around the back of the main hangar to a row of T-hangars, each rented out to a pilot or group of pilots who kept light planes in them. One was open, an older gentleman standing in front of it, arms folded, like he was expecting something. He was. Me. I recognized him as one of the guys who'd given Nikki a ride one afternoon.

"Well, hello, Mister Wilson," I said, extending my hand.

"Hello, Mister Granger," he replied. "Mizz Nikki says y'all are in the market for a plane."

"It's under discussion," I said. I glanced at Nikki. "Why?"

"I failed my physical. It's time to..."

"Awww, man," I said. "I hate to hear that."

"Oh, don't get all sad, Dan," he said. "Wife hasn't wanted to fly with me for years. I still keep this thing because I like it, but when all you do is fly around the patch every week or so, well ... and my eyes're getting too bad. I got a couple of waivers already. Time to give it up."

"It's a Mooney, baby," Nikki said.

"Oh, I'm familiar, sweetheart, but..."

"It's faster than Tina's. Or Cindy's."

"It better be," I said. "Retractable gear."

"What kind of planes did you say your sisters fly?" he asked.

"Tina's got a Cessna 182. Cindy's is a 180."

"This is a J-model. Two hundred horsepower, so it won't burn as much fuel. And it'll cruise a long way at a hundred and eighty miles an hour."

"Hundred and fifty-five knots," Nikki whispered to me. "Faster than..."

"Lot faster than Tina or Cindy. They're a hundred and forty knots. Tops."

"Gee, Mister Kevin," I said. "I dunno."

"Look, son, here's the deal. You're standin' right here in front of me. You can see the plane. Mizz Nikki's flown with me in it. The mechanic here's just done the annual on it, so she's good for a year. I bought 'er new from the factory. I can show you all the paperwork from the day I picked 'er up. And If YOU buy it, maybe ever' now and then, you'll let me fly with you."

Nikki nudged me. "Okay, how much?"

"Ninety. Cash."

"Ouch!"

He continued, "The price range on the internet for these things starts at about seventy-five and goes to a hundred and fifty. This one's got a mid-time engine and no crash record. You can walk around her and ask people and find out that every day that this thing wasn't carryin' me and whoever on a trip, it's been backed into this same hangar."

I laughed. "D'you sell cars?" I asked.

"Nope. Attorney." He smiled. "Does it show? Nikki says you're an engineer. It shows."

"Oh, does it?"

Nikki smiled. "Sit in it!"

I did. Okay, just a little drool stained the front of my shirt. I knew the reputation of these things. Fast. Efficient. I climbed out over the wing.

"Let me talk to my instructor. I've only got fifty hours. This is a bit of a step from that Cessna 152 I'm flying."

"Only difference between this and your buddies' Cessnas is you have to remember to put the gear up and down. Past that, a few miles an hour faster on stall, the flaps don't do as much. But when you get the gear up and level out, she hauls ass." He looked at Nikki. "Oops, sorry, Mizz Nikki."

She smiled.

"Look," Kevin said, "I'm in no hurry. I think it would be easy to list it with somebody and let them sell it for me, but then I pay that guy a commission. Here, you get to save the commission. But I do need to know something before too awfully long?"

"How long is 'too awfully long' to a lawyer?" I asked.

"You want that in engineering terms?" he laughed. "Let me know in a couple of weeks. If you decide to buy, then another couple of weeks to close. We can get an inspection by another mechanic if you want, or you can talk to the guy that did the annual." He rubbed his chin. "Oh, wait! Just maybe you might want to FLY it?"

"Sure! Can Nikki do 'back seat'?"

Nikki was smiling. Little darlin' can't hide 'smug' very well.

In the truck on the way home, Nikki looked at me. "Funny look on your face, husband," she said. "Really funny when you saw a hundred and seventy knots in Mister Kevin's plane."

"Alvin (my flight instructor) says he'd expect me to get something a little simpler, but that..."

She finished my sentence. "That if I went along with you and reminded you to put the wheels down, you'd be okay. The money..."

"Got the money. Easy. Even after throwing in the seed for the new company." I looked at the cutie sitting beside me. "Guess I hadn't gotten you a graduation present yet, anyway."

Squeeeeeeeeal!

Okay, that was something to talk about with the gang, both gangs actually, the study group and the sisterhood.

Alan and I and Cindy's Dan all talked about the choice. "Just watch," the other Dan said. "You put the nose down, that thing'll build up speed fast!" And Alan commented on the rather smaller carrying capacity. "But that's a fast little thing. I heard the squealing when she was telling Tina and Susan about it."

Happy. That's what things are. Everybody was happy except my boss. I sat down and explained what had transpired and what my plans were going to be.

"Damn, Dan! I can't fault you for it. But it just sucks. You're gonna make me have to start working again."

"I'm sorry," I said. "This is Nikki's opportunity to go to college, and my chance to move up a level or two in the scheme of things."

"Still sucks. How about sub-contracting?"

"In which direction?" I asked. "I'm going to do the 'Alabama' thing. And I'm gonna be expensive."

"And I'm thinking of last year, after the hurricane. I could've hired you and covered the cost easily."

"Steve, that's always a possibility."

I diligently worked to make sure I wasn't leaving him hanging on any of the projects I had going. Burning bridges is not a good idea in the specialty field in which I'd made a reputation. I felt bad that I didn't tell him that one of the hotshot young technicians was interested in coming over with me, but I couldn't say anything to Steve. It wasn't my place, in case Kevin Hartner decided NOT to go.

All that, and when I get home there's this fantastic creature there, designed specifically to fit that hole in my soul that says 'perfect mate'. Nikki. Today's been stressful. I've spent it in the facility of one of our 'on again-off again' clients who uses us to get him out of a bind, but when he's got a choice he uses one of our competitors who's notorious for bidding low and manning a project with idiots, hoping like hell that thing'll hold together until their crew gets out the gate.

This time it bit him in the ass. Major equipment outage. Damage. Loss of production running into the millions of dollars. And when he called, I told Steve, "Screw 'im. I know what went wrong. And I warned him about what he needed to do. He took MY report and gave it to that bunch of knuckle-dragging idiots."

"You know I can't tell a customer to get screwed, Dan."

"Okay. Don't tell him outright to get screwed. Pull that ratesheet out that's got the big numbers, you know, and fax it to him and tell him that he's paying full engineer rates for me for the duration of the job. Plus senior technician rates for all our techs. And if we have to sub-contract for an electrical contractor, we bill HIM cost plus twenty percent."

"Damn, Dan," he said.

"Just do it. I'm tired of the game he plays." I fully expected to lose the job. I was wrong. The client was desperate and he KNEW who to call when it came down to getting things done.

Day One of that job was horrible, working to make sure equipment was isolated. ("Dan, how do you work on that high voltage?" Easy. I turn that stuff OFF.) Opening up and dragging out equipment that partially melted in place. Pulling steel panels bulged by the explosion of an electrical fault.

I put good technicians (and mediocre ones) on the job and watched them work, taking copious pictures and notes, downloading files of data from smart devices. Then sat in a corner and started working over the mess. Talked about the client engineer like a dog, too. All he could do was hang his head and acknowledge what I said about the cause and what it would take to put things back to where HIS company could make money. MY company was making it hand over fist.

When I got home, late, Nikki met me at the door, kissing me, shoving my smudgy ass to the shower. "You got t' clean up, baby. I'll have your dinner on the table when you get out of the shower."

As I stood under the brisk hot stream, I mused about a year ago when a similar situation would've had me returning home to an empty house. Well, not exactly empty, but the cat was notoriously indifferent to how tired I might be.

At the table, Nikki fed me and questioned me about what I saw. I showed her pictures that I'd uploaded to the server, accessible from the computer in my home office. She looked, hugging me from behind, her chin resting on my shoulder. "Looks like the fault didn't clear in time, baby. Like that other one you showed me. Am I right?"

She stood up straight and started kneading my neck and shoulders. I moaned my approval. "Why don't we go to bed. I know just the perfect thing to relax you." She smiled. She did know.

By the time I got to the bedroom, she had the covers on the bed turned down and folded at the foot of the bed. She peeled my pajama bottoms off. The pajamas were a concession to sitting on the furniture, not a concession to modesty. She got them out of the way. "Lay down," she said, kissing me lightly, the brush of her lips sending shocks coursing through my being.

"You're tired. Stressed. I've had a good day. Let me help you."

"Little one," I said, "Just your being here is more help than you could imagine."

"Thank you, love," she said. "But I can do better." She wiggled her hips and the scrub pants that she used for pajamas dropped to the floor, revealing long, shapely legs. Next she crossed her arms, grabbing the hem of the scrub top she wore, and with a single movement peeled it up and over her head, tossing it aside. Then she stood, straightening her back, to her full, completely nude, delectable height, cocking one leg. She knew. Yes, she knew exactly how much I adored her. And she let me worship for a moment before crawling into bed.