cup on the saucer, she folded her hands on the table.
“I hope you know what you’re getting yourself into, Mr. Trayhern.”
“Call me Morgan. I don’t stand on ceremony with my people.”
“All right,” Maya murmured. “Do you know anything about us or did you buy us sight unseen, Morgan? A pig in a poke, maybe?”
Her direct and uncompromising gaze would have been unsettling had Morgan not liked that kind of straight-across-the-board honesty. When she lifted her lips and smiled, it was with a carnivore’s grin. She was playing with him, like a jaguar might with its helpless quarry. Houston was right: she shot from the hip. Good. “Yes, I saw the bottom line.”
“And the fact that I used to have three Boeing Apaches, but because spookdom decided to strangle me slowly by cutting my budget yearly, I had to cannibalize one to keep the other two flying?”
“I saw that.”
“And that I’ve got twelve overworked pilots who need some help and relief?”
“Yes, I saw that, too.”
“And that the men don’t like us women showing them up?” Her eyes glinted and she leaned forward slightly.
Morgan wasn’t intimidated by her low, furious tone or her directness. He met and held her stare. “I saw that, too, Maya.” When he used her first name, rolling it gently off his tongue, she recoiled. At first, Morgan wondered if she didn’t like his informality with her. And then, intuitively, he figured it out: Maya was expecting a hard-nosed bastard to show up and try to push her around, keep her outside the circle, like other men had before him. The look in her eyes was one of surprise—and then naked suspicion. Morgan knew he was going to have to sell himself to Maya. He would have to prove that, although male, he was trustworthy. That he would fully support her and the hardworking women comprising the secret squadron hidden in the mountains of Peru.
Leaning down, Morgan pulled out several papers from his own backpack. He looked around. The place was deserted. He wanted no other eyes on the material that he was going to lay out before her.
“Don’t worry,” Maya said. “Patrick knows who we are. He and I are good friends. He protects me and my women when we come into town and need a little R and R. This is our home away from home. He’ll make sure no one comes up here during lunch. We’ve got this place all to ourselves.”
“Good.” Morgan placed the first sheet of paper in front of Maya. “This is an acquisition form showing that two Boeing Apache Longbow helicopters have just been purchased for your squadron by me.” He put a second paper in front of her. “This is a Blackhawk helicopter to replace the Vietnam era Cobra that you’re flying.” He put a third document in front of her. “Within a week, you will be receiving three I.P.s—instructor pilots—to train you and your team on the new Apache D model, and three enlisted men who will train your crews in software, armaments and mechanics. And lastly—” he put a fourth piece of paper in front of Maya “—here’s your new budget. As you look it over, you’ll see the financial strangulation your squadron has been experiencing is over.”
Maya took all the papers, intently perusing them. Did she dare believe her eyes? Was this really true? She’d gone for three years with so little, watching her people bear the brunt of their financial distress. The task before them had seemed almost impossible, and yet they’d managed to strangle the drug trade to Bolivia by fifty percent, despite the odds, despite the fact that the U.S. government had practically choked off the mission through lack of funding. Looking up, Maya regarded Morgan through her thick, black lashes. He was at ease, almost smiling. She knew the sparkle in his eyes was not there because he was laughing at her. It reflected his pride in the job he’d done getting her the aircraft and help she so desperately needed.
Cutting her gaze to Houston, she growled, “Is this for real, Mike?” After all, Mike was one of her kind, a Jaguar Clan member, and she relied on him heavily at times like this. No clan member would ever lie to another.
“It’s for real, Maya. Every word of it. Morgan is your sugar daddy.” And he gave her a playful, teasing grin.
Maya grimaced. “What a sexist you are, Houston.”
He scratched his head ruefully. “I was teasing you, Maya. Morgan Trayhern runs a first-class operation known as Perseus. You and your squadron are officially moved under his wing and command.” Mike tapped the budget paper. “Look at the bottom line. That’s money. U.S. funds, not Peruvian soles.”
Maya looked at it. Her heart thudded with excitement. “I’m afraid to believe this,” she whispered as she looked through the pages again. “We’re really going to get two new D models? The ones with radar? I’ve heard so much about them…. I tried to get them, but they kept telling me they didn’t have the budget to let us have the upgraded model.”
Morgan tempered his excitement over the joy he saw in Maya’s face. This woman was used to running her squadron her way. And he respected that. Still, he needed to be able to gently move her in the direction that he saw her duties down here heading, now and in the future. Maya’s plan had been a greenhouse experiment—an all-woman military contingent doing some of the most demanding, most dangerous work in the world. Despite the difficulties of going up against drug runners who flew the Russian Kamov Black Shark assault helicopters, which were nearly equal to an Apache, and flying in this nasty, always changing weather at some of the highest altitudes on the planet, she’d been more than successful. She’d never lost a helicopter or a pilot in the three years since she’d started this operation, and that was a phenomenal record of achievement in Morgan’s eyes.
He knew that it was Maya’s careful selection of the right women pilots and crews that made this mission successful. Furthermore, she was a charismatic leader, someone people either hated or loved on sight. Morgan understood that, because he had that quality himself. Only Maya was a much younger version of him; she was only twenty-five years old. She had a lot going for her. And he admired her deeply for her commitment to Peru and its people.
“There’s just one hitch,” Morgan told her quietly. He saw her eyes narrow speculatively on him.
“What?” she growled, putting the papers aside.
Seeing her tense, Morgan said, “I know you have an all-woman squadron. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find women IPs to come down here to upgrade you on flying the Apache D models. Do you have a problem with men coming in for six weeks and staying at your base to teach your people?”
“I don’t have a problem with men, Mr.—Morgan. They have a problem with me. If you can guarantee they won’t be gender prejudiced, I won’t kick and scream about it.”
“Good,” Morgan said, breathing a sigh of relief. He turned and dug into his pack again, producing a set of orders that had been cut by the army. “Here’s the list of men who will be coming in shortly. We haven’t been able to tell them they are coming down here yet, but that’s a mere formality. I give you my personal guarantee that they are the best. The army’s cream of the crop of teachers, to move your people into the D models as rapidly as possible. Because you are so shorthanded, you can’t afford to send your pilots back to Fort Rucker for training. Instead, we’re bringing the training to you, so it won’t interfere with your ongoing missions.”
Taking the list of names, Maya frowned as she rapidly perused it. She knew just about everyone in the training field. The Apache team was a small unit within the army as whole—a tight, select family, for better or worse.
Morgan
