she drifted away from the others. To her surprise, the airfield hadn’t been in Caserta, despite the palace having housed the Italian Air Force Academy, but several miles to the west, in another town altogether. Nervously, she gazed out over the tarmac toward the mountains hulking in the distance. A milky-blue heat haze filled the valley, blurring the peaks. The hills, what she could see, were raw and wild. Half volcanic rock, half green-and-gold vegetation, they were breathtakingly pretty. And also deadly if crashed into. She knew enough about airplanes to know that much.
With her attempts to calm herself incinerated by the thought, she turned her attention to all the crates and bags waiting to be loaded into the plane. She might not be a pilot, but she could only imagine all that weight might be an issue when it came to clearing mountain peaks. Perhaps they should leave some of those crates behind?
“Is there a problem?” Sergeant Danger’s husky voice caught her off guard, and she jumped.
Placing a hand over her racing heart, she turned and then startled again. He was much closer than she had imagined him. An unexpected whiff of aftershave and warm, healthy male eddied around her, teasing and pleasant. Much more so than the heavier odors of oil and aviation fuel. She found herself leaning toward him despite her misgivings.
That this rough-and-ready man had bothered to slap on some aftershave this morning struck her as unexpected, though perhaps it shouldn’t. The draft, after all, called up young men from all walks of life. For all she knew the sergeant could have been a banker, like her father, before being called up.
The irony of such a possibility made her want to laugh and cry at the same time. She had never thought about it, but most of the men here had likely never wanted to be soldiers, had never wanted to leave their homes and fight in a war. And yet here they were, carrying out their orders until killed, or wounded enough to return home. It wasn’t right.
The whole situation wasn’t right, but what could she do?
She blinked away the sudden rush of emotion. “It’s nothing,” she managed in answer to his question, glad he couldn’t divine the real reason for her tears. “I’ve just never flown before.”
“You’ll be fine. Trust me, riding in a plane is a piece of cake compared to jumping out of one.” He winked at her, a breath-stealing smile curving his utterly kissable lips.
Then her stomach dropped as his words soaked in. “Jump out? Oh, good Lord, not on your life! I’d rather go down in a flaming wreck. There’s no way I would be able to make myself jump.”
His smile vanished. “Don’t say that. You’ll jinx the flight, which would be highly unappreciated by the pilots.”
“You’re kidding.” But he wasn’t, she could see, and being a theater person, she understood jinxes and superstitions. “I’m sorry. Hopefully you were the only one who heard me.”
“Apology accepted,” he said, his expression grim. “But be careful what you say—cursing a man’s luck, no matter how innocently, can be just as deadly to him and his unit as actual gunfire. A fellow who thinks his luck has run out tends to make bad choices, taking out his team as well.”
“I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, well.” He exhaled tightly. “I realize this is your first tour, but I gotta be straight with you: it might be your last if you don’t start paying attention. It’s why I don’t like civilians mixing with GIs. You only make our lives more dangerous.”
She opened her mouth to apologize again, but he was already striding away toward the men loading the plane.
Angry tears filled her eyes. How dare he chastise her over something she had no way of knowing? Whatever connection she had felt with him earlier crashed and burned. She had been right the first time. He was a jerk.
Chapter 16
The noise inside the airplane was deafening as the twin engines roared in an effort to lift the bumping and swaying plane over the peaks. Vi closed her eyes and prayed. Fear and nausea created an unholy combination in her stomach, one that made her glad she hadn’t finished her breakfast. Her irritation at the sergeant had gotten her through the first fifteen minutes of the flight. Then the heart-stopping lurches and dips started, and any courage she’d had before fled.
Spending hours in the back of a truck would’ve been heaven compared to this. Who cared how