“Wow! Really?”
“Sure.” Buzz opened the sheath and slid the radio from its nest. “You ever used one of these before?”
The little boy’s eyes widened. “Who? Me?”
“You don’t see anyone else around, do you?” Buzz handed him the radio.
Eddie accepted it as if it were made of glass, then stared down at it with great reverence. “It sure is heavy.”
“See that button right there?” Buzz asked, referring to the Squawk button.
“This one?” He carefully touched it with a small fingertip.
“Press it.”
Tentatively, Eddie pressed the button—and nearly dropped the radio when it beeped.
Buzz withheld a smile. “You ever ride in a chopper before?”
Eddie looked up at him. “I rode in a limo once.”
“A limo, huh?”
“Yeah, my mom took me. She had to wear a dress.”
Buzz didn’t want to think about Kelly in a dress. He especially didn’t want to sink to the level of asking this child why she’d had to wear a dress—or who she’d been with—but he couldn’t quite suppress the quick surge of jealousy.
“The limo was cool,” Eddie said. “But I’ll bet a chopter is better.”
Buzz laughed outright. “That’s chopper, sport.”
“Wow! A real chopter! I can’t wait to tell my mommy! Can she come, too?”
Buzz didn’t think Kelly would consider a ride in a helicopter very cool. Not after losing her father and brother in a chopper crash.
“I’ll have to talk to your mother about—”
“Mommy!” Spinning, Eddie took off running toward Kelly. “Buzz said I can take a ride in the chopter with him!”
Buzz groaned at the way that sounded. Like he was trying to buy the kid’s love by offering something she couldn’t give him. Sheesh, he didn’t have this communicating with kids thing down yet. The key, he realized, was not to say anything you didn’t want broadcast in the next ten seconds.
“What’s this about him riding in a chopper?”
Buzz looked up to see Kelly approach, her eyes flashing cold and hot, her back ramrod straight. She’d always looked good when she was mad and the years hadn’t changed that. He still noticed. And he still felt the same old punch of lust every time he looked at her.
“That’s not how it sounds,” he said.
“Why don’t you explain it to me then?” She folded her arms.
Buzz sighed. “I just radioed RMSAR headquarters. They’re going to pick us up in the chopper.”
Her stance relaxed marginally. “Oh. Well…”
“Swoop and scoop,” he added.
A different kind of tension leaked into her expression, and she paled. “Buzz…”
He glanced down at his son, hoping she knew better than to frighten the little boy. As if realizing she would, indeed, frighten Eddie if she made her argument in front of him, Kelly turned away and knelt in front of Eddie, sweeping the hair off his forehead with the backs of her fingers. “Honey, I want you to go into the tent and put your jacket on and pack Bunky Bear into your backpack, okay? And tie your shoes. Double-knot, like I showed you. We’re going to leave in a little bit.”
“Mo-om…”
“Give Buzz back his radio.”
“Jeez. I didn’t even get to talk.”
“Don’t jeez me. And be sure to thank him.”
Sighing heavily, he handed the radio to Buzz. “Thanks,” he mumbled.
Clearing his throat, Buzz accepted it and shoved it into the sheath. “Any time,” he said.
Eddie lingered until Kelly put her hands on his slim shoulders and turned him in the direction of the tent. “Put your jacket on please. Go.”
Casting a final I-can’t-believe-she-would-do-this-to-me look at Buzz, Eddie folded his arms and tromped toward the tent, clearly not happy that he’d been relegated to packing his stuff and tying his shoes.
Buzz waited while Kelly rose to her full height. He felt the familiar tightening in his chest when she turned back to him and raked him with those pretty brown eyes. “Why a swoop and scoop? Why can’t they designate a pick-up point and land, for God’s sake?”
“Too many trees. Terrain is too rough. There’s no place for miles to land that big 412.”
“In that case, we can hike to a suitable pick-up point.”
“Winds are expected to start kicking again in about an hour. We don’t have time to hike to a decent pick-up point.”
“I don’t want Eddie dangling from the end of a cable a hundred feet above the ground.”
“I’ll be with him,” Buzz cut in. “He and I go up first, then I’ll come back down and get you.”
She stared at him as if he’d just asked her to jump out of a plane without a parachute. “There has to be some other way.”
“There isn’t,” he said firmly. “I thought about it all night. We don’t have time to hike down to the valley. It would take us half the day. By the time we get there the winds would be up again.”
“Buzz, I don’t like it.”
“There’s no other way.”
“We’ll just take an extra day and hike down the way we came.”