Free Such a Rush by Jennifer Echols Page A

said. “We can’t go in one of the Air Tractors. They’re one-seaters.”
    “I’ve personally heard Mr. Simon tell my dad that he would never let Mark take anybody for a ride in the Stearman.”
    I didn’t doubt it, since Mark was a live wire. But I said carefully, “Did you overhear this on the office porch? A lot of bullshit flies around on the porch.” Mr. Hall had said many negative things about Grayson on the porch too.
    Grayson got my meaning. His eyebrow went down. Then he asked pointedly, “Mark’s taking you flying every day this week? But not today?”
    “No,” I said impatiently. “Starting tomorrow.”
    “What time tomorrow?” he pressed me. “Have you set a time?”
    We hadn’t set a time, and frankly, I’d begun to worry. Mark had promised me when we first talked about it that we’d start flying together on Monday morning, but here it was Sunday afternoon and he hadn’t mentioned it again. He was getting drunk at the beach. And I’d been afraid to bring it up—afraid that if I said the wrong thing to Mark, the job would disappear.
    Which was pretty much what Grayson was telling me. Mark had told me a lie so he could move in with me.
    I was frightened. But I couldn’t show Grayson this, so I tried to be furious instead. “Why can’t this be a transaction between pilots? In your mind, why does it have to be dirty?”
    “You tell me,” Grayson said bitterly, removing his elbows from the counter and straightening to his full height. “That’s how you work. I used to envy the rare people you smiled at when you pumped their gas, like they’d done something special and earned a reward. But now I realize you were smiling at them because they’d given you something you wanted. A big tip. Flight time. You wouldn’t smile at someone without good reason.”
    I hadn’t thought he noticed whether I smiled at him or not.
    There was a possibility here. A spark. I’d always viewed him as Mr. Hall’s black sheep son, impossibly cool and way too good for me, passing through. Finally, here was a hint of reciprocation of the crush I’d pretended not to have on him since I was fourteen.
    No. Mark might have fooled me. I wouldn’t let Grayson fool me too. Cheeks burning, I said sternly, “Grayson Hall. The second you feel cornered, you fly off the handle and say anything that pops into your head. You’ve always gotten away with it, and maybe you still will, but that’s not a good interview technique for potential employees. If there was ever a chance I would fly for you, you blew it the instant your mind fell into the gutter.”
    My anger drained away. My fingers hurt from gripping the countertop. Grayson’s mirrored shades still stared me down like nothing was behind them.
    Then he bit his lip. “I need you,” he said in his nicest tone so far.
    “Tough.”
    He put his fist down on the counter. Not hard. Just there. He balled it tightly and relaxed it.
    He took a long, deep breath. His broad shoulders rose and fell with it.
    And then, without another word, he turned and left the office. He crossed the porch and disappeared in the direction of the Hall Aviation hangar, where I couldn’t see him out the lobby windows.
    All the tension whooshed out of the room behind him. Without it, there was nothing left to hold me up standing. I collapsed into my desk chair and took a few deep breaths. I felt like I was going to lose it, but Grayson might be hangingaround outside. Alec might. Mr. Simon might. I couldn’t lose it here at the airport. I had to get home.
    I locked up for the day, shut off the connection between the radio and the outside loudspeaker, and put the cell phone in a drawer. When I’d first started working here, I’d stayed until eight some nights because being alone here was better than being alone at home. My supervisor from city hall made me stop because I was running up the light bill. He didn’t know I needed a handout, and I wasn’t going to tell him.
    Locking the porch