Under a Christmas Moon
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Mary Anne Wilson
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This Christmas… A stranger will steal his heart. Test pilot Jake Bishop keeps his secrets safe, along with his heart. So he's taken aback when his solitary Christmas at a Wyoming ranch is interrupted by oh-so-determined Liberty Connor. Despite his best efforts, the charming redhead is unraveling all his defenses. Now Jake's in big trouble. Because even wishing on a Christmas moon won't save him from falling for a woman who's engaged to another man…
PROLOGUE
IT LOOKED LIKE a road to nowhere, but Jake Bishop knew better. After a mile of driving on the cracked asphalt that turned off the highway north into the desert, it ended at a set of massive metal gates. The ten-foot-tall barrier bore no logos or company names. There was no explanation for it or the imposing security fencing that ran into the distance both east and west with a spiraling razor wire topping it.
Jake had been here three months ago on a job and knew exactly what was behind all that security. He brought his dusty black pickup to a stop and lowered his window to gain access to a call box on a heavy support post. As furnace-like air hit him, he grimaced. In the second week of September, the Arizona sun was relentless. His black T-shirt and jeans, which he wore with tooled leather boots, felt too heavy and too confining. Even wearing sunglasses, he had to squint to see the call button before he pressed it.
A surveillance camera swiveled around to aim at him. “Hey, right on time.” He recognized the voice of Simon Fox, the head of security for Madison Development, when it came over the speaker.
“The man said 1200 hours. I’m here.”
“Well, come on up.”
The call ended as the gates swung slowly back to give Jake access to the sprawling compound. He drove through and up a well-paved access road for about half a mile toward the central core of the business buildings, a group of low-roofed stone-and-wood structures. He drove past them, then turned onto a gravel road that ran parallel to a runway large enough to accommodate most commercial-sized jets.
He drove up to a single Quonset hut a good distance from the main buildings. Painted a chalky white, it was only recognizable as Security because two Jeeps parked right by it had M.D. SECURITY lettered in red on their doors. Jake stopped and pressed his truck’s horn.
His cell rang and he answered it immediately. “I’m waiting out here.”
“Sorry,” Simon Fox said in his ear. “Change of plans. Madison isn’t wheels-down until 1400 hours.” Victor Madison, who oversaw everything from the first ideas to the final product of his cutting-edge private jet development company, had been precise when Jake had talked to him two days ago. Two days, 1200 hours. I’ll be waiting for you, the man had said. Now Jake was the one waiting.
Simon gave Jake the code for the access door to the hut, then added, “Go on in and cool off.” The call ended.
Jake stared at the security building. Two hours. He hated delays and wasting time, especially when he was more than up for an emergency retest on the MT-007 prototype, which was why he was here. He wanted to find out what he must have missed on the first flight test, as much as he wanted to check out the plane.
When he got out of the truck into the smothering heat, the desert wind caught at his hair, which was in real need of a trim. He raked it back with his fingers, then grabbed his cell and swung the door shut. He didn’t even think about going into the Quonset hut. Instead, he walked the football-field length to the runway, then stepped up onto the tarmac and headed east.
By the time he reached the closest of the two massive hangars, his clothes were sticking to his skin, and his hair was clinging damply to his neck. He walked over to the bank of independently operating, thirty-foot-high doors that made up the front of the oxidized green building. Grabbing a thick leather strap on the closest door and avoiding contact with the hot metal, he pulled the door open. There was a groan of metal on metal, then he had a wide enough gap to get out of the heat and sun.
The outward appearance of the buildings in the compound were deceiving. They looked old, dusty, sunbaked and totally unremarkable. But inside, the setups were cutting-edge in every way. That included total climate control, and the cool air felt great as Jake took off his aviator sunglasses to hook them on his T-shirt.
As his eyes adjusted, he saw his target right in the middle of the vast space: the prototype MT-007. She was incredible, her lines elegant yet fierce. The slightly downward wing thrust and high angle of the tail by the double engines enhanced that feeling of movement even when she was sitting still. There was none of the showy paint or logos and chrome that would eventually be added, but even the dull black finish didn’t diminish her.
“Flawed, but beautiful,” he breathed as he strode across the concrete toward the eight-passenger jet. He made it to within ten feet of it before he heard the shout he’d expected but thought would take longer to come.
“Stop right there!” He turned toward Simon Fox, who was little more than a dark silhouette against the brilliance of the sun behind him in the doorway.
“Your timing sucks, Simon,” Jake called.
“I’ve got perfect timing,” the man said as he took a couple of steps into the hangar and motioned Jake over to him.
The security man was about as tall as Jake but not as lean, and maybe five years older than Jake. With dark buzzed hair, he looked annoyingly cool in jeans, a white shirt and lugged boots. The only sign he was on duty was his black shoulder holster.
Jake slowly jogged back to within three feet of Simon. “I just wanted to have a look at her.”
Simon shook his head. “When I got the alarm, I knew you were faster than I thought you’d be in this heat.”
Jake ignored that and asked, “What came up with her?”
“Don’t know, but if I did and told you, I’d have to eliminate you and then myself.”
He shrugged. “I’m just curious about what was so important that a new test had to be run so expeditiously.”
Simon exhaled. “It’s not in my job description to know anything about that.” He shook his head before his deep brown eyes met Jake’s. “You need to chill, literally and figuratively.”
“No, I need to figure out what I missed the first time.”
“The boss was right about you. No nerves, no hesitation. He knows you press it to the limit as if you have nothing to lose or as if you have some special lucky charm.”
Jake reached into the watch pocket of his jeans and took out something he’d carried with him for fifteen years. He caught it between his thumb and forefinger and held it up to show Simon.
The man squinted at a gold medal about the size of a silver dollar. It wasn’t quite a true circle and had mellowed in color. It had once been engraved, but that was long gone due to the fingers that had worried it over the years.
“So, that’s your lucky charm?” Simon asked.
Jake closed his hand around it as he drew it back. “I got this from my foster dad, a retired marine. We all called him Sarge. When I was heading to boot camp, he gave this to me. It’s a Distinguished Service Medal he was awarded in Vietnam. He told me it was to help me remember I make my own destiny, and to own it.” Sarge—whose real name was Jim Caine—and his wife, Maggie, had opened up their ranch in Eclipse, Wyoming, to run a foster care group home. Jake had moved there at fifteen. He didn’t know if he’d told anyone this before, but Sarge had been on his mind a lot lately.
“You figure this is your destiny?” Simon asked as he motioned to the plane behind him.
Jake pushed the medal back into his pocket. “Until I drive back out the gates and head to Florida for my next contract.”
When Jake had been released from the foster system at eighteen, he’d left the ranch and shaped his own destiny as much as he could. But he always kept in touch with Sarge as well as with Seth Reagan and Ben Arias, his best friends on the ranch. They were all living their own lives now, the way Jake was living his.
“Sarge sounds like a good guy,” Simon said.
“Yes, he was and is.” In a flash of memory the man came to him—six foot five with imposingly broad shoulders, big hands and a big voice. You are part of this place now if you want to be, Sarge had boomed at Jake, a teenager whom everyone else had written off as a lost cause. “He told me if I did right, he’d do right by me,” Jake said. “He meant it.”
If Jake had downtime between this retest and his next contract, he would go up to the ranch and see if Ben and Seth could meet him there. He’d been away far too long this time.
“Smart, too. Now let’s get you out of here,” Simon said, and stepped back out into glaring sun and heat.
Jake started to follow. He was about to step over the threshold when he heard a double-clicking sound echo behind him. In a single heartbeat, there was a massive roar accompanied by a rush of fiery air.
Jake instantly knew it was an explosion, and it hit hard and fast with a force that lifted him off his feet. He was hurled up and out into the brilliant light of day. For one surreal moment, he was flying. The next moment, pain beyond endurance came along with a crushing pressure that targeted his chest and head. No air. No way to breathe or stop his momentum as the sky and tarmac reversed places, and in that single moment, Jake knew he’d run out of time.
He’d never see Seth, Ben or Sarge again. This was the destiny he’d designed by his own actions.
