"I heard the good news!" Tom was grinning. "You're back in the States, filling in for Patrick." His smile faded. "Poor guy. Can't believe he biffed it so badly parachuting. Sporting three pins in his leg, did you hear?"
"Ouch." Mike wondered exactly how selfish it was of him to be grateful for the miracle of that mishap, and also the fact that the backup pilot had contracted hepatitis.
Probably pretty damn selfish.
But he'd been training for exactly this opportunity for years. He'd been in space twice before and couldn't wait to get back up there. So far, all he knew was that the mission would carry and install the third of eight sets of solar arrays that, at the completion of construction in 2006, would comprise the space station's electrical power system, converting sunlight to usable energy. It was a project he was intimately familiar with, as he'd been working on it in Russia for years. "How is it all going?"
"It's going," Tom said, nodding. "They're thrilled to have you, as your reputation precedes you."
That, Mike knew, could be good or bad.
"Hey, heard about last year," Tom said. "How you limped back after the payload fire midflight."
Limped. Kind word for nearly losing it, as in crashing back to earth, becoming fish food, biting the big one. Thanks to some quick thinking on Mike's part-and he was convinced anyone on that team could have done the same, he'd just gotten there first-he'd managed to contain the fire and put it out before it destroyed them beyond repair. "I don't care to repeat that experience," he said in grand understatement.
"You were a lucky bastard, that's for certain. All of you."
"Have you met your team?" Tom turned to the two men who'd just come up to them. "Mike Wright, meet Jimmy Westmoreland, Mission Specialist-One. And Frank Smothers, Mission Specialist-Two."
As it turned out, Mike had met both men before. They'd come to Russia several years back to study some of the communications equipment for the space station in its planning stages, so it was more of a reunion than anything else. A few moments later he was introduced to Stephen Philips, the fifth member of the team and their payload specialist.
"You've met everyone now," Tom said. "Not bad for your first ten minutes here."
"I haven't met the commander." Oddly enough, Mike felt his first flash of…not apprehension; that was far too strong a word for a man who felt so utterly comfortable in his world. But just as the space industry was notorious for its small population of overeducated overachievers, it was also notorious for its big egos, and no one, absolutely no one, made it to commander status without a significant sense of self-importance.
Added to that was yet another problem.
This commander was a woman.
Everyone knew Mike loved women. He cherished them, dreamed about them, wanted them, enjoyed them.
Take last night, for example.
But working for a woman? As in, directly beneath one?
He didn't want to think of himself as biased or sexist, but honest to God, he couldn't imagine why a woman would want to be commander of the space shuttle, he just couldn't. It took strength, a tough-as-nails demeanor and, well, balls.
"Corrine Atkinson?" Stephen craned his neck, as did Tom and the others. Unlike Tom, Frank, Jimmy and Stephen were of average height or taller, and leanly muscular. They wore the short, short buzz cut that screamed military, and all of them had the look of tough, rigidly controlled, well-trained athletes.
Unfortunately, astronauts on the whole were not nearly as serious-minded as their reputation might lead the general public to believe. In fact, for the most part they were great pranksters and troublemakers, not one of these guys being an exception.
"The commander is here somewhere," Stephen assured Mike. "She just came in from Houston."
"She flew in to meet you, in fact," Frank said, far too innocently. He ruined it by grinning. "Don't worry. We told her all about you."
Jimmy joined in with his own evil grin. "Yeah. We started with that time we came to Russia and you brought us to that party, remember?"
God help him, he did.
"And those women jumped out of a cake," Jimmy added, though Mike already knew the rest.
"They were some great lookers," Frank said. "But then we found out they were prostitutes. You tried to send them home, Mike, remember? They didn't have a ride, so we offered to give them one-"
Mike groaned at the recounting of the bachelor party for one of his comrades. "Tell me you didn't tell her this."
"Oh, yes. We did. She especially liked the next part." Frank grinned. "You remember…the naked part."
"Okay, that was not my fault." Mike rubbed his temples. "And when they pulled their guns to rob us, we didn't get hurt. Did you tell her that, I hope?"
"We were safe only because they had a crush on you," Jimmy pointed out. "They still took our wallets and cash."
"And our clothes," Frank added. "Don't forget they took our clothes and then our keys, and left us by the side of the road."
"It started to rain," Jimmy recalled with a shiver. "Hard."
"Yeah." Frank smiled in fond remembrance. "Good thing it wasn't winter."
"The commander," Mike said weakly. "She found that story particularly fascinating, I suppose."
"Oh, yeah."
Everyone but Mike doubled over with laughter.
Great. Just great. Mike hadn't even met the woman and he was probably on her shit list.
"There she is now," Stephen said, pointing across the room.
She had her back to them. All Mike could tell from the view was that she was rather petite. No other details, except she'd pulled her hair back in a severe bun that reminded him of Mrs. Stestlebaum, his strict, terrifying first-grade teacher.
Commander Corrine Atkinson appeared to favor boxy business suits that didn't show nearly enough of the female body to suit him, and hid any curves she might or might not have.
"Come on, I'll introduce you," Tom said.
Mike drew in a deep breath, feeling resigned, but not sure why. So she dressed a little stiffly. So she liked to torture her scalp with unforgiving hairdos. It didn't mean she would be difficult to work for.
He hoped.
"Mike?"
"Yeah," he said to Tom. "Coming." But he didn't move.
Frank laughed and slapped him on the back. "It's just the boss, big guy, not the guillotine."
But Mike knew that sometimes they could be one and the same. Together, moving as a team already, they strode forward to introduce him, the other men smiling, relaxed in a way that suddenly Mike couldn't have imitated to save his life.
Strange, given how much he enjoyed smiling and being relaxed.
He didn't understand it, at least not until he got within two feet of her and she turned to face him.
Corrine got that funny tingle at the base of her skull, the one that warned her that something exciting-good or bad, she couldn't yet tell-was about to happen.
The inkling was right on, she discovered, as she slowly turned and faced the group of men standing there smiling, all of whom she knew, some better than others.
With the exception of the one in front.
Her perfect stranger.
The man with the wicked eyes and even more wicked hands, the one she imagined would headline her fantasies for years to come, was standing right there in front of her.
Only now he wasn't in worn jeans and a clean T-shirt, sitting at the bar tapping his foot in tune with the music as a storm raged outside. Now he wasn't looking alone and sexy, and just a tad bit dangerous to her mental health.
Now he was…oh, definitely still sexy and just a tad bit dangerous to her mental health-but no longer alone late at night.
He was surrounded by her team, looking for all the world as if he belonged there, looking as if he'd been born there.