Even pier side, the Duke’s outline had a tendency to merge into the growing background shadows in odd ways, as if she were a specter preparing to fade into the night.
Much as Amanda was about to do herself.
She smiled wryly and unlocked the door of her leased automobile, releasing a puff of the day’s retained heat. A few minutes later she was part of the traffic stream flowing toward the main gate at Pearl.
She headed east along Nimitz Highway, staying with it even after it changed into Kalakaua Avenue and plunged into the heart of downtown Honolulu. Following the shoreline of Mamala Bay past the tourist kitsch of Waikiki, she circled around to Sans Souci and the other quiet beaches below Diamond Head. It was a moderately long drive from Pearl Harbor, but that was the price that had to be paid for a degree of privacy.
Amanda pulled into the small oceanside restaurant that had the big, leafy hau tree shading the out-of-door tables on its lanai. A Pontiac Banshee sports coupe was already parked in the lot, its driver leaning back against its fender, waiting for her. A few moments more and Amanda was exchanging her first night’s kiss with Vince Arkady.
During the trial by fire of the Antarctic campaign, they had become comrades and confidants. That they would also become lovers had been a given long before they had been able to act upon the possibility.
Amanda had frequently told herself that getting romantically entangled with one of her own junior officers was possibly the single most stupid thing she had ever done. However, she had always received the same answer: that the only thing more stupid might have been not getting involved at all.
6
The Hau Tree Lanai was at the same time both a premier and a pleasantly understated restaurant. American-style prime steaks and seafood were offered, with outdoor seating, a sea breeze, and superb view of both Mamala Bay and the Honolulu beachfront.
It was a wonderful place to lounge with a cool drink on a warm night and watch the lights of the city. Especially in good company.
Amanda took a sip from her after-dinner sherry and soda, lightly pressed Arkady’s hand against her thigh beneath the shelter of the table.
“Congratulations,” he said.
“Hmmmm? For what?”
“Scuttlebutt has it that we aced our exams today. We keep the E.”
“That isn’t official by a long shot … but I think we did all right.” Amanda allowed herself to preen just a little.
“As if there would be any doubt.” Arkady grinned at her.
Rakishly handsome and with dark hair pushing the Navy’s length standards, the helo pilot looked a little more pirate than naval officer tonight. His appearance was enhanced by the casual safari shirt he wore tucked into his brushed denim slacks.
“I never promote overconfidence, Arkady,” she replied, “in either myself, or in anyone else. And that brings up something I need to talk to you about.”
“Okay, shoot, babe.”
Amanda set her glass down and sighed. “It’s no big deal, really, but you got a little sloppy on the ship today.”
“Sloppy?” He frowned. “Was there a problem with air division?”
“Oh, no.” Amanda shook her head emphatically. “The air group was fine. No problems. It’s just that when we were talking in the hangar bay during the conflag drill, you got a little familiar. You reached out and patted me on the shoulder.
It was just a little deal. And God knows I didn’t have a problem with it personally, but I did have an inspection officer on my tail. It wouldn’t have been a good thing if he’d seen that.”
“Hell, I know that, babe. But we were in zero-zero visibility. Nobody saw anything. I’m sure of it.”
“I hope not. But we can’t afford to get lax. Especially aboard ship. You know how the Navy feels about relationships inside a chain of command. I could get you in so much trouble over this—” She was by a snort of laughter. Arkady bent forward over the table, trying to control his spontaneous explosion of mirth.
“I’m pleased that you find the imminent disintegration of your career so amusing,” Amanda said with pointed irony.
“Babe, that’s not it at all. It is just that you are so damn predictable in some ways.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Others have told me that on occasion. But what do you mean exactly?”
The aviator lifted her hand to the tabletop and squeezed it gently between his. “It’s like this. It takes two to run a romance, and if I remember right, I was the one who wanted to push the point when we first met in Rio.
“For two, the Navy always comes down a lot harder on the senior member of a liaison like this than they do the junior. You’re the one who’s putting her neck on the line because of me.
“Nonetheless, there you go, dragging all the blame over onto your side of the bed. For God sakes, lady, can’t you just sit back and enjoy an illicit love affair without taking the weight of the world on your shoulders?”
Amanda gave the minutest shake of her head. “Nope.” It felt very good to laugh with her young lover just then. During some of her introspective moments, Amanda had tried to analyze what Vince Arkady’s role was in her life. Possibly it was that he made her remember there was a world beyond the parameters of naval regulations.
That, plus other things. Amanda drew his hand to her face, lightly nuzzling it for a moment. It was a good hand, strong when it needed to be, but likewise gentle, and roughened by honorable service.
“Babe, there’s a question I’ve never asked you before.”
“What?”
“What made you decide to become a naval officer?”
That was an interesting question. Amanda reached for her drink and took another thoughtful sip.
“I really couldn’t say exactly,” she replied. “I can’t recall making any kind of concrete decision about it. I’ve always loved the sea more than just about anything else I can think of. And around our house, you just sort of absorbed Navy through your pores.”
“Your dad, the rear admiral?”
“Um-hmm.” Amanda nodded. “Thirty years on the line, including the Persian Gulf Tanker Wars and Desert Storm. And then there was my grandpa Marshall. He served aboard just about everything from the China river gunboats to the USS Missouri.
“I wish you could have met him, Arkady. Grandpa did Neutrality Patrol duty in the Atlantic before World War Two, the Doolittle Raid, the Aleutians, the Solomons, the Philippines, and Korea. He had seen it all and done it all, and when I was a kid I was sure that he was just one pay grade below God. I would sit and listen to him and Dad yarn for hours.
“Somewhere along the line, I just started knowing that I wanted to be like them. And that someday I wanted a ship of my own.”
She looked out across the beach below the restaurant lanai, watching the waves angle along the sand.
“I suppose,” she said after a few moments of reminiscent silence, “that it was something of a shock to my father when he found out that his baby girl wanted to be a hairy, smelly sailor, just like he was.”
The corner of Arkady’s mouth quirked up. “I don’t know, it seems to me that he was pretty proud of his ‘ girl’ when he pinned the Navy Cross onto her back at Norfolk.”
“Yeah.” She smiled to herself in the twilight. “I guess he was.”
Suddenly, there was a shrill electronic trilling. Diverted, Amanda reached into her shoulder bag and the cellular clipped to it. She had the professionalism back in her voice by the time she had flipped open the phone.