Next to the open engine cowling, Jael crouched. Walter hunkered beside her, watching intently as she fiddled with the carburetor.
Hitch shoved his hands in his pockets and started toward them.
Jael looked back and flashed him a grin. The sun glinted against the smudge of grease across one cheek. She was back in breeches and boots—with a red kerchief over her silver-streaked hair.
She looked like she belonged here. No more the bedraggled, wild-eyed ragamuffin who’d parachuted in front of his Jenny. She now looked about like a woman who had taken on pirates should look.
She was the reason for all of this. If it hadn’t been for her, he’d have been on the far side of the country by now. He’d have left town without ever knowing about Walter, without ever making things right with Griff.
He smiled back at her. Someday he’d tell her that. And thank her for it. Maybe today, as a matter of fact. He lengthened his stride.
“Captain Hitchcock.”
Livingstone. He winced and slowed up enough to look over his shoulder.
Still in his white suit and Stetson, Livingstone propped his walking stick across his lap and used both arms to wheel his chair toward Hitch. His bandaged legs stuck straight out in front of him on the chair’s wicker leg rests.
That explained the other plane.
Hitch faced him. “Still here, are you?”
“Couldn’t rightly leave the vicinity without laying eyes on our own true-blue hero, now could I?” Livingstone scanned Hitch from top wing to landing gear. He almost looked impressed.
“This isn’t about the bet, is it?” Hitch asked. “’Cause it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to take that management position after all.”
“Is that a fact?” Livingstone pursed his lips. “Well, then, might it be our purposes are coinciding without our even realizing it?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean simply this.” Livingstone wheeled a little closer and lowered his voice. “As you may know, the Extravagant Flying Circus has met with a rather tragic demise.”
“Ah, yes.” After Zlo’s escape, all Livingstone’s pilots had winged it out of the valley, intent on saving their planes while they still could.
“But,” Livingstone said, “a new venture has come to my mind. Despite the recent tribulations, this area has proven itself ripe for the expansion of aviation. I am considering opening a flying school.”
“A school?” Hitch frowned. “With one plane?”
“Or perhaps two.” Livingstone glanced at Hitch’s Jenny. “Knowing the art of good publicity as I do, I believe if I were able to advertise a flying instructor of some heroic notoriety, we could draw in quite a crowd.”
Stay here—and still be able to fly? His mind started spinning with the possibilities.
Livingstone smoothed his mustache. “We could even put on a small circus hereabouts. A monthly affair, perhaps. I’ve already signed on your fair wing walker.”
“Ah…” The words wouldn’t come fast enough.
Livingstone smiled—a little too victoriously maybe—and started wheeling his chair back. “You think about it. Take your time. Let me know whenever you’re sure.”
Hitch was already turning to his Jenny—to Walter and Jael. “Oh, I’m sure.” Saying so was a mistake, of course. Livingstone would use it against him when the time came to negotiate wages. But the words popped out, right from the bottom of his soul.
He started across the field toward the Jenny.
Earl hobbled over from the other direction, his roll of tools under his good elbow. The fingers poking out of his filthy bandage held a chicken thigh to his mouth.
He gave Hitch a grin and a nod, then turned and caught sight of Jael and Walter kneeling beside the engine. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing? You two ain’t grease monkeys yet, no matter what you think.” He stomped toward them.
Jael and Walter both laughed and jumped up to run around the back end of the plane, practically daring Earl to chase them. He didn’t, of course.
Hitch stopped a few yards off and waited for them to circle back around the front. He rubbed the sweat from his palms onto his pant legs. Almost involuntarily, he looked over his shoulder.
Still kneeling on her picnic blanket, Nan shaded her eyes with her hands and watched him. Her shoulders lifted in a breath, and as she let it out, she lowered her chin in a deep, consenting nod.
Walter rounded the front of the plane, without Jael, who must have realized what was in the wind and backed off. He saw Hitch and danced over, eyes sparkling.
“Howdy,” Hitch managed.
The boy grinned up at him all the harder.
“What’s this? Don’t tell me you’re back to not talking?”
Walter shrugged. He seemed to think about it, then said, “Howdy.”
“That’s more like it. ’Cause, you and me, we got things to talk about.” He knelt and set his hands on Walter’s shoulders.
Every minute in that jail cell, he’d been trying to figure the best way to say this. Nan and Byron had promised to prepare the way for him.
He wet his lips. “What would you think if I were to start being your dad?”
Walter cocked his head and raised his eyebrows. He looked intrigued.
Hitch kept going. “What would you think if it turned out I was your dad? And maybe, one of these days, if you wanted to, you could come live with me?”
Walter kept staring. If anything, the look rising in his eyes seemed to be one of hope. He flung himself against Hitch’s chest, wrapped his arms all the way around, and hugged him.
Hitch’s breath ripped right out of him. How could anybody forgive that fast? Or trust that easy? He didn’t deserve it, that was sure. But here it was, like a gift someone had slipped into the palm of his hand. And he’d almost missed catching it altogether.
Walter stepped back from Hitch’s arms and looked up at him, fairly glowing.
Then J.W. hollered, “Hey, kid, you playing or not?”
Walter glanced over, then again at Hitch, eyebrows raised, asking for permission.
Hitch nodded. “Go along. We got more to talk about, but it’ll wait.”
He stayed on his knees and watched Walter scamper off.
So help him God, he was going to make good this time. He’d be there for Walter, every single day of his life. He’d accept this gift, and he’d do his best to take care of it like it deserved to be taken care of.
Beside the plane, Jael stood with her hands in her back pockets. She grinned.
He pushed up to his feet and joined her. “I hear Livingstone offered you a job?”
She inclined her head.
“Me too.” He took a breath. “I don’t have any kind of right to ask you to stay, after everything that’s gone down. But just in case it might mean anything to you, I am promising I’m going to stay.”
Her grin faded. She stitched her eyebrows together and pursed her lips. She’d never seemed to have much trouble making up her mind about things. But right now, she looked downright indecisive.
He tried again. “I reckon you don’t have to say anything right now.”
“It is not that.” She moved a step closer. “It is that I am not knowing right word for… this.” She set her palm on his chest. Without so much as a blush this time, she leaned in and kissed him right smack on the mouth. Then she pulled back, shook a few loose tendrils of hair out of her face, and grinned wickedly.
He blinked. “What? No slap this time?”
She shrugged one shoulder. “Not this time, I think.”