Dieter hung up.
So now he was flying on another man’s jet with her.
The same as it always was.
But he would get to Montreux sooner, and operational security would be better for it.
Dieter sent a mass text to the operators of Rogue Security:Operation Impossible Dream is a GO for this weekend, Saturday. Repeat: Mission is a GO.
His next call was to one of the nannies that Flicka had indeed hired for his daughter. Alina loved the fifty-something, ex-kindergarten teacher Suze Meier more than all the other nannies put together. Suze had offered to let Alina “have a sleepover” for a few days while Dieter worked night and day at the wedding.
Alina giggled the whole way over to Suze-Mama’s house and had waved bye-bye without turning away from the blocks she was stacking.
Dieter would have liked a little pouting from his daughter when he left, but it was probably for the best.
Blue Skies
Dieter Schwarz
I understood.
Dieter stretched his legs while sitting in one of the rearmost seats of the private airplane. Papers and a computer were spread out in front of him on a table that seated four.
Up near the plane’s cockpit, Flicka dashed through the open door of the little jet last, still talking on the phone that was pressed against her face. She had changed into a business-casual pantsuit, and her long legs stretched in pale green slacks as she strode through the airplane.
Faint aromas of cigarette smoke and whiskey lifted from the leather seats. Dieter was sensitive about cigarette smoke. He hadn’t slipped and smoked for a few months, but he could smell even the faintest trace.
Near the front of the plane, another four-chair table stretched. Single seats lined on the other side of the plane, giving the jet enough seats for twelve people.
Essentially, Dieter had wedged himself into a corner of the plane, leaving it up to Flicka to sit as far away from him as she preferred.
She hung up the phone and marched right toward him, her blond curls bouncing around her shoulders. There was anger in her stride, but less than even last month. “Look, we have to work together for another week. Let’s just pretend all that never happened for a week or two, all right? We’ve been doing a good enough job of it.”
“There’s one more thing.”
“Please, no.” She sat down in the seat diagonally from him, but she was staying.
“I want you to know—”
“Get off my airplane.”
“—that I met Gretchen after I left London,” Dieter said. “After I arranged for security for you, I flew to the States the next day. I met her in Chicago. I didn’t know her when we lived in London.”
Flicka gripped the armrests. “I can’t deal with this right now. Look, after Rae and Wulf are safely off on their honeymoon, you and I will have a coffee or a drink. Maybe more than one drink. And we’ll figure out how to be okay with each other. But right now, I have a thousand details to oversee, and I need all the coffee to stay awake for three days running to make sure everything isabsolutelyperfectfor my Wulfie’s wedding.”
Dieter’s lips barely curved. “I’ll hold you to that.”
“And just so you remember, I’m married.”
“Flicka, I would never try anything. I would neversuggestanything.”
Three women entered the plane from the door at the front. Dieter had already seen them crossing the tarmac and recognized them as Flicka’s admins who had flitted around Wulfram’s house.
She said, “I’m married, and I plan to stay that way.”
“I would never want anyone to betray their spouse or break their vows,” he said. “You know I wouldn’t, right?”
“I mean it.”
