“Likewise, asshole.” I wrap my arms around him in a bear hug that lifts him off the ground. I squeeze a strained grunt from him before I set him back on his feet. “Thanks for shouting me first class for the initial leg. Having that much room and comfort makes a real difference to a guy my size.”
He wobbles slightly before realigning his spine. “Yeah, well. I’d say you deserved it, but by the time you finally agreed to come back to work with me, there were fuck-all other seats available. You owe me.”
“I ain’t paying you shit. If you want me as badly as you say, you can woo me with fancy things — it’s not like you can’t afford it.”
“Fuck you.” He gives me a playful shove. “I already eat beans from a can like a hobo so I can pay your fucking wages.”
I look him up and down, noting the labels embroidered on his quality outdoorsman-looking ass. “Uh-huh. Is that why my last flight was a tin can? I practically had to peel myself out of it.”
He laughs with me and claps a hand on my shoulder. “Hope it was big enough to haul your oversized assandmy equipment. Where’s the gear?”
I point past his shoulder toward the cargo area. “I’ll go piss, then I’ll get it.”
When I walk back out of the men’s room, I stop dead in my tracks at the sight ofLanarolling her luggage toward my friend,and I just about die on the spot when I hear the first word out of her mouth when he lifts his eyes from his phone.
“Dad?”
I steady myself with a hand on the wall as that one word threatens to fell me like a tree in a forest full of revving chainsaws.
“You came to meet me?” she asks, sounding surprised. “I thought you’d just send someone.” Her smile is huge as she hugs Hawk, and my guts drop to the floor when he pats her back.
“Kelly — my best guy — was able to make it up for the season at the last minute,” Hawk says. “Managed to time both flights to Dawson almost perfectly, so I thought I’d make an effort and come collect you both.”
“Oh.” Lana stiffens in his arms. Her eyebrows dip in the center before evening out again. “Well, that’s very efficient of you,” she says, disentangling herself from her father. “I can appreciate that.” Her smile is infinitely more forced than the one that had lit up her face upon seeing him. “When you sayKelly, are you talking about theinfamousKelly? The foreman of legends, who runs your crew like greased lightning?”
“The very same,” Hawk says with a proud grin I would feel flattered by if I wasn’t freaking the fuck out.
“No wonder you wanted to come pick him up personally.” Her flat tone is edged with disappointment, but it soon hardens into a more accusatory pitch. “Wait…Kelly’sgoing to be on our crew? The man whose presence will affect literally every single forecasting calculation I’ve made to date?”
“Yep.” Hawk looks in my direction with a huge grin. “There he is.Kelly.” He waves me over. “Come meet my daughter, Lana. She’s going to be reviewing the claim’s functionality and offering her productivity expertise.”
I move in slow motion toward Lana, whose eyes are so wide and unblinking that I’m sure she thinks she’s hallucinating.I hold my hand out automatically, and she takes it just as reflexively.
“Kelly?” she squeaks.
“Bates Kelly,” I confirm. “Lana… Hawkins?”
“Baker-Hawkins,” she corrects, giving her father a nervous glance. “I’m one of Dad’s non-Martha kids, and you’re…Kelly. Dad’s left-hand man, who was subbed out by Clyde this season. You’re… not on my list.” She turns to Hawk, looking more than a little ruffled in the feather department than seems safe. “He’s not on my list.”
“So put him on the list,” Hawk says with a shrug.
“Just put him on?” Lana’s expression is incredulous as she glances at me twice and then glares at her father. “Like his being here doesn’t changeeverything?!”
“Steady on, Goose.”
Goose?
Oh, fuck. I’ve heard Hawk talk about his daughter, Goose.
A “real odd duck,” he always jokes — among some other borderline disrespectful shit that I want to travel back through time and punch him for now that I’ve met her. Fuck, fuck,fuck.
“And Kelly’s therighthand,” Hawk adds, giving me a wink. “Always.”
Lana shakes her head and seems to become even more incensed as she stares down her father. “He’ll have to be the left this season.Martha’sthe right. You promised.”
“She’ll understand.”
Lana plants her feet in a battle stance. “I assure you, shewon’t.For fuck’s sake, Dad. Do you even know her?”
