Chief Petty Officer Andrews smiled. “I have a romaine salad with goat cheese and mandarin oranges. For dressing, I have a balsamic vinaigrette, a gorgonzola, or just oil and vinegar if you prefer your dressing on the side. Do you take croutons?”
“Um… yes,” Julia said. Her eyes were wide, as if this were the most bizarre thing she’d seen all day.
Petty Officer Andrews smiled and disappeared through her little door again.
“I made such a mistake when I went to vet school,” Julia said, when she was gone. “I should have joined the navy. Is it always like this?”
Chapel smiled. “Always,” he said. “In the army we ate dirt half the time, and we used rocks for pillows. In the navy they got goat cheese and mandarin oranges.”
IN TRANSIT: APRIL 12, T+15:37
The salad seemed to perk Julia up, though he could see in her eyes just how tired she was. While she ate she actually smiled at Chapel and met his eye once or twice and then turned her head away with a little laugh. “It’s funny how comforting having a good meal can be,” she said.
“I imagine you could use a little comfort right now,” Chapel told her.
She snorted in exuberant agreement. “I need to feel normal, basically. I need to feel like I’m not about to be shot. And frankly, I need a shower and a change of clothes. And a good nap in a real bed. And a drink! Definitely a drink.”
“When we get to Atlanta, sure,” Chapel said. “Maybe we both need that.” It had been a very long day, and it wasn’t over yet. “My instinct is to keep moving, to keep working. But if I don’t get a little downtime, I’m going to start getting fuzzy. Then I’ll start making mistakes.”
Julia met his eye directly and gave him a very warm smile. “I know you’re on a tight time frame. But I want you to promise me something. The first time we get a chance, you have to let me show you how much I appreciate your saving my life.”
For a moment — just a moment — Chapel thought he knew exactly what she meant by that, and the thought made him feel very hot and bothered. “You don’t mean—”
Her eyes opened wide, and she put a hand over her mouth. “Jeez! No. I meant you would let me buy you dinner. Or something.” She laughed and reached over and patted his wrist, defusing the sudden tension. “Wow, Chapel. You’re blushing.”
He turned away, because he could feel the heat in his cheeks.
“Oh, don’t be embarrassed. It’s cute,” Julia said.
Nobody had called Chapel cute since he was seven years old. It felt very strange to hear it now.
“There’s something about you, Chapel. You’re a tough guy, I see that in the way you move, the lines in your face. But there’s an innocence underneath it. Interesting. It’s like I can see that you really believe in what you do. In who you are. You’re not cynical about your job at all.”
“I took an oath to protect my country,” he said. “I take it pretty seriously.”
Julia shook her head. “I’ve met spies before. They seemed to feel like having secrets made them better than everybody else.”
“The opposite is usually true,” Chapel said, furrowing his brow. He was distinctly uncomfortable with where this conversation was going.
Luckily Julia didn’t push it any further. Though she did say, almost under her breath, “I wish I could see you in your uniform. I bet you look just adorable.”
Now that was one thing no one had ever said about him. He pretended he hadn’t heard her and went back to his sandwich.
After they finished their meal, Julia curled up in her leather seat, covered in a thick wool blanket that looked very warm, and was out like a light. Chief Petty Officer Andrews came out and touched a button on the arm of Julia’s chair. It reclined smoothly and without noise, so gently Julia didn’t even wake up. The chief petty officer expertly slipped a pillow under Julia’s head. She smiled at Chapel, then disappeared as silently as she’d come.
Chapel watched Julia’s body rise and fall with her breathing for a while. He thought about how she’d held him when he rescued her from Laughing Boy. About how good it had felt to have her body pressed up against his. He’d felt like a hero, then.
He watched her brow wrinkle and knew she must be dreaming.
She was beautiful. Beyond that, there was something more to her. Real substance. She was strong and smart and kind. He hadn’t met anyone like her in a long time. He’d brought her with him to keep her safe. That was all. She had kissed him, but she’d said she wasn’t trying to start anything. Whatever he was feeling now she probably didn’t return it. How could she? He was a man with one arm. That was enough to put anybody off. Maybe she’d just kissed him out of pity. She’d called him cute and adorable, but those were words women used to describe babies and kittens, not men they wanted to get to know better in a romantic way. Weren’t they?
Damn. He needed to stop thinking like that. He needed to stop thinking about Julia as anything but an asset that needed to be protected.
He turned his seat to face the window and watched lights blinking on the tarmac. He had to get his mind off Julia. He grabbed his phone and his hands-free set out of his pocket. He put the hands-free set in his ear and forced himself to close his eyes. “Angel,” he said, “I don’t know if you’re listening. I wanted to say I’m sorry.”
“Magic words,” Angel told him. “Do you have any more of them?”
“I was letting this case get to me,” he told her, “when I accused you of having your own agenda. That was wrong of me. You’ve done nothing but help me. You’ve been an utter godsend. I’m starting to see that I could never do this without you.”
“That’s a start,” she said.
“This case — this operation — is like nothing I’ve ever had to do before,” Chapel told her. “I’m starting to get worried. There are three more chimeras out there. There’s no way I can catch them all before they kill someone.”
“It’s looking pretty grim, I’ll admit,” Angel told him.
“And now I have Laughing Boy to worry about. He’s killing people, Angel. He’s killing anyone who comes in contact with a chimera, just in case they’re infected. He was going to kill Julia.”
“I know.”
“I couldn’t let that happen,” he said.
“I know. Director Hollingshead wasn’t very happy when he heard you’d brought a civilian along for the ride, of course. But I explained everything to him and made him see it was necessary to prevent another death.”
“You did that for me? Even after what I said?”
“I care, Chapel. I care about people, just like you do.”
Chapel nodded to himself. He was very glad to hear it. “So he’s… okay with this?” He glanced over his shoulder and saw Julia’s sleeping face half covered by her blanket. She was beautiful like that, in repose. When she wasn’t angry or grief-stricken. He wondered what it would have been like to meet her before all this. In just ordinary circumstances. But then again, how could that have ever happened? A veterinarian in New York and a defense intelligence analyst in Virginia would have very little to talk about. Almost nothing in common. “He won’t demand I turn her over to the CDC?”
Angel was silent for a moment. After recent events, Chapel worried she might not come back on the line. “She could be infected, Chapel.”
“I know,” Chapel sighed. He’d known it from the moment he’d found Laughing Boy inside her clinic. She had, in fact, been exposed to the chimera, and if it so much as scratched her while they were in the back of the hijacked cab together, she could have the virus already. “If Hollingshead orders it, I’ll bring her in. Turn her over to his doctors so they can screen her for the virus. Treat her if necessary. But I can’t just send her off to face Laughing Boy on her own.”