Authors: Tracy Cottingham
“Cassandra?” Gunnar reached forward and patted her on the back.
“Are you all right?”
Cassie nodded and proceeded to take a quick drink to keep him from continuing
to help her. She cleared her throat and moved her chair further away from
him, needing a little bit of distance. “Do you mean to tell me that you
won’t be doing any of the flying for our company?”
“I never did before, and I don’t intend to start now,” his tone was curt,
defensive. “I’d have to give up stunt flying all together, and I’ve told
Wes before that if that was the case I wasn’t interested.”
“And he agreed?” Cassie couldn’t believe what she was hearing.
“He doesn’t have much of a choice,” he stated matter of factly. “When we
first got together it was to do stunt flying, not commuter flying. If he
wants to diversify and expand that’s fine by me, but it’s not my problem.
Besides, commuter flying is boring, stunt flying is exciting, and fun, and-”
“Deadly,” Cassie cut him off.
Gunnar started to fire back, but he stopped himself, and tried a gentler
approach instead. “Look, I know you lost your husband to this, but you
and I also know how rare that is.” He ran his hands through his
hair. “Hell, I checked with some of the pilots that were there that day,
and no one can figure out what went wrong. It was a fairly routine stunt,
and you’re husband was reputed to have a good feel for his skill.”
The fact that he could be so
flippant about an accident that took her husband’s life floored her. “Are
you for real?” She shoved her food away and stood up. “I was there that
day, Gunnar, and I saw the whole thing.” She tried not to show it, but
she was so angered by his lack of sensitivity, tears were streaming down her
face. “He died that day because just like you, he’d been working on a new
trick to really wow the crowd. Too bad he’ll never know just how much of
a thrill he gave the spectators, eh?” Her voice was laced with
disgust. “I’ll give him one thing though, at least he knew the difference
between a hobby, and a real job. With the hobby being the one that you
did after you put your time in on the business, or a wife and child, or God
forbid the dreaded nine to five thing.”
“I don’t shirk my responsibilities, if that’s what you mean. But I do
choose my own road, and if you can’t understand that…” He stood up as
well. “Look around you Cassandra, in case you haven’t noticed, my
business always has been stunt flying, and I don’t have a wife or a child that
I have to think about.”
“Gee, I wonder why?” Cassie threw enough money down on the table to cover
the bill, and made her exit.
She couldn’t believe she’d been so
worried about lying to a man that obviously didn’t care about anything or
anyone but himself. After all, what difference did it make whether or not
she re-fit the airplane to branch off in another direction, he wouldn’t even be
flying it anyway. She thought of all of the points he had tried to make
in favor of stunt flying, and recalled the charcoaled hollow container that
became her husband’s coffin when it crashed to the ground. “What a
waste,” she thought bitterly. “What a stupid, foolish waste.”
Cassie was anxious about the eight o’clock meeting she’d called for Wes and
Gunnar, and had spent all night trying to find the best way to break it to
them. In the end she decided to treat it as if it was a business
proposal, instead of the done deal that it was. Lonnie had agreed to stay
on for two more weeks, giving her the time she needed to really get things
going before having to make Abby a top priority as well as running the
business. Abby was used to her being gone at work, but she’d always been
with Ben when she was gone. Now that the two of them no longer had the
option or the luxury, Cassie knew she was going to have to pick up the
slack. Only first, she was going to have to sort out the obvious glitch
her new business plan was going to cause, and with the way she’d left things
with Gunnar, she knew she was going to have to find a handful of pilots or the
whole thing was going to come crashing down on her head, good idea or no.
Originally, she’d been hoping to avoid a complete disaster, but after learning
about the kind of person Gunnar had become, she knew there was no way they
could ever hope to share a future together, and instead of the excitement she should
be feeling, she just felt empty.
To her, it felt as if she’d gone through a second death last night. It
had been ridiculous to pin such hopes on a relationship that hadn’t even had
much time to develop, but when she allowed herself to be completely honest, she
knew that what bothered her the most was that being with Gunnar was the only
man that wouldn’t feel like such a betrayal of her husband. If he hadn’t
removed himself from her life so successfully, she would have probably never
met Ben, and although she was thankful every day that she found her husband
even if she had to lose him, Gunnar felt like home.
Wes flew in the door with a cup of coffee in his hand and startled her out of
her day dreaming. She hastily covered up the blue prints before he could
get a peek, and tried to smile politely as she urged him to sit down.
“Boy,” he was shaking his head. “Unless things have really changed, you
must have something really important to say if you’re out of bed this early.”
“You know me too well,” she laughed nervously, and looked for a way to change
the subject. “Where were you anyway?” She asked, realizing for the first
time that he hadn’t even shown up at Disneyland like he said he would. “I
thought the idea was to take a vacation all together, you know, away from the
grind?”
“Oh, that.” He smiled sheepishly. “Something far more exciting came
up and I just never quite made it out there. You know how it is.”
“Yeah, I can imagine. The life of a confirmed bachelor must get pretty
rigorous from time to time,” she joked, and then Gunnar came in, and it was as
if a blanket of silence filled the room.
“It appears we’ve been summoned,” Gunnar casually walked over to a chair at the
opposite end of the table, and flipped it around so the top was facing him
before sitting down.
If Cassie didn’t know better, she’d say he looked hung over, but he was still
so handsome she couldn’t really tell.
“It’s so nice to see how you two have bonded since I last saw you,” Wes’s
sarcasm broke the awkward standoff.
“Be careful,” Gunnar wasn’t quite finished. “If she doesn’t like what you
have to say, she may just yell off with your head.”
“No,” Cassie did her best not to take the bait entirely. “Not Wes, just
you.” She was relieved when Rhonda came through the door with the copies
she’d been waiting on. “Thank you,” she said reluctantly, fingering the
papers in her hand, knowing how much trouble they were about to cause.
“Well,” she began with as much confidence as possible. “Since I called
you both here, and I have everything I need now, I guess I’d better get to
it.” She breathed a heavy sigh, looking first to Wes who was lounging
comfortably, not really expecting anything Earth shattering and then to Gunnar
who as always looked like he was about ready to pounce on anything she did that
he didn’t like.
“In short,” she began, for the third time,” I’ve been working on a plan to
branch out in a new and
somewhat unusual direction by converting one of the commuter
planes into something I think people will
eventually pay a nice sum to experience.” She handed
them the packet depicting every aspect of her idea, and tried to ignore the
looks she was starting to get from both of them. “I could go through it
with you, but I thought it might be best if you just read it on your own, and
then if you have any questions or feedback, we could go back over it
together.”
She watched anxiously as Wes turned each page slowly. He was doing his
best to keep his expression neutral, but his shoulders were inching up bit by
bit, and his foot was tapping out a violent rhythm against the hard wood
flooring. Gunnar hadn’t even bothered to open it. He just sat
deathly still, narrowing his eyes as he stared at the cover page. She was
okay with that, till his icy stare lifted off the paper and found her.
Then, in one swift motion, he tossed her handout into the trash can, kicked his
chair out from behind him, and stormed out.
“Well, it’s pretty obvious how Gunnar feels,” Cassie interjected when Wes had
finished the last page. “How about you?”
Wes rubbed his hand along the back of his neck. “It’s not that I don’t
like it, it’s just that it’s so... out there.”
“It’s only out there because we haven’t tried it yet,” Cassie had to work to
keep her own excitement in check. “Imagine the possibilities of offering
hour long romantic getaway fantasy flights. I mean, unless a person is a
reluctant flyer like myself, who wouldn’t want to spend an evening by
surprising a loved one with something so spontaneous and different. The
possibilities are endless. What I described on page two is just a basic
package I put together.”
“It would cost
a pretty penny to reproduce the blue print you have there, and the money would
end up going completely down the toilet if people don’t share your
enthusiasm.” Wes tried to come at it from a pure business vantage
point. “It seems to me this would be the sort of thing to try once we
were sure that our commuter trade was secure. You know, when we’ve been
at this a while longer and we have a proven track record together. That
way we don’t stand to lose anything even if a worst case scenario
happens. He tossed her handout back over to her. “Why don’t you
hang on to this idea of yours for year, at the end of that time if things are
running smoothly will go ahead and give this a try, agreed?”
“She can’t agree even if she wanted too,” Gunnar strode back into the
room. “She’s already done it.”
Wesley laughed him off at first, but when he looked to Cassie and she didn’t
refute it, he lost it.
“You have got to be kidding me!” He yelled. “You did
this without our consent? Why?”
“To get back at me,” Gunnar seemed to enjoy watching someone else have a bone
to pick with her.
“What?”
“She threatened something like this before I left to secure the Nakamoto
deal. She wanted me to feel as vulnerable and out of the loop as she
did. Are you happy now Cassandra? Have I paid enough? Or are
there any other crazy ideas up your sleeve that we have to worry about?”
“I highly resent the word crazy, and you’ve got it all wrong, as usual.”
She could tell that Wes was still about to jump from his skin if he didn’t
start getting some answers, and she needed desperately for him to
understand. “Look, I admit that what I did was a bit...hasty, but there
were two things I had no idea about at the time or I wouldn’t have even
considered it.” She should have been grateful that they were both at
least listening but it wasn’t much comfort. “First, I had no clue that
Nakamoto Industries was such a gigantic account, which I do not feel
responsible for because
you
personally delighted in keeping me in the
dark about it until it was all over,” she pointed to Gunnar. “And second,
I didn’t know that Gunnar wasn’t going to do any of the flying himself.”
“You’re not doing any of the flying?” Wes turned his frustration to
Gunnar. “What about the plans we discussed before we made the
arrangements to move down here?”
Gunnar shrugged
his shoulders. “I told you I’d think about it and I did. And as I
told her highness over there, stunt flying has always been my first priority,
and I’m not about to give it up because she decides, behind our backs, to
branch off in a new and completely ridiculous direction.”
Cassie was getting tired of all the bashing her idea was taking. “For
your information, I decided to do a little test marketing before we left, and I
placed some ads in the paper. As of September, my ridiculous little
venture is booked solid through to Thanksgiving, with the fifty percent,
non-refundable booking fees ready to take to the bank.” She flung the
deposit Rhonda had made up across the smooth surface of the table. She
knew the amount would leave them speechless. “Oh, and a reporter from the
Los Angeles times is coming out one week from Thursday. Apparently they
saw the add, and think this will be the hottest new craze slash controversy to
hit L.A. in years due to the incredible interest that’s already been generated,
and the opposition of a few people that aren’t really all that comfortable with
the idea of couples...well, having the opportunity to couple, for lack of a
better word in the air above them.”
She didn’t know what she was expecting, Gunnar to fall at her feet and finally
praise her for the imaginative, wonderful business woman she was? She
knew better than that but she was hoping for more than the continued silence
she got.
“Okay, I still will go on record as saying that I truly hate not being
informed. I think it’s unprofessional, and completely goes against us
really connecting and making this business venture as positive as it could be,
but what’s done is done and we have to decide where to go from here.” Wes
eyed Gunnar, silently imploring him to agree. Instead, he got the same
sharp stare he reserved for Cassie. Wes shook his head and turned to
her. “I want the names and addresses of the people who have booked, and
for what flights, when, so I can pull together a quick demographics sheet to
help us with the advertising, and I want a complete financial accounting of
which funds were drawn from the existing company to make this happen.”
“I paid for the re- condition myself,” Cassie remarked offhandedly, wondering
if Gunnar’s face would eventually crack if he held it in the same rigid
position for too long.
“With what?” Gunnar asked as if he didn’t believe her.
“My savings.”
For the first time his expression changed. “You used the last of your
savings,” he sounded concerned, before covering it with a snipe. “And you
call yourself an intelligent woman?”
“Cassie,” Wes stepped in front of her. “The company has enough holdings
to cover it. You don't have to put yourself personally on the line.”
“It’s really nice of you to offer Wes, especially in light of the way I sort of
threw this at you. But the truth is, I was kind of hoping to keep this
separate. If it goes at all, I’d like to discuss dissolving the
partnership. I think it would be best for everyone involved if you just
bought me out of my shares in the commuter line, and we called it even.”
“I don’t think we need to throw in the towel just yet,” Wes picked back up the
handbook she’d made. “I think it’s just going to take more time for us to
really learn to work together, that’s all. Why don't you get me the
information I need, and meet me at the air strip at two, so you can show me everything
there is to know about Leisure Time’s new Fantasy Flights.”
Cassie nodded her agreement and headed for the door. She was tired from
working all night, and was exhausted at having to deal with her guilt over how
she’d behaved, and Gunnar’s inability to even be civil. She’d assumed
he’d step aside and let her pass but he didn’t move. She came within
inches from bumping into him when she stopped and waited. “Don’t you have
a show to practice for?” She could feel the heat pouring from his body,
and had to force the images of just how good he’d feel if there weren’t any
clothes between them from her mind. “After all, we wouldn’t want another
strange fluke to befall the idyllic world of stunt flying, and see you get hurt
now would we?”
He continued to stare her down, first taking in her lips, then letting his eyes
blaze a trail down along her body, undressing her with his icy glare.
“You’re right,” he spoke slowly, quietly. “We wouldn’t want yet another
man in your life to go falling, crashing down into the ground now would we?”
Cassie closed her eyes, jerking slightly at the images he’d created. Her
hands were trembling, and hot tears stung her lashes. “Get out of the
way,” she managed through clenched teeth, pushed by him and headed out the
door.
Cassie stopped at the end of the hallway to catch her breath, and calm her
frayed nerves. It was only by accident that she heard Wes’s angry voice
as he finished things up with Gunnar.