by Sammie
"Lunch," he calls as he comes into the hangar, toting a large bag in one hand, Holly clinging to the other.
"Oh, brilliant!" Dom waves at them from the top of the plane he's working on. "We'll be there in a minute." He holds down what seems to be a nail and swings down a hammer.
He nods towards the camoflauge-painted helicopter. "Taking her out again?"
"Yeah," Dom nods from his spot near the top of the helicopter. "Caitlin's going to take her out tomorrow morning. Soon as we get everything checked out."
He grins down at her, where she's working under the Stearman. "Looks like you're getting your flying time in."
She returns with a bright smile of her own. "Oh, yeah! I love it." He offers his free hand, the one that doesn't have Holly clinging to it, and pulls her up. Her greeting to Holly is returned with a lukewarm 'hello', and he wonders if they had a fight, but one look at Caitlin tells him otherwise. She looks as confused as he is.
Wariness crosses her face for a blink-and-miss second, and then she's back to her big smile. She grabs a rag, wiping the oil off her hands and shaking dust out of her hair. "Did I hear something about food?"
"Lunch. We figured you two would be hungry."
"It was Hawke's idea," Holly smiles, clutching his arm and looking up at him. "He's so considerate."
"Sure, sure." Dom climbs down. "What've we got?"
"Sandwiches. Drinks over there."
"Oh, lovely. Thanks," Caitlin begins, popping open a drink and handing one to Dom. "What kind of sandwiches?"
His lips twitch and he pulls one of the small heroes out of the bag. "Your favorite. Turkey," he replies in a deadpan tone as he holds out the sandwich.
She makes a face at him, pursing her lips in an attempt to hide her smile but is unsuccessful. In her grin, she acknowledges the hit. "Cute."
"That's what they all say." It takes a second to register, and then her mouth opens in a look of vague indignation that he'd (pretend to) take her comment as one on his looks. She purses her lips again in amused irritation. Two hits in one day. He's on a roll.
"Well," she replies back. "It's the least I can do for a man who goes out of his way to get turkey out of season."
An amused smile crosses his lips, and he feels a slight tug on his arm.
"So, what's so funny?" Holly asks brightly, but there's something in the tone that's a little shrill.
"Oh, nothing. It's nothing," Caitlin hurriedly assures her.
"Private joke," he replies and immediately wishes he hadn't said it. The look on Holly's face is the same as it was last night at his cabin. "Come on. Let's drop your things in Dom's office."
He doesn't make the connection immediately. When he arrived at the hangar after the explosion, all he could think of is that Aarons was targeting Santini Air again to scare Holly. Like Dom said, two accidents in a week isn't accidental. One can't pay enough to get a coincidence like that. Yet, as Aarons speaks now, he finds he's not completely surprised.
"She tried to knife one girl."
He closes his eyes briefly.
Aarons smugly assumes that the dead cat in the mail is what tipped them off. Perhaps it was for Dom. For him, the cat is just confirmation.
The minute Everett says that Holly and Caitlin are headed up to his cabin, he requests the turbos. His gut is churning; whatever this is can't be good. Caitlin hasn't been up there yet, and the last stay there with Holly was uncomfortable, to say the least.
She tried to knife one girl.
Aarons' words keep turning over in his mind. The man has no reason to lie; he's hardly a lady-killer, and admitting to two other men that he had such a failure with a beautiful woman is hardly in his interests. No, what he says about Holly's true.
And, String thinks to himself grimly, he's inadvertently put Caitlin in danger, because Caitlin's been kind to him.
He streaks into the restricted airspace without a pause. He does not want to guess as to why Caitlin is flying into the airspace Dom told her not to fly into. Even if she'd forgotten about Dom's warning, the military control would have radioed her. Either her communications have been cut, she's stupid, or she's under some kind of duress.
His only comfort is that, from the way the Jet Ranger is flying, it appears to be flown by someone who knows what they're doing. If there are really only two people in the chopper, as Everett said, then Caitlin must be flying, which means she's still alive...for now.
Dom's Jet Ranger suddenly starts diving towards the ocean, and he can feel his gut turning.
Even when he radioes Cait to tell her that he's standing between her and the fighter planes, he has no idea what's going on. She doesn't respond to his calls for a few minutes, and it's a relief to hear her voice when she finally does speak.
"Why does she sound like she's just run a 10K?" Dom asks.
They hide Airwolf temporarily in a back field and drive as fast as they can back to the airport. Caitlin is coming in hard and fast, and she lands the helicopter hard. He and Dom run towards it, but before they even reach it, Holly is jumping out. She runs towards them, crying. "Oh, thank God," she sobs as she throws her arms around his neck. "I nearly died! She nearly killed me!"
Hawke gently pries her arms from around him and gives her a hug before depositing her in Dom's arms, where she's still crying. He runs towards the helicopter, whose blades are slowing in their rotation. He can hear Holly calling after him, repeating something about Caitlin trying to murder her, but he ignores it.
He expects to see the pilot's door open and Caitlin step out. Nothing. He reaches the door and grabs the handle, yanking it open. "Caitlin!"
She's sitting in the seat, slightly wide-eyed, staring at the cyclic, her hand still griping it so tightly her knuckles are white.
"Caitlin."
She recovers, giving him one of her big smiles, but it doesn't reach her eyes. She starts to climb out, and he reaches up to help her. Her hands are clammy, and she seems a little unsteady. "You all right?" He's got her firmly by her arms, and he squeezes her arms comfortingly.
She's looking a little peaked. "Yeah." She nods. "Yeah." She pauses, then seems to remember something, and then murmurs, "I think...I think Holly hit her head."
"Dom's taking care of her," he dismisses it.
"I didn't mean to push her that hard," she comments, looking down at the ground, as if willing him to believe her.
"Cait, Dom'll take care of her," he repeats, then ducks his head slightly, trying to catch her eyes. "You. You all right?"
She doesn't seem to register the question immediately, but then nods. She starts to reach back to the helicopter, and he holds the door open for her as she climbs back in to root out for her things.
The guilt eats at him. Every instance, she's nearly died, and she's gotten left on her own. After nearly crashing in that movie stunt, he and Dom chased Aarons' men, who'd come on set. The helicopter that blew up - it was Dom's close call but it was Caitlin was supposed to die in that explosion; and they ran after Aarons immediately. The only time he's been here for her is now.
She's got a constitution of steel, he thinks to himself. "Are you all right?"
"You worried about me or the chopper?" her voice comes, muffled, as she's poking around the back for her things. When she appears, she has her cheeky grin back on. It doesn't quite reach her eyes, but at least she's smiling.
He just grins. She's recovered, at least temporarily.
"What happened up there?" he asks quietly.
She looks at him, as if she's going to tell him everything, but her eyes flicker over to Dom and to Holly, and she pauses. She opens her mouth to speak, then looks back to Holly and then back to him. She stops, then says, "Hawke, I know she's your friend - "
"Truth, Caitlin."
"There's something really, really wrong with her," she blurts. "She needs help."
"How well do you know that girl?" The detective looks at the both of them.
He shrugs. "Just a couple days for me. She's Dom's niece."
"Not her. The other one."
"Caitlin?" The detective nods, and he and Dom exchange looks. "Just a couple days," he replies. "Both me and Dom."
"She's my employee," Dom says firmly, squaring up protectively for a fight.
"Good," the detective retorts. "You ought to listen to her a little more. She thinks too well of people, but she sees things you two obviously missed." He turns to go.
He frowns, exchanging looks with Dom. The nurse is still with Holly, but the doctor is nowhere to be found. They decide not to ask anything of the nurse - not with Holly present - and go to look for the doctor, who is as absent as Caitlin.
They find them in the office, where the doctor is writing furiously as Caitlin speaks. They stand outside the door for almost another fifteen minutes before the door opens. The doctor is shaking her hand. They're chitchatting, and then the doctor picks up his things to go when Caitlin stops him. Neither have seen him and Dom outside.
"She'll be all right, won't she?" Caitlin's voice is soft, worried.
"We'll make sure of it, Miss O'Shannessy."
Caitlin smiles and shakes the doctor's hand. She jumps slightly when String clears his throat, signaling their presence. She turns and sees the two of them, gives them a smile, and then excuses herself. She greets Everett and disappears out of the hangar.
"Doc?" Dom encouraged.
"Your niece has got all the signs. It's good that we're taking her for treatment now. You're very blessed that things didn't get worse."
"So, the helicopter accidents? The spider?"
"The note, the waitress, the constant questioning, the gun. The stories." The doctor's eyes dart between the two men. "You didn't know?"
"The note? The one with the present?"
"Your Caitlin O'Shannessy recognized that the note as written by a woman. Not a masculine enough hand, she said, although she followed that up with the comment that she'd known guys with girly handwriting, as she put it."
He purses his lips. He should've known. "The waitress?"
"She said you apparently smiled and thanked a waitress, and Holly seemed upset?"
"Well, yeah, but she was refilling my drink," he protests. "And she's sure it upset Holly?" He pauses, thinking over what he said, and then shakes his head in realization.
The doctor just holds out his hands, a "see?" look on his face.
"Stories?" Dom cuts in. "What stories?"
"The man she ran away from said that she thought her life was a great drama," Hawke says slowly, crossing his arms. "Cut his brake lines, said her life was in danger, that his men were leering at her, sent herself a dead cat." He can't remember much more than that.
The doctor nods knowingly. "Sounds about right." He opened his mouth, then paused. "Does that man Holly was with - does he lie?"
"What?" Dom looks as confused as he feels.
"This man. Does he lie?"
"What are you talking about? Of course he does!" Dom exclaims. "He said he'd have left Holly in the street if he could!" He turns to the doctor. "He's scum!"
"He told us - us, who pulled Holly out of his house - that he would have left Holly in the street. Stupid thing to say to her uncle." It's all beginning to make sense to him, even if Dom, out of his infinite loyalty, is still holding out a little for Holly. Ed Aarons might have been slime of the earth, but he was telling the truth about Holly. "You mentioned that Cait said something about stories."
The doctor pauses, then says only, "Some things about you. At least three times, when they were alone, Holly brought up your and Miss O'Shannessy's relationship in conversation."
"What relationship?" Dom exclaims, turning to look at him in puzzlement.
"Miss O'Shannessy" the doctor nods in the direction where Caitlin disappeared off to "was tipped off when Holly said that Aarons lied a lot."
"That tipped her off? How?" Dom frowns.
He knows how. Holly had been saying that Aarons was a control freak, a captor who told her that he posted men around his compound to keep her there. If he'd been lying, that meant that she wasn't really a prisoner at all. And if Holly knew he was a liar, that meant that SHE knew everything was a fake - and that meant she knew she could have left any time she wanted, that she wasn't a prisoner.
The doctor nods as Hawke finally works it all out. "Miss O'Shannessy's very fortunate." The doctor pauses. "People with symptoms such as Holly's will often target those within her drama. I'm assuming that the man she was with before didn't keep other women in the house?"
"Not that I saw." String frowns. "He said she tried to kill herself and to kill him." He pauses. "He did say she tried to knife another girl."
"Ready targets." The doctor shakes his head. "You're lucky, Mr. Hawke."
"How am I lucky?" he asks incredulously.
The doctor looks at them with a "don't you get it?" look. "You haven't realized? All those accidents weren't targeted at you. Holly had a ready and available target instead."
He stares at the doctor for a second, hearing verbal confirmation of what he's suspected. He takes a deep breath, making a half-turn away, his hands on his hips.
"Who?" Dom looks confused.
"Caitlin," he replies shortly.
"Caitlin?" Dom is even more puzzled.
"You had two helicopter accidents."
"Yes," Dom replied slowly.
"Both of them were supposed to be Miss O'Shannessy flying, no?" He turns to see Dom looking at the doctor, then at him, then back to the doctor, understanding dawning on his face. "Am I right?"
"The movie stunt," Dom breathes. "The chopper she was going to fly! It was a fluke that I was in it!"
The odds of having possibly fatal crashes on two helicopters which CAIT was supposed to fly is even less likely than just the accidents themselves. They all, including Holly, knew Caitlin was supposed to fly the helicopter in the movie stunt. Dom was in the bad helicopter, the one which blew up, but he'd been starting it up for Cait. She was supposed to be the one there; it had been a flight discussed by all three of them the day before, when Holly was present. All the other flights they made - well, that he and Dom made - went smoothly.
He had assumed that Holly was the one Aarons wanted to hurt, and that he and Dom were the secondary ones - and Caitlin was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He never thought she was the primary target. He doesn't want to dwell on how close he was to making a return trip to Texas, taking the remains of another friend for burial.
"Trust me. Would've been you, Mr. Hawke, if O'Shannessy hadn't been here," the doctor shrugged. "Easier to knock off the rival."
"Why am I always the last one to figure these things out?" Dom exclaims. "Why did Holly think Caitlin was a rival? What's going on with you and Caitlin?"
"Nothing!" he barks. "I barely know her. We met in Texas, and she came and delivered the body of a friend killed over there. There's nothing more."
"Well." The doctor shrugs. "It's typical of this kind of paranoia. Holly wouldn't need anything to assume the worst. I rather think your Miss O'Shannessy caught on, no matter how much she tried to lay that aside to help her."
"Good night," Dom exclaims. "Why didn't she tell us?"
"You mentioned a gun?" Hawke interrupts.
The doctor looks between them two in surprise. "She didn't tell you?"
"Tell us what?"
The doctor opens the small zippered pouch and pulled out the small revolver. Dom starts. "Yours?" Both men shake their heads. "Holly pulled a loaded gun on her in the aircraft. Ordered her to keep flying, although she'd been instructed to turn and was attempting to do so."
Dom is staring with his mouth open.
He breathes in deeply, shifting on his feet. "Thank you, doctor." The doctor nods and leaves.
"Why didn't she tell us?" Dom repeats, gesticulating wildly.
"She was most likely hoping that she was wrong about her suspicions," he replies. That, he thinks grimly, and the fact that she most likely felt that she would be badmouthing a family friend to the family. Not an especially great position to be in as a stranger.
She comes back in a few minutes later, laughing at something that Everett is saying. She approaches them with her cheerful smile. Dom reaches over and gives her a big hug. She looks puzzled but hugs him back, looking from Dom to him and then back. Dom releases her, holding her at arm's length with a big grin. Her confusion is evident.
He was too late for Jimmy; he was nearly too late for Cait. What good is it, breaking her out from Pope just to die in California? He reaches out and squeezes her arm, and she gives him a confused smile as her gaze flickers between him and Dom, back and forth, becoming more suspicious by the second. "Y'all aren't firin' me, are ya?"
"Firin'!" Dom imitates her accent. "What do you mean, 'firin''? I never hired you!"
He feels badly, but someone has to return Airwolf to the lair, and someone must stay with Holly. Dom is doing the latter, so he has to do the former. He sets Caitlin to working, and she jumps into it with a gusto that clearly indicates she needs to take her mind off it all.
He quickly returns Airwolf and drives at top speed back to the hangar. Caitlin is still working when he arrives, and he has to shout over the noise. "Come on! Let's go get something to eat."
"I can't! Everett's not back yet."
He looks around. Huh. He hadn't noticed the mechanic was gone. "All right, then." He hauls himself up onto the chopper next to her.
"You can go," she offers.
"Two'll make the work go faster," he offers back. "Anything I can do?"
She shakes her head. "I'm 'bout done," she says. "I just gotta put all the bolts and stuff back. Oh, I know!" She pulls off a heavy string of wing nuts and bolts she's got around her delicate neck and hands it to him. "Hold, please?"
"What am I," he asks in a deadpan tone, "a hall tree?"
"Oh, is that what what you get paid for?" she asks sweetly, then turns back to her work. He just sits next to her, holding her string so she can pull off the bolts and nuts she needs. At one point he holds one still as she twists it into place. Some time later she finishes. "There. All done."
"Everett's back." He nods to the office, where the mechanic has been working for the last ten minutes. "Wanna grab something to eat?"
"Sure." She jumps down before he gets a chance to offer her his hand. "Where we goin'?"
"Somewhere special you want to go?"
"I've been here two days. Just somewhere new, I guess."
They end up at a sports bar near the airport, and he admits that it's a new experience for him - not that he's never been in a sports bar, but that he's never taken a woman to a sports bar. It's a nice one - well-kept, higher-end - but it's a sports bar nonetheless.
They order, and he grins to himself when he sees what she orders. He's not a firm vegetarian - he eats fish, after all - but what amuses him is what she's got. He's not fond of women who are constantly obsessing about their weight, but he'd be hypocritical to say that people shouldn't take care of themselves.
She's ordered a hamburger. With a huge salad as a side. And she's eating both with gusto.
The TV's on, and they begin recounting the weekend games. Caitlin gets a sour look on her face, and his grin widens. Seems the Dallas Cowboys lost to the Washington Redskins two days prior, 14-34, and she's clearly grouchy about it.
"Four-three record? That's not going to get 'em to the playoffs," he drawls.
She rises to the bait. "There are still nine games!"
"At the rate they're going?" He spears a bean on his plate and uses it to point at her. "Ten says they win half and lose half of those nine."
"Seems someone failed math class," she teases.
"Well, I'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt. Win 5, lose 4."
"My boys'll do better than that," she huffs, unconsciously touching her cap, which is sitting next to her. "'Sides - don't tell me you root for the Rams!" she exclaims in horror.
He just grins, picking up his glass to take a sip. He doesn't answer her question immediately, taking his time before looking at her, his eyes twinkling, and drawls slowly at her, "Hey, 'least our coach knows which quarterback we want to use."
She looks insulted. "Tom Landry's a great coach!" She pauses. "The quarterback thing aside."
"That I agree on."
"Did you know he was a pilot? B-17s." Her eyes are shining again. "My dad flew out of the same base. It's called Reese, now."
"Your dad teach you to fly?"
"Yeah." She smiles, but it's a little sad. There's a story, but he doesn't press. "Helicopters, especially, but small planes, too. I mean, I did work for the highway patrol."
"That is true."
She's starting to comment about their first meeting when she suddenly shifts gears. "You can't deny it now. I saw it again!"
"Saw what?"
"That beautiful machine of yours. Not half as clearly, but I saw it. And you called me over the com, so you can't deny you were there."
He'd forgotten about that one. He pulls his mask over his face; he's not going to tell her. "You nearly died, Cait. You were seeing things."
She clearly is getting irritated with that argument. "I nearly died doin' that movie stunt and I didn't hallucinate a helicopter then," she retorts.
Oh. Good point.
"I was a military pilot, Cait, and you were nearing military airspace with military planes following you. All I had to do was call in a favor."
"Not in a chopper like that!" She leans forward, resting her forearms on the table, her plate pushed to the side. Her eyes are shining with curiosity and excitement. "Come on. You can tell me," she says with a coaxing smile, as if sharing a secret. Her nose wrinkles every so slightly as she smiles. "I won't tell anybody."
He thinks vaguely that, again, he should be insulted that a pretty woman is more interested in his helicopter than in him, but the twinkle and excitement in her eyes are too much to resist. Dang, she's got brilliant eyes.
Grinning, he imitates her stance, leaning forward so they are nearly nose and nose, as if he's about to tell her. "Of course you won't tell," he whispers into her ear. "Because there's nothing TO tell."
She makes a face at him, pursing her lips as she tries to figure out another way to get at the information she wants. "I know I didn't imagine it."
"You were nearly blown up," he replies. "That's enough to imagine anything."
"Not a beauty like that one, it's not!" She looks at him with a 'gotcha' expression. "Come on, Hawke. How many people you know see black helicopters when they're about to die?"
True. But he isn't going to give in. "Well," he drawls, "I know this one lady chopper pilot from Texas, and every time - "
"Ha, funny." She twitches, trying to think up another way to do it. "I'll play you for it," she dares him, waving at the pool table.
"For what?"
"I win, you have to tell me."
"About what?"
She makes a face.
They don't play. As they're leaving, she drops her purse, and she bends over to grab her things. A teenager waiter's eyes nearly pop out of his head. Hawke glares at him, folding his arms across his chest. The boy gulps and hurries away.
Good thing they didn't play pool.
The next morning, the doctor pulls up with Holly and Dom at Santini Air. He's waiting, and he's impressed that Caitlin is waiting here, too - but not surprised. She's too kindhearted not to be.
There's some last minute paperwork and such that need to be taken care of, and half an hour later, Holly is ready to go. He and Dom are waiting outside by the car as the doctor and the nurse come by with Holly.
"She's really something, isn't she."
He looks over at Dom, who is watching the two women with a guilty expression on his face. "What?"
Dom nods towards Caitlin, who is carrying a bag as she walks towards Holly and the doctor. She seems to hesitate as she approaches, but the doctor waves her over. She delivers the bag - it's Holly's, he recognizes - and a small paper sack.
Holly seems a little sheepish, and she says something to Caitlin. Whatever it is makes the doctor nod approvingly and makes Caitlin give a sort of aw-shucks, embarrassed shake of her head.
"Nightmare she just got out of," Dom says, without his normal bluster. "And she's comforting Holly." He seems oddly subdued, his voice full of regret "She's a good kid."
"Yeah."
She retreats, and he sees her coming over to stand with them. Dom puts his arm around the pilot, and Hawke wonders briefly at his mentor's special solicitude towards Caitlin.
Holly bids him goodbye, and he can't help but hope that she'll be all right. He pities the poor girl; to be trapped in a mindset like that...
Everett approaches them to announce that the new helicopter is ready, and eventually Caitlin offers to take it up. Dom blusters his way through, but Hawke can tell that he's already decided to offer Caitlin some work, if not full-time right away. Caitlin gives Dom a huge hug, and when she releases him, she starts back towards the helicopter, eager to get to work.
He grins at Dom, who pretends to look resigned but can't seem to hold the expression. "Mind if go along?"
"Nah. Go ahead."
The blades have already begun rotating when he pulls open the door on the other side. "Want some company?"
"Dom send you to check up on me?" she asks, with just a tinge of suspicion.
He pretends offense. "You wound me."
"All right," she acquiesces with a big smile. "Come on!"