The Spitfire Girls(73)
She looked over, and could hardly miss the stone wall. ‘What about it?’
‘The girls have taken to throwing one another in after their first solo flight. Apparently it’s a way to cool off a hot pilot.’
She coughed. ‘They what?’
His smile gave her a hint of the man beneath, and for the first time she didn’t feel quite such dislike towards him. ‘I tried to punish them, but they couldn’t stop giggling and I ended up leaving them to it. Honestly.’ He chuckled. ‘The short sheeting tricks on their beds I reprimanded them for, but they’ve all adapted so well, I let them have one little win.’
‘I wholeheartedly approve then, and I’m a little surprised at how soft you’ve become,’ she said, teasing. She turned back towards her office. ‘I’ll see you this afternoon, Captain. I have admin to do before I get back to training my girls.’
‘Or you could show the girls exactly why you’re so respected as a pilot,’ he said quietly. ‘I think they need to see what they could be capable of one day.’
She turned and met his gaze. ‘Did I hear you correctly? You actually want me to show off?’
He laughed. ‘Yes.’
‘Fine. Have a plane ready for me after lunch.’ She turned sharply on her heel. ‘And make it something decent!’
Lizzie chuckled to herself. Jackson was right; it would be good to give the girls an air show. She just hadn’t expected him to suggest it.
At noon, Lizzie strode up to Jackson, walking tall with a hum of excitement surging through her body that she hadn’t felt in months. When she’d taken over the controls of the Halifax for the first time, becoming the second girl in England to be given leave to fly one, the thrill had been enormous. And, right now, she had the same kind of feeling.
‘Jackson, what do you say we skip lunch and hit the sky together instead?’ she asked.
There was no one else around, just the two of them, and she was tired of being grounded when all she wanted to do was fly. She was going to do the flight he’d suggested to show their recruits what the planes were capable of after lunch, but right now she wanted to have some fun.
He folded his arms across his chest and smiled. ‘You’re joking,’ he said.
‘Come on, you can still remember how to fly, can’t you, Captain?’ she asked sweetly, trying not to laugh. ‘Weren’t you some whizz in the air before you were stationed here to babysit me?’
‘You’re challenging me to some sort of flying duel?’ he asked. ‘Or are we just going to run through some training drills?’
‘We’re just going to have fun,’ she replied. ‘Don’t you miss the actual flying part of our jobs? I thought we could fly together, just this once, as a reward for all our hard work.’ Lizzie grinned. ‘This isn’t about me proving I’m better than you, in case that’s what you’re worried about.’
‘I know you think you’re the best pilot this side of the Atlantic, Dunlop, but it sure as hell doesn’t mean you’re better than me.’
She laughed. ‘Come on, what do you say?’
‘This is just for fun?’
She beckoned towards the runway. ‘Yes. Just you, me and the sky.’
As much as she wanted to show him she was the better pilot, she’d grown a lot since her time in England, and this was as much about flexing her flying muscles as it was showing Jackson that they could get along well. They both loved the same thing, and she was itching to get back behind the controls.
She headed to the closest aircraft, pleased to see that there were two AT-6 Texans, silver with a single white star, available. They would be perfectly matched in identical aircraft, and the 600-horsepower plane would be more than adequate.
She climbed in, waited for Montgomery to do the same, and then fired up the engine. The trainees would be flying these sleek aircraft eventually, so it was good for her to fly one before she resumed teaching later that afternoon. It had been a while since she’d flown anything similar herself.
The flight engineer waved her off and she signalled to Montgomery before taxiing towards the runway. She hurtled down the tarmac, her stomach leaping as it always did when she was wheels-up and away. Lizzie circled and gave her rival plenty of space to take off and join her, and soon he’d fallen in beside her. She wondered what it would feel like to be flying in formation with him, preparing for war and going into combat, knowing that he was protecting her and she him. She waved at him before putting some space between them and doing a slow roll. She looked over and saw him repeat the same trick, only he followed it up with a lazy-eight.
Lizzie laughed. This was definitely fun. Her body hummed, her mind quiet and content as she followed her instincts and glided through the sky.
She crossed over and fell into the space to Montgomery’s left; he deftly dropped lower and put himself back on the left-hand side, as if he were trying to prove that she wasn’t the boss. Lizzie wasn’t going to have him out-play her, so she forced her plane into a spin well away from him, her heart thudding as she worked the controls fast to get the plane on course again. She barrelled lower through the air and her engine stalled, but she quickly righted herself and got it going again, soaring back up and taking her place to his left.
Lizzie saw the look on his face through his cockpit window, and knew he was having as much fun as she was. Soon they were both doing rolls and then racing; her cheeks hurt from smiling so hard, loving every minute of their silly antics.