"There's another test at 0800," Cal said as he sipped his coffee. "When Adrian and Yates get here, we'll all go to the control room so we can listen in on the flights. Colonel Mackenzie's going up today. He always comes back to the control room after a flight, and I'll introduce you to him."

"We've already met," she replied. "He came by last night before I quit for the day."

"What did you think of him?"

She thought for a moment, trying to come up with a concise answer, and finally settled on "Scary."

Cal laughed. "Yeah, I wouldn't want to cross him. I would have sworn that fighter pilots didn't respect anything, but they sure as hell respect him, in the air and on the ground. One of them said mat Mackenzie is the best pilot in the Air Force, period. That's saying a lot, considering none of this group are slouches."

The other two members of the team arrived. Yates Korleski, a short, sturdy, balding man, was the senior member and head of the team. Adrian Pendley was Caroline's fly in the ointment on this particular assignment He was tall and good-looking, divorced, and unrelentingly negative about having Caroline on the team.

When she had first gone to work for Boling-Wahl he had given her the rush, and he'd never forgiven her for the brush-off she had given him in return. He was good at his job, though, so she was determined to work with him, even if it meant ignoring his incessant little gibes.

He walked past her without speaking, but Yates paused beside her desk. "Did you get settled in okay?"

"Yes, thanks. Met the head honcho last night, too."

Yates grinned. "What did you think of him?"

"Like I told Cal, he's a bit scary."

"Just don't ever make a mistake, or you'll find out how scary."

"No allowing for human error, huh?"

"Not with his birds or his men."

Yates wandered off in the direction of the coffeepot, and Caroline decided that maybe her panic of the night before had been justified. Yates had been working on defense contracts for twenty years, so if he was impressed, the colonel wasn't any ordinary joe. She grimaced at the inadvertent mental play on words.