She held the contract nervously in her hands, wondering what it all meant and why he had really come here. It couldn't really be this simple.
“I'll show my father,” she said quietly. She wanted to ask him about it too. Why hadn't he and Nick told her anything about Desmond Williams's visit? To give them the benefit of the doubt, maybe they had just forgotten. But something told her it was more than that. They had kept it from her. But why? It sounded so perfect.
“Why don't you think it all over, and we'll meet again tomorrow morning. How about breakfast at my hotel at eight-thirty? After that, I've got to head back to the West Coast. But hopefully you'll be there too in a few days.” He smiled, and she noticed that there was something very persuasive about him. He was very handsome and very cool, and he somehow made it sound as though she couldn't possibly resist him, and surely wouldn't want to. “Eight- thirty tomorrow morning then?” he asked pointedly, and she nodded. They shook hands on it, and a moment later, he had walked back to his car and driven away. As she stood staring, the Lincoln disappeared into the horizon. She tried to remember everything she'd ever heard about Desmond Williams. He was thirty-four; he was one of the richest men in the world, and he had inherited an empire from his father. His company made some of the finest planes, and he was supposedly ruthless in his business dealings, she had read somewhere. She had seen a photograph of him with some movie stars. And in her wildest dreams, she couldn't imagine what he wanted with Cassie O'Malley.
She walked slowly toward the small building where Nick and her father worked, thinking of everything he had said, and what it might mean to her. It was an opportunity that clearly would never come again. She couldn't even bring herself to believe that it had come this time.
She walked in, in her father's old overalls, and he glanced up at her, with her streaked face, and disheveled hair, and asked her if there was a problem with the de Havilland, because if there wasn't they needed it at noon for a long run. But she wasn't paying any attention to him, as she stared at him. And in her hand she was holding the contract.
“Why didn't you tell me someone came to see me yesterday?” she asked, and he looked suddenly startled.
“Who told you that?” He was going to have Nick's head if he had betrayed him. But Nick was staring at them. He had seen the look on her face when she walked into the office.
“That's not the point. A man came here yesterday and left a card for me. And neither of you ever told me.” She turned angry eyes to Nick then, accusing him as well, and both men looked uncomfortable beneath her gaze. “That's like lying to me. Why?”
Her father tried to look unconcerned. “I didn't think it was important. I probably just forgot.”
“Do you know who he is?” She looked from one to the other of them, unable to believe that they had been that ignorant. “He's Desmond Williams, of Williams Aircraft.” It was one of the largest manufacturers of airplanes in the world, the second biggest in the States. Desmond Williams was certainly what one could call important.
“What did he want?” Nick asked casually, watching her, but he already sensed what Williams must have said, from the way she was behaving.
“Oh… just to give me a bunch of remarkable planes to fly, you know, to test fly, set records in, check out for him. Nothing much. Just a little job like that for a whole lot of money, and an apartment.” The two men exchanged a dark look. This was exactly what they'd been afraid of.
“Sounds nice,” Nick said easily, “what's the catch?”
“There is none.”
“Oh yes, there is,” Nick laughed at her. She was still a child, and he knew that he and Pat would have to do everything they could to protect her. Desmond Williams was flying around the country looking for publicity props, and once he had her, he would use her till she dropped, not just for test flights, but for everything else he could, newsreels, advertisements, endless photography. In Nick's opinion, she was just going to be another kind of Skygirl. “Did he give you a contract?” Nick asked casually, and she was quick to wave it at him.
“Of course he did.”
“Mind if I have a look?” She handed it to him, and Pat glared at both of them. This was exactly what he had never wanted.
“You're going to say no to him, Cassandra Maureen,” her father said quietly as Nick pored over the contract Nick was no lawyer, but it looked pretty good. They were offering her a car, an apartment, for her use of course, not as a gift; she was to fly anything they thought appropriate, doing test flights for them; and the second part of the contract said that she would be available for unlimited publicity in connection with their planes. She had to make herself available for social, state, and even national events, for photography at the drop of a hat. She would be counted on as a spokeswoman for Williams Aircraft, and they expected her to act accordingly. She couldn't smoke at all, or drink excessively, there was an allowance for wardrobe costs, and they were going to supply her with uniforms she could fly in. Everything was clearly spelled out. The contract was for one year, and they were offering her fifty thousand dollars for the year, with a renewable option for a second year, if both parties agreed, at a higher rate to be negotiated, within reason. It was the best contract Nick had ever seen, and an opportunity few men would have turned down. But the contract also made it clear, Williams Aircraft was looking for a woman. It could be an opportunity that would be hard to miss, in spite of the fact that she was going to be part pilot, part model. But he was still deeply suspicious of Desmond Williams.
“What do you think, Pat?” Nick looked up at him, curious about his reaction.
“She's staying right here. That's what I think. She's not going anywhere, and certainly not to California to live in an apartment.”
Cassie looked at him, blinded by anger over his not even telling her that Desmond Williams had come to see her. “I haven't decided yet, Dad. I'm going to meet with him tomorrow morning.”
“No, you're not,” Pit O'Malley told his daughter firmly, and Nick didn't want to argue with him in front of Cassie. He thought there were plenty of possibilities for exploitation in the deal but it was still worth exploring. It would be fun for her, and she would fly incredible planes for the next year. It was very exciting. They were even testing planes for the military, and openly competing with the Germans, and the money she would make would take care of her for a long time. It seemed unfair to him to keep her from it, or not to at least consider it carefully.
“What about college?” Nick asked her quietly as her father stormed back into his office and dammed the door behind him.
“He said I could take classes there when I have time.”
“It doesn't sound like you will, at least not most of the time. When you're not flying, you'll be doing publicity.” And then, cautiously, “Cassie are you sure you want to do this?”
She looked at him thoughtfully. She had never wanted to leave home, but her life wasn't going anywhere. She liked hanging around the airport, and she had had a good time at the air show. But she didn't want to teach. She didn't want to marry Bobby Strong, or any of the other boys she'd gone to school with. What was she going to do with the rest of her life? She wondered sometimes. And even she knew that there was more to life than greasing and gassing her father's planes, and making short runs to Indiana with Billy Nolan.
“What am I going to do here?” she asked honestly.
“Hang around with me,” he said sadly. If only she could, forever. He would have loved it.
“That's the bad part of
“It says in the contract they'll lend you a plane to come home with now and then. I can hardly wait for that. How about bringing home an XW-I Phaeton for a quiet weekend.”
“For you, I'd bring home a Starlifter if you wanted me to, I'd even steal one.”
“Now there's a thought. That might soften up your old man. We could use a few new planes around here. Maybe they'd like to give us one or two,” he joked, but he was feeling devastated at the thought of her leaving. She was so much a part of his everyday life, and they had done so much flying together in the past three years, he couldn't bear to think of her going to LA He had never expected anything like that to happen to her.
And neither had Pat. He had no intention of losing his little girl. It was bad enough that Chris had been talking about going to Europe to study architecture for a year or two. But that was still a few years away. This was now. And it wasn't Chris, it was Cassie.
“You're not going anywhere,” he reiterated again that afternoon, “and that's final.” But in her mind, she was still going to make the decision. She talked to Nick about it again, and he could definitely see opportunities for them to take advantage of her, but there were so many benefits to her in the process that he wasn't at all sure it mattered. The money, the fame, the planes, the test flights, the records she could set, the benefits to her seemed
