An Honorable Woman. Lindsay McKenna

into the cockpit and fly.”

      “Well, Cam, you pilots put your lives on the line. I don’t. I fly a desk most of the time. I take other slings and arrows—glares, silent name-calling and outbursts of anger from time to time with my people, but that’s not often. And you’re in another league on this. With an all-woman squadron down here, we have a natural tendency toward teamwork and helping one another. Whereas with men, at least most macho ones, there’s nothing but rivalry. Some guys just don’t like to work together. They like to show off—strut their stuff and show you what they know as an individual, not a team member.”

      Laughing softly, Cam nodded. “Well, the one bright spot, like I said, is Gus Morales. He’s a dream, really.”

      “Yeah?”

      Cam filled her in on the Mexican-American pilot.

      “He was a good choice as X.O.,” Maya affirmed.

      “Maya, I’m going to ask a stupid question.”

      “No question is stupid, Cam. Only the one that goes unasked. What is it?”

      Relieved that Maya didn’t mind holding her hand as she learned how to become a leader, Cam felt the courage to go on. She shifted in the chair and crossed her legs.

      “I see the closeness and confidence you have with Dallas Klein, your X.O.—the confidence you have in her. I was wondering…well, do I want to create that same situation with Gus?”

      Chuckling, Maya said, “X.O.’s are people, Cam. Sometimes you get lucky, like I did with Lieutenant Klein, who became an immediate friend. She’s someone I can blow off steam to, cry in front of, talk and laugh with. And whatever I say to her stays with her. She knows how to keep a confidence. She’s not a gossiper. As a leader, you can’t cry in front of your people. You have to look confident, strong and sure of yourself even if your gut feels like jelly and you’re questioning yourself every step of the way. The right X.O. can give you a safe harbor to vent your anger and frustration, share your humor over dumb things, mistakes, talk about your personnel, and in general, help you run the command. You want an X.O. who is perceptive, who can give you feedback and who isn’t afraid of you just because you’re the boss. You don’t want a boot licker.”

      “Gus isn’t that.”

      “Good. Is he reliable, you think?”

      “In my gut, he’s like Dallas, I feel.”

      “Trustworthy?”

      “Yes, but I haven’t had time to really verify that. It’s just an instinct thing.”

      “Well,” Maya drawled, humor in her husky tone, “you know how much we work on gut instinct around here. And you know how accurate it is. Often, it saves our lives when a Black Shark is lurking around and our Apache is unable to pick up its identification signal. The only thing keeping us from getting blasted out of the sky sometimes is our intuition. If Morales feels right to you, feels like he’s trustworthy, I’m sure he is, whether he’s proved it yet or not.”

      “You’re right,” Cam murmured. “You’d like him, Maya. He’s enthusiastic, he’s smart and he catches on fast.”

      “Well, at least one of the three is a winner, Cam. What you have to do as a leader is figure out how to bring these other two dudes not only into line, but also up to scratch with their air skills.”

      “I’m going to work out a mission plan when I get off the phone with you. I’d like to discuss it with you tomorrow night, if that’s okay with you?”

      “Sure.”

      “You don’t mind?”

      “Heck no! I’d be worried if you weren’t calling me, Cam. Good leaders aren’t born, they’re made one grueling day at a time.”

      “Gosh, that’s true,” Cam whispered, wrinkling her brow. “I’ve got to learn not to get emotionally involved when dealing with those two pilots.”

      “That’s right. They’ll teach you what I call the Zen-like art of detachment,” Maya chuckled. “You’ve got to change your attitude, Cam. Down here at BJS, everyone likes everyone else. We all get along. We’re one big team. We’re like a bunch of sisters out on this wild and crazy adventure together. From what you’ve said, Zaragoza and Dominguez want to set you up to fail, to embarrass you, to show your faults instead of reflecting on their own skills and weaknesses. It’s a game, and you’ve got to learn the game in a hurry and turn it back on them.”

      “I have to be tough in ways I never wanted to be, Maya. The only way I got through today was to act like our Inspector Pilots back at Fort Rucker.”

      “Yeah—lean, mean mother machines,” she said derisively.

      “And mother wasn’t used as a nice word, either,” Cam said, smiling a little.

      “Right on. So be a mean mother. Don’t give an inch. And don’t let them know they’ve taken a pound of flesh out of you. Keep them off balance. That means you have to be thinking way ahead of them. You have to know them so well, their individual personalities, that you know what their action or reaction is going to be before they initiate a response.”