Space in His Heart

She looked at her friend, not sure what he meant, but happy to have the gentle touch after the biting attacks of the media she’d spent the past forty-eight hours trying to defuse. “I’m fine, really.”

  “We’re swimming with Public Affairs staff, Jess. You don’t have to be here.”

  “Where else on earth would I be?”

  “With the families. With the spouses and loved ones of the crew.” He squeezed her a little tighter. “Where you belong.”

  She studied the warm twinkle in his eyes. “I guess I haven’t done a very good job of hiding my feelings, have I?”

  “Pretty tough to hide the fireworks when the two of you are in the same room.” He laughed softly. “Go be with the families, Jess.”

  The possibility was so appealing she nearly cried. “Could I really do that, Stuart?”

  “With that badge, you can go anywhere.” He gave her a little nudge. “It’s a two-minute drive. I’ll take you.”

  Without thinking, she put both arms around him. “Stuey, you are the best. Let me get my purse… and cell phone, of course.”

  Jessica had toured the Launch Control Center and knew exactly where the Stockards would be. Most of the VIP spectators were gathered on the main floor, a large, glass-walled room that faced the launch pad on one side and the dozens of computers, technicians, and video screens that formed the Launch Control Center on the other. Everyone waited for the instruction to move to the second floor, where they would sit in rooftop bleachers for an unobstructed view of the launch.

  Entering the main area where families and VIP guests mingled and chatted, Jessica showed her badge to the guard and quickly scanned the room. As soon as she caught the bright blue eyes of Valerie Stockard, the older woman’s face broke into a smile and they rushed to each other.

  “Jessica! I was so worried we wouldn’t get to see you!” Valerie kissed her cheek, erasing any remaining doubts she had about watching the launch with Deke’s parents.

  Jessica held both of Valerie’s hands and saw the strain on her face. “Are you all right?”

  “Wait till you become a mother, dear. From the first bike ride with no training wheels, it’s hell.”

  The comment struck a bittersweet chord that squeezed her throat. If only she could find out.

  Jack appeared at Valerie’s arm, beaming with pride and offering a bear hug to Jessica.

  “Can you stay here with us or do you have to be with the media, dear?” Valerie asked.

  “I can’t take another minute of them, quite frankly. I’d love to watch the launch from here. With you, if you don’t mind.” It felt so right, so completely perfect to be with them. Far from the reporters, far from the job. Here, with family.

  “We’d be delighted,” Jack responded with a heartfelt smile.

  * * *

  At T-minus nine minutes, at the start of a built-in ten-minute hold on the countdown, the VIP guests were guided upstairs to the outdoor viewing area. Once on the viewing deck, the families naturally grouped together. Alongside Jack, Valerie pulled Jessica next to her as they took seats on the bleachers. The simple act touched Jessica and she wished she could tell this dear woman how much her kindness meant on that nerve-racking morning.

  The Florida sky remained suspended somewhere between nighttime and dawn, painted in a dramatic smoky violet that left both the stars and a few puffy clouds strangely visible at the same time. In the distance, Jessica saw the curved sliver of the moon hung low, a reminder of the glorious days when families gathered here to watch their loved ones take off for a walk on that orb.

  The countdown continued at T-minus eight minutes and fifty-nine seconds and a hush fell over the viewing area. The loudest sound came from the single speaker, crackling with static and the staccato conversation between the crew and Mission Control and the periodic announcement of the countdown status.

  Every time they heard Deke’s voice, Jessica saw Jack Stockard’s jaw clench, a familiar muscle tensing in his handsome face.

  At T-minus seven minutes and thirty seconds, the catwalk was pulled away from the orbiter and Mission Control instructed the ground crew to begin their exodus from the gantry. That was it. Just the five brave souls inside Endeavour remained on the launch pad, a small team of courageous rescuers, determined to risk their lives to save Micah Petrenko’s.

  At T-minus four minutes, the flight crew was ordered to close the airtight visors on their helmets.

  “Roger that. We’re sealed up.”

  “That’s it,” Jack whispered. “He won’t say another word till he’s in orbit.” Then he smiled at the two women next to him. “Relax. He can fly anything.”

  The sound of Deke’s final words to her rang in her ears. Will you be here when I land?

  At T-minus forty-five seconds, a massive cloud of steam mushroomed around the engines of the shuttle.

  “What causes that steam again, Jack?” Valerie asked.

  “Three hundred thousand gallons of water. Less noise, less damage to the shuttle.”

  At T-minus twenty-five seconds, Mission Control announced that the main engine firing sequence was turned over to the onboard computers. Valerie reached for Jessica’s hand and squeezed it, looking first to her husband and then to Jessica. Her eyes were filled with tears, and a mixture of pride and fear froze the features on her face.

  At T-minus ten seconds the crowd began to chant, and for a moment, Jessica remembered the feeling of Deke’s arms around her as they counted down to the New Year together.

  Nine… eight… seven…

  Oh, my love, be safe.

  At T-minus six seconds, the main engines fired. An explosion of brilliant orange flames spewed forth, a blinding and intense inferno of color nearly as big as the launch pad itself, filling the air with a pungent, acrid smell and assaulting the senses of every onlooker. Jessica instinctively squeezed her eyes closed to protect them from the fiery brilliance. Tears splashed on her cheeks.

  Four… three… two…

  A rumbling eruption and a second billowing cloud mixed with flames exploded and sent earth-shattering thunder across the flat land of Kennedy Space Center. The Launch Control Center trembled with the force of the rolling explosion, shaking the bleachers and rattling Jessica to her bones. Propelled by the fire and fuel, the giant rockets gradually and deliberately lifted from the ground.

  Jessica wiped at the tears streaming down her face with one hand and held Valerie’s in a death grip with the other. Deke, please get up there. Darling, please, I love you so much. Please, please be safe. Her heart hammered in her chest, her breath suspended as she waited in terror and anticipation and utter amazement.

  In less than three seconds—an eternity—Endeavour cleared the tower of Launch Pad 39B. With a glorious plume of flames and smoke, it rose higher toward the heavens, then rolled on its back to continue its journey. Jessica’s eyes stayed fixed on the flame in the sky and she finally exhaled as the solid rocket boosters dropped silently into the air. Still the shuttle continued at the top of a mile-long white contrail that cut through the morning sky.

  Farther and farther he went until there was no more than a millimeter of flame, then the external fuel tank dropped and the main engines were the only light visible to earth. It was his last stroke of color in the dawn-tinted sky, a final farewell before Deke took over the flight deck, masterfully and flawlessly guiding his ship into the blackness of outer space.

  Jessica dropped her head on Valerie’s shoulder and fought back a sob. She felt Jack Stockard’s arms come around both of them as they formed a tiny circle of three.

  Valerie wiped her face and laughed a little. “Now all he’s got to do is fly through outer space, attach a thousand-ton spacecraft to a moving target, and rescue a dying man.”

  “That’s not all, Val,” Jack added with a wry smile. “He has to land the son of a bitch that’s held together with bubble gum and tape.”

  Jessica looked from one to the other with her own unsteady smile. “He can do it.”

&nbs
p; She had to believe it. She just had to.

  * * *

  Adrenaline still coursed through Jessica’s veins an hour after Endeavour launched. After a short celebration with the Stockards, Jessica decided to return to the Press Facility and continue the revelry with her hard-working friends.

  Along the path that joined the two buildings, she stopped to peer at the silhouette of Pad 39B outlined against the rising sun. Silent now, and empty, the pad was a wildlife preserve tucked into the coast of Florida that for one brief moment every few months was shattered and shaken apart by the impact of technology. A smile tugged at her lips and Jessica realized that the beauty around her had been there all along. It just took a while to see it.

  The last few hours had overshadowed all of her fears about her future—or lack of one—with Deke. Today was not the day to wallow in self-pity. It was a day to thank God and the brilliant engineers of NASA, including the late Skip Bowker, that Endeavour was safely in its orbit around the earth. Yes, Deke had to get Micah and get home. But step one was over.

  She stared at the sky, cornflower blue now and broken only by enormous powder puffs of white clouds. Without knowing it, she moaned out loud, an unstoppable response to the emotion that seized her heart. Never, in all her years of striving toward goal after goal, had she felt such a magnificent sense of accomplishment. It made her want to dance to her office and throw her arms around all the people she knew shared that sense of achievement.

  Once in the building, the joy faded at the sight of Bill Dugan sitting behind her desk, on her phone, scowling. He hung up when she walked in.

  “What’s the matter?” she asked.

  He pushed the chair away from the desk and blew out a dramatic breath. “What’s not? I just got off the phone with Zimmerman.”

  Anger zipped through her. “What are you doing talking to Newsweek, Bill? That’s my story.”

  “Now don’t get your panties in a bunch.” He smiled and leaned back in her chair. “More influence on him can only help. Let’s get our launch report out to the team.”

  A slow, steady throb in her temples replaced euphoria. Ignoring the discomfort, she came around the desk and tapped him on the shoulder to get him out of her chair. “I’ll email everyone. Let me sit down and get online.”

  “Not necessary. I’ve already drafted something on your computer while you were still over with the, uh, families. Let’s print it out and fax it to Tony’s house. It’s Sunday morning. He won’t look at his email today.”

  She didn’t even know Tony’s home fax number, but she didn’t feel like fighting him now. “Sure. Go ahead and a print a hard copy.”

  He looked at the printer at the edge of her desk. “Got any R&C letterhead? This’ll go to Price and I always like the client to see the agency logo on everything. Makes us look like we’re all over the account.”

  “Jeez.” She shook her head as she opened the supply cabinet. “I had no idea you were such a political animal, Bill.”

  “And I had no idea you were so friendly with your client’s parents.”

  The unmistakable inference in his tone grabbed her.

  “They live in New York,” she said calmly as she lifted a box of file folders to get to the stationery. “I had the opportunity to meet them when Deke did the Today show.”

  “And by the way, I don’t recall you asking to leave the media facility to go to the Control Center for the launch.”

  Her fingers curled around a sheaf of R&C stationery that she’d brought back from Boston. “I had no idea I needed a hall pass from you before I left a facility.”

  He looked up sharply from the keyboard. “Easy, Jess. You’re on shaky ground.”

  She grabbed the ream of stationery with every intention of slamming fifty pages or so on the desk to accompany a defensive comeback. But she froze instead, riveted to what she saw underneath it.

  With a little gasp of horror, she dropped the whole stack of paper in her hand, and sheets ruffled to the ground around her.

  Stark blue letters on a white background. The imprint of NASA. The old, outdated, supposed-to-be-shredded letterhead that the anonymous memos had been written on.

  “Oh my God. Look what’s in here.” She lifted a piece gingerly and turned to Bill, nearly afraid to talk. “The old NASA stationery.”

  He nearly leaped around the desk and took it from her. Then his pale blue eyes flashed in accusation. “Where did this come from?”

  “I… I don’t know.” She looked back in the closet at the box it had been in and suddenly, she had the answer. The sickening, pathetic, ugly answer. No one at NASA had sent those memos. “It came from the Boston office of R&C.” She remembered her secretary preparing the box for her, nervously mentioning that Carla Drake had instructed her not to include any other client information. “Rita packed up supplies for me when I was up at Christmas.”

  “Jessica,” he said quietly. “What have you done?”

  “What have I done?” She gaped at him. “You think I sent fake memos? Please. But it would certainly help someone trying to get my job to make me look guilty. Or just sabotage the whole NASA campaign and make me look inept.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Carla Drake. Evidently, she’s the most political of all of us. Only she didn’t bother to check that the Boston supply of client stationery was out of date.” Jessica shook her head and stared at the paper. “Is she so hell-bent on ruining my career that she’d risk the account and the agency’s reputation? It’s outrageous.”

  Bill looked hard at Jessica. “Unless you can prove she did something like that, Jessica, I doubt anyone would believe you. The stationery’s in your office.”

  “She let the cosmonaut story break without warning me,” Jessica insisted, picking up the receiver of her phone. “She’s behind this somehow. I’m going to call Tony.”

  Bill’s hand clamped on her wrist. “Don’t do that, Jess.”

  “Why not?” Jessica tried to yank her hand free.

  “Because she’s Tony’s golden goddess right now and you don’t stand a chance of accusing her without proof. You’d look like a fool. And maybe a guilty one.”

  She would have laughed in his face if his expression hadn’t been so sincere. “You can’t be serious. I’m the one with the least to gain by this. I’ve lost almost everything I’ve ever worked for over the last three months.”

  “If this gets out, the agency will lose the account.”

  She dropped the phone in the cradle. “Is that what you’re worried about? This is a felony, for God’s sake. Someone tampered with government property. Someone could have cost Micah Petrenko his life if they’d scrubbed a launch based on the content of those memos.”

  He turned away and picked up the jacket he’d thrown over her guest chair. “I’ve got a meeting with Colonel Price. I’ll handle this, Jessica. You’ll get nowhere accusing Carla Drake. You may end up in more hot water than you’re already in.”

  He left her standing with the R&C stationery around her feet like a pile of freshly fallen snow.

  Chapter Twenty-five

  At seven o’clock that evening, Jessica finally left Kennedy Space Center for her home on Sea Park Road. Bill had never come back to her office and she’d spent most of the day watching the shuttle feed in Stuart’s office and marveling at the perfect docking with the space station. Step two completed. Was there nothing Deke Stockard couldn’t do?

  She hadn’t called Tony, knowing Bill was right and she needed more evidence. Nor had she taken the issue to Colonel Price. Instead, Jessica called Jo and suggested an unorthodox plan. Jo, bless her adventurous soul, agreed to it immediately.

  After changing into sweat pants and tee shirt, Jessica absently sliced a tomato for a salad and imagined Jo and her husband, Bobby, going in for their covert operation.

  On the TV, the local NASA channel that ran the shuttle feed played softly in the background: the shuttle camera only transmitted a frozen shot of Earth, presumably from a
window of the orbiter. Stuart had told her that image could stay on for hours until the crew moved the camera. It seemed crazy, but as long as that camera was running, she knew Deke and the crew were alive. The link to him made her feel better.

  When her phone rang, she dropped the knife and seized the kitchen extension.

  “We’re in,” Jo whispered before Jessica could say hello. “Thank God I married a computer geek, huh?”

  “Is anyone around?” Jessica imagined the empty R&C offices on a Sunday night.

  “Believe it or not, a few ambitious account executives who want to grow up and be you. But I oh-so-coolly explained that my husband had a consulting job to upgrade some computers. They bought it.”

  “Good thinking. I’m just certain that hacking into Carla’s computer will prove she sent the emails to Newsweek.”

  “Don’t be so sure.” Jo warned. “I already looked through the client letterhead. The NASA stationery here is all the new logo.”

  “Maybe she took a stash and hid it in her office,” Jessica suggested. “She would never risk asking Rita to get her NASA stationery.”

  “Maybe. I’ll look. Bobby hasn’t found anything yet. I’ll call you back.”

  Jessica hung up and glanced at the TV, her heart jumping. The screen had gone black. With a gasp, she grabbed the remote to turn up the sound, but a pounding on her door stopped her.

  Still holding the remote, she peeked around the entryway wall and peered through the glass panels. Bill Dugan offered an apologetic half-smile. She had no idea he even knew where she lived.

  “I’m sorry we never got to finish our conversation,” he said as she opened the door and he stepped in. “Can we talk now?”

  “Not if you’re going to keep defending Carla Drake and reproaching me,” she said sharply. “I need help, not condemnation right now.”

  With an easy hand on her shoulder, he guided her back into the living room. “You’re right. I was too harsh this morning. Anyway, I’ve had a long talk with Price and I want to present an idea to you.”

  He sat on the sofa and Jessica looked at the TV screen. Still black. What was going on up there? And why didn’t Jo call back?