Hanging on by Dean Koontz Read Free Book Online

the mood struck her. It seldom struck her. Modesty just wasn't worth it.
        When the transport plane landed this night, the air was chill, and it was a night for the work uniform and for modesty. However, Lily was wearing a pale-white velvet dancer's costume when she went to see the pilot. It was cut high along her hips, revealing all of her long legs, and it was cut so tight through the crotch that she knew she'd never be able to have children once she got out of it. She didn't want any children, of course. Raised a Roman Catholic, part of a large family, she had sworn off having her own kids when she'd been fifteen. One night, sitting at the family table, she'd looked around at all those shining Irish faces, then looked at her washed-out mother and her dried-up father, and sworn off pregnancy. Pregnancy was the most vicious disease imaginable. Now, she actually welcomed the murderously tight fit of her dancer's costume. It was tight in the top, too, so that her ample jugs were like tortured balloons that might squeak free and fly away. The costume had no back whatsoever. It was cut to her dimpled ass and gave a hint of backside cleavage. She might as well have been nude. That was the idea.
        "Why don't you come outside?" Lily asked the pilot as she watched him watch her jugs. "We'll go for a walk."
        "I don't feel like it," the pilot said, watching her crotch now, his fine eyes desperately searching for a stray, curling pubic hair.
        He always refused to get out of his plane when he landed. He told the men in Kelly's unit that he had been given a vision in a dream, and that this vision had warned him not to get out of his plane when he landed supplies there. In the dream, the pilot had seen FDR and Truman sitting on matched commodes with their faces wreathed in golden light. In unison, speaking as sweetly as angels, they had warned the pilot with this: "If you ever leave your plane at Kelly's camp, your life won't be worth a fart." Then they farted in unison, for emphasis. When Lieutenant Slade first heard about the pilot's vision, he said, "Inspiring!"
        "Oh, come on," Lily said, holding a hand out to the pilot.
        "No." He was adamant. He had suddenly abandoned his pubic-hair search and had focused on the bulkhead beside her.
        Abandoning all pretense, as she always had to, Lily said, "Take me with you, please!"
        "You know we can't, Lily," the pilot said. Though he was looking at the wall, he was seeing Lily in his mind's eye. He began to sweat.
        "Why can't you?" she asked, pouting her full lips.
        "Officially, you aren't here."
        She twisted slightly, leaning against a steel strut that reinforced the cabin walls against major flak damage. She was lighted exotically by the green and amber scope bulbs on the control panels, and she looked very good. Long legs, perfectly curved. Firm thighs. Hips just wide enough. No waist at all. Swelling breasts, jammed up, nipples almost peeking over velvet cups. Face half in shadow, full lips parted with a promise of more than just a kiss. She looked tremendous.
        "You look tremendous," the pilot said, still staring intently at the wall. "But that won't do you any good. You aren't here; no one's here." But he looked back at her jugs, now, as if they were here. "This place is two hundred miles behind German lines, and the high command hasn't ordered anyone in here yet. Therefore, there isn't anyone in here. Yet. And I can't bring back someone who wasn't here to begin with." When he was done with his speech, he was breathing heavily, and he was looking at her jugs more longingly than ever.
        "You can't deny your senses," Lily said.
        "Yes, I can," the pilot said.
        "If I'm not here, who are you talking to?"
        The pilot was silent awhile, thinking about that. The sounds of the ground crew unloading the big transport through both its bay and cargo doors were audible but somehow