Ham, Fraser, and the Jones, Inc. drone operator, Scarlett, who was waiting for her fiancé, Ford, to come home from deployment, were hanging out for the weekend at the house while the rest of the Jones, Inc. guys had jumped on a plane last night and headed back to Minnesota.

Pete, Logan, and Roy were still using the safe house as a general HQ, but had gone out for the day.

Which meant that Tae probably had to figure out what happened next between her and Colt.

Alaska?

Florida?

Whoops. Nope. She just needed to lean into the glorious day, munching on the salty fries Colt had fetched for her, sharing his soda.

Dodge had been the one with the air show idea and had made them tour the grounds, forcing his brothers to listen as he quizzed a guy with a new standard D-25 biplane, which “had a wingspan of forty-five feet and a top speed of one hundred miles per hour,” according to its owner, an elderly gentleman who sported a leather jacket and goggles.

“My grandfather used her for rum-running back in the Prohibition era. With the big high-lift wings and wide landing gear, she can just about land anywhere.”

And that’s when Dodge began talking about his now-destroyed Piper Cub with the tundra wheels, and Colt had steered her away to watch the remote-controlled planes take to the sky. Not toys, but larger planes that took some finesse to operate. The pilots took them through loops and dives that mimicked the show to come.

“The day is supposed to end with a drone light show,” Zoey said. She planned to stay on at the lab, continue to work on the virus.

The invitation was open to Tae.

Maybe.

Nope. Not thinking about it today.

She did wonder, however, what went down between Zoey and Roy, because he’d left last night, and hadn’t come around today. But she hadn’t gotten Zoey alone for days for a catch-up.

Hopefully Roy didn’t do something stupid and break her heart.

Zoey seemed fine, however, as they all toured a massive Lockheed C-5 Galaxy, a B-17 Flying Fortress, and an F/A-18 Super Hornet. Dodge joined them for the Chinook tour, then showed them the Black Hawk, which he’d flown.

They finally climbed into the stands, joining some five thousand other watchers, children, teenagers, couples, and families, as biplanes and even wing walkers soared overhead.

A glorious day, the highs in the upper eighties, but it had already rained today, which had tempered the air. Tae couldn’t help but think that they’d certainly escaped disaster because an event like this, with so many children and teenagers running around to bring home the virus to their friends, would have been the perfect target.