Page 11

Chapter 10

A good landing is one you can walk away from. A great landing is when you can use the plane again.

“It’s going to be fine,” Mari said into her phone as she poured a mug of coffee, inhaling the rich scent. She wasn’t sure who she was trying to convince more, herself or Berlin.

“You can’t be sure. But if you stay where you are, then you’re ninety-nine percent more likely to be safe,” Berlin said.

“Did you just pull that statistic right out of your butt?”

“I have a great butt.”

“I know and, oh my god, we’re getting off topic.” She pulled open the fridge, grinned at the array of flavored creamer inside. The Redemption Harbor crew had really stocked this place up for her.

Colin walked into the kitchen then—shirtless.

Yes, shirtless. She felt it bore repeating because oh. My. God. She hadn’t had coffee and wasn’t even sure there was enough coffee in the world for this.

It was like he’d walked right off the set of an action movie with ripped abs and… Wait, Berlin had said something. “What?” she ma naged to get out and was glad that Colin was looking longingly at the coffee pot and not noticing her drool over him. See? This right here was why she had to get the hell out of there.

“I asked what your pilot friend has to say about it.”

“He’s fine with it. Totally on board. I’ve gotta go.” She hung up, then turned down her ringer.

But three texts popped up one after the other.

Liar!

We’ve got people sitting on your place and his. We have this under control.

Do NOT go anywhere. OR ELSE.

Jeez, how did Berlin text so fast? Setting her phone down, she poured creamer into her mug as Colin leaned against the countertop, coffee mug in hand.

“So what am I on board with…if you were referring to me?”

“Ah, I was. So Gary called this morning and needs me for a last-minute flight to pick him up.”

“Nope.”

She arched an eyebrow at him. “Well, I wasn’t asking.”

“You can’t go anywhere right now.”

“Being in the air is the safest place to be.” She didn’t have a death wish. And besides, she was right. While flying, she’d be safe and far away from here. “If anything, I’ll be even safer than here on the ground where anyone could walk through that door and…bam!” Unlikely, since no one knew their location and the Redemption Harbor crew had been careful. But she could be theatrical at times.

He looked as if his head was about to explode, but to her surprise, he took a sip of his coffee and calmly said, “What if one of my guys picked him up?”

“I could ask, but he’s prickly and doesn’t like change. It’s an OCD thing—as in diagnosed. He’s very particular. And before you ask, there’s no way he’d let anyone else fly his plane. I don’t think his insurance would be okay with it anyway. I’m the only one contracted.”

Colin was silent for a long moment and she had to actively not stare at his bare chest. Seriously, why wasn’t he wearing a shirt? Was he messing with her? Or was this how he just normally walked around? Clearly it had been too long since she’d gotten naked with anyone. Combine that with how raw she was feeling—it was the only thing to explain this attraction. And it would go away, she was sure of it.

“Look, he’s my oldest client, Colin. I need his business.” She didn’t need Colin’s permission or anything, but she wanted him to understand why this was so important to her. He was a small business owner now too.

Sighing, he finally nodded. “Fine. I’ll go get dressed.”

“What? Why?”

“I’ll drive you to the airport. I assume you’ve already checked the weather, but you can get started on filing your flight plan.”

Oh. Well that was nice. “Ah, okay, thanks. I’ll go change too.” Because she was still in her pajamas. “I need to call Berlin back too before she sends over a SWAT team.”

Colin just grinned and headed out and up the stairs. She tried not to stare, failed. Instead, she drank in the muscles along his spine, over his shoulders, imagined dragging her fingers along all that taut skin, and whew, he was out of sight.

Now she could breathe again. That man should not be allowed to just run around half dressed.

** *

“So why does your client need you so last-minute? Is this normal?” Colin’s tone was neutral enough, but she knew he was unhappy.

At least he wasn’t arguing with her about this anymore. She didn’t glance up from her tablet as she said, “It’s very normal. And he’s a political consultant. I’m not sure of all the specifics, but he travels a lot in the state and the immediate surrounding ones. Someone who hired him flew him up to Arkansas for a couple days, but from the sounds of it their dealings went sour and he’s done. He wants to be gone yesterday. And he’s paying me extra,” she murmured as she finished up with her flight plan.

“What did Berlin say when you called her back?” He pulled into the airport parking lot.

“Ah, she was annoyed but agreed that I’d be safest flying. She also made it clear that she’s tracking my phone, even though I gave her access to my flight.” Mari laughed lightly.

“She sounds like a good friend.”

“She is. Everyone at Redemption Harbor is.” And Mari was grateful they were in her life. “Thanks for the ride. I also told Berlin that you would be heading directly back to the safe house, so don’t make a liar out of me. I’ll call you as soon as I—”

“Oh, I’m going with you. There’s more than enough room for me and I’m sure your client will understand if he’s really a good guy. I loaded up my backpack when you were getting dressed.”

So clearly he’d been planning this. No wonder he hadn’t argued with her. Sneaky, sneaky. She took a deep breath, dug down for calm. “Colin—”

But he was already out of the vehicle. Damn it! She grabbed her stuff and before she could get out, he’d already opened the door.

“Colin—”

“Feel free to keep saying my name, but either way I’m going. And it won’t take you long to change the weight and balance so don’t even start. If I have to play the ‘I saved your life so you owe me’ card, I absolutely will.”

“Oh. My. God. You can’t just use that anytime you want something.”

“I can when your life is literally in potential danger. And if you push back, I’ll call your mother. Not your brother—your mom. Oh yeah, that’s the real card I’m pulling.”

That stopped her. “You wouldn’t.”

He showed her his cell phone and already had her mom’s number pulled up. An adorable picture of the two of them was the image for her contact information.

“When did you take a selfie with my mom?” she grumbled, already grudgingly accepting that she’d lost this one.

“This was at a Christmas party two years ago.”

She sniffed slightly. “Okay, fine. You can fly with me, silently . No side seat flying.”

“Like totally silent, or can I tell you if I see some weird shit on radar?”

Sighing, she walked away from him even as she fought a smile. She’d forgotten how much she used to just plain like him. And right now she couldn’t have any distractions.

Neither of them could.

Once she’d completed the preflight check and gotten her departure clearance from ATC, she could feel that sense of freedom once they hit three thousand feet AGL. She wasn’t sure why, but she could finally take in a full, clear breath now that they were nearing cruising altitude.

“Maybe you weren’t wrong about flying,” Colin said over the headsets.

“Maybe? Come on. It’s a gorgeous day and no one knows we’re up here.” Except the people they’d seen at the hangar and ATC, but whatever.

“I could get used to flying in this. It’s like being in a luxury car.”

“Right?” It was one of her favorite planes to fly. The designers had clearly had luxury in mind with plenty of legroom for passengers, buttery leather seats, and she loved the panoramic windows. Other than this she mostly flew Cessnas, which she liked, but the Cirrus was still a favorite.

“What about your client?” Colin continued. “Would he say anything to Ackerman about you flying today?”

“I don’t think so. I told him I needed to talk to him about something related to Ackerman when I picked him up today. He texted back that it was fine and that he’s not really friends with the guy anyway. More like associates. Sounds like he met him through one of his political contacts. I don’t think he’d say anything to him… I can’t imagine they talk about me at all.” But maybe she should have been more specific. She shook her head lightly. “So how’s your job been going anyway? Since you got out of the Air Force?” Now that they’d cleared the air, she found that she liked being around him. Even if she found him ridiculously attractive—to the point of distraction. She wasn’t sure if he felt the same way. He was too hard to read, and his whole overprotective vibe was pretty much standard so that didn’t help at all.

“Well when a certain pilot isn’t trying to steal my clients—”

“You stole my client first.”

“You swiped land that I’d all but bought.”

“If you want to get technical. But I’d say we’re even at this point.” She grinned at him before looking back out the dash. “Look, I’ll sell you that land for what I bought it for.”

“Seriously?”

She shrugged as she eyed the dash, spotted a couple planes on the TAS well below them as they increased to a slightly higher cruising speed. “Yeah, I don’t need it. I mean, I could use it. And whatever, you saved my life. So if I do this, then you can’t play that card again.”

“Hmm, I might not want to buy it then, because I intend to play this card for yeaaars. ”

She shook her head, but then straightened when the panels on the dash went dark.

The plane dropped slightly and her stomach went along with it. But panicking was the last thing she could do.

Colin straightened next to her as well, but it was clear that something was wrong as everything went silent, the propellor completely dying. They’d lost power.

Even though she knew them by heart, she pulled out the short checklist of emergency procedures while still steering the plane. She tried to restart the engine, but it was completely dead. Even though her heart rate kicked up, she’d been in this situation more than once and knew not to panic. Planes didn’t just fall out of the sky without power—though this wouldn’t be as smooth as if she’d been flying a sport plane, those babies floated no matter what.

She could land this—she just had to be calm. And if she couldn’t handle gliding it to a landing, she could activate the parachute.

“The field to the northeast of us is a good candidate for landing,” Colin said, his tone even.

“I agree.” They were near St. Francisville, an area she’d flown over many times before. There were a lot of green open areas interspersed throughout the forests.

Damn it.

The familiarity of the area made this easier and so did his presence. And thankfully Colin was stone-cold relaxed, not that she’d expect any less. “Nearest airport is False River, but you’re right, that field is our best shot.” They weren’t going to make it any farther. “Wind’s out of the south, determining best glide speed,” she said, even though Colin knew what she was doing. But it was easier to talk herself through an emergency landing. It helped keep her mind on her tasks and not on the fact that they’d lost power completely.

After determining the glide speed and trimming the plane, she squawked 7700 on the transponder, indicating an emergency situation.

Looking at her emergency checklist, she started getting into the pattern, treating the field exactly like she would a runway. Landing in one piece was the priority.

As they hit a bump of turbulence, she eyed nearby power lines and two towers, thankfully well out of the way. She visually scanned below them and determined that the grassy field was still the best place to land.

She reached up, skimmed her fingers over the red handle that would deploy the CAPS parachute system should they need it. It made her feel better knowing it was there, but she didn’t think they’d need it.

As she flew, Colin changed the dial to the emergency guard channel 121.5 “Mayday, mayday, Cirrus…”

He gave their call sign and location as she established the 1,000 feet AGL and was abeam the imaginary touchdown point as she continued to glide the plane into the base leg.

“I’m getting nothing,” he said through the headset, though she’d heard the same.

Or rather hadn’t heard a response. They were on their own.

As she abeamed the point, she didn’t have to cut the power like she normally would have because they had none, then she put the nose down as she made the turn.

“Approaching final, unlatch doors,” she said as they began the final descent. The familiar repetition was more for herself than anything else. She was trying to treat this like a normal landing when it was anything but.

He opened his door at the same time that she popped hers open. In an emergency, the last thing you wanted was to end up trapped so it made sense to open the doors before landing. So far, this was relatively smooth—emergency landings were rarely like in the movies where planes just dropped from the sky. That wasn’t how it happened as long as the pilot kept the plane’s nose down and maintained the best glide speed. And you know, didn’t run into any power lines or ridiculous windshear while landing. The important thing really was to stay calm.

As she neared their makeshift runway, she slightly pulled the nose up and breathed out a sigh of relief once she felt the upward flare, then touchdown.

They rumbled along, the field bumpier than she’d realized, the plane still shuddering, but the grass slowed the plane down a lot faster than a paved runway.

Once they came to a full stop, she slid her headset off and unstrapped as relief punched through her. She got out at the same time Colin did, but she reached into the back seat for a tool kit. “I’m going to unscrew the cowling, see what the hell is going on.” Because they should never have lost full power. She’d filed a flight plan, so it wasn’t like they were missing. Sooner or later when she didn’t close out said plan, someone would figure out something had gone wrong.

But they were miles from actual civilization, which meant if they couldn’t get this plane started, they were going to have to hoof it out of here.

“What the hell?” After lifting off the cowling, she stared down at the fried engine. Two of the computer components looked as if they’d been torched.

“I’ve seen this before,” Colin muttered before he reached down into the open engine and pulled out a small magnetic device. “It’s a remote EMP.” An electromagnetic pulse.

She blinked, but plucked it from his hand to inspect it. “Wait…what? I thought planes were shielded against EMP strikes or attacks.” It was how th ey were built, for very obvious reasons.

“From lightning and solar flare types of EMP strikes, yes. And combat aircraft have a different type of shield altogether…which is not important. This type of plane does have shielding, but not from someone planting this.” He took it back, inspected it carefully. “This is along the lines of a military-grade weapon.”

A shiver rolled down her spine as the implication of what had happened settled in her bones. “So someone tried to kill us. Again.” They had a parachute but now she was wondering if that had been tampered with too.

Colin nodded, his expression dark as he scanned the skies. “And we need to get out of here because pretty soon whoever did this will realize they failed. They likely thought killing the electronics would cause a crash immediately.”

Which meant they didn’t know much about planes. Thankfully.

With trembling hands, she grabbed the backpack she brought with her on every flight and Colin pulled out his own small one. Every pilot she knew brought a small bag even for short flights, with water and snacks.

Because you never knew what could happen.

“How’s your phone looking?” she asked as they headed for the nearby tree line. “Because I have no service.”

“Me neither.” His expression was grim. “But I do have a compass. We need to head northwest. Let’s get moving.”

Freaking fantastic.