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Mickey barked his answer and leaped out, loping across the ice and out into the snow. There was a line of trees about a hundred yards to the north, mountains to the west, and nothing but tundra to the south and east.
He went back for another box as the woman was climbing out.
She slipped as she set her high-heeled boot down on the ice. “Did you say wolves?” She glanced around nervously.
“Yeah, there’re probably several packs close by.” He stopped beside her and leaned into her face. “And they get real hungry in the winter.” He brushed past and grabbed the other box. “Aren’t you more afraid of being out in the middle of nowhere with an alleged murderer?”
“I don’t think you killed anyone.” But she didn’t sound quite sure.
He set the box down at the edge of the lake and turned to face her. “Yeah. I did.”
Her eyes widened and she blinked a couple times. “Who?”
“Hoping to get information for your story?”
“I get it. You could tell me, but then you’d have to kill me?” She spun on her heel and scrambled back into the plane.
What the hell did she think she was going to do in there? He hurried over the ice toward his plane.
A minute later she came out the pilot’s door tugging on one of the coolers.
“Here.” He pushed on her shoulder. “Let me get it before you break something else.”
“I can do it.” She tugged again and lifted the cooler into her arms. She turned to give him a triumphant look and for the first time he saw her up close in sunlight. Her deep blue eyes sparked defiantly, but her full red lips trembled. The sun turned her brunette hair a deep rich mahogany. Something about her beauty made him want to drag her into his arms and claim possession.
What was he doing? Going all soft—or hard—over a pretty face? He grabbed the cooler from her and snarled, “You want a medal?”
By the time he’d set the cooler down in the snow and headed back, she had the last one in her arms. He took it from her. “Get my toolbox.”
“Isn’t someone sending out help?”
“No.” He walked cautiously over the ice and then set the cooler down.
“But, I heard you on the radio.”
“You want me to leave you here, just keep arguing.”
Her eyes widened and she dashed inside the plane.
He approached the Cessna just as she was climbing out with his toolbox in hand.
“I’m not calling for help over a damned bent strut.” Not unless he was forced to. He took the toolbox from her and recognized the gloves she wore as his. The ones he’d given her last night. Just before he’d kissed her. He glanced up, meeting her gaze.
The woman cleared her throat. “Here are your gloves back.” She held them out in front of him.
He spun and hunkered down to take a closer look at the broken gear. Dammit, she’d almost sucked him in again. Concentrate, you moron. Landing gear.
“Keep ’em.” He looked up at her, one eye closed against the bright sun. “For now.” He couldn’t really work with them on anyway. And he still had a traditional sealskin pair his grandmother had made him if he needed them. For now it wasn’t that cold.
He returned his attention to the job at hand. The wheel was sitting at an angle, the steel bar connecting it, bent. He could probably bend it back, but there was no guarantee it would hold through takeoff, much less another landing. He needed a new strut, and they probably didn’t even carry landing gear for a C-206 this old. Well, if he could get it good enough for now, he could probably find one at a junk sale online once he made it home to Barrow. If he couldn’t fix this, he’d be forced to radio to Nome for rescue.
“What can I do to help?”
“You mean besides never coming into my life to begin with?” He reached into his toolbox and pulled out a hammer.
“Yes.” From the corner of his eye he saw her cross her arms. “Besides that.”
“Nothing.”
“Fine.” She turned and walked away.
“Careful of the—”
She screamed and went down on her butt.
Max chuckled. “The ice.” His chuckle turned into a full out laugh as she tried to get up and rubbed her behind.
“Very funny.”
“Yeah, it is.” He hadn’t laughed out loud like that in…he didn’t know how long. “Maybe you could cut a hole in the ice with that glare of yours and catch us a fish for dinner.”
“Dinner? Are we going to be here that long?”
“Maybe longer. I don’t know.” He examined the busted gear. Might be able to use the oxyacetylene torch to heat the strut enough to hammer it straight. But he needed a way to keep the wheel elevated.
“Where are we?”
“About forty miles southeast of Nome. If you’re going to bug me asking a million questions, make yourself useful and grab that crate from the plane.”
“You ever heard of please?” But she was already moving.
He concentrated on how he was going to jack up the fuselage. “And you can bring me my sunglasses from the visor when you’re done with that.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” she quipped from inside the plane. He tried not to smile. Didn’t she know killers don’t appreciate sarcasm?
He didn’t have a jack. He could forage for wood, but, what if…
She climbed out and set the crate beside him, then pulled his sunglasses off the top of her head and handed them to him.
“Ahem, your sunglasses, my liege.” She was bent over at the waist, holding his Ray-Bans in her palms with her arms extended. She had guts, he had to give her that. He took the glasses and she straightened and plunked her hands on her hips. “Will that be all, master?”
She had one brow raised and her ski jacket was unzipped, revealing a tight sweater beneath. It was cold enough her nipples were two tight little points through the sweater. Her bra must be thin. Or she wasn’t wearing one. The thought got him all riled up below the belt.
Her lips tightened into a thin line again and she zipped up her coat.
Dammit. His face heated and he brought his gaze to hers. “Nothing I haven’t seen before.”
For the first time he wondered why she was here. Sneaking into his plane, hiding out. Chasing after a years-old story. She must be desperate. Surely there were hundreds of other more important things happening in the world she could be reporting on.
“So, can you fix it?”
He pulled the oxyacetylene torch kit out of the crate and prayed he had enough propane. Then he unloaded the rest of the stuff, turned the crate upside down and sat on it. At least one of them would have a dry butt.
“How much do you weigh?”
She sputtered. “Excuse me?”
“Enough to unbalance the center of gravity in my plane and stall the engine? Say, one-twenty? One twenty-five?”
“Gee, you sure know how to charm a girl.”
He just raised a brow.
She pursed her lips. “That’s close enough.”
“Here’s what we’re going to do.” He stood and went to retrieve one of the coolers. “I’m going to tip the plane over.”
“What?”
“Just listen.” He set the cooler next to the wing opposite the bent strut and went back for the second cooler. “When I tip the plane, you’re going to climb onto the wing over there with a cooler on either side of you.”
When he turned with the other cooler in his arms she’d narrowed her eyes at him. “And when you yank down the other wing I go flying off, never to be seen again?”
Never to be seen again. Like his friends.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Bad joke.”
He came back to the present, the heavy cooler straining the muscles in his arms. He carried it around to join the other, and the woman followed him.
“Is your name really Serena?”
She nodded. “Serena Sandstone. Named after my paternal grandmother.”
“If this doesn’t work, I’ll have to go into the forest and cut some timber to act as a jack. That could take hours.”
“Well, let’s get started then.” She dusted her hands together.
SERENA BIT her lip and clenched her hands into fists as soon as Max turned away from her. She wasn’t sure how long she could keep up the pretense of undaunted confidence. She had a feeling she wasn’t fooling anyone but herself, anyway.
Max went around, squatted beside the bent wheel and positioned his hands under the fuselage. “Ready?” he shouted.
“Ready,” she shouted back.
As he pushed up, Serena looked her fill of bulging thigh muscles beneath his jeans. His teeth shone as he gritted them, grunting as he strained to lift the side of the plane. Was it antifeminist to be totally impressed with his he-man strength?
The passenger side wing lowered and she lifted first one cooler on and then the other, doing a bit of straining herself. Then she searched for a handhold, found a raised steel bar under the fiberglass, hoisted herself up and twisted to sit on her already wet butt.
“I think that’s going to work,” he called.
“Good,” she yelled back.
She heard a click and a whoosh and assumed he was lighting that welder-looking thing attached to the two tiny fuel tanks. He didn’t speak and every so often she’d hear him hammering on the metal. She drew her knees up, pulled her hood over her head and stuck her gloved hands under her armpits. It seemed as if hours passed.
She wished she had her purse up here. There was a candy bar in there, for sure, and a package of peanut butter crackers. Her mouth started watering.
Max never spoke except for an occasional curse.
She didn’t remember when she started shivering, but the sun had traveled way to the other side of noon. Daylight lasted about as long as the night this time of year. Her stomach had been growling since he’d mentioned dinner, and she’d swear her butt was frozen to the wing. He’d probably have to bring that welder over here and melt her ass just to detach it.
Her eyelids felt heavy, and she laid her head on her knees.
“Okay. I think it’s good.” Was that Max? Serena raised her head. He came around the nose of the plane, his stride sure and his gaze steady, a tall handsome Inuit in his fur parka and boots come to rescue her from the cold.
“Hold on.” He pulled one cooler down, then the other. His hands were red and raw. The wing started rising and he reached up to catch her as she slid off.
But her legs wouldn’t hold her and she would have fallen to her knees except he caught her against him, his arms a powerful vise around her. Their lips were almost touching and despite her shivering she felt something stir inside her, in her chest and between her thighs. The heat from his body surrounded her and the heat in his eyes scorched her.
For a moment she thought he would kiss her again.
“Mags.” Why was she slurring her words?
He pulled back and scowled. “Your lips are blue. Why didn’t you say something?” He swung her up into his arms, carried her to the passenger door and opened it. “Get inside.” He set her down in the seat, then tugged his parka off over his head. “Put this on.” He tossed it at her and marched away.
“But—”
“Just put it on and crawl into the back, get on the tarp.” As she slid the warm parka on, he loaded the toolbox and crate through the driver’s side door. From the crate he pulled a lantern, lit it and handed it to her. “This should heat you up. You have hypothermia.”
The coolers and boxes got shoved back into the plane. Max whistled and Mickey barked and came running. Then man and dog both jumped into the plane. But the man crawled into the back with her.
“Look at me,” he commanded as he held her chin between his thumb and fingers. His stare was intense as he examined her face. He pulled a large knife from his boot.
Her eyes widened on the knife and then on him.
Catching her look, he snarled. “It’s to open a can.” He twisted around, dug into the crate and pulled out a big can of stew. “You need to eat.” He punctured a hole in the metal and began cutting it open.
Now she felt like an idiot for doubting him. Why was he being so nice? Taking care of her, after what she’d done? This was all her fault. “I’ll d-do it.” Her voice, her whole body, was shaking uncontrollably. “You g-go ahead and f-fly the plane.”
He grunted. “We’ll leave in the morning.”
“We c-can’t leave now? I thought you s-said it was fixed?”
“The sun’s almost down. If the gear doesn’t hold during takeoff we could break something else. Something I really can’t repair.”
Resolved to spending the night here, she nodded. She was shivering less now. She was so hungry she’d eat the stew cold. But Max replaced the top of the lantern with a flat attachment and set the can on top of that to heat. Then he reached into the crate and pulled out a silver flask.
“Drink.” He shoved the flask into her hands.
“What is it?” She unscrewed the lid and sniffed.
“Whiskey.” He stirred the stew with his knife and raised an eyebrow at her.
Giving him a fake smile, she took a swig. And gasped. She wasn’t used to the hard stuff. White wine was her idea of booze. But she felt it travel all the way down and heat curled in her belly. She took another swig and tried not to make a face while she swallowed it this time.
“Thanks.” She handed the flask to him and he took a long swallow, his Adam’s apple bobbing just above the collar of his faded sweatshirt. “Texas State Technical College?” She gestured to the words on his shirt. “That’s a long way from Alaska.”
Glancing down at his shirt, he shrugged. “My father lives there.”
“So, you stayed with him while you got your degree?”
“Stew’s hot.” Using a grease rag as an oven mitt, he lifted the can off the lantern top and poured three helpings onto metal plates from the crate. He produced two metal spoons, handed her one and then gave the third plate to Mickey, who wolfed it down.
Wolfing it down would be a fair description of how she ate it, as well. It was good and filling. “Delicious. Thank you again.”
He nodded, gathering up the plates and giving them to Mickey, who licked theirs clean too.
“What kind of dog is Mickey?”
“Part malamute, part something else. A mixed breed. Like me.” He drank from the flask again.
“Your mother’s Iñupiat?”
“You need to know that for your story?” He glared at her.
Whoa. Touchy subject. “I was just making conversation.”
“What the hell’d you think you were going to learn sneaking aboard my plane?”
“I was—” she focused on her hands and gripped the soft fur of his parka, ashamed to look him in the eyes “—following up on a rumor.” It seemed ludicrous now, wearing his parka, eating his food, to accuse him of drug trafficking. She just wasn’t capable of being objective when it came to him. Or maybe she wouldn’t ever be capable.
“Which one? The drugs? The murders, or the Russian spy?”
“Oh, I hadn’t heard the Russian spy one.”
He snorted. “Some reporter you are.”
If he only knew. “I’m not.”
“What?”
“I’m not a reporter. I’m the hostess of a cable show called Travel in Style. I was filming a show on the Iditarod.”
He blinked. “You’re a…TV personality?”
“Yes. You could call me that.”
“Huh.” He rubbed a palm across his beard. “So, what? You’re doing a piece on how not to travel?”
“No.” She cringed. “Not at all. I wanted to do this piece on genocide, but the network execs won’t let me and every time I try to do a real investigative report they give it to someone else and I need to find a way to make them take me serious—” realizing she’d been rambling, she looked up at him “—ly.”
He was staring at her as if she were a three-headed walrus.
“I really am sorry about all this.” She reached a hand out to cover his white-knuckled fist. “But wouldn’t you like a chance to prove all those rumors false?”
“No.” He jerked his hand from hers, took the lantern and turned to crawl into the front of the plane and open the door.
“Wait.”
He paused but didn’t look back.
“I, um, I need to…”
His gaze cut to hers. “Come on then.” Mumbling to himself something about troublesome females, he swung down to the ground and then as she tried to follow him out the door, he handed her the lantern, grabbed her around her back and under her legs and lifted her out. And didn’t put her down.
“I can walk now.”
“The hypothermia can make you weak and lethargic.”
But truth be told, she didn’t mind being snuggled like this in his arms. It was full dark out now and here in the middle of nowhere the blackness seemed to cut them off from everyone. As if they were on their own planet. But she wasn’t scared at all. In fact she felt safer here, with Max, than in her condo in L.A. No way he was a cold-blooded killer. The man might be cranky, but there was grief in his dark eyes.
There was a story here. She’d just pursue it later.
His faded sweatshirt was soft and hugged his firm chest. He smelled clean and crisp, slightly of oil, but with just the right amount of musky man sweat. With a sigh, she laid her head down on his shoulder and nuzzled her cold nose into his warm neck.
He stopped midstride. “Don’t.”
No doubt he intended to sound threatening. But right now all she heard was the hunger in his voice, and the promise in his tone. And her body answered with its own primal need. She raised her head.
He started walking again.
Well. That put her in her place.
He set her gently on her feet behind a short shrub, walked a few paces away and turned his back.
Mortification filled her. She just couldn’t. “I have some tissues and wet wipes in my purse. Would you mind?”
“What about the wolves?”
She had to think about that. Which was worse? No contest. “I’ll take my chances with the wolves.”
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