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THREE
Intellectually, Arden knew that the one-in-ten-million chance of being killed in a plane crash was much lower than the one-in-one chance of being killed if GeoArray got its hands on her. Once GeoArray got what it wanted, her pursuers would have no use for Arden and no reason to let her live. She’d been on the run for almost two weeks and was certain that with a few more days, she could crack the encryption that protected the files. If she was caught and the files confiscated before she had the chance to extract the information she needed, she’d have no way of proving Marcus Emory was a murderer—and maybe worse. She’d also have no way to prove her innocence.
Yep. Her chances were better on the Cessna, but she wasn’t boarding it. She didn’t fly. Not ever. She’d find another way out of the mess she’d gotten herself into. Of course, to do that, she had to lose Kane.
She shot a quick look in his direction. He was focused on the icy access road, concentrating on getting them to the death trap of an airplane before their pursuers. If he’d been driving a little more slowly, she would have chanced opening the door and jumping. She probably had a good shot of landing without injury—but not when they were traveling nearly blind in excess of fifty miles an hour, and not with Sebastian strapped to her chest.
She’d have to make a break for it after they reached the plane. Even if she weren’t terrified of flying, there was no way she could let Kane bring her home.
As much as Grayson wanted to help her, until she could prove her innocence, she couldn’t ask him to take her side against the FBI. Law enforcement was his calling and she would not be the one who caused him to lose his job with the FBI. She wasn’t sure what story Marcus Emory had fed the FBI, but his clever move had made her an enemy of the state. She was wanted by the United States government and, by now, possibly a half-dozen other entities.
She had to finish what she’d come to Maine to do.
She had to decrypt the files she’d intercepted from GeoArray. The fact that GeoArray was willing to engage the FBI in its search for her meant that Emory was desperate. Any doubt she’d harbored about the importance of those files was gone. Her gut told her the content of the files would expose the criminal activities behind GeoArray.
She glanced out the back window and saw a vehicle pass the airport access road.
“You can slow down,” she said. “They’ve passed us.”
“Not if we want to get to the plane before they realize we’ve turned off.”
“What’s the plan once we reach it? We can’t just climb aboard and leave.”
“Sure we can. It’s unlikely other planes are flying out of here tonight. I can be cleared for takeoff in minutes.”
“If there’s anyone at the tower.” And she hoped there wasn’t.
“There is. I put in a flight plan for this evening and was given a three-hour window to fly out. We’re within that time frame.”
“I don’t like it,” she muttered. “How about you come up with a different plan? Because I already told you, I’m not flying out of here.”
He didn’t respond.
“Did you hear me?”
“I heard.”
“And?”
“I don’t change plans. Not when they’re good ones.”
“Often, it’s opinion that determines whether or not something is good,” she pointed out. “Your opinion and mine are very different on this issue.”
“Are you aiming for an argument, Arden? Because now isn’t the time for it.”
“There’s no time like the present for me to state irrevocably that I think your plan stinks.” She didn’t care about the argument. She didn’t care about his plan. She needed him to think she did. That would put him off guard when they reached whatever death trap, winged vehicle he thought they were flying out in.
He didn’t take the bait.
“Who’s after us?” he asked instead.
“You asked me that before. I chose not to answer.”
“I asked who you were running from. Now I want to know who’s behind us.”
“Sorry, I—”
“If I’m going to go head-to-head with an enemy, I want to know who the enemy is.”
“Ever heard of GeoArray?” she asked. She’d let him think she was cooperating. If he believed she was going along with his plan, he’d be a lot less likely to anticipate her escape.
“GeoArray is after you?” he answered. Obviously he’d heard of the defense contractor.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I was...helping a friend and I stumbled on some information that GeoArray would rather I not have.”
“What kind of information are we talking about?”
“The kind that could get you killed if you knew about it.”
“There isn’t a whole lot going on tonight that couldn’t get me killed,” he responded, glancing in the rearview mirror and frowning.
She looked over her shoulder. “Do you see them?”
“No, but once they realize they’ve lost us it won’t take long for them to figure out that we turned into the airport access road.” He parked the SUV near a hangar, grabbing her arm before she could jump out.
She could have pulled away. He wasn’t holding on that tightly, and she knew how to break someone’s grip, but the look in his eyes held her in place.
“Don’t try it,” he said quietly.
“What?”
“Whatever you’ve been planning. We don’t have time to fight each other.”
“We aren’t fighting. I’m—”
“You’re going to get us both killed, Arden. Is that what you want? Because, if you run, I’m going after you. That will slow us down and give whoever’s following us plenty of time to catch up.” He released her arm, reached over the back seat and grabbed an army duffel bag, then opened his door.
She opened hers as well, stepping out of the vehicle and shivering as a few flakes of snow landed on her cheeks. She didn’t fly, and she especially didn’t fly when the weather was bad.
Her plan had been to run as soon as her feet hit the ground, but she couldn’t ignore Kane’s warning and feel good about it. She glanced at the road running parallel to the airfield, spotting a vehicle creeping along it. It had to be them. It wouldn’t take them long to figure out she and Kane were at the airport.
But...
She didn’t fly.
She’d have to run, and she’d have to hope that Kane was intelligent enough to stick with his escape plan.
“Don’t worry,” Kane said quietly. “I’ve got your pack.”
She swung toward him.
She’d forgotten that she’d slipped out of the pack. That wasn’t like her. Hesitating wasn’t her style, either. She always had a plan. She always followed through on it, and she almost never forgot anything.
Especially not something as important as that pack.
“I’ll take it,” she said, rushing around the front of the Tahoe to where he was waiting and grabbing one of the straps.
“We’re wasting time. I’ve got it. You want what’s in it, you’ll have to come with me.” He walked away, his strides long and purposeful.
Arden needed that backpack. More precisely, she needed what was inside it. Her laptop. She had, of course, hidden away a second copy of the files for safekeeping, but that laptop contained days of work. In fact, she knew she was close to breaking the encryption wrapped around the files. She couldn’t afford to lose all that work. Starting over was not a scenario she wanted to entertain.
“Let’s be reasonable about this, Kane,” she said.
“If by reasonable you mean we work together to solve your problem, I’m all for it,” he responded, stepping into the hangar, his duffel slung over his shoulder, her pack still in his hand.
She had no choice but to follow him right into the belly of the beast.
At least, that’s what it felt like when she saw the little tin coffins disguised as airplanes lined up and ready for takeoff.
She felt sick, the thought of getting on a plane and flying into the snowy night making her light-headed.
“You’re better than this,” she muttered, annoyed with her own weakness.
“What’s that?” Kane glanced over his shoulder as he reached the front of the line of planes.
“Nothing.”
“You’re sure?”
“As sure as I am that I am about to die,” she responded.
He either didn’t hear or he ignored her.
“We’re in front of the queue. That’s the good news.”
“What’s the bad news?” she asked, eyeing her pack and wondering how tightly he was gripping it.
“We’re running out of time. Come on. Let’s get on board.”
* * *
The large aluminum hangar door was already open, the Cessna Skyhawk ready to go, having been kept inside the bay to keep ice and snow from accumulating before takeoff. No sign of the dispatcher, but Kane wasn’t going to let that slow him down.
He stepped back and took Arden’s arm, ignoring the tension in her muscles and the paleness of her face.
“You ready to take off?” someone called.
He turned, watching as the dispatcher walked toward him, a sub sandwich in one hand, clipboard in the other.
“No,” Arden responded.
“Yes,” Kane corrected.
“Good. Good. You leave now and you’ll beat the storm. Otherwise, you’ll probably be stuck here for the night.”
“That won’t work for us,” Kane said, with a sense of urgency. “My friend’s ex is hot on our heels. I need to get her out of here quickly.”
The man nodded his head. “Understood, no problem. Go ahead and load up. I’ll contact the tower and tell them you’re waiting to be cleared for takeoff.” He rushed to his desk, taking a bite of sandwich along the way. Once he’d settled into his chair, he turned to his computer and began typing.
Kane pulled Arden the remaining short distance across the hangar’s concrete floor to his plane. There was no sign of the sedan through the open bay doors, but he was certain it would be only a matter of minutes before it would reach the airfield. They needed to be on the plane and on their way before then. “Let’s go,” he said, sidestepping one of the main wheels and tossing her pack and his duffel onto the rear bench seat of the plane.
Arden stopped short, planting her feet. “Go on without me. I’ll find a place to hide.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“Yeah. It is.” She darted away, but he’d anticipated the move and snagged her arm, then, in deference to the cat still hiding under her coat, in one quick motion he hefted her into his arms like a groom carrying a bride over the threshold. He could feel her trembling. This was no joke. She was terrified, and for about two seconds, he thought about finding another way.
Unfortunately, doing that would probably get them both killed. It would more than likely get the guy with the sandwich killed, too.
Kane wasn’t in a dying kind of mood, and he sure didn’t need any more innocent blood on his hands. He’d had enough of that to last a lifetime. It’d been thirteen years since Evan Kramer had died in his arms and he could still remember the sticky slickness of his second cousin’s blood on his hands, the harsh rasp of lungs as he gasped his last breath. A moment in time, a lifetime of regret.
He hoisted Arden up through the open doorway. She was lighter than he expected and, despite her struggling, he still managed to set her down gently on the floor of the plane’s cargo area before jumping in after her. Forcing her to do something that obviously terrified her made him feel like the worst kind of jerk, even if his options were less than limited.
“Get out of your coat, and get that carrier off your chest.”
Stooping in the threshold of the plane’s open door, Kane yelled out, catching the dispatcher’s attention once more. “We don’t want to bring any trouble down on you, but her ex is dangerous. Be on the alert.”
“Got it. I’ll lock it down after you leave. And your return flight plan’s been approved by air traffic control, so you’re good to go. Let’s get you out of here before he shows up.”
Kane yanked the plane’s door shut; the hatch clicked in place as he locked it. When he turned back, Arden was still rooted to the same spot. He quickly unzipped her coat, dropping it on the bench seat with their bags, then helped her remove the carrier from her chest. Cradling the cat in his left arm, he guided her to the front passenger seat, gently pushed her into it and strapped her in with the safety harness. Arden remained quiet as he set the cat’s carrier in her lap and wove the lap belt through the blue carrier straps to secure the animal.
Her silence was disconcerting.
She hadn’t been at a loss for words since he’d found her at the cottage. The fact that she wasn’t talking now was something he’d worry about after he got them in the air.
He stowed Arden’s pack and his duffel behind the bench seat, retrieved her jacket and draped it over her lap and chest. She’d closed her eyes and was breathing deeply, mumbling something he couldn’t hear.
That was better than silence, but it still wasn’t good.
Being ten thousand feet in the air with a woman in full-out panic wasn’t much better than being on the ground with a couple of thugs who wanted them dead.
“It’s going to be okay,” he said, dropping into the pilot seat and starting the engine.
“I told you, I don’t fly,” she responded, her eyes still tightly shut.
At least she was talking and coherent.
“You do now.” He checked the flaps and instrument control panels then pulled the safety harness over his shoulders.
“Oh Christmas tree, oh Christ-mas-tree,” she sang, her voice high-pitched and a little off-key.
Maybe she wasn’t coherent after all.
“Arden?” He touched her shoulder. Her muscles were taut, her entire body tense.
“Thy leaves are so un-change-ing,” she continued. Her voice warbled on the last note, but she kept right on singing. “Oh Christmas—”
“Arden? Are you going to be able to keep it together?”
“I am trying to get to my happy place.” Her eyes flew open, and he was looking straight into her sky-blue irises. “You are making it very difficult.”
“Your happy place is Christmas?”
“It sure isn’t this dinky tin can that you plan to fly us out in.” She closed her eyes again, continuing her song. “Not only green when sum-mer’s here...”
She hit the last note and the cat yowled, joining the song with earsplitting intensity.
At least neither was trying to claw a way out.
He guided the plane out of the hangar, radioing the dispatcher for permission to take off. They began taxiing down the runway. With this load, the plane required about eight hundred feet of runway for takeoff. Maybe a little less if the conditions were perfect.
Tonight, the wind was blowing, a light mix of sleet and snow splattering the windshield.
In the distance, the sedan sped through the airfield gates, then veered toward them, high beams on, picking up speed as it approached. He could only hope they’d beat it down the runway. The plane picked up speed. Six hundred feet. Seven hundred. Kane pulled back on the controls just as the sedan reached the runway. It stopped and the doors flew open.
But Kane was past them, the wheels lifting from asphalt, the plane soaring into the sky. Below, the men were firing. The distinctive metallic pings as several bullets pierced the plane’s fuselage left no doubt that some of the rounds had hit their mark.
“Oh Christmas tree, Oh Christmas tree, such pleasure do you bring me!” Arden was nearly screaming the song now, the cat still yowling, the engine roaring.
But they were up, so far away from the gunmen the bullets were ineffective. Whatever damage had been done was done. He assessed the instrument panel, looking for potential trouble.
Arden had stopped her quirky rendition of “O Christmas Tree.” The cat had stopped yowling. The only sound was the whir of the engine. It sounded smooth. No coughs or hiccups, but the fuel pressure gauge dipped and a red light flashed ominously on the panel.
“That,” Arden said, jabbing her finger toward the light, “does not look good.”
“We’ll be fine.” He hoped. There was a problem with the left flap on the wing of the plane. For now he could still fly, but depending on the issue, his ability to control altitude and speed of the aircraft could definitely be affected—the higher they flew, the worse it would be. More of a concern was the fuel pressure gauge that was definitely reading lower than it should. If they lost fuel pressure, they’d have no choice but to make an emergency landing.
“Define fine,” she demanded, her face so pale even her lips were white. She had the bluest eyes he’d ever seen, and a face that was more intriguing than beautiful. She also had a brain that rivaled anyone Kane had ever met—she’d definitely give his academically focused parents and those in their social circle a run for their money.
Lying to her wasn’t going to work.
Even if it would have, he wasn’t going to do it. Truth was always the best way. Even if the truth was sometimes difficult to swallow.
“A bullet may have hit the wing flap,” he said, bracing himself for Arden’s full-out panic.
To his surprise, she simply nodded.
“That’s what I thought. I suppose you have a plan?”
“Yeah. Get the plane back down and fix the problem.”
“Is there another airport close by?”
“It doesn’t matter. I won’t run the risk of landing anywhere in Maine if I can help it.” GeoArray seemed to have connections and resources. He was pretty sure the company could quickly mobilize the troops wherever he put down.
“What if you can’t make it out of Maine?”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.” And if Kane was reading the gauges correctly, they’d be fortunate to make it across the border into New Hampshire.
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