Up Close and Dangerous Read online

  “Mayday, Mayday, Mayday!”

  Dimly she heard Justice on the radio, calling out the distress signal, their plane designation, and current location, then he cursed viciously and fell silent as he fought the inevitable. The plane dropped suddenly, a move that sent her stomach climbing into her throat, and she squeezed her eyes shut so she couldn’t see the rocky peaks rushing at them. Then the left wing rose as the right one dipped and they rolled to the right, a nauseating maneuver that made her swallow convulsively. A few seconds later the right wing rose and for a brief—very brief—time they were level. Then the left wing dipped and they swung to the left.

  Her eyes popped open. For a moment she couldn’t focus on anything; her vision was narrowed, dim, and her chest hurt. Distantly she realized she was holding her breath, and with an effort she exhaled, then sucked in oxygen. Another breath, and her vision cleared a little, enough to let her see him. He was all she could see, as if his image were magnified and everything else remained lost in the fog. She could see his right jaw, see the clenched muscles working, the sheen of sweat, even the curl of his eyelashes and the faint shadow of newly shaved whiskers.

  An agonized thought shot through her brain: he was the last person she would see! She caught another breath, pulling it deep. She would die with him, this man who didn’t even like her; a person should at least die with someone around who cared. The same could be said of him, though, and she felt a deep sadness for both of them. He was…he was…The thought splintered, her attention caught. What the hell was he doing? Realization dawned, sharp and incredulous. He was guiding the plane, with the rudder and skill and ruthless determination, and also every prayer he knew, probably. The engine was dead, but he was still flying the damn plane, somehow keeping it under rudimentary control.

  “Hold on,” he said harshly. “I’m trying to get down to the tree line, but we might not make it.”

  Bailey’s brain felt like sludge, barely able to move, to function. Tree line? What did that matter? But she shook off the terror-induced brain fog enough to pull her seat belt tighter, press her head against the back of the leather seat, and hold on tight to the sides of the bottom cushion.

  She squeezed her eyes shut to block out the sight of oncoming death, but she could feel the plane tilt first one way, then the other. Thermals, she thought, the single word swimming into focus. He was using the movement of the air currents to give them some lift, buy them precious seconds. The plane was too heavy to function like a glider, but the layers of air were slowing their descent somewhat; whether it would be enough to make a difference, she didn’t know, but Captain Justice must have something in mind, mustn’t he? Why else would he be fighting so hard to control the plane? If the end result was the same, then why bother?

  With a sense of doom she waited for the overwhelming crush of impact, the last split-second of awareness. She hoped dying wouldn’t hurt much. She hoped their bodies were found fast, so her family wouldn’t suffer through a long search. She wished…she wished for a lot of things, none of which would happen now.

  She felt as if an hour had passed since the engine stopped, though logically she knew mere minutes had gone by…no, not even minutes. Less than a minute, surely, though that minute seemed endless.

  What was taking this damn plane so long to crash?

  Him. Justice. He was the reason this was dragging out. He was still fighting the laws of gravity, refusing to give in. She felt an irrational urge to punch him, to say “Stop prolonging this!” How much terror was she supposed to take before her heart gave out under the strain? Not that it made any difference, under the circumstances—

  WHAP!

  The jolt jarred her teeth; it was followed instantaneously by a horrendous, deafening roar of screeching metal and thunderous cracks, more of those weird whapping sounds, and an impact so hard everything went black. The seat’s shoulder strap jerked almost unbearably tight. On some level she was aware of tilting to the right, then dropping, falling; the seat belt held her in place though her arms and legs were flopping like those of a broken doll. Then the right side of her head cracked against something rigid, and she was swallowed by darkness.

  BAILEY COUGHED.

  Her brain faintly registered the involuntary response. Something was wrong; she wasn’t getting enough oxygen. She felt a vague sense of alarm and tried to move, tried to get up, but neither her legs nor arms worked. She concentrated, hard, her entire being focused on moving, but the effort was too much and she drifted back down into nothingness.

  The next time she surfaced, she struggled and concentrated and was finally able to twitch the fingers of her left hand.

  At first she was aware only of small things, immediate things: how hard it was to move, how her right arm felt as if something was cutting into it, the need to cough again. Saturating all of those small things was pain, insistent and unwavering. Her entire body hurt, as if she’d fallen—

  Falling. Yes. She’d been falling. That was it. She remembered hitting—

  No. The plane…the plane had crashed.

  Realization filled her, a realization mixed with both wonder and trepidation. The plane had crashed, but she was alive. She was alive!

  She didn’t want to open her eyes, didn’t want to see the extent of her injuries. If she was missing any body parts she didn’t want to know about it. If she was, she would die anyway, of shock and blood loss, on this isolated mountaintop both miles and hours from any possible rescue. She wanted to just lie there with her eyes closed and let whatever would happen, happen. Everything hurt so much she couldn’t imagine moving and risking pain that was more intense.

  But it was annoying, the way something was interfering with her breathing, and her right arm really hurt where something sharp was digging into it. She needed to move, she needed to get away from the wreckage. Fire. There was always the danger of a fire in a plane crash, wasn’t there? She had to move.

  Groaning, she opened her eyes. At first she couldn’t focus; all she could see was a brownish blur. She kept blinking, and finally the blur became some sort of fabric. Silk. It was her silk jacket, covering most of her head. Laboriously she lifted her left arm and swiped at the jacket, managing to drag it away from her eyes. Pieces of glass made small tinkling sounds as the motion dislodged them.

  Okay. Her left arm worked. That was good.

  She tried to push herself upright, but something was wrong. Nothing was where it should be. She made a few more feeble, futile efforts to sit up, then made a low sound of frustration. Instead of struggling like a worm on a hook, she needed to take stock of the situation, see exactly what she was dealing with.

  Concentrating was difficult, but she had to focus. Taking deep breaths, she looked around, trying to make sense of what she saw. Mist, trees, occasional glimpses of blue sky. She saw her own feet, the left one sans shoe. Where was her other shoe? Then, like a bolt of lightning, another thought shot through her brain. Captain Justice! Where was he? She lifted her head as much as possible, and immediately saw him. He was slumped in his seat, his head dropped forward. She couldn’t make out his features; they were covered by what looked like a sea of blood.

  Urgently she tried to surge upright, only to fall back once more. Her position confused her. She was lying on the floor of the cabin—no, that wasn’t right. Fiercely she concentrated, forcing her brain to make the adjustment from what it expected to the reality of her position, and abruptly things made sense. She was still buckled in her seat, and she was lying against the right side of the plane, which was resting at a fairly sharp angle. She couldn’t sit up because she needed to haul herself up and to the left, and she couldn’t do that unless she could use both arms, but her right arm was trapped and she couldn’t free it unless she first got her weight off it.

  If Justice wasn’t already dead, he soon would be if she didn’t get in a position to help him. Get out of the seat. That’s what she needed to do. With her left hand she fumbled for the seat belt, popped the clasp open. When t