“Yeah, and I kept it out of your face, as much as I could. Should I have blasted that LED beam at you? Blinded you to double-check the color of your eyes, just because there was something familiar about you? That would’ve given you away, sure. I’d have known exactly who you were then. But you were so damned hurt, and I was trying to help by not scaring you more than I already had. Is that why you’re treating me like shit today? Just because I left as soon as that mission concluded? Kee-rist, Bree! Is that why you don’t want to go with me? Not even if I’m damned sure going to save yours and Robin’s lives, and end that bastard Berfende? Because that’s a gawddamned given, Bree. That asshat is nothing but a dead man walking.”
Bree dropped her gaze, her mouth devoid of saliva, and her heart racing like a runaway horse. There was too much fire between them, and even angry, Kruze was still charming the pants off of her. The power emanating off him was volcanic, so damned hot, and she was dripping wet. But he was right. Since the moment he’d rescued her from Josephus, all he’d done had been aimed at getting her safely aboard that rescue chopper. He was doing the same thing now, keeping everyone safe and promising to finish Berfende, once and for all.
Flaming embarrassment crept up her neck, even as her core wept for him. In that cave, he’d used his LED flashlight to remove the glass shards from her rear end. She’d been embarrassed, but he’d given her his jacket, for the love of God, and survived the cold night, while she’d slept in warmth and comfort for the first time in months. In every way, he’d put her first. But here she was, acting like a jilted lover instead of the intelligent woman she used to be. Why couldn’t she get away from the fool she’d devolved into when she’d been inside that deep, dark hole? Everywhere she went, the darkness still stalked her. Heck, she was carrying it with her, but she had no idea how to let it go!
“I… I over-reacted, I’m s-s-sorry,” she stuttered. Again and again, I’m sorry for everything!
Kruze eased down to one knee, his index finger on her lips, stopping the vicious rant building up inside her like steam inside that stupid, damned teapot. She was so close to exploding, spewing every last one of her worthless good intentions into his face. If only he’d kiss her.
“Shush, sugar, shush,” he murmured, his anger turned to gentleness that brought tears to her eyes. This was the man she’d fallen in love with, this gentle, caring, considerate beast. Why didn’t he stay with her in Paris? Why’d had he left her there like she was nothing?
“Please stop saying you’re sorry,” Kruze begged. “You have nothing to be sorry about. Nothing that happened was your fault. You’re just tired, and you need a good long rest. You haven’t recovered from Turkey, not at all. That’s what I hope you can do today, Bree, just rest. That’s why Robin went with her grandparents, not with us. You’re ready to drop, anyone can see that. Please, let me take care of you this one last time.”
Bree bowed her head, afraid if she kept looking at him she’d burst into a fountain of tears. “B-b-but, you should’ve told me where Robin was going.” Damn it, she would not play the stupid, obedient female. Not this time. “You should’ve told me!”
His hand moved to her cheek, the pad of his thumb softly skating over the bottom lip she was biting. His palm was so warm and... and nice. He forced her chin up, his green eyes shining through his dark, shiny bangs. “You’re right, I should have. That was wrong of me, and I’m sorry. I was so caught up in getting you and Robin to safety, that I jumped the gun. I made decisions without asking you, and I should have. I apologize.”
Lord, he was good at being a bad boy. “It’s okay,” she whispered begrudgingly, her voice hoarse and her head spinning at his nearness. Please kiss me. I really want you to. I need you, I do.
Instead Kruze leaned in and pressed his lips to the middle of her forehead. “You’ll see. The house I’m taking you to is off the grid, and it’s large enough for both of us. You won’t even know I’m there. I won’t bother you after we arrive.”
Her nostrils flared at the sweet, musky scent of this over-heated male. As much as she’d tried to hate him, Bree wanted Kruze. “Okay,” she breathed, his lips so close, she could almost taste them.
By then, Bruce was back at the door, waiting. With one last squeeze, Kruze backed out of the plane and stepped away from her. He shook hands with Bruce in one of those forearm-to-forearm guy-handshakes. Bruce handed Kruze a clipboard and a headset, and they walked to the rear of the plane. They were running through their pre-flight safety checklist. Kruze meant to fly this plane? Bree should’ve known.
With her heart still pounding at that close, almost intimate encounter, Bree’s mind skipped to Robin. Where was she now? In a plane? In that TEAM SUV talking a mile a minute with Persia? Never in Bree’s life had she felt so old, cold, and weary. So lonely. The last few months had done her in. Tipping her head to the narrow window-pane, Bree inhaled a cleansing breath, then breathed it slowly out. She was exhausted on so many levels. Not suicidal. Just hopeless.
The plane’s door slamming shut startled Bree awake. She’d dozed off. Bruce was nowhere to be seen, and Kruze was now in the pilot’s seat, strapping in, checking instruments, flipping switches, and doing whatever pilots did. Lifting one arm over his head, he handed her a headset without turning around. “This’ll dampen the noise. Put it on, and we’ll be able to talk.”
“Thanks,” Bree said as, once again, she did as she was told. That had to change.
“You want to come up front with me? Better view from the cockpit.”
“No, I’m good where I am. I’m going to take a nap. Tell me when we get there.”
He shrugged, as if it made no difference to him.
The twin engines revved, and the plane taxied to the opposite end of the little runway. When Kruze pushed the steering thing forward, the plane lifted smoothly into the air, and Bree was doing it. Flying in the opposite direction of the child she adored.
If that didn’t break her heart, nothing could.
Chapter Twenty-One
There was no turbulence forecast between New Jersey and Winterton, Maine, so Kruze was able to keep the plane steady. It shuddered a little after he cleared Portland’s airspace, but he attributed that to a rogue gust of wind. No big deal. Small planes were more susceptible to quirks in the jetstream. Other than that, it was blue skies all the way. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that Bree was asleep. Finally. If nothing else, she was one stubborn woman. But relaxed, there was an innocence about her. The worry lines bracketing her mouth were gone, as were the tiny furrows between her brows. He’d give anything to see her smile again.
But Kee-rist, he hated her current hair color. Dishwater blonde made Bree look pale and washed out, and the lack of style took away more of her spark. He wanted that other Bree, the saucy redhead who’d captured his heart those few years ago. The sassy woman he’d made a baby with. The sexy, daring minx who’d lured him out onto that Paris balcony when she’d lifted the back of her nearly see-through nightgown and bared her tempting, sexy derrière. He’d taken her up on the invitation, then took her from behind on that balcony overlooking that busy Paris street. His heart flipped remembering the heat between them. She’d climaxed quickly because that Bree had loved taking chances. She’d been naughty, and she’d enjoyed the risk of being seen or caught. Just thinking about what happened that balcony turned him hard as a steel pike.
They were nearly to his home-away-from-home, his cabin near Eagle Lake, Maine. The Cessna was flying low and steady, over miles of green pines and wide-open space. Kruze shifted in his seat, adjusting his hard-on when a loud roar, followed by a wicked sputter sounded to his left. He couldn’t believe what he was looking at. A flameout? That didn’t make sense, but he’d definitely lost the left engine. Taking fast emergency measures, he shut it down and called a mayday into the nearest airport, which, unfortunately, was a good fifty miles behind them.
There was no choice but to keep flying. Totally doable, Kruze wasn’t worri
ed. He’d landed with one engine before, that time after a bird strike. He could do it again. But they’d need to land sooner than later, and they wouldn’t make it to his place. Which would put them in the middle of Nowhere, Maine, surrounded by miles of undeveloped forests, if he found a suitable place to land. A meadow would be nice. A road would be better. Hell, even a deer trail would be better than going down in all these trees.
It was a fight keeping the plane’s wings steady. Worried, he dialed Chance, hoping he didn’t get Paloma again. But he had to cut the call before Chance answered, when the right engine roared, crackled, and spit smoke and flames.
“Kee-rist!” Kruze hissed, glaring at the damned thing. Flames and smoke peeled like inky ribbons behind the already blackened propeller and over the wing. Two flameouts in one trip? That made no sense. He’d run through the safety checklist. Bruce was former Air Force, for fuck’s sake. They’d known each other for years. Kruze knew damned well he hadn’t sabotaged the Cessna. But someone had. He’d lost all power.
A nervous voice from the dead silence behind him asked, “Kruze?”
“Make sure you’re belted in,” he ordered, wrestling the dead yoke. “Double-check your harness. We’re going down.”
“In all these trees? Wait! There’s a river down there. I see it! Will that work?”
He shook his head, but looked down at the river, which from this altitude, looked more like a stream instead of the white-water rapids he’d expected to see. White water was a definite no-go, but that stream just might work.
“Good eyes, sugar,” he told Bree as he forced the flaps into landing position, then worked mightily to steer the Cessna where he wanted it to go. They might just make it, but bringing a dead bird down would be a helluva rough landing. Any one of those trees alongside the river could clip a wing, shearing it off. Never mind what river rocks and boulders would do to the landing gear and belly. The plane might break apart.
They were coming down too fast. By sheer willpower, Kruze refused the plane’s natural tendency to dive nose first. That would throw them end-over-end. Cartwheeling increased the likelihood of Bree or him being thrown from the plane and dying. Sweating buckets, he’d barely finessed the nose up, when the belly collided with what he hoped was shallow water. But he wasn’t that lucky. They weren’t skimming water, just the rocky shore. But they were horizontal. They just might make it—if the plane slowed down.
Flashing glimpses of ramrod-straight tree trunks roared past the cracked windows. Horrific vibrations shook the plane. There was no sense fighting. Kruze took his hands off the yoke, just as the nose skimmed one edge of a massive boulder. Still on its belly, the sideways impact sent the plane pivoting. The first tree it hit sheared the right wing off, taking the flaming engine with it. They were still going too fast, propelled in a wide, dizzying circle, headed straight for the forest.
“Hold on!” he ordered, looping his hands and wrists through the suicide straps overhead. “Cover your face, Bree!” Kee-rist, he wished she were sitting with him, close, where he could reach out and hold her when they hit.
“I love you, Kruze Sinclair!!” a frightened Bree screamed, right before…
CRASH! OOOMPH!
The plane jerked to a dead stop, then bounced, damned near breaking his neck. Reeling from the impact, Kruze let go of the straps and shook his aching head to clear the cobwebs. Damn, it was cold. He blinked both bleary eyes, fighting to see, only to realize the cockpit had filled with black, oily-smelling smoke. The engine at his left was still burning. Didn’t that figure, drop out of Heaven only to land in Hell?
“Bree?” he called, waving a hand over his face, trying desperately to twist his upper body around far enough to see her through the smoke. “Where are you, sugar?” Something was stuck in his side, the soft part of his abdomen, below his ribs and above his hip bone. Made it damned hard to draw a full breath.
“Here,” she croaked behind him. “I can’t get out of my harness, but I’m okay. Are you?”
“I’m good.” Kruze honestly didn’t know how he was, but he wasn’t going to scare her. Nothing hurt too bad, but his lungs refused to expand. He couldn’t catch a full breath. The plane had come to rest on its belly, the trunk of a long-dead tree visible through the side exit window. With their escape blocked, one engine on fire, and the other missing, the only way out was through the shattered windshield.
With fingers that felt numb, fat, and useless, he finally unfastened his harness. Kruze bent his knees tight to his chest, lifted both boots over the instrument panel, and—Kee-rist!—the pain in his side had to go. Sweating up a storm, he managed a solid kick at the windshield. Then another. At last, the damned thing crackled and bent outward. Thank God. He was running out of power. Crisp, cool air flooded the cockpit, chilling the sweat he didn’t know was dripping out of his hair and running down his face. Sky. He could see the late afternoon sky. It’d be dark soon. They’d landed in the middle of nowhere. They needed to get out of this damned wreck.
But the nose of his plane was higher than its tail. They must’ve landed on a boulder or log or something. Kruze smoothed his sweaty hair back over his head to keep it out of his eyes. He was hurting. It was all he could to lower his legs enough to put his boots on the floor. Every inhalation took too much son of a bitchin’ effort.
“Bree. Climb up here… with me.” He rasped, then coughed. “The side exit’s blocked. Hurry. We’ll have to climb through the windshield. Are you out of your harness yet? Do you need help?” As if Kruze could help anyone. At the moment he could barely help himself.
“No, I’m good. Just stay where you are, I’m coming,” Bree replied huskily.
Normally, those lovely words out of a woman’s sexy mouth would’ve made Kruze grin. But too many black spots stalked the edge of his vision now. He needed to move faster, jump higher, and do it all with better efficiency before he passed out. Because something was dead damned wrong, and that something was stuck in his side. Pissed that he couldn’t seem to catch a break, he tossed his useless earphones to the safety-glass-cluttered co-pilot seat.
And just like one of his favorite dreams, Bree appeared at his side out of the murky black. The first thing she shoved forward was his heavy gear bag. She maneuvered that onto the co-pilot’s seat. Her backpack came next, then another bag and his jacket. The air was getting harder to breathe.
“Anything else I should get before we bail?” she asked, her slender fingers gripping the edges of both cockpit seats, as she prepared to climb between them.
The left engine was still burning. Bree was right. This might be their only chance to grab what they could to survive, before the plane blew. But Kruze wouldn’t take a chance with her life.
“No,” he decided, reaching for her, pulling her forward by one arm, then pushing her sweet ass over him to the window. “You first. Climb over me, yeah. Watch your head. There you go. Get out. I’ll be right behind you.”
Shoving the crackled windshield aside, Bree turned and cleared the way for him, then scampered over the fuselage without kneeing him—thank you, Jesus—and was outside of the cockpit on her knees in seconds. He handed their bags through the empty window frame, then his jacket, while she tossed each item to the ground opposite the burning engine, making room for him. Damn it, his plane was ruined, and that was just plain sad. This was his ugliest landing ever. Melancholy came out of nowhere, swamping him.
“Hurry, Kruze,” Bree ordered. “It’s your turn. Come on.” She clapped her hands. “Get your ass out of there.”
He blinked, and suddenly Bree was stretching through the window for him. One hand was already clamped around the back of his neck. With all of her might, she was tugging him forward. How the hell had she gotten hold of him so fast, without him seeing her? Damn, he was cold.
“C-c-copy that,” Kruze replied, sure he was losing his mind. That damned thing stuck in his side was now a pain in the ass. “Wait. Hold up.” Each inch she pulled him forward, sen
t electric shocks of pain through him. He was sweating bullets. “I’m—Kee-rist! I’m stuck.”
“On what?” Her breath spilled all over his sweaty face. Bree was on her knees, almost entirely back inside the cockpit. “I’m not leaving you behind. Try harder. Hurry!”
“I am trying harder,” he growled, worried now. Burning to death was becoming a very real possibility.
“No, you’re not,” she snapped. “Your harness is off. It’s not in the way. You’re clear to move, and the steering thing is pushed all the way forward. You’ve got plenty of room. There’s nothing blocking your way, and… Oh, no. Wait. Wait! Don’t move, Kruze! Oh, Lord! Hold still.”
That didn’t sound good. He blinked up at her dark silhouette against a sky so blue…
Damn it. He must’ve blacked out again. Bree was back inside the plane. Blinking furiously to wake his sorry ass up and stay awake, at last, she came into clearer focus.
“You want me to move or what, sugar? Just tell me. What’s in my way? Can you see anything?” Because I sure can’t. Whatever was stuck had him good. Kruze sure as fuck couldn’t move.
“Hold still, honey,” Bree ordered, her voice so damned gentle. Too gentle. Not a good sign when a guy’s the last one inside a burning plane. That was the tone doctors and nurses used before they told a patient he was going to die. “Just…just stay still, will you? Kruze, stop moving. Your armrest broke. I can’t get it to move. You’re hurting yourself. Let me—”
She was trying not to scare him. That shouldn’t have worried Kruze, but it did. That was his job. He pulled back farther in the seat until he could tuck his chin into his chest and look between the wall of the plane and his left side. But Bree’s arm was in his way. He still couldn’t see anything wrong, until—
She reached farther down, her cheek plastered against his chest. He tipped as far as he could to his right. She flexed that strong, womanly arm, and—“Kee-rist, woman!”—unstuck the hot, burning, son of a bitch from his side. That hurt! “Jesus! What the holy fuck did you do to me?”
Damned (SOBs Book 4) Page 17