by Terry Spear
Gavin looked at her. “Oh, I forgot to mention the pilot.”
Chills raced up her spine.
“The pilot got away,” Gavin said.
“Out in the wilderness?” she asked, trying to feign real surprise, despite knowing that one of the robbers had made it out alive. But maybe not. Just because they hadn’t captured him didn’t mean he’d actually survived.
“Yeah. It was odd too. Searchers found her clothes buried some distance from some of the plane wreckage. The bloodhounds lost her trail. They easily tracked down two of the robbers’ trails. The other guy must have had some wilderness savvy. The police figured the pilot must have dressed in a change of clothes—something more suitable for the weather and terrain—and torn off. Maybe she even took the loot. She would have been getting a cut, unless they’d paid her a set amount to fly the plane.”
“Oh right. When most of the men couldn’t survive out there on their own or get away without a trace, a woman had no trouble? Sounds like a stretch to me.”
“She might have hooked up with the guy who disappeared. The men they caught would never tell investigators the whole story…who he was, who she was. We figure someday someone will find her and the other guy’s remains. They suspect she didn’t survive. Unless she was a rugged mountain woman, or had friends who were able to pick them both up somewhere. As many days as it took rescuers to come for me that far out in the wilderness, that would be an unlikely scenario.”
It was way past time to change the subject. “Why did you leave the force?”
“We just needed a change of pace.”
Or he was on the take and he had to leave before the police found out about it? “Are you still a PI?”
“Yeah. My buddies and I grew up together, and after we did our time on the police force, we went into the PI business together. Which was a good thing, considering what happened to us. As newly turned wolves, we had a really hard time keeping our shifting under control for quite a while.”
“I can only imagine. My family are royals, pure lupus garous for many generations, so we’re fortunate we can shift at any time that we want.”
Gavin glanced out the window at the view of the Boundary Waters. “It must be nice having control over your shifting at all times. I’d sure love to have that ability.”
“It is. I guess you’re planning to get a ride back to our hangar later to pick up your vehicle. You weren’t going to get a flight back?”
“I’ll be paddling to Ely. The guys were all on jobs, or I would have asked one of them to drive me there. Cameron’s mate is minding the shop and the triplets so she couldn’t drive me either. And Owen’s mate is much more newly turned than us, so she sticks closer to the cabin.”
“How did that happen?”
“One of Cameron’s pups bit her when she fed him at a campsite near where we live.”
“Oh no, that’s not good.”
“In the end, it all worked out great for Owen.” A breeze was beginning to pick up and Gavin frowned, feeling anxious. “We’re not going to have trouble landing, are we?”
“The bay where I land should be sheltered enough if the wind doesn’t pick up any more than this. It can be dangerous landing when the water is glassy too. Um, I guess I shouldn’t have mentioned that part.”
“I didn’t think you’d have to worry about water that’s too smooth.” Gavin noticed she was frowning, and he smelled her anxiousness too, which didn’t bode well. The smell of electrical charges and the rain in the air warned of an impending storm. It wasn’t supposed to storm until tomorrow and then continue for a couple of days.
“Yeah, it’s hard to tell you’re close to the water when it looks like glass. I hate to mention this. Can you smell and feel the electrical charges in the air?” Amelia asked.
“Yeah, are we going to make it?” He hoped they didn’t have to return. He’d have to wait a couple of days to come back out here. He wanted every day to count during his investigation.
“If the bay’s too choppy, no. I can’t risk the plane or us. I’ll have to take us back.”
“Wouldn’t that be risky for us too?” And if she managed to drop him off in the Boundary Waters, then tried to fly in the storm, she would continue to be at risk. He didn’t want that.
“I’ll take you with me to Saint Paul. That’s saying the weather is better there. You can help me take Winston to the new shelter. We’d be ahead of the storm and just leave the plane there for the night.”
He glanced at her. “And stay the night there together somewhere?”
“Let’s just see what happens here. Hopefully, I can drop you off, no problem, and continue on my way.”
“How far is it to the bay?” He hoped they would be there soon.
“Another twenty minutes. Just enjoy the view. Think of yourself as a wolf with wings, soaring high above two thousand lakes connected by rivers, all that beautiful forested land, islands, pristine. Pine, spruce, and fir make up the forests, along with birch, aspen, and maple. One million acres of woodlands and waterways. Couldn’t be more perfect for a paddler. Or a wolf.”
They suddenly heard a loud popping sound over the noise of the single-engine plane.
Fearing the worse, Gavin gritted his teeth. He knew that wasn’t a sound he should be hearing.
The engine began making a grinding noise, a sputtering sound next, and then a final death rattle.
Amelia considered the instrument panels, then began looking at the area they were flying over.
The smell of smoke and burning fuel filled the air.
Gavin was sure this was bad. He wasn’t going to comment, certain Amelia knew what she had to do, and he didn’t want to interrupt her concentration by stating his biggest fear: they were going to crash.
The emergency light came on, indicating an engine fire. The propeller ground to a standstill. The plane grew eerily quiet.
Another pop sounded. Calm and in control, Amelia tried to call a Mayday. When she keyed the radio in and hit the transmission button, no squelch sounded to indicate it was working. She quickly ran through her checklist. The lights on the instrument panel all went dark. “Emergency backup battery should come on.”
It didn’t.
She glided the plane over a frothing river filled with rocks and rapids, cliffs on one side of the river, trees on the other. She couldn’t land here. “Under normal conditions, we can land a seaplane either with the power off or the power on. With the power on, the pilot has better control of the plane.”
Gavin couldn’t believe it. He hoped they’d make it safely when they landed. With choppy water and no power, he didn’t think they would.
* * *
Amelia prayed she’d reach the lake, even if she couldn’t make it to the more sheltered bay. The land was covered in trees, so she couldn’t attempt to land anywhere else, and the surrounding lakes were too small to land on.
“The transponder,” Gavin said, looking like he’d prefer jumping from the aircraft than landing in it on the rough water that was getting rougher as the winds picked up.
“Electrical system is out, and the emergency backup battery didn’t come on. I would have set the transponder to Mode A Code 7700 to let everyone know we have a state of emergency, but I can’t.”
“What’s the next step?” he asked.
She was glad he wasn’t panicking, despite his fear of flying. She couldn’t believe she could be crashing a second plane with him on board. “I’m gliding us in. If I do this right and we’re lucky, we’ll be fine. If we flip, the plane will fill with water. Quickly. If that happens, unfasten your harness. You have to find the door and swim out. It’ll be dark in the cabin. With our wolf’s night vision, you should be able to make out some things.”
“What about Winston?”
“I’ll get him. You just get yourself out of the plane.” The pup was her
concern. She didn’t want to lose a passenger too.
Gavin unbuckled his harness and reached back to get one of his bags.
“What are you doing? Stay buckled in. I’ve got to land the plane.”
“I’ve got to grab my satellite phone and let people know where we are, if you don’t have any other way to do it.”
She glanced at the pocket where she normally kept her own sat phone and realized she was flying her dad’s plane and her sat phone was in the seat pocket on her plane.
“Hurry then.”
The lake came into view, and she flew into the wind to slow the plane down, which would hopefully cause the lowest impact damage if she ran into trouble. She could easily lose control of the seaplane if she didn’t compensate for the shifts in wind, with the gusts picking up.
Amelia began looking for a smoother area in the water to land. She’d never had to do this without power and with the water as choppy as this. From her training, she knew she had to put the plane down in the valley of the waves, landing on the crest of the wave and nosing in to go down into the valley. She only wished she could land under full control. She had to make do with what she had.
As she went over the landing checklist mentally, she realized the gear warning system was not working. She did a quick visual check to make sure. The landing gear was up.
“I’m landing. Return to your seat, and strap yourself in. As soon as we land, if we need to quickly evacuate, open the door to the aircraft, and get out.”
“My sat phone is in one of my bags. I’ve almost got it.” He buckled himself in, then pulled out the phone.
She landed on the crest of a wave. A gust of wind lifted the left wing, making the right wing clip the water and breaking it off with a crack. Her heart stuttered.
The plane flipped so quickly that she felt like she was on a roller-coaster ride, sideways, up, down, holding on for dear life, trying to recall what she needed to do. Make sure Gavin got out ahead of her, unharness Winston, help him out of the plane, then inflate the dog’s life vest. She’d have to get the raft after that.
The plane had flipped upside down and was taking on water.
“Gavin, are you okay?” She hurried to unhook her harness. Every second counted.
It was dark inside as she unfastened her belt and heard Gavin unlocking his.
“Yeah. Door to my right. I’ll get Winston. Do you have a life raft?”
“Back there with Winston, under his seat.” Amelia headed back to Winston. “Don’t inflate your PFD until you’re outside the plane. I’ll get—”
“Do you have another preserver?”
“Yeah. All the seat cushions are.”
“Can you attach the carabineer from my bags to one of the seat cushions and shove it outside the plane?”
“Yeah.” She was supposed to be in charge, but she was glad Gavin was good at coordinating an escape under pressure too.
“Let me help you unharness Winston,” he said.
She unfastened the harness, and Gavin helped the dog to his feet.
“I’m taking him out now. Winston, come on, boy. You can do this.” Gavin swam out of the plane, pulling Winston by the collar.
She hooked Gavin’s bags to the seat-cushion flotation device and pushed them out through the open door. Before she could swim out, Gavin returned and took a breath of the air in the cabin. “Go, I’ll get the raft. See to Winston. We’re a long way from shore, so we could have a problem with hypothermia. Maybe not Winston though. His fur coat might protect him. The raft should help us get in safely. I’m afraid the pup wouldn’t make that long swim.”
Gavin shoved the raft out, and Amelia reached around. She couldn’t locate Winston’s waterproof container of kibble. She swam out to join Gavin and the dog. She’d thought of getting out of the water and sitting on top of the seaplane’s floats. But they might not get rescued until the storms died down and the wind and cold air, and their wet clothes would be worse. Plus, with a thunderstorm approaching, staying out on the water was much too dangerous. Not to mention that the seaplane was sinking.
The winds were whipping up the waves even worse now, and the sky was growing dark, thunder grumbling off in the distance, the storm headed their way. And they were a long damn way from shore. They needed to use the raft to get there as quickly as they could.
* * *
Gavin was tying the box-shaped form of the raft to one of the floats. Starting to feel the effects of the chilly air and water, he fumbled with the rope on the raft. If he could shift, his muscles would heat up significantly, and his wolf coat would help to warm him. But he needed to do this as a human.
The raft secured, he yanked the cord to release the raft. Nothing. Hell. He yanked again, and then with one last jerk on the cord, the raft popped open with such force that it knocked him back a foot in the water.
He was damn grateful the raft was intact, with no tears that he could see. He lifted his bags into the raft with them still hooked to the seat cushion. “My cooler’s still inside the seaplane. Maybe we should get it in case we don’t get rescued for a while,” he said. “Do you want to get in and pull Winston while I push from behind?”
“Yeah, sure.”
Amelia swam around to the other side, searching, and finally found the rope ladder, then climbed in while Gavin held on to the raft to stabilize it. She crawled across the floor of the raft to reach for Winston’s collar. He was dog-paddling next to the raft.
As soon as she had hold of him and started pulling, Gavin began trying to push the heavy dog. “Up, up,” Gavin said, straining to push the deadweight into the raft.
“Come up here, Winston. Come on.”
The plane was groaning and sinking more.
Gavin was beginning to think he wasn’t going to get the dog in the raft. Hopefully, Winston’s claws wouldn’t rip it. With Amelia pulling, the dog trying to gain purchase, and Gavin pushing from behind, Winston finally scrambled into the life raft and collapsed.
“Is he okay?”
“Yeah,” Amelia said, checking him over. “He looks fine.”
“You?”
“Yeah.”
They needed to untie the rope before the plane sank. Gavin thought about the cooler. “I’m going for the food.”
“The plane is going under. Maybe it’s not such a good idea now. You could be trapped.”
“Untie the rope before it goes down. I’ll get free.”
“Gavin, we need warmth and shelter first and foremost. We can survive without food until someone comes for us.”
“It won’t take but a minute.” He still had a mission, and he planned to accomplish it, despite the setback. He’d need food and all his equipment. And his canoe. It had been secured upside down under the plane. That meant it would be right side up now. The canoe was so versatile that he could convert it to paddle like a kayak, a canoe, or a dinghy. It was virtually unsinkable and untippable. He really wanted to cut it loose.
He swam back to the open door and dove back into the plane, feeling his way around until he reached the cooler. At least it would float on its own. The plane was creaking, and he felt it shift. Hell. He grabbed the handle of the ice chest and shoved it out the door. The chest went straight to the surface of the water.
Gavin went up for air again. Amelia was holding on to his cooler, tying it to the raft.
He wasn’t sure his canoe had made it unscathed, but he wanted to try to release it. He pulled a pocketknife out of his zippered pants pocket and dove down, feeling his way around the canoe until he could grab hold of the rope and begin to cut. It was taking too long. He swam to the surface and took a deep breath of air, and then dove down again. This time, he tried to pull one of the knots free. He felt the plane shifting lower again.
He felt panicked, concerned Amelia hadn’t untied the raft in time before the plane sank completely.
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When he went back up for air, he saw that the raft had floated away. Amelia was paddling back toward him.
“What are you doing?” She sounded highly annoyed with him.
“Getting my canoe. Be back in a sec.”
Then he dove under, determined to free his canoe. This time, he felt it give. He tugged and tugged and felt it loosening further. He needed air again, and the plane was sinking. He would lose the canoe if he didn’t keep trying. With a final tug, he felt it come free and shoot to the surface of the lake, while he swam to join it.
He finally surfaced and took in great gulps of air. The winds and waves had pushed the raft maybe an eighth of a mile away. He had the canoe, but no paddles. His lucky paddle was gone.
“We’re coming for you!” Amelia yelled out to him. They were a little closer to shore.
“I’ll paddle to you.” He finally inflated his life vest. He was so cold that he was having a terrible time getting into the canoe. He finally managed and lay there, exhausted.
* * *
Amelia paddled as fast as she could against the wind and the waves. She was elated that Gavin had freed his canoe, but she was angry with him too. Did he still want to paddle around the Boundary Waters just for fun after this disaster? He could have drowned. In his human form and not wearing cold-weather gear, he had to be freezing after being in the water for so long. She hoped he wouldn’t become hypothermic before he could get into dry clothes and warm up. She was chilled to the bone, and she’d gotten out much quicker than him. If she could strip off her clothes and wear her wolf coat, she’d be fine.
Winston was sitting, panting, and watching Gavin paddle with his hand toward them. The cooler was slowing Amelia down, and she felt she wasn’t making much progress at all.