I’m safe. I’m dead, after all.
She shivered, remembering the slapping cold of the water, and pulled her leather jacket closer. She’d forgotten how cold it was here in the early morning even in the middle of June. She looked around again at the fog-shrouded mountains, a grayish blue in the early morning light. But this morning she wasn’t moved by the incredible raw beauty, she only wanted to get home. She wanted to plan, and Uncle Gillette would help her. He was very smart, a marine captain. There was no such thing as an ex-marine, he’d said once with a snap in his voice, and she’d never forgotten.
But her Charger had let her down on the final lap. Rachael hitched her duffel onto her shoulder, looked toward Parlow, seeing houses dot the distance among trees and hills and narrow winding roads.
She’d taken three steps when she froze in her tracks at a distant noise, a sputtering sound, an engine coughing, and it was coming closer.
She looked up but didn’t see anything. Maybe it was a car coming on another road, maybe it was ... No, no way could it be them. She drew a deep breath, then continued to scan the sky. No, what she’d heard—well, she didn’t know what she’d heard.
But still she didn’t move. She stared toward the end of long, narrow Cudlow Valley, cut like a knife slice through the mountains. She stood there, her hand shading her eyes from the slivers of sunlight trying to break through the fog.
And there it was, a single-engine plane coming over the low mountains at the far end of the valley, jerking and heaving, black smoke billowing out near the tail. The plane was in trouble, dear God, it was going to crash, no, the pilot was pulling the bucking plane to line up at the far end of the narrow valley. She saw flames shooting out through the smoke, moving up toward the wings. He wasn’t going to make it. She watched, couldn’t take her eyes off that plane even as she began to run toward it.
Was Cudlow Valley long enough and flat enough to land a plane? She had no idea, she’d never learned to fly. She watched the wings straighten, pictured the pilot willing his plane to a sloping trajectory, lower and lower. She held her breath, and prayed.
An explosion rocked the small plane, nearly flipping it over, and it began to spiral, out of control. FOUR
Unbelievably, the pilot wrenched it back in line. The next second, the engine went dead and the small single-engine plane dropped like a stone. She knew she was going to watch him die, there was no way he could bring it in. But somehow, somehow, he caught an air current and managed to glide the dying plane forward and down until the wheels finally touched the ground. The plane bounced and lurched, the front came up, then slammed down again. It jerked and shuddered before coming to a rolling stop not fifty feet from where she stood at the very end of the valley. Smoke gushed out and the flames licked higher.
Rachael started running toward the plane even as she saw the pilot kick open the door and struggle to drag an unconscious man across the seat and out the narrow door. She didn’t know how he did it, but he did. He hauled the man over his shoulder and began to run away from the plane.
He stumbled and went down. The unconscious man flew over his head and landed hard, his head striking a clump of rocks. He didn’t move. The plane exploded into a bright orange ball, flames gushing high into the air, spewing parts of the plane in every direction. She saw the pilot pull himself up and stagger toward the unconscious man. What looked like part of the tail struck his leg and he went down, and this time he stayed down.
It was terrifying, Rachael thought—life or death, all decided in under two minutes. She’d had maybe another minute.
She reached the unconscious man first and dropped to her knees. He lay on his back, motionless, eyes closed. He was slight, and older, near fifty, and there was blood on his head and all over his chest. She pressed her fingers to his throat. He was alive, but his pulse was faint. She lightly shook him. “Can you open your eyes?”
He didn’t move. She sat back on her heels. Without thinking, she took off her leather jacket and covered him as best she could.
Her head whipped up when she heard the pilot groan. She was at his side in a moment, looking down at his smoke-blackened face, blood matting the dark hair against the side of his head, a thick trickle of blood snaking down from his left ear. There was blood oozing out of a tear in his pants where part of the tail had slashed into him. He wasn’t moving.
Please don’t die, please don’t die. She couldn’t stand any more death.
Rachael lightly laid her hand on his shoulder, shook him slightly, but he didn’t move. She felt his arms, his legs. Nothing seemed broken, but inside he could be seriously hurt. He was much younger than the other man, around her age, big and fit. He wore a black leather jacket similar to hers over a white shirt and tie, black pants, low black boots. She lightly slapped his face. “Please, wake up.”
He moaned, jerked onto his back. She leaned close, slapped his cheek again. “Come on, wake up. You can do it. I can’t lift you by myself and I’m alone. The other man is unconscious and he needs your help. Wake up. Please.” She slapped his face harder.
A hand grabbed her wrist. She yelped but he didn’t release her.
Jack opened his eyes. Long straight hair brushed his face, hair the color of sunlight. Blond and brown and gold, with one skinny braid running down the side, and he tried to lift his hand to touch it, but he couldn’t get his arm up there. He said, “I like the braid. I’ve never seen that before. You pack quite a punch.”
“Yes, well, sorry, but you have to wake up. I’ve got to get you and your friend medical help. Where are you hurt? What happened?”
To her surprise, he actually smiled. “Am I dead? Are you an angel? No, you’re not an angel, your hair’s too pretty and that braid—angels don’t wear braids like that. And you’ve got dirt on your nose.”
“I’d like to be an angel but I guess that would mean you’re imagining me, and thank God you’re not. I’m Rachael.” She swiped at her nose. “There’s a cut that’s bleeding above your left temple; it’s only a trickle now. I saw part of the plane tail hit you, knock you down. Your right thigh is bleeding pretty bad. We need to put pressure on it.”
“Use my tie.”
She pulled off his bright red tie with little colorful squiggles on it and eased it under his leg. “Tell me when you think it’s tight enough,” and she pulled.
“That’ll get it. Knot it good. Anything broken?”
“No, not as far as I can tell, but I’m not a doctor.”
“Usually broken bones tend to be pretty obvious.”
“There’s your innards. Anything could be going on inside you.” He was silent a moment, communing, she supposed, with his insides. “Feels okay, so far.”
“Good. I’m not a pilot, either, but I watched you bring that plane down. I have no idea how you managed it, but you did. That was amazing. I’ve never been so scared. Well, maybe one other time.” Just last Friday night, as a matter of fact. Insanely, she wanted to laugh.
He looked up at her, managed a smile. “Hey, since I walked away—well, ran away—I won’t call it a crash, but it was definitely what I’d term a forced landing.” He frowned, and she realized he was barely hanging on. “I couldn’t believe it when I saw this valley. I thought for sure we’d end up slamming into a mountain and some archaeologist would find us in a couple hundred years.”
“I don’t think you should count on that much luck ever happening again in your life. I’m sorry to tell you, but your plane’s pretty much destroyed. So’s your cool tie, now that it’s got blood all over it.”
He dropped her wrist. “A bomb.” His voice was faint now. “No, no, don’t fade out on me again. You’ve got to wake up, you’ve got to help me.” She leaned real close. “Look at me. What’s your name? That’s it, concentrate on your name. You can do it.” A bomb? He said there was a bomb? Well now, wasn’t that great, just great.
“My name’s Jack.”
“Okay, Jack. You hang in. We’re going to get to my car, you’ll at least
be safe there and warmer than you are here.”
Jack Crowne thought his head was going to burst, it hurt so bad. As for his leg, it nagged and throbbed, but he could deal with it. If he could have one more spot of luck, maybe that piece of plane hadn’t sliced him all that deep. “The Marauder—she’s a good plane,” he said, then cursed under his breath. “Was.”
His brain focused. “Didn’t you say something about my friend? You found another man? Older, on the small side? Wearing a silly pink-and-blue bow tie?”
She lightly touched her hand to his shoulder. “Yes, he’s over there. He’s unconscious, but alive. There’s blood all over his chest and on his head. I didn’t check for broken bones. I’m sorry, but I’m alone. Once I get you to my car, I’ll help him.”
“No, no, I’m pulling myself together. We must get to him now. My cell, let me get my cell, I’ll call for help.”
“Sorry, that’s not an option. Cells don’t work out here what with all the mountains and no towers. We’ll take care of him, don’t worry. All right now, don’t close your eyes. I really can’t lift you by myself. We’ll go over to help your friend.”
Jack gritted his teeth and thought about Timothy, who could be dying right now, right here, in this empty valley in the middle of nowhere. With her help he managed to ease up onto his elbows. He looked around. “I’m still in Kentucky?”
“Yes, close to the Virginia border. You managed to land your plane in the Cudlow Valley, the only break in the mountains for miles and miles. If you hadn’t made it here, well... it doesn’t matter, you did. Best not to dwell on that right now. Luck and skill, you had both. Now, your friend—”
“Help me to him and I’ll carry him to your car.” Rachael couldn’t imagine his helping anybody, but she clasped him around his chest and pulled. He came up to his knees, plastered against her. She paused for a moment, his head dipped to rest on her shoulder. “You okay?”
“The world’s spinning and I want to vomit, but yeah, I’m okay. Give me another minute.” Jack breathed slow and shallow. Thankfully, the nausea passed. His head pounded, sharp and heavy, but he could deal with that since it was no longer blinding him. “Okay, let’s go. I’ve got to see to Timothy.”
It took the better part of five minutes but he was finally standing, walking, Rachael taking as much of his weight as she could without dropping herself. “There’s Timothy. He hasn’t moved.”
With Rachael’s help, Jack knelt beside Dr Timothy MacLean. He checked his pulse, checked his head, then ran his hands over his arms and legs. He handed Rachael her leather jacket. “The blood on his chest—he’s got a good-sized gash, well below his heart, thank God. Doesn’t look deep and the bleeding’s stopped. I’d say he’s also got a couple of broken ribs. As for his head, I know he was unconscious when I got him out of the plane.”
“I saw him hit his head on some rocks.”
He cursed. “It’s my fault, I stumbled and he went flying.”
“Yeah, right, blaming yourself sure makes sense.”
He narrowed his eyes at her even as he took more deep breaths. She saw the fierce concentration on his face, watched him suck in a deep breath and lean down. He managed to pull the man up and over his shoulder. He staggered, but kept his feet. “I’m glad he’s on the small side,” he said, panting. “All right, Rachael, if you could ease yourself under my left arm, let’s give it a go.”
He wasn’t all that steady on his feet, but together they managed one step, then another and another. “My car’s on the side of the road, over there. She up and died on me and I don’t know a thing about cars.”
“I do,” he said, gritting his teeth, wanting to puke again. Timothy didn’t weigh much, but still it was nearly 140 pounds of dead weight. Jack stopped, waited until the nausea passed, which it thankfully did again. “Okay, what is it? Twenty more feet. I can do that.”
He did. She opened the back door and he eased his friend onto the backseat. He shrugged off his leather jacket and handed it to her. She was able to nearly cover Timothy completely with the two jackets. Jack leaned against the car, his eyes closed, the blood now caked on the left side of his face. “What time is it?”
“Going on eight o’clock.”
He said, still not opening his eyes, “Loosen the tie around my leg.”
She did. “Good, the bleeding’s stopped.”
His head listed to the side, then he straightened. “All right, let me take a look at your car. Maybe it’s something easy I can fix.”
Probably not, Rachael thought. Nothing was easy in her life. FIVE
As Jack straightened, he grazed his head on the raised hood and thought he’d pass out. He grabbed the dirty fender, closed his eyes tight, and let the world spin. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, being laid flat again; it might save his head from exploding. He felt her arms come around his chest to prop him up. She said, “Hold still for a moment. That’s right, I’ve got you.”
When he finally got himself together and pulled away, she said, “Are you okay?”
“Better days,” he said, “like yesterday. Thanks.”
She grinned up at him, and wanted to say, Me too. “Can you tell what’s wrong with my car? Can you fix it?”
“Any chance you’re out of gas?”
“Nope. I filled up in Hamilton.”
“Okay, the hoses look okay. Crank the car.”
She turned the ignition, but nothing happened. She tried again, still nothing.
“Okay, there’s no fuel coming out of the fuel line. Your fuel pump’s busted. It’s got to be replaced. I wish I could jury-rig it, but I can’t. That sign says we’re in a town called Parlow. Is it big enough to have a decent mechanic?”
She nodded. “Yeah, population’s maybe three thousand. It’s only a mile up the road. Is a fuel pump major?”
“Nah, and it’s not too expensive.”
“I was starting to walk to Parlow when I heard your plane coughing and sputtering. You said it was a bomb. I don’t understand.”
Now didn’t he have a big mouth? “I was probably wrong. It’s over, don’t worry about it.” He tried his cell again, knowing there wasn’t magically going to be a signal when there hadn’t been one the last dozen times he’d tried.
Sure enough, no signal.
She said, “Right, I won’t worry my pretty little head about it. You moron.”
He somehow managed a grin over the grinding pain in his head. “No one’s called me a moron since I forgot the condoms and Louise Draper walked out on me.”
“Well, there you go,” she said. “Forget the cell phone. It’s the mountains, and too few towers out here, like I said.”
“Okay, then, Parlow, Kentucky, here we come.” He looked once again at Timothy, still unconscious on the backseat, his face ghostly pale. But Timothy was alive, thank God, and Jack just had to keep him that way. At present, that was a pretty big joke—he was nearly ready to fall facedown onto the blacktop.
This was all she needed, Rachael thought, but what else could she do? She couldn’t leave this man here to fend for himself. Okay, so she’d arrive at Slipper Hollow later rather than sooner, no problem. Since Uncle Gillette didn’t know she was coming, he wouldn’t worry. She said, “I don’t think there’s anything more either of us can do except make it to Parlow and get some help.”
“Have you been here before?”
For the barest instant, her face froze before she said, “No, I haven’t.”
He studied her through a haze of pain, watching her hair curtain her face as she looked down, that braid cupping her cheek, then slowly nodded. “It’s okay, I haven’t, either.” He wasn’t stupid, he’d seen the shock of panic in her eyes, heard the lie, and wasn’t that strange? Who cared if she’d been in a little town in Kentucky? He ran his fingers through his dark hair, making it stand on end. “Parlow’s bound to have medical facilities, an ambulance.”
“Seems likely,” she said, and the way she said it—too studied— another lie.
Parlow would have a police chief or a sheriff, Jack thought. He really didn’t want to involve local law enforcement, but given his and Timothy’s current condition, he doubted he’d have a choice.
Walking beside the two-lane road was slow going. Jack was a big man and she had to take a lot of his weight to keep him upright and moving. After twenty steps, Rachael, now panting, said, “Stop a moment.” She leaned him against an oak tree beside the road. “This rest stop is as much for me as it is for you. Okay, okay, we don’t have much farther to go, we can do it.”
“Sorry, I forgot, what’s your name again?”
“Rachael—ah, well, last names aren’t really important, are they?”
His cop antennae flashed red again even though the Devil was pounding nails into his head. At least his leg was hurting a bit less so his brain could function a bit more. He wanted to ask her who she was and what she was afraid of, but he said, “I guess that would depend on why you don’t want to tell me. Do you think I’m going to hit on you and you don’t want me to follow you home?”
Hit on her? Her? “I guess your head injury is making you blind.”
“Oh no, a man is never blind when it comes to a woman. Well, unless he’s dead.”
She laughed, shook her head at him, pushed her hair behind her ear. The braid fell forward to dangle alongside her cheek again. He’d have told her it was sexy, if he’d had the strength. She said, “I saved your bacon—drop it. Well, to be honest here, you saved your own bacon, but then you dropped it and I picked it up. I figure you owe me.”
“Yes, ma’am, I surely do. I wonder if Parlow has a hospital.”
“Oh no—well, who knows? There’s probably a community hospital not far from here. We’ll see, won’t we?”
Got you on that one, kiddo.
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