To Have And To Hold (Mills & Boon Vintage 90s Modern)

by Sally Wentworth

  ‘Here, let me,’ she called out.

  ‘Alix!’ Rhys’s voice was tense with fear for her.

  ‘I must help. What about the pilot?’

  ‘He’s alive. I’m going to him now.’

  Somehow, between them, Todd and Alix managed to carry Martin out of danger. Todd was limping badly and his left arm hung uselessly at his side. When they reached the tree and put Martin down, he grunted out, ‘You—look after him. I’ll go back—help Rhys.’

  ‘No, you can’t! You’re hurt. I’ll go.’

  Todd tried to protest but she was already gone, able to see better now and avoid the bushes. Rhys was still inside the plane. Hoisting herself up, Alix went in to find him. He was in what was left of the cockpit, trying to free the pilot’s trapped legs. When he saw her, he could only shake his head and say, ‘Oh, Alix.’

  She smiled. ‘That’s what I usually say to you.’

  His eyes widened, settled on her face for an incredulous moment, but then he became practical again and said, ‘Can you pull his leg free if I can lever this piece of metal away?’

  ‘Of course.’

  The poor man cried out in pain when she touched him, but somehow they pulled him free.

  ‘He’s bleeding badly,’ she said in distress, feeling the blood on her hands.

  ‘The first-aid kit; see if you can find it. It should be here in the cockpit somewhere.’

  Alix groped around, cut her hand on a piece of metal, but found the box and, oh, thank God, there was a torch inside it. Rhys worked quickly and efficiently, stopping the bleeding, putting on a thick dressing, then splinting up his broken legs.

  ‘All right, let’s try and get him out. I’ll take his head. Try and be as careful as you can with his legs.’

  They had trouble getting him out of the door, but somehow they managed it and carried him over to the others. Martin had come round and his father was holding him while he was being sick. Rhys put the pilot down and straightened up. ‘I’ll go back and get the first-aid kit.’

  ‘No, Rhys, please,’ Alix said in distress.

  He put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. ‘If the plane was going to go up it would have gone by now. I’ll be back in just a few minutes.’

  He was longer than that, and when he returned he was laden with blankets, cushions, drinks, Martin’s bag, as well as the first-aid box. They were busy, then, the two of them, working as a team to make the pilot more comfortable, putting Todd’s arm in a splint and a sling, taking a look at his leg and putting a dressing on it, examining Martin and finding that he was shaking with shock but otherwise seemed to be unhurt. They gave Martin a drink and some chocolate, wrapping everyone in blankets, trying to keep them warm, lit a fire of twigs and leaves.

  Only then, when there was nothing else she could do did Alix relax and find that she was completely exhausted. She sank to the ground, her legs like jelly, and found that she was suddenly shaking uncontrollably. Rhys had gone back to the plane and came back with a lot more things, including some water to heat over the fire in the drink cans to make coffee. Alix was sitting in the shadows and it was a few minutes before he came over to her. He put his arm round her, felt the convulsive tremors that ran through her and immediately drew her closer. ‘It’s all right,’ he murmured. ‘You’re safe, little one.’

  He comforted her like a child, stroking her hair, letting her feel the strength of his body. Alix wept a little, but presently became still, her head on his shoulder.

  Rhys must have thought she’d fallen asleep, because he said softly to Todd, who was cradling his son in his good arm, ‘Did you manage to get through to anyone on the radio?’

  ‘We were sending out mayday signals the whole time, but we weren’t sure of our position. But the lights Alix saw-—the pilot thought he saw them up ahead just before we went down.’

  ‘We should be able to find the place easily enough, then,’ Rhys said confidently. ‘I’ll set off at first light.’

  Alix sat up. ‘Surely they’ll be sending out search planes to look for us. They knew we were coming, didn’t they? They might even be looking for us now.’ Rhys threw another log on the fire, watched the sparks fly up—and then Alix understood. ‘They don’t know where we are, won’t know where to look,’ she said dully.

  ‘No.’ Rhys didn’t try to hide it from her. ‘So I’ll have to go and get help.’

  ‘If we kept the fire going,’ Alix said on a desperate note, ‘surely someone would see it, or see the smoke?’

  ‘Very probably,’ Rhys agreed. But he glanced towards the pilot and said, ‘He needs medical attention quickly, Alix. I’ve given him some morphine to kill the pain but there isn’t much left.’

  She didn’t argue any more but said firmly, ‘Then you must get some sleep. Go on, I’ll watch the fire.’

  ‘OK, thanks.’ He gave her a hug. ‘Watch out for any passing grizzly bears.’

  ‘They’d better watch out themselves,’ she responded. ‘We could do with their coats.’

  Rhys woke a couple of times during the long hours of darkness; she could tell by the sudden tensing of his body, then he would relax again and after a while fall into another troubled sleep. The dawn seemed to break very slowly, just a lightening in the sky and then the shapes of the trees emerging slowly through the morning mist. The pilot had done wonderfully well; they seemed to have come down in the only patch of open ground for miles around, an area that must have been burned to the ground within the last couple of years, because there were only low bushes and saplings growing.

  Alix set some more water on to heat and when it was boiling made some coffee, then woke Rhys. He turned over and it was only then that she saw the dried cut on his forehead.

  ‘Rhys, your head.’

  He put a hand up to it. ‘Must have bumped it when the plane crashed.’

  ‘It must have been that that knocked you out.’

  He looked surprised. ‘Was I out?’

  ‘I thought you were dead,’ Alix told him, inwardly shuddering at the fear she’d felt.

  Perhaps it showed in her face, because Rhys drew her to him to kiss her. ‘You didn’t really think you’d get rid of me that easily, did you?’ He drank the coffee, rose, and winced as he flexed his muscles.

  Todd woke with a groan, rousing Martin. The boy was much better this morning but terribly white and subdued, still inwardly blaming himself for the crash. Rhys, however, made him look in his fishing gear for a knife, rescue the compass from the plane, and generally help him to get ready.

  When he was, Alix stood up. ‘I’m coming with you.’

  Rhys kissed her but shook his head. ‘No, my darling, you must stay here and look after the others. Be ready to attract the attention of a plane if one flies over.’

  ‘But how can I possibly do that?’

  ‘By setting fire to our plane,’ he said steadily. ‘Look, I’ve made it all ready for you.’ He gave her Todd’s lighter. ‘All you have to do is set light to this petrol trail I’ve laid, then run like hell and get behind a tree. Do you think you can do that?’

  ‘Yes, of course. But, Rhys, I can’t let you go alone.’

  ‘You must. Don’t worry. Now, I must go. Walk with me a little way.’ He said goodbye to the others then put his arm round Alix’s waist as they walked out of sight among the trees.

  ‘You’ll mark a trail,’ she said anxiously, fully prepared to follow him if he didn’t come back.

  ‘I promise.’ Rhys kissed her then, kissed her with such passion that she reeled. He looked into her face for a long moment, then tore himself away and went striding off through the trees. When he was almost out of sight he looked back and waved.

  Alix went slowly back, made the others as comfortable as she could, and sat down to watch—and worry.

  She didn’t have to set light to the plane. In the afternoon when the sun was hot overhead, she heard the unmistakable sound of a helicopter engine. Alix had been bathing the pilot’s forehead, trying to calm what seemed
to be a growing fever, and wondering if he ought to have another shot of morphine. Martin heard the helicopter at the same time and shouted excitedly. Together they ran out into the open, waving blankets, jumping up and down and yelling at the tops of their voices. The helicopter came low, hovered, and three men in flying suits and helmets jumped out.

  For a moment Alix didn’t recognise Rhys and she grabbed the first man. ‘My husband! Have you seen my husband?’

  He gestured behind him and then she saw the third man taking off his helmet. Rhys grinned at her. ‘It was almost worth crashing to hear you call me that.’

  Then she was in his arms and held very tightly as she sobbed out her relief.

  It was night again, but the circumstances were so different now. The pilot was in hospital. He was going to be all right, the doctors had said, out of action for a few months until his legs mended, but then be as good as new. Martin and Todd, his arm set in plaster, were spending the night in a nursing home in the nearest town, waiting for Lynette to fly out to them. But father and son were comforting each other and keeping close. The doctors had wanted Alix and Rhys to stay in their care overnight, too, but both had refused. Instead they’d been driven to the log cabin that Rhys had rented, one very similar, he said, to the cabin that he had found earlier, and where he’d woken the surprised occupants only a couple of hours after he had set out for help.

  Their battered suitcases had been rescued from the plane, the cabin had already been provisioned, and someone had lit the fire in the stone fireplace. They’d already eaten and bathed, back at the hospital. Now they drank a silent toast to each other and stood on the fur rug in the firelight, slowly undressing one another, the flickering shadows hiding the bruises, the dressing on Rhys’s forehead where he would always have a scar. When they were naked he kissed her, going down on his knees in physical worship. Then he picked her up and carried her to the big, warm bed.

  ‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ he murmured as he held her in his arms.

  For answer Alix smiled and moved against him.

  He groaned and was suddenly leaning over her, suddenly intense. ‘Don’t ever run away from me again,’ he said forcefully. ‘Swear you won’t.’

  Putting her hands on either side of his face, she gave him a teasing look. ‘Oh, I might.’ She felt him tense and said quickly, ‘But only as far as the nearest bedroom—and only if you’ll promise to catch me.’

  Relaxing, he bit her ear lobe. ‘Minx.’ Then his eyes darkened and he pulled her to him, to make love to her with all the passion and urgency that she’d once glimpsed but never known, lovemaking that was a thousand light-years away from their wedding-night. And as he took her in a savage blaze of hunger, Alix knew that she’d found the love she’d always dreamt of at last.

  ISBN: 9781408987377

  To Have And To Hold

  © Sally Wentworth 1994

  First Published in Great Britain in 1994

  Harlequin (UK) Limited

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