Page 32 of Final Approach

She set it ablaze with ease. Was this what Girl Scouts taught in America? I made a mental note to ask her where she received her training. Once the fire sizzled to her satisfaction, she stared back at Ambrose and Madman, who’d watched silently from their position.

“Come on, Ambrose,” she coaxed sweetly, bordering on mocking. “You need answers, so let’s go over the facts.” Her brows curled inward in a grimace. “The facts I remember, anyway.”

She took up residence on the dirt floor, looking ridiculous in her oversized clothing and heels, and yet I couldn’t take my eyes off her. Her glossy dark hair was pulled into a tight ponytail at the top of her head, casting a college-dormitory silhouette onto the cracked ground beyond the firelight. Her shorts rode up as she sat, and I noted the thick cord of a raised, purple scar starting at the knee and running upward to where fabric met skin. A similar cord wrapped around my insides.

Something—someone, perhaps—had hurt her.

My baby girl.

Lowering my body, I sat next to her, a respectable distance away, but close enough to reach for her, if necessary. I wrapped my arms around my knees in an attempt at comfort while Ambrose slowly stepped toward the fire, as if relenting to Marley was an admission of defeat. He slowly lowered to sitting with a clenched grimace of pain. He sat on the edge, as far away from the pair of us as he could, but he sat all the same, and his expression morphed from discomfort to expectant.

Marley smiled tentatively at the other man in our little midnight party who hadn’t yet moved. “No need to beat anyone up on my behalf, okay, Madman? We’re probably going to need your help to sort this out.”

Madman’s face was a mask of heavy stone, but he dipped it in acknowledgment and moved closer to the fire. His eyes roamed the chunk of metal at our backs before scanning the dark shadows in the jungle to our front. Once satisfied, he opted to stand at the helm of our fire, assuming the role of sentinel.

Our transported prisoner had taken the role of our guard. How ironic.

“Let’s set some ground rules first,” I suggested as I stared down the hostile man seated opposite. “No schoolyard name-calling, no interrupting, and you agree to reserve your judgment until you’ve heard what we have to say. Can you agree to that?”

A stiff nod. Right, then. My part in this assembly was over. While Marley took the helm, I could travel down one thousand different paths of anxiety in my head, wondering where our copilot had disappeared to, why we were transporting drugs, and fantasize about my next drop of drink.

“Alright, Captain.” I dipped my head in her direction. “Let’s talk facts.”

“Facts,” Marley repeated, her gaze fixed on the flames before us as if they held the answers to our questions. Her head snapped upward, catching Ambrose in her snare.

The vivid green of her irises had darkened to deep emerald, and they held the composure of a monarch doling out counsel. Fair and discerning, not a drop of her own personal pain in view.

The Baron would admire the breadth of her control. It only made me nervous. Those with the most control unraveled the fastest, and hit the hardest when they finally came undone. I couldn’t allow it to happen—not again. Not to her.

“I don’t have any memories before the crash, Ambrose. My last memory is driving to the airport for my turnaround shift.” Her cheeks flushed a rich rose pink, the same color as the familiar velvet drapes in my childhood sitting room.

This admission was haunting her, I realized. Her gaze held a sharp note of determination when she continued.

“I don’t know what happened, why we went down, or why I ended up in the cabin instead of the cockpit.” She tapped the side of her temple. “I don’t know if it’s trauma, or a concussion, or if I’ll ever get those memories back. I can’t tell you what happened because I legitimately do not know.”

A sad smile pulled at the lips I’d one day kiss.

“What I do know is that my passengers’ safety has always been my top priority. I have logged over 1400 flights in my career. Captain Adams and I have been flying together for five years. Whatever you’re thinking about competencies, we are not an amateur operation. Less experienced pilots wouldn’t have left survivors.”

No, they would not. Score one for Marley. And Jameson.

Jamie Adams had landed the plane, that much we knew for sure. Wherever our friend was now, whatever he was mixed up in, we needed to find him.

“Aileron is a small company, but they won’t ignore an ELT,” Marley continued, unaware of my inward spiral. “Whether they get to us tomorrow or the next day, we will be rescued. We just need to survive these few days together. You’ll get compensated by insurance once they submit the audit, and you can move forward with your life. Depending on what they uncover, I may never get to fly again.”

The ELT. Damn it. We needed to be rescued, of course we did, but what would happen to us if the drugs were found? Would we be arrested? In Colombia, of all places? I drew in Madman’s ferocious visage, even in this moment of calm. A man of my stature was not built for prison, not without the madmen of the world providing their protection like he was now.

A violent shudder rattled through my muscles and deep into my bones. We had to hide the drugs. It was the only way to ensure our innocence.

Marley tapped her head again. “I’d like to think I followed every procedure, but I don’t remember it.” She huffed a caustic laugh. “And really, it’s irrelevant. People lost their lives, and I wasn’t able to save them. That’s on me.”

“It is not on you,” I muttered darkly, thick anger rising in my chest at her insistence on being the martyr.

She dismissively waved her hand. “I know how you feel,” she confirmed gently, “and this is how I feel. Nothing you can say will change that, Nik.”

We’d see about that. I stifled my frustration by turning my attention to Ambrose. The man’s poker face was admirable. Not a single muscle had shifted in those perfect, rounded cheekbones as he listened to her. But he was listening, I’d grant him that.

Madman shifted his position from the edge of the fire and stood beside Marley, squatting down on his haunches to stare into her eyes. She remained seated and poised, refusing to cower under his scrutiny. I was learning every day she had balls and beauty in equal measure, and hiding my attraction was becoming an impossible task.