by Em Petrova
“It’s a snowstorm. We’re flying straight into it, and most likely, I won’t be able to land.” She continued to scan the controls, familiarizing herself with them in the event she had to put this baby on the ground in a hurry. Between this asshole demanding she land and the violent winds threatening to rip them from the sky and smash them on the ground, her heart couldn’t beat any faster.
“That is not acceptable! You must land. We need to search for my brother.”
Cora’s blood ran cold at his statement.
“I don’t see any way to land here, sir.” She kept her voice even despite the terror of another plane crash pounding through her veins. She could still feel the G-force of falling out of the sky and hear the screech of metal.
Dad. What do I do?
If her father could answer, he would tell her to do what it took to survive. Knowing how the hijacker reacted to being told that they couldn’t travel to his new destination, she could count on this brother being a demanding asshole that he believed himself immune to death and above the forces of nature.
Out here, it was man versus nature, and man rarely won that battle. She’d been lucky to live through the plane crash. They’d all defied God by surviving that avalanche.
She turned her head to look at the man hovering over her shoulder harassing her. “You need to sit back and fasten your seatbelt.”
He ignored her. “My brother is out there somewhere. We must find him and take him home to our mother.”
“Your brother most likely died in that avalanche on the ridge like the others in your group.” The perverse words came into her head and projected from her mouth before she could lock them inside.
The man’s hand struck so fast, she barely had time to think. When the pain flashed through her cheek, she felt that same ear-ringing shock she did when the hijacker struck her.
Fury rose up, hot and as wild as the storm raging around them now. “Keep your hands off me, you evil bastard!”
“Land this plane where I tell you and I won’t kill you once we hit the ground.”
She glared through the windshield at the landscape. She knew from navigating these parts that up ahead was an opening large enough to land the plane. That was providing conditions were all perfect, the wind didn’t lift the wings and send them into the mountain and Yahontov keeping his fucking hands off her.
“Land it, woman, or I’ll learn how to do it myself!” He locked his grip on her controls.
Panic set in, and she fought to override it. “Get your hands off my controls! You hired me to fly this plane. Let me do my job!”
He removed his hand, but the plane had dipped lower on the left, forcing her to straighten it.
She could put this plane down hard enough to kill these two men.
Maybe the thought had always nestled in the recesses of her mind. Her father had taught her how to survive a crash. Last time she’d been unconscious, boneless, and not bracing for impact, which she believed might have spared her life.
Now she was thinking about crashing on purpose.
No, it’s a forced landing. Not unheard of by bush pilots, and she’s been on two such excursions with her daddy when he was forced to land.
With her knowledge, she could do it. She felt confident in that. She just didn’t want to die in the process.
It was a chance she must take. If she didn’t land where Yahontov wanted her to, he’d likely slit her throat and toss her aside to land the craft himself.
She either died by her own hands or his. And she wasn’t about to give him that power.
“Land this plane! Now!” His bellow shook her eardrums.
“Fine!” She adjusted the speed. The man still wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. If she set down hard enough, maybe he’d smash his skull or break his damn neck. She hoped both.
She pressed the throttle forward and adjusted the rudder pedals to a neutral position. The airspeed dial still read in the green, showing their speed would keep them from stalling in the air and they weren’t losing altitude.
Yet.
I need your help, Dad. Now’s a good time.
Talking to her father’s spirit granted her all the calm she required to do this. She pulled in a deep breath. The instrument that told her their location between ground and horizon read right where she wanted it.
She dragged another slow breath and released it, counting down in her head.
Five. Four.
Could she really do this? Land hard enough to kill her passengers but not herself? Did she have a choice?
Four. Four. Four.
C’mon, Cora girl. You got this.
Her father’s voice in her mind spurred her on.
The plane dipped, tunneling through the air toward the ground.
“Three two one!” she rushed out all at once.
“What are you doing!” Yahontov’s enraged voice shook the interior of the plane. He leaned over her, pushing at controls that would only make things worse. She lifted her elbow and struck him in the mouth with all her strength, knocking him backward just enough to let her finish it.
The aircraft shook as it plummeted through the thick whiteout. In seconds, they would hit the ground, but she intended to pull up hard just before that happened.
If only she could see the ground.
Her gut told her she had milliseconds. Yahontov appeared over her shoulder again, grabbing for controls. This time she used her hard head to bash his.
Pain splintered through her skull, but she had enough wits to continue.
Wind screamed by the windows. The right wing dipped. If she’d tried, she couldn’t do this more perfectly.
Suddenly, she pulled up sharply. The nose jerked into the air, but the right wing struck earth. The plane pitched. She extended her legs so as not to have them broken, even though her instinct was to crunch into a ball and close her eyes.
The impact rang her bells. Then she smelled the acrid smoke.
In a flurry, she reached for her seatbelt and unfastened it. With the plane cocked onto its side, she dropped out of her seat. Then flipping her legs around, she kicked at the door until it opened.
Thank God it wasn’t crushed, trapping her. She dived through the exit and landed in deep snow.
The icy flakes enveloped her gloved hands as she braced for her fall, but she couldn’t keep from face-planting into the snow. The cold rush cleared her head, and she shoved to her feet, whirling in the same motion to look at the plane.
Staring at yet another wreckage twisted her gut, and her stomach threatened to revolt. She held in the bile pushing at her throat and stumbled away from the burning plane.
Smoke billowed out. One of the men kicked at the other door that was pinned shut by the wing, which folded across it like a paper airplane wing.
For a moment, she took in how perfect this was. Both evil men would die in the burning plane. She’d be safe. Xtreme Ops would be safe, from them at least.
“Help!” The man’s scream plied at the human side of her. She listened to him scream for an endless, heart-pounding minute before she couldn’t stand it anymore.
She rushed forward and crawled through the open door. “Here! Come this way!”
A glance at the rear showed her the man seated on the right side of the plane lay crumpled on his side, dead from the plane caving in on him.
But Yahontov…that son of a bitch lived.
Cora hesitated. Was she really about to save him?
“Help me!” he called again.
“Dammit!” She extended her hand to him. When strong fingers wrapped around her wrist, she used her body weight to drag him forward into the cockpit. She smelled his blood, a sickening stench that burned her nostrils along with the smoke. They didn’t have long. The fire could reach the gas tank and the plane could burst into flames any moment.
Digging in her feet, she pushed herself backward. She landed in the snow and continued to pull and tug until Yahontov landed at her feet.
Blood poured from a
wound on his scalp, and from his mouth. She hoped her elbow blow had done that to him.
Black eyes stared into her, and Cora’s gut heaved again.
She automatically reached into her coat pocket and settled her fingers over the hunting knife she always carried. A bush woman never knew when a sharp blade would come in handy to dispatch an injured animal or to cut some simple twine for a birthday gift. Since the day her daddy had put the knife into her hand, she carried it faithfully.
Yahontov lurched toward her, and she yanked out the knife, flicking the blade up at the same time.
She didn’t hesitate—she jammed the knife into his body, in the sinew between neck and shoulder. He screamed and made a grab for the knife, but she yanked it free and stabbed him a second time. This time she sank it deep into his gut. The stench of liver bile hit her nose, and hot blood poured over her fingers.
Scrambling on the snow, she panted hard with exertion and the realization of what she’d done. So much blood. Could she end this man’s life? Taking down a plane was one thing—killing with her bare hands, in cold blood, was something different.
Yahontov reared up again, those cold, dark eyes burning with hate.
With no choice, Cora raised the knife over her head and brought it down with all her strength. He shook off the stab and withdrawal of her blade, this time in his upper arm. Blood dripped off her knife and into the snow.
Where were the wolves when she needed them?
A scream rose in her throat and clung there as Yahontov picked himself up and moved one more step toward her. The menace on his face had her gasping—and more determined than ever. Until he stopped, she couldn’t. She must defend herself or die by his hands.
Yahontov’s feet dragged through the snow. Cora’s chest heaved. “Don’t make me kill you!”
He smiled, smearing blood across his teeth.
Fury lifted her hand. She held the knife high, poised to strike.
One more step. The toe of his boot dragged in the snow. Blood dripped from the many wounds she’d delivered, and wind and snow whipped around them in a tempest.
All of a sudden, Yahontov’s expression changed. He pitched forward.
The cry she trapped inside her throat escaped, snatched by the wind so she couldn’t even hear it on the howl of the storm. Snow blasted into her face, and she blinked rapidly at the fallen man.
He lay face down in the snow. Either dead or dying. Injured enough to stop…finally.
Her instinct was to drop the knife and cleanse her hands in the frigid snow, but she needed to keep hold of it in case he got up.
Not far away, smoke spiraled from the plane. Would anybody see it? She wouldn’t last out here very long without supplies.
She had to put up a mayday if she could.
Keeping her attention on the man in the snow, she scurried around him, giving him a wide berth. At the plane, she reached inside and fumbled around for the headset. When she placed it on her head before takeoff, Yahontov had ordered her not to connect or speak to anybody.
Penn had seen her. Looked straight at her. He would come for her, but she still had to try to call for help.
She twisted a dial and shoved the mic to her lips. “Mayday. Mayday. Flight down forty miles off the coast, headed southeast. Please help. Mayday.”
With no idea if she was heard, she tossed the headset and crawled as far away from the burning plane and the body lying in the snow. Gavrie Yahontov didn’t move, and she was glad for it. Did that make her a monster? She felt no remorse for her actions—it was self-defense. Now she saw what drove the men of Xtreme Ops to fight.
Maybe she’d just found her next path in life. After two plane crashes, serving and protecting sounded like a piece of cake.
Chapter Twelve
“Penn.”
He swung around and nailed Lipton in his stare. His first in command’s grim expression and the phone he offered him did nothing to ease the frantic pressure around Penn’s heart.
He snatched the phone and pasted it to the side of his head. “Sullivan.”
“This is JR, your OFFAT officer. We’ve got your plane on the map.”
His heart gave a hard jog in his chest. “How? Where?”
“We just got a mayday signal.”
“Was it a woman?”
“The connection is staticky, but yes, we believe it’s the woman you’re looking for.”
“Where is she?” He tensed, prepared to run to the snowmobiles they had lined up to carry them places where the chopper couldn’t.
“She’s exactly where you thought, Sullivan. Good work. Reinsel is impressed with you.”
He gave zero fucks about Colonel Reinsel or any impression he made on the man. All he wanted was to reach Cora. Christ, her plane was down, she’d survived yet another crash, and he could only hope she was still alive.
She had to be.
“Keep me updated, JR.” Without so much as a thanks or goodbye, Penn thrust the phone at Lipton and rushed for the snowmobiles gassed up and ready to go.
They all jumped on a machine, and with Penn in the lead, zoomed across the landscape headed straight for the place where the plane was down. He gripped the heated handlebars and did something he hadn’t done in too long—he prayed.
His momma had raised two sons who knew how to ask for help from higher powers when the time called for it. This was one of those times. He set his jaw and channeled every bit of his energy into thinking about Cora and praying she was whole and could hang on until they reached her.
If anyone could survive an Alaskan storm, it was her. The woman had enough knowledge of survival, and he was rarely impressed by anybody. But Cora impressed him.
I’m coming, Angel. Hang on.
He hit top speed on a flat, topping 150 miles per hour. Speeds like this would put them at the scene in minutes. Still too much time, in his opinion.
“Damn, these things cruise,” Broshears’ voice projected into his ear.
“Good to know OFFAT doesn’t suck. They came through for us,” Lipton added.
Penn ignored their talk, focusing solely on the landscape and leading them on the fastest route to Cora.
Five minutes in, they hit the edge of the storm. After seeing it from the air in the chopper, he knew just how big the system stretched. It filled the whole sky. Right now, snow would be heavily falling on Cora. Was she safe? Was she—
His thought cut short as he spotted the smoke cloud rising into the air.
“There!” Lipton called out, but Penn was already turning his snowmobile, cutting sharply across the land to reach her faster.
He counted down the seconds in his mind. When he reached a full minute, he began to search the area for the wreckage. They cut a corner off a field, launched up over a small rise…and he spotted it.
Twisted metal of the plane, a wing flipped up. Flames had charred away the paint and some of the metal peeled back to reveal the skeleton of the steel frame. Insides, a blackened lump of a seat was all that was left of the cockpit.
He slammed on the brakes, and his machine skidded on the thick snow. Penn’s boots hit the ground before the other men jumped off too, all six of them quickly converging on the wreck.
“Cora!” His vocal cords shook with the force of his scream.
“Jesus, this one’s dead.” Broshears flipped over the man who was face-down in the snow, revealing his dead stare to the sky.
“Yahontov,” two of the guys said together.
“Cora!” Penn set off around the plane, scoping the nearby trees he knew she’d take shelter in.
When he spotted tracks in the snow zigzagging through the trees, he brought up his rifle.
“You see those, Captain?” Hepburn asked.
“Too big to be hers,” he said under his breath but loud enough for his men to hear.
“Think it’s Antonov?” Hepburn asked.
Beckett’s response came to them. “Nope—his charred corpse is sitting right here buckled into the plane seat.�
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Penn raised a hand and signaled to his team. In seconds, they spread out in a line through the trees. Goddammit, he needed Cora safe before searching for whoever was on foot in these woods.
His mind darted to the moment when he’d looked up to see Cora with a knife at her throat. This could not be a repeat of that—over his dead body.
He tracked the footprints through a cluster of pines and spotted the remnants of a tent, the nylon in tatters from the ruthless winds, but clearly a place where a man had been sheltering during these days since he escaped the Huttons’ downed plane.
A sharp cry sounded, and he whirled to see the red parka rising up from the snow, arm lifted. Even through the heavy snowfall and swirling wind, he saw the lethal blade Cora held.
“Cora,” he whispered.
“Fuck, she’s out of her head.” Hepburn stopped in his tracks as if seeing a grizzly rather than a broken and frightened woman. If it was the last thing he ever did, he’d ensure she never experienced another week like this one.
In a few steps, Penn closed the gap between him and the woman he’d guard with his life.
The woman he was falling in love with.
He reached for her hand holding the knife. “Cora! It’s me. Stop. It’s Penn!” His words didn’t break through her attack mode, and he grappled with her hand. Wrenching the knife from her, he simultaneously caught her by the waist and yanked her off her feet against him.
She fought like a trapped bird, striking him in the stomach with a lethal elbow jab. The air whooshed from him, and then she went dead still.
“Penn!”
“It’s me. Shhh. Be quiet. Someone’s lurking around. We think it’s Yahontov.” His words spilled out next to her ear in a quiet rush even as his heart slammed hard and fast with relief that he’d reached her and she was well enough to fight him.
She didn’t speak. He set her on her feet and looked into her eyes. A cut on her brow had blood streaked down her cheekbone, and she bore a lump on her temple, but she was standing. She was alive.
“Penn,” she rasped. Her knees gave out, and he held her up, moving her to a thick tree and using his body to block her from an attack that could come from any angle. Yahontov would be armed and would not go down without a fight.
