Tailspin

by Sandra Brown

  His eyes scaled down from her face to the toes of her boots and up again. “As nice a prize as you would make, I don’t think they’re after your sweet self, so much as that box you’re welded to. More to the point, they’re after what’s in it.”

  Of their own volition, her lips parted with alarm.

  “Riiiight,” he said. “That weird pair were waiting for you, and you are going to tell me why, and you are going to tell me now.”

  She raised her chin in defiance. “Or what?”

  8:32 a.m.

  Rye gave the small of Brynn’s back a nudge to get her across the threshold, followed her into the room, and closed the door with a solid thunk. He pressed the button on the doorknob and slid the chain lock into place. The curtains were drawn, but there was an inch-wide separation in the middle of the window. He overlapped the edges to close it.

  The decor was standard mountain-cabin-in-the-woods à la the sixties. The artwork on the knotty pine–paneled walls was reminiscent of the bear in Brady White’s office, the bedspread striped in earth tones, the lampshades made of burlap. In the bathroom, everything was tan and basic motel issue.

  While he conducted his brief inspection of the layout, Brynn didn’t move from the spot where she’d taken root just inside the door. She said, “After a drive long enough to make me car sick—”

  “Mountain roads. It’s not my fault they’re winding.”

  “But I thought you were going to the airplane.”

  “I thought so, too. Change of plan. Besides, it’s still too foggy to take pictures.”

  “What are we doing here?”

  He set his flight bag on the seat of a chair, then removed his bomber jacket and tossed it onto the bed. It landed with the lining side up. Brynn frowned with distaste.

  “Don’t be so hard on her,” he said. “She’s kept me warm many a night.” He waited a beat, then added, “But since you’re here…” He left the suggestion hanging.

  “Dream on. I’m not a pinup girl.”

  His gaze lowered to her mouth, and then to her breasts, and when it reconnected with hers, he said, “You’d do.”

  Suddenly they were no longer sparring. Those two words, and the raspiness with which he’d spoken them, had caused a seismic mood shift. Worse, both of them were aware of it.

  To set things right again, he turned away from her and forced a light laugh. “Relax, Dr. O’Neal. I don’t have designs like that on you.”

  “Answer my question.”

  “I forgot what it was.” He sat down on the bed, pulled off one boot and let it drop, then the other.

  “What are we doing here?”

  “Oh, that. I’m waiting you out.”

  “Waiting me out?”

  “Until you give me the last number of the combination.”

  “You don’t need it. You’ve seen inside.” She hefted the box by the handle.

  He got up, wrested it from her, and set it on top of the dresser. “When I asked the first time what was in it, why didn’t you just say, ‘It’s four vitally important and time-sensitive blood samples that must be kept airtight’?”

  He shook his head. “Instead, you acted squirrely. That’s Rawlins’s word, and, as bad as I hate to agree with him, it’s a perfect description. From the time you came sneaking out of the woods toward the plane, you’ve been disingenuous.”

  “That’s a step up from dodgy and squirrely.”

  He fixed a stare on her. “I’m not playing, Brynn. My reputation is on the line and so is Dash’s. Trust me on this, I’m not screwing around.”

  “Neither am I.”

  “Fair enough.” He pointed to the box. “Something’s inside the lining. Just like there’s a world map on the other side of that beauty.” He nodded down at his jacket. “If there’s nothing else in there, why didn’t you scream bloody murder when I hustled you out of that café?”

  She opened her mouth, but nothing came out before she quickly closed it.

  “See, that’s what I thought,” he said. “You wanted to avoid those two guys because they worry you. You’re up to something, and I want to know what it is. I wish you’d tell me now and save us both time and hassle. And money. I’m out forty-five bucks for these charming accommodations. I don’t want to be here any more than you do.”

  “Nobody asked you to poke your nose in.”

  “No, I wasn’t asked. I was obligated.”

  “How so?”

  “Whatever is in your precious box cost Dash an airplane and could have cost Brady White his life. So you had just as well take off your coat and get comfortable, because you’re not leaving this room until I know what’s so goddamn valuable.”

  “My coat stays on.”

  He made a suit-yourself gesture, then looked down at the box. “Who’d you steal it from?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “Says the career thief’s daughter. Is your old man in on it?”

  “I haven’t seen him in years.”

  “Marlene White heard he’d made parole.”

  “I heard that, too.”

  “You haven’t seen him since his release?”

  “No.” He looked at her with skepticism. She repeated her no with emphasis and added, “He’s got nothing to do with this.”

  “What is this? What’s the contraband? An explosive devise of some kind? It’s set to blow at a given time, and you don’t want to be around when it does. Is that why you’re in such a big hairy hurry to hand it off?”

  “Are you insane?”

  “Are you?”

  “No.”

  “What about your cohort Dr. Lambert?”

  “He’s a genius.”

  “A genius who adheres to some radical credo—”

  “No!”

  “You’re right. A bomb doesn’t sound like him. Too militant. Too ballsy. Not scientific enough.” He stroked his chin as though considering. “You two are going to poison Atlanta’s water supply? Contaminate the CDC with a smart virus? Inject one into the hot dogs at Turner Field?”

  She bent her head down and rubbed the space between her eyebrows.

  “Am I warm?” he asked.

  “Nowhere near.”

  “Then open the box and show me what’s under the foam lining.”

  “There’s nothing under there.”

  “Then prove it. Let me see.”

  “No.”

  “Brynn—”

  “No!”

  He held her stare while seconds ticked off, then he squared up the box with the edge of the dresser and dialed in the four numbers he knew. She placed her hand on his wrist. “Wait. Don’t. Please. The contents could be compromised. I swear that’s the truth.”

  “Okay. I’ll believe that much. But we’re not talking about blood samples, are we?”

  “They did come from possible donors.”

  “I’ll even buy that. Keep going.”

  She looked at him with appeal. “Can’t you be satisfied with knowing that it’s vital I get this to Atlanta with all due haste?”

  “Tell me why it’s vital.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Because you’re involved in something illegal.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  “Silence means yes.”

  She came back with asperity. “Silence means it’s impossible to give you a simple yes or no. But I swear that it’s not illegal in the sense you mean.”

  “Then tell me in what sense it’s illegal.”

  “I can’t!”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s delicate and complicated, and I don’t trust you.”

  She could have answered him in any number of ways that wouldn’t have surprised him, but this did, probably because it sounded truthful and unmitigated. “How come?”

  “I don’t even know you.”

  That sparked a reaction from him as automatic as an alarm from a cockpit instrument. “Well, we can fix that.”

  He cupped the back of her head in his palm a
nd drew her up to meet his mouth.

  Chapter 11

  8:44 a.m.

  The instant Rye slid his tongue between her lips, he acknowledged that he’d been waiting for any excuse to kiss her.

  He heard a little catch in her breath, felt a small puff of it against his lips. Both were sexy as hell and encouraging. He angled his head. The deeper he explored, the better she tasted, the more carnally his intent was channeled. Somehow he’d known her mouth was made for this.

  Reaching inside her coat, he curved his arm around her waist and pulled her to him. He felt the giving fullness of her breasts when matched to his chest. A slight shift of his left thigh, and the alignment of their bodies below their waists improved. God, did it ever.

  Every sexual impulse he had kicked into overdrive, making him so damn hard, and, for a few mind-blowing seconds, he felt a corresponding softening, an invitational tilt, a momentary fitting of hardness into hollow.

  Then she tensed up and broke the kiss, lowering her head, catching a few strands of her hair in his scruff.

  He released her gradually. When his arms fell away, she stepped around him, careful not to touch him, careful not even to brush against his clothing. As she moved past, he pivoted in order to keep his eyes on her.

  She stopped a short distance away and raised her hand to her mouth. Her back was to him, so he had no way of knowing if she was covering her mouth in mortification, testing her lips for moisture, dabbing at a whisker burn, or wiping away the taste of him.

  “You can’t seduce the combination out of me.”

  That remark pissed him off. But when she turned around to face him, he had a smirk already in place. “Wasn’t trying to. It’s just that you know me now. Better, at least. Pretty damn good, in fact.”

  She gave him a murderous look, which only caused him to grin.

  “Surely you can trust me enough to tell me about the two guys trailing you.”

  “I don’t know anything about them.” She began to roam the room, seemingly without any purpose except to evade his questions.

  “No idea who sent them?”

  “You’re assuming they were sent, that they weren’t just two men having breakfast.”

  “I would guess that they’re undercover FBI.”

  She stopped her aimless roaming and looked at him.

  “Narcs maybe?”

  She turned away and resumed the agitated prowling.

  “The big guy might pass for an agent, except that feds don’t drive Mercedes. The little guy, no way. He’s a punk.”

  She was fiddling with the card on the nightstand that listed TV channels. “How do you know what he is?”

  “I recognize the type. They’re all over the world. Different languages, different colors, religions, causes. But they’re always looking for a fight, and they thrive on bloodshed.” He gave her a meaningful look. “Which is why I think you’re in over your head, Brynn, and you don’t even realize it.”

  She laid the card back on the nightstand. “Why do you care?”

  He placed his hand over his heart. “Because I’m such a nice guy.”

  For that he got another dirty look. “Why are you sticking around?” she asked. “Why aren’t you long gone?”

  “I wish I was.”

  “So?”

  “Think of the shoe prints, Brynn. One set large, one small. I’m damn near certain those two men in the café were Brady’s assailants.” He walked toward her, wanting to gauge her reaction to what was coming. “I also think it was them who zapped me with a laser just as I was about to land.”

  She recoiled. Her lips parted. He didn’t believe she could have faked how astounded she appeared. “A laser?”

  “Not the kind you buy to bamboozle your neighbor or drive your cat crazy. High grade. Industrial strength. Powerful enough to penetrate that fog and damn near my skull.”

  “I’ve heard of that happening to pilots. A lot, lately.”

  “Well, it happened to me last night. I would have made that landing if I hadn’t been blinded seconds before touching down.”

  “You could have been killed.”

  “That’s crossed my mind a few dozen times.”

  “Did you tell Rawlins this?”

  “No, and I have my reasons.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me last night?”

  “Because I didn’t know you, either.” He let that reverberate for a few seconds before continuing. “For all I knew, you were the culprit. The way you crept up on the plane made me suspicious. But once I saw how protective you were of that box, it didn’t make sense. Why would you want to sabotage the airplane carrying the treasure chest?”

  “I see. You don’t think I’m an attempted murderer, but only because it doesn’t make sense.”

  “Oh, did that hurt your feelings?” He scoffed. “Don’t cop that self-righteous attitude with me, Brynn. I’m not the one keeping secrets.” He gave her a hard look. “I don’t really think you’re a terrorist bent on killing a lot of people, but I do think you’re in possession of something that belongs to somebody else. Or at least to somebody who claims rights to it.

  “Diamonds, the key to a safe deposit box, a human finger bone excavated on Mars. The booty doesn’t matter to me. It’s yours to keep. Split it with your daddy. I don’t care, except for the role I unknowingly played in transporting it. If it’s illegal, I could do jail time and lose my pilot’s license.”

  “If you’re so worried about it, then take me back to town, to the Ford dealer, and let me leave.”

  “No. That’s not the only reason I’m staying. I want payback for the damage done to Dash’s plane, and the attack on an innocent man.”

  “That’s the obligation you feel.”

  “Yeah, that’s the obligation I feel.”

  “Your worst nightmare.”

  His focus sharpened on her.

  Softly, she said, “Involvement.”

  He didn’t realize she’d heard him say that or that she would have tucked it away in her memory bank to take out and air now. All the emotions that invoked coalesced into anger.

  “I’m tired of this dance.” He went over to the dresser. The first four dials on the padlock were as he’d left them minutes earlier. Only the last one remained. It was on the four. That didn’t unlock it. He rolled it to the numeral one. That was no good, either. “I’ve got a maximum of eight more tries.”

  He went through them, taunting her as he counted them down, but her expression remained impassive. After the nine failed, she said, “You’ve only got one more chance, and it’s futile to try it.”

  “We’ll see.”

  He dialed the zero. The lock stayed locked. Cursing, he turned to her.

  “Told you.”

  He fumed in silence, then said, “Fine. Play your game, but you’ll do it without your toy.”

  He picked up the box and clamped it against him with his arm. “Until I know what’s in it, and have my reckoning with the people who tried to crash me, it stays with me.”

  “Put it down.”

  “Nope.” With his free hand, he grabbed his flight bag and headed for the bathroom.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to shower and then get some sleep.”

  “Sleep?” Brynn placed herself in his path. “We don’t have time for that. If you don’t believe anything else, believe me when I say that it’s imperative I get that box to its destination.”

  “Which is?”

  He gave her a ten count, and when she didn’t reply, he bumped her aside with his hip, continued on into the bathroom, and slammed the door behind him.

  9:01 a.m.

  “We lost her.”

  Goliad’s update wasn’t what Delores and Richard Hunt had expected to hear, and the news certainly didn’t go over well with either.

  Following their bodyguard’s last call, Richard had demanded to know everything Delores had been withholding from him about the situation in Howardville. She had laid out the fac
ts the way a blackjack dealer dealt cards, methodically, one at a time. After each, Richard had calculated his odds of winning the hand or losing huge.

  He’d been dismayed over how badly the job had been botched, and angry at Delores for glossing over the worst of it. “All I got was a weather report!” he’d shouted.

  Her only defense had been that she’d wanted to prevent him from worrying.

  “I appreciate that consideration,” he’d told her in an effort to suppress the full ferocity of his anger. “By the same token, I resent being kept in the dark. Don’t do it again. Ever.”

  He had accepted her tearful apology along with her promise not to hold back anything from now on, no matter how dire circumstances became. She’d sealed her promise with a kiss and reminded him that the situation wasn’t all that bleak.

  No one knew of his connection to any of last night’s events. No one knew of his illness. The media had believed the statement his office had released about their plans for the holiday: They were spending a quiet Thanksgiving alone at their beloved estate in Georgia. They welcomed a respite from the Washington social scene. They valued their time together at home. Blah blah blah.

  With confidence, she had said, “We encountered some speed bumps, but they’re behind us now. I have Nate’s assurance that all is well.”

  Her confidence had been premature.

  Dr. Brynn O’Neal’s whereabouts were unknown. Goliad and his nitwit partner had lost track of her.

  Propped up in bed with pillows behind his back, Delores at his side, Richard had assumed the facial expression that opposition senators hated to see at the podium during a debate.

  There was no gentleness in it, no suggestion that he might reconsider his position and compromise. His visage was as indomitable as the faces carved into Rushmore. It could intimidate even Delores.

  She covered his hand with hers, but he shook off the comforting gesture and barked, “What happened, Goliad?”

  Talking to them through the speakerphone, he gave them bullet points, as was Richard’s preference when receiving bad news. He wanted to know the worst aspects of a crisis first. The fine print could be added later.