She put her fingers against his lips. “It is fast, but when something’s right, it’s right.”
He kissed her knuckles as he took her hand in his. “After my wife died, I shut down, but when I met you, things started happening inside. I don’t know how else to put it, but I know it was because of you. I thought I’d never feel about another woman the way I felt about Anna, but I see now that I was just holding on to the love I’d had before so I’d know when, and if, it ever came to me again. I think it has, Kelly. I know it has.”
Tears glimmered in her blue eyes. “That’s the most beautiful thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
“It’s true,” he said against her temple, savoring her soft warmth, the peace wrapping around him. “I know how quickly life can change, honey. Anna taught me that. Whatever time we have left, I want to spend with you. If you want some time to think about it, that’s fine. But don’t think you’re going to get rid of me.”
She stared into his eyes for a long time, considering. Spence’s hand tightened on hers; he was prepared to beg if necessary.
Then a slow smile curved her lips. “You’re something else, Spence Cantrell. Since Carl, I haven’t trusted my instincts about anything, but this…craziness forced me to. Thanks to you, now I know there are some feelings I can trust. You’re one of them.”
He grinned. “So, what should we do on our date?”
“Well, you’ve already given me the ride of my life, Marshal. I can’t wait to see what you come up with next.”
He nudged her chin up, staring into her eyes. How had he gotten so lucky? “You won’t regret it, Kelly,” he promised before his lips claimed hers in gentle possession. “I’m going to love you with every breath I take.”
She smiled, a brilliant light coming into her eyes and making him go weak inside. “That’s funny. I have a feeling you will.”
She rested her head on his shoulder and he settled back with his good hand locked in hers as the plane circled round and headed toward Whiskey Springs.
Final Approach…to Forever
Merline Lovelace
Books by Merline Lovelace
Silhouette Intimate Moments
Somewhere in Time #593
*Night of the Jaguar #637
*The Cowboy and the Cossack #657
*Undercover Man #669
*Perfect Double #692
†The 14th…and Forever #764
Return to Sender #866
**If a Man Answers #878
The Mercenary and the New Mom #908
**A Man of His Word #938
**The Harder They Fall #999
Special Report #1045
“Final Approach…to Forever”
Silhouette Desire
Dreams and Schemes #872
†Halloween Honeymoon #1030
†Wrong Bride, Right Groom #1037
Undercover Groom #1220
Harlequin Historicals
§Alena #220
§Sweet Song of Love #230
§Siren’s Call #236
His Lady’s Ransom #275
Lady of the Upper Kingdom #320
Countess in Buckskin #396
The Tiger’s Bride #423
Harlequin Books
Renegades
“The Rogue Knight”
Bride by Arrangement
“Mismatched Hearts”
Silhouette Books
Fortune’s Children
Beauty and the Bodyguard
†Holiday Honeymoons:
Two Tickets to Paradise
“His First Father’s Day”
Chapter 1
Day 4
“Flight 407, this is Chase One. We didn’t copy your last transmission. Say again, please.”
Suzanne Delachek pinned her ice-blue eyes on the Boeing 727 streaking through the late afternoon sky a hundred feet off the chase plane’s left wingtip. Static crackled in the earphones of her headset. Five seconds passed. Ten. Her heart jackhammering against her ribs, she keyed her mike again.
“This is Chase One, 407.” Despite the tension coiled like a snake at the base of her skull, she kept her voice cool and calm. “Repeat your last transmission.”
Still no response.
“What’s going on?” FBI Special Agent Mason Taggart crowded into the cockpit, hunching down to peer over Suzanne’s shoulder at the 727. “Why the hell doesn’t O’Connor acknowledge?”
She didn’t take her eyes off the other aircraft, all white except for the subdued blue striping on its fuselage and tail fin. She knew the answer to the agent’s question as well as he did.
O’Connor was busy—very busy!—keeping his crippled plane in the air.
A dedicated U.S. Marshals Service prisoner transport, the 727 had been hijacked three days ago by Carl Hart, one of the convicts on board. The pilot was dead, killed along with the hijacker in a midair shootout that sent bullets smashing into the instrument panel and wreaked havoc with the flight controls. From his last transmission Suzanne knew the thoroughly shaken copilot was now sweating his way through the emergency procedures checklist, trying to determine the extent of the damage.
Suzanne had been talking him through the checklist, step by step. She’d logged more than seven thousand hours in Boeing airframes during her flying career, first as an active duty air force aviator, then as a senior instructor pilot for the FAA. Two thousand of those hours were “PIC” time—pilot-in-command time—aboard a 727. For that reason, the FAA had scrambled a plane and dispatched her to Whiskey Springs, Texas, shortly after the hijacking. She knew exactly what the 727 could do, when it would do it, and how.
What she didn’t know was why O’Connor had cut off his last transmission so abruptly.
“Flight 407, please acknowl—”
“This is 407. We got us a problem here, folks.”
Suzanne’s silver-blond brows snapped together. The speaker’s Texas twang identified him immediately. Ryder Hamilton.
The FBI had fed her a quick background brief on the convict who’d climbed into the cockpit to help after the pilot was killed. A West Texas native, he’d parlayed a two-bit oil exploration company into Hamilton Oil and Gas, a Fortune 500 corporation. In the process, he’d scammed hundreds of folks in a get-rich-quick oil lease scheme. He was also the only other person aboard Flight 407 with any experience in a cockpit. Unfortunately, that experience consisted of a few hundred hours in the single-engine Piper Cherokee he once bumped around the oil fields of West Texas. Still, O’Connor had been grateful for even that dubious assistance.
Now, apparently, Hamilton had decided to take a more active role than just reading the instruments for the harried copilot.
“State your problem, 407.”
“O’Connor just bought the farm.”
Suzanne’s heart stopped. Just froze in place for several seconds, then restarted with a painful thump. Praying she’d misheard the transmission, she keyed her mike.
“Say again.”
“He just had a massive heart attack.” The Texas drawl took on a grim edge. “He clutched his chest and keeled over. Right here at the controls.”
Behind Suzanne, Taggart cursed, low and long. She paid no attention to the agent, her every sense riveted on the rawhide-rough baritone in her earphones.
“We dragged him back to the galley,” Hamilton relayed. “The nurse is performing CPR, but he says to tell you not to expect any miracles. God knows, we sure could use one right now.”
Suzanne allowed herself a short, silent oath. That was all she had time for with a crippled jetliner flying in a huge circle over the Gulf of Mexico, forty-eight desperate souls on board, and a man at the controls who’d never flown anything other than bug smashers.
“All right,” she said, infusing her voice with icy calm, “you’ve got the controls. The aerodynamics for a 727 and a Piper Cherokee are exactly the same. Thrust and drag, Mr. Hamilton, thrust and drag. The jet’s just bigger and faster, and—”
“And shot all to
hell! Don’t BS me, lady. I’m looking at an instrument panel with holes in it big enough to put my boot through.”
“We know Flight 407’s instrumentation took some hits, but it’s maintaining airspeed and altitude. O’Connor put it on autopilot right before his last transmission. We won’t disengage until you’re ready.”
“Until we run out of fuel and fall out of the sky, you mean.”
“You’re not going to fall anywhere,” Suzanne promised, praying fiercely that she was right. “The 727’s a forgiving airplane, with big fat wings and a beautiful glide. I know what it can do. Just trust me.”
The short silence in her earphones was deafening.
“The last time I trusted a woman, sweetheart, I ended up in leg irons.”
Right, Suzanne thought with a flash of scorn. Blame your problems on someone else. That was what all these cons did, including the sleazy contractor who’d convinced her parents to shell out a big chunk of their savings for a new roof, then never delivered so much as a shingle.
Now wasn’t the time to challenge Ryder Hamilton’s self-delusions, though. Thrusting aside every thought but the safety of the passengers aboard Flight 407, she spoke slowly and calmly.
“I’ve logged thousands of hours in large, multiengine jet aircraft, Mr. Hamilton. I’m going to walk you through the emergency checklists, step by step. You’re going to repeat everything I say, find the appropriate instrument, and repeat the procedure again before you twist a single knob or toggle a switch. Got that?”
“Yeah, I got it.”
“Ready?”
Across a hundred feet of empty sky, Ryder clenched his sweaty palms around the jet’s wheel. Swallowing the Texas-size lump in his throat, he tore his gaze from the shattered instrument panel long enough to shoot a look out the side windshield.
There it was. Just across a patch of blue sky. A sleek little Gulfstream six-passenger jet. Crammed full of FBI agents and US Marshals, he’d been reminded. And at least one cool-as-ice female with a voice like a chilled smoothie and thousands of hours in big jets. Hoping to hell a few of those hours would rub off on him, he keyed the mike.
“Ready as I’ll ever be, sweetheart.”
“The name’s Delachek,” she replied with a composure that acted like a long, soothing swallow of milk on the acid churning up his stomach. “Suzanne Delachek. Can you get someone up there in the cockpit to help you read the instruments?”
“Marshal Cantrell’s sitting right here beside me.”
“We understand Cantrell took a bullet.”
Ryder started to reply, but the dark-haired marshal with a bloody bandage wrapped around his upper arm answered for himself.
“It’s just a flesh wound. The flight nurse patched me up.”
“Get someone else up in the cockpit,” Delachek ordered flatly. “Someone who won’t be distracted by pain.”
Ryder and Cantrell shared a quick look. They’d met for the first time a short while ago. One was a convicted felon. The other, a law enforcement officer dedicated to hunting down any fugitives who might try to escape the punishment due them. Yet the bond they’d forged in that brief time was stronger than the steel manacles Ryder had worn during the first part of this flight into hell.
“I can help Hamilton,” the marshal said tersely. “And I’ll be damned if I’m going to let anything else happen to Kelly Jackson while I’ve still got a breath left in my body. I’ll read the instruments.”
“Just tell us what to do,” Ryder snapped.
A long, even sigh filtered through his earphones. She didn’t flap, this Suzanne Delachek. But then again, he reminded himself sardonically, she wasn’t flying in a jet with an instrument panel shot all to hell.
“All right. Cantrell, you’re there for backup. Hamilton, you and I are going to get real tight, real fast. I’m going to get inside your head. You won’t have a thought we don’t share, or make a move we don’t make together. We’ll think as a team, act as one unit. Together, we’ll bring Flight 407 home.”
Twenty minutes later, Ryder had almost—almost—begun to believe her. For every one of those endless, stomach-twisting minutes, his rational mind had screamed there was no way he could fly this behemoth, let alone land it. But the stubbornness bred into him with the dust and heat of West Texas shut out everything except Suzanne Delachek’s voice. Cool. Confident. Smooth as glass.
She talked him through a visual of every instrument. Read the gauges with him. Made sure he knew the location and purposes of the switches on the overhead panel. All the while, the Boeing jet punched a big, endless circle in the late afternoon sky.
They were out over the Gulf. Whenever Ryder blinked the sweat from his eyes and dragged them away from the instruments for a second or two, he could catch a glint of the late afternoon sunlight on the waves. He refused to think about going down in that shimmering water. Even at its slowest speed, the jet would smash against the flat, unbroken surface of the sea and disintegrate into a million pieces.
Not that he liked the idea of trying to put this hummer down on a runway any better. But the fuel level had dropped almost a thousand gallons since he’d scrambled into the cockpit and he didn’t need Suzanne Delachek to figure out how long they had left. Flight 407 would run out of sky and Ryder out of options in less than four hours. The thought of bringing this big jet down through a dark April night popped fresh beads of sweat on his brow.
“We’re going to check the flaps now.”
There she was. In his head. Just as she’d said she would be. Putting the airbrakes on his skittering panic with that cool-as-snow voice.
“They’re triple-slotted on this model,” the ice maiden advised, “with leading-edge slats.”
“Whatever the hell that means.”
“That means you have low-speed takeoff and landing capability. Do you see the switches to the left of the altimeter? In the upper instrument bank?”
“Left of the altimeter,” Ryder muttered. “Upper instrument bank. I’ve got ’em. Lowering flaps—”
“No! Wait until I—”
The 727 bucked like a bee-stung bronc. The right wing tipped up. The nose went down. The plane dropped into a plunging spiral. A hundred feet. Two hundred. Three.
“Pull left, Hamilton! Pull left! Retract the flaps.”
He could barely hear her over the roaring in his ears.
“Hamilton! Listen to me! Suck up those flaps! Now! Do it now!”
The jet shuddered. Metal groaned. Cantrell braced both boots against the deck and helped wrestle the shuddering controls. Cursing and praying at the same time, Ryder pulled left, saw the sea tilt away.
“That’s it. Level her out slowly as those flaps roll up. Slowly, I said!”
Inch by tortuous inch, the sky and the sea shifted into horizontal planes again. A lifetime later, Ryder slumped against the seat. Shudders wracked him. His white prison T-shirt lay plastered to his chest.
“Nice recovery, Hamilton.”
He almost hated her at that moment. He couldn’t move, could barely breathe over the terror pumping through his veins. Yet she sounded as though she hadn’t even broken a sweat.
“The right flaps are gone,” he snarled, as if she and everyone else listening in hadn’t already figured that out. “It’s anyone’s guess about the left. How the hell am I going to land without flaps to slow us down?”
“We’ll find you a nice, long runway. Maybe bring you in at Cape Canaveral, where the space shuttle lands.”
Ryder clutched at that straw with everything in him. Hope flared anew, only to die an agonizing death not five minutes later.
Following her instructions, he tested the landing gear system. A red light flashed on the instrument panel.
“I’ve got a system malfunction.”
“Yes, you do. Your right main gear didn’t come down. Retract the left and we’ll figure out where we go from here.”
He flipped the switch, frowning when the red light continued to flash. “The right gear won’t co
me down.”
“Try again.”
His chest squeezed by iron bands, Ryder toggled the switch. The red light flashed obscenely.
“Nothing.” He dragged in a painful breath. “So what do we do now, coach?”
“Give me a minute,” she replied with unshakable calm. “I’ll get back to you.”
Switching the radio to receive only, Suzanne squeezed her eyes shut and swallowed frantically to keep the panic rising in her throat from ripping free.
What would they do now? he’d asked.
What could they do now?
She opened her eyes, locked them on Mason Taggart. The FBI agent looked like a short, nervous bear, she thought on a near-hysterical note. Thinning brown hair. Brown eyes. Rumpled brown suit. His throat worked once. Finally, he forced out the truth they both wanted to deny.
“They’re going to crash, aren’t they?”
Suzanne looked at him for long moments. A dozen scenarios flashed like summer lightning in her head. She discarded them all. Searched her mind. Came up blank.
No, there was no way Ryder could land a 727 with only one main gear. No way anyone could. That single set of wheels would become a pivot point as soon as the plane touched down. Best case, the jet would spin off the runway. Worst case, it would cartwheel wildly and burst into a fireball. Shuddering, she pushed that horrific option right out of her head.
Maybe…
No, the passengers couldn’t bail out. Even if Suzanne could get parachutes aboard in time, the 727 wasn’t designed for emergency egress while in flight. If the passengers tried to exit through the left door, the airstream would smash them back into the wing. Exiting via the emergency hatches over the wings would send them right into the tail-mounted engines. After the D.B. Cooper incident, when another hijacker had parachuted from a plane with several million dollars and was never seen again, a mod to commercial aircraft sealed the aft stairs so they couldn’t be opened during flight.
Suzanne didn’t even consider bringing the jet down low enough for the passengers to jump into the Gulf without parachutes. The slowest speed the 727 could maintain without stalling was ninety knots, which translated to over a hundred miles an hour. The odds of anyone hitting the water at that speed and surviving weren’t even calculable.
Special Report Page 16
