“I’m going to scope out our little island. Maybe scrounge up some fruit or something for breakfast.”
She nodded, oddly hurt and relieved by the guarded note in his voice. She could have told him that their “little” island might well stretch for miles, that she and her folks had spent weeks that long-ago summer exploring the limestone ridges called hammocks that rose above the seasonally wet saw grass prairie. Instead, she chewed on her lower lip and kept silent. The time for sharing bits of personal history had passed…along with the soaring joy of beating the odds. Now they both needed to get on with the business of survival.
Suzanne waited until he disappeared into the stand of trees to crawl out from under her makeshift coverings. She’d better get dressed and pick out a handy tree to duck behind herself. With luck, she might even stumble across a freshwater pool to sluice off in. Grimacing at the clammy dampness of her underwear, she tugged them on, then slithered into the flight suit. Her hand faltered when she reached for the front zipper.
Images of the previous night danced before her eyes. Ryder had made inching down that little plastic tab a sensual experience Suzanne wouldn’t forget in this lifetime. Probably not in the next, either. Her throat went dry at the memory of the kisses he’d dropped on her throat, her breasts, her—
Whoa! She needed to focus here, to get both her clothes and her head on straight before the choppers started circling. Forcing her mind from the erotic to the immediate, she tugged on her boots and picked her way through the palmettos in the opposite direction from the path Ryder had taken.
As it had so many years ago, the Everglades’ unique beauty pulled at her senses. The verdant richness of damp grass drifted through the pinkish dawn. Shady buttonwoods garlanded with air plants vied for space and sunlight with black mangroves, royal palms and the twisted little tree called gumbo-limbo. A much younger Suzanne had delighted in the silly name, just as the sight of a stately heron wading near the edge of the hammock brought a gasp of delight from the woman she’d become.
She paused for a moment, watching the bird silhouetted against the still-shadowed river of grass. He moved so slowly, as if just awakening to the new dawn, until something in the dark water caught his eye. Quick as a bullet, his head shot down. After a short, furious thrashing, the heron emerged with a flapping fish scissored in its long mandibles.
Suzanne’s stomach rumbled in appreciation of the hunter’s skill. She tried to remember the last time she’d eaten. Yesterday morning. At Sam Houston International Airport, right before she climbed into the chase plane.
“I don’t suppose you’d care to share your breakfast, would you, buddy?”
She didn’t have any way to light a fire to bake or roast a fish, but a little sushi would certainly help fill the hollow pit of her stomach.
Evidently the heron wasn’t into sharing. He tossed back his head and guzzled the fish down whole.
Sighing, Suzanne moved on.
A little farther along the shore she found a break where rainwater collecting in the limestone had formed a stream-like channel. Suzanne plunged into the trees and followed the trickling water to the collection point. She attended to her basic needs, then stripped off the flight suit again and knelt beside the limestone basin.
Even without soap, she managed to do a credible job of removing all traces of yesterday’s tumultuous events. A bit of bark scraped most of the night’s fuzz from her teeth, making her feel almost human again. She had just zipped herself back into the green uniform when a crunch in the undergrowth jerked her head around.
The palmettos a few yards away rattled.
“Ryder?”
The papery rattle ceased, but Suzanne’s mind had already taken off. Her heart in her throat, she recalled in vivid detail the snub-nosed crocodile that had waddled into her parents’ campsite early one morning. Or had it been an alligator? She could never keep the two reptiles straight, and wasn’t particularly anxious to come face to face with either one right now.
Another crunch brought her surging to her feet.
“Hamilton? Is that you?”
The palmettos shook again. Suzanne backed up. She was all ready to beat a hasty retreat when a hulking convict with a shaved head and water dripping from his torn, muddied clothes crashed through.
“No, it ain’t Hamilton.”
Suzanne’s first reaction was relief. Even crocodiles possessed more attractive faces than this tattooed creep, but at least he wouldn’t have her for breakfast. Then she noticed the jagged shard of metal in his meaty fist.
Relief tripped instantly into wariness, but she’d dealt with enough uncertain situations in her career to know the last thing she should show was fear.
“Are you off Flight 407?”
His mouth twisted, distorting the swastikas inked into the corner of each lip. “Whaddya think, I got these rags on Fifth Avenue?”
“I’m glad you survived,” she said for lack of anything else.
“Survived, my ass.” He swiped a beefy forearm across his face in disgust. “I almost drowned tryin’ to punch my way through that grass, then I got lost in the dark and spent all night goin’ in circles.”
Suzanne let out a secret sigh of relief. The thought that he might have lurked in the trees, watching her and Ryder, had made her skin crawl.
“Anyone else with you?” she asked coolly.
He took his time answering. She didn’t like the way he played with the glistening metal shard, testing it over and over on the ball of his thumb.
“No, I ain’t got no one with me. What about you? Who’s this Hamilton you was calling to? One of them marshals from the plane?”
“No, a convict.”
The word tasted bad in her mouth.
Recognition clicked behind the prisoner’s eyes. “Big guy? Black hair? The one what flew the plane when the copilot crapped on us?”
“That’s him.”
“Well, well. He went back and pulled you out, huh? Accommodatin’ of him.”
He rocked back on his heels, thinking. Suzanne could almost hear the clank of wheels turning inside his shaved head.
“You hear them rescue planes circlin’ over the grass last night and this mornin’?”
“Yes, I did.”
“They gonna find us?”
“Any minute now.”
“That’s what I’m thinkin’, too. The marshals are gonna drag every inch of this swamp until they round up all the prisoners from Flight 407.”
He stared at her, his black eyes calculating.
“I figure I’m gonna need me a ticket outta here,” he said slowly. “That might just be you.”
The hair on the back of Suzanne’s neck lifted. Swiftly, she calculated her chances of taking this guy down. He was big, maybe six-four or five, and packed solid with tattooed muscle. She’d tossed enough men on their backs during her self-defense and survival training to feel confident in most situations.
This wasn’t one of them.
There was no way she was going to let herself be used as a hostage, though. Not without a fight. She’d try reason first, though.
“You saw what happened to the man who tried to hijack Flight 407. You don’t think the marshals are going to just fly you out of the swamp to a destination of your choice, do you?”
“No, but you will.”
“The hell I w—”
For a goliath, the man moved with lightning speed. He was on her like a hyena on fresh kill.
Even then Suzanne might have gotten in a swift kick or a knee to the groin if a mango root hadn’t tripped her up. She stumbled backward, off-balance but fighting him with fists and nails. He ended the uneven contest with a single slice of the serrated metal shard.
Frowning, Ryder squinted at the western horizon, just turning a flamingo pink. The drone of aircraft engines cut through the slowly brightening sky. He thought he caught the whap of rotor blades a couple of times. Once, the clang of ships’ bells.
Dammit, where was Suzanne?
<
br /> The guards had removed the prisoners’ personal effects before they marched them onto the 727. Without a watch, Ryder could only guess how long it had been since he’d returned to find Suzanne gone, but he was sure at least twenty minutes had passed. Maybe more. He’d give her another five, he decided, then go looking.
Not that she couldn’t take care of herself. He’d never met a more self-possessed woman. Man, either, for that matter.
His gut still twisted when he remembered watching that C-130 Hercules creep into position above Flight 407. He hadn’t pulled in a whole breath the entire time the slender figure in the helmet and green flight suit had spun like a wind-tossed top at the end of a thin steel cable.
Thinking of that flight suit put another kink in his gut. Who could have imagined that he’d ever see what lay under the green fabric? Not just see. Touch. Taste. The mere thought of her smooth, silky flesh balled his fists.
He had to stop thinking about last night! He’d drive himself crazy if he didn’t. He still had to get through a lot of empty hours before he tasted freedom again. Six months of empty days, restless nights. He couldn’t tantalize himself with fantasies of meeting up with Suzanne again when those six months had passed. Or torture himself by wishing he’d met her before a pouty redhead had sashayed into his heart and right out again, taking his company payroll, his reputation, and a good chunk of his pride with her.
For a man everyone round Midland touted as the next Donald Trump, he’d sure been thinking with the wrong body part when he’d locked on to Sharon’s radar signal that night at the Rusty Derrick. Funny how easy it was to confuse lust with love.
Hooking his thumbs in his pockets, Ryder scowled at the sun. Okay, so he lusted for Suzanne, too. What man wouldn’t? The ice maiden packed a giant-size wallop of heat under her seemingly frigid exterior. She could cut a man off at the knees with one flash of those blue eyes, and the body that went with them took him down another six inches. Hell, her voice had turned Ryder on even before he’d met her, and he’d been expecting to ride a 727 out of the sky at any minute!
Yet…
He couldn’t remember mere lust kicking him square in the gut like this before. Or feeling this tight, desperate knot at the idea that he might never see Suzanne again. Maybe after he got out he’d give the FAA a call, get her number.
Yeah, right. Like he had anything to offer her. He’d liquidated all his assets and sold everything he owned to pay back the purchasers of the phony oil leases. He’d walk out of prison with the shirt on his back, one change of clothes courtesy of the government, and enough money for a bus ticket to nowhere.
No, better to put her out of his head right here and now.
Despite the bleakness that settled like a lump in the pit of his stomach, he had to smile. As if there was any way he could get Suzanne Delachek out of his head. After all they’d been through together, the woman was imprinted on his soul.
The distant whap-whap-whap of a helicopter jerked him out of his thoughts. His head whipped up. There it was, a tiny gray dragonfly with orange coast guard markings, heading their way. His pulse jumped with eagerness, with relief, with a stinging regret. Time to go find Suzanne and get back to the real world.
“Ryder.”
The cool voice spun him around. He took a single step forward, then froze.
Suzanne walked toward him, her pale hair glinting in the golden dawn. A shard of glistening metal indented the skin just under her chin. Blood trickled down her throat.
“What the hell…?”
The tattooed gorilla who’d refused to help Ryder free her from the wreckage ambled along behind her, his fist bunching the neck of her flight suit. A thin sneer that might have been meant as a smile traced across his face.
“She gave me a little trouble, but I convinced her to be nice.”
“So I see,” Ryder forced out through a jaw clenched so tight it cracked.
“You give me any trouble, cowboy, and she’s dead. I’ll slice her up right before your eyes.” The sneer broadened into a vicious grin. “I ain’t got nothing to lose. I’m already doin’ three life sentences.”
In the space of two or three heartbeats, Ryder considered every option. The shard pressed so close to Suzanne’s jugular eliminated all but one.
Lifting his shoulders, he surrendered to the inevitable. “I won’t give you any trouble.”
Chapter 5
Suzanne’s heart stopped. She’d anticipated a dozen different reactions when Ryder spun around to confront the bastard holding the razor-edged piece of metal to her throat.
That careless shrug was not one of them.
“You’re givin’ up easy, cowboy,” the man behind her growled suspiciously. “If you don’t care nuthin’ about her, why’d you risk your ass to go back and haul her out of the cockpit?”
Ryder strolled forward a pace or two, pitching his voice to be heard over the thud of an approaching chopper. “Maybe I was thinking then exactly what you’re thinking now.”
“Yeah? What am I thinking?”
“That she’s our only guarantee out of this swamp.”
Her pulse hammering, Suzanne stared at him, then wrenched her gaze toward the helicopter buzzing toward the hammock. The coast guard bird was following the watery trough she and Hamilton forged in the saw grass last night, from the partially submerged nose section, right to their little island.
“Damn! They’re comin’ straight at us!” The razor-tipped shard of metal pricked into her flesh. “Don’t try nuthin’, hear me?”
She set her teeth against the burning pain. “They can’t land here, moron. Too many trees. When they spot us, they’ll radio for a seaplane or a boat and—”
The tip gouged deeper. Gasping, Suzanne writhed to twist out of his hold. He yanked her back with a jerk on her flight suit, his breath foul against her cheek as he leaned over her.
“Who you callin’ moron?”
“Hey, go easy on her!”
“You tellin’ me how to handle things, cowboy?”
Ryder moved closer, shouting now to be heard over the whap of rotor blades. “If she bleeds to death, neither one of us will get out of this mess alive. She’s the only card we have left to play.”
When he saw the expression on Suzanne’s face, his shout twisted into a snarl.
“Don’t look at me like that! I was ready to serve out the rest of my sentence. But after yesterday, I figure life’s too short and too uncertain to spend any more time staring at gray walls.”
“Now you’re starting to think like a con,” the bastard behind her sneered.
“Wave.” Ryder rapped out the command, closing the last of the distance between them. “Act like you’re eager for rescue. That way they’ll only send one seaplane to pick us up instead of a whole damned armada.”
A beefy arm hooked over Suzanne’s shoulders in a parody of a friendly embrace. The deadly shard withdrew from her jugular and disappeared behind her back.
“Wave, bitch.”
The chopper hovered over them.
Suzanne lifted her arm and caught Ryder’s almost imperceptible nod. With the same lightning move as the heron she’d spotted earlier, she swung her elbow back down and rammed it into her captor’s ribs with everything she had in her.
The blow didn’t do any serious damage to the goon behind her, but it surprised him for just the half second Suzanne needed to break his grip. She dropped like a stone, and was still on her way down when Ryder hit him with a flying tackle.
Arms flailing, legs thrashing, the two men crashed into the palmettos. Panting, Suzanne scrambled to her feet. The chopper hovered right above her, its rotor wash beating at her head and shoulders, the engine’s whine deafening. Someone shouted over a loudspeaker. Suzanne paid no attention, every particle of her being focused on the gleaming metal shard still gripped in a meaty fist.
She swung her boot at her former captor’s wrist with vicious accuracy. Bone snapped. The tattooed con howled. The jagged piece of metal went fly
ing into the saw grass.
Enraged by the pain, the convict wrapped Ryder in python-size arms and squeezed for all he was worth. The two men rolled over and over. Suzanne followed, swinging her leg back for another kick, this one intended for the brute’s skull. Before her boot could connect, the thrashing combatants rolled right off the hammock and into the water. They went under with a splash, still grappling, Ryder’s face twisted in a rictus of pain and savage determination.
Suzanne started to dive in after them. A hard hand wrapped around her arm and yanked her back.
“Stand clear!”
She whirled around, stunned by the sight of two men in jeans and navy blue windbreakers stenciled with U.S. MARSHALS on the pocket. Even more stunned by the rifles they had trained on the men thrashing around in the saw grass.
They’d rappelled out of the chopper, she saw in a sweeping glance. The line still dangled from the hovering helo.
“We saw them attack you,” one of the marshals shouted. “That murderous bastard is Joey Herndon.”
“He was on his way to death row at Marion when Flight 407 was hijacked.” The second marshal hefted his rifle and squinted though the scope. “Be wonderful if he saved the taxpayers the expense by drowning. I’ll cover them, Alex. You wade in….”
Suzanne slapped aside the rifle barrel. “You can’t shoot. You might hit Ryder!”
“Ryder Hamilton? Is that him wrestling with Herndon?”
“Yes, dammit! He needs help!”
The marshal lowered his weapon with a lack of concern that curled Suzanne’s fingers into claws.
“Doesn’t look to me like he needs any help.”
She spun around, her heart pounding, as a creature from the deep rose out of the swamp. Wet saw grass drooped over his head. Mud oozed down his neck and shoulders. Chest heaving, he slogged through the waist-high water, dragging a dazed whale behind him. As he neared the hammock, all Suzanne could do was swallow convulsively and offer him a stupid grin.
Special Report Page 20
