by Lynsay Sands
"Better and better," she said on a groan.
Jet laughed at her dismay and leaned sideways to nudge her with his shoulder. "We'll have fun, I promise. You and me in the cockpit, yapping and laughing . . . it'll be like old times."
"Yeah," she said with a slow smile. She'd missed yapping and laughing with Jet. He'd been a sort of standin girlfriend/adopted brother through high school and the first four years of college. Hard to believe when she looked at him now. No one would mistake him for a standin for a girlfriend. Jet was definitely all man. If he wasn't so much like a brother to her, she might even be at risk of falling for him herself. The thought made her smile faintly as she asked, "So what exotic locale follows Chicago?"
"After Chicago, it's--" He paused midsentence and dug in his pocket as the sound of a guitar strumming reached their ears. Pulling out a phone, he peered at the display, his eyebrows rising. "My boss. Gotta take this."
Abigail nodded in understanding and watched as he hit the answer button, placed the phone to his ear and stood to move a few steps away, saying, "Hey, Bob, what's up?"
"Can I get you another?" the blonde barmaid asked, suddenly appearing on the other side of the bar again. Abigail turned to glance at the woman, noting that she was eyeballing Jet as she asked the question. That being the case, she wasn't terribly surprised when the woman didn't give her a chance to respond before asking what she really wanted to know. "So, is your friend available?"
Abigail supposed it was insulting that the woman didn't even imagine for a minute that she might be Jet's girlfriend, but let it slide and merely admitted, "As far as I know he's not dating anyone."
"Yeah?" The blonde beamed at her. "Do you think--?"
"Abs, we gotta go."
Abigail and the bartender both turned with surprise at that announcement when Jet suddenly returned.
"We do?" she asked with a frown as he bent to scoop up her backpack.
"Yeah." Straightening, he urged her off the stool, then began walking her quickly toward the exit.
"Why?" she asked with bewilderment, jogging to keep up with his long steps. She'd always had to jog to keep up with Jet. His legs were nearly twice the length of her stubby little ones and she had to take two steps for every one of his.
"Got a job," he announced with a grin.
"Now?" she asked with amazement. "But I just got here. I haven't even seen your apartment yet."
"I know, and I almost refused because of that, but then Bob said where the shipment was going and I decided we should go."
"Where?" she asked at once. He was beaming so brightly, she knew this had to be good, certainly better than cold Canada, or Chicago.
"How do you feel about a couple of days on a beach in Caracas?"
"Venezuela?" she squawked with dismay.
He paused at the exit to peer at her uncertainly. "What's wrong with Venezuela?"
"I read an article just last week that claims Venezuela is the kidnap capital of the world or something."
"Oh, pffft," he responded, tugging the door open and ushering her out of the bar. "You'll be with me. I'll keep you safe. And Bob was so desperate to find a pilot for this flight that he agreed to let me out of the Quebec flight. We can spend a couple days there. That gives us time to kick around, hit the beach, see the sights." Stopping suddenly, he turned her away from him and helped her get the backpack on again. "It's definitely more exotic than Quebec, right?"
"Right," she agreed wryly, and supposed kicking around and seeing the sights didn't sound bad. She wasn't too keen on the beach part though. Not in the shape she was in. Still, it could be fun.
"You have a passport, don't you?" he asked suddenly. "Please have a passport."
"Yeah. I even brought it with me," she assured him. Abigail hadn't thought she'd need it, but it had seemed smarter than leaving it in storage.
"Good, good, we're all set then," he said happily, finishing with her backpack. "Put this on."
Abigail turned and stared at the helmet he was holding out. Her gaze then slid to the motorcycle behind him and her eyes widened incredulously. "You expect me to ride on that?"
She'd expected a car, maybe even a pickup, but a motorcycle? Where had her old, slightly goofy, geek of a friend Jethro gone? Apparently, he'd grown up and morphed into Jet the adventurer.
"You'll love it," Jet assured her, settling the helmet on her head and strapping it on. Once done with that, he quickly donned his own helmet, then swung a leg over his bike and glanced over his shoulder at her. "Come on. This is an emergency flight. We have to get to the hangar ASAP."
"What kind of emergency?" Abigail asked, climbing gingerly onto the seat behind him. He flew a cargo plane, for heaven's sake. What kind of emergency flight could there be for a cargo plane?
"I don't know," Jet admitted, starting the motorcycle. Raising his voice to be heard over the engine, he then added, "I guess it's a time-sensitive shipment. The client has their own plane, but it broke down and they need to get their cargo to Caracas ASAP so called us. That's the only reason I'm getting the flight. Normally guys with more seniority get the exotic locales, but I was the only one available last-minute."
"Oh," Abigail murmured and then repeated it more loudly when she realized he'd never hear her over the roar of the motorcycle engine.
"Put your arms around me and hold on tight," Jet instructed, glancing around. Catching her worried expression, he grinned and added, "Relax, Abs. It'll be an adventure."
Two
"Relax, Abs, it'll be an adventure," Abigail muttered under her breath as she felt around in the dark, trying to find the jump seat Jet had told her to use. He hadn't warned her how dark it would be back here. But then perhaps he hadn't thought about that in his panic. If he had, he surely would have offered her a flashlight or something. Instead, she was feeling her way blindly down the side of the cargo hold of the airplane, trying to find a seat that apparently folded down from the wall and had straps she could belt herself in with for takeoff.
Abigail shook her head. This adventure was not going according to plan at all. They'd moved through the San Antonio traffic quickly on the motorcycle and arrived at the airport before the clients had arrived. While Jet dealt with flight plans and other paperwork, Abigail had mostly stayed out of the way, merely handing her passport over to some official type dude who'd asked for it. They'd then headed straight to the hangar where his cargo plane waited. She'd joined Jet in the cockpit while he went through what he called a preflight checklist and had settled comfortably in the big cushy front passenger seat, thinking this would be fun after all. But then the client had arrived.
Abigail had only caught a glimpse of the two men who had got out of the van before they'd moved out of sight, but they'd looked a bit shady to her--jeans, T-shirts, tattoos, and scruffy-faced, one bald and one with hair that needed cutting. They'd looked more like they belonged to a biker gang than like businessmen. Fortunately, they hadn't seen her when they arrived, because as it turned out, she definitely wasn't supposed to be there.
After going to talk to them, Jet had returned to the cockpit in a bit of a panic. It wasn't just going to be cargo. The "Clients" were flying with it and when he'd mentioned the possibility of a friend joining them, they'd nixed the idea at once. No one but them and the cargo would be passengers on this flight. Period.
Abigail had been alarmed at this news, thinking it meant she needed to get out and find her way to his apartment. But that had not been Jet's plan.
It was his plane, he'd have her along if he wished, he'd assured her firmly. It had all sounded very brave and manly until he'd added that she would just ride in cargo so they didn't know.
As Abigail had gaped at him over this plan, he'd explained that the door at the back of the cockpit opened into the cargo area. He'd watch the men load the cargo and once they'd closed the hold and started toward the cockpit, he'd bang on the side of the plane twice. She was to immediately slip into the cargo hold, find the jump seat and strap herself
in. Once they landed, he'd wait until the men were heading around to the back of the plane to retrieve their cargo, then he'd tap on the door to let her know she was to get out of the cargo area and hide herself in the cockpit until the clients left with their shipment. Jet would come get her when the coast was clear and they could go through customs and start their "adventure."
Abigail took another step, banged her knee hard against something, cursed, then quickly covered her mouth and froze, expecting the door to the cockpit to burst open and angry, biker-looking dudes to come rushing out, shouting and brandishing firearms of some description. When that didn't happen, she let her breath out slowly, then felt around to see what she'd bumped into.
The cargo, Abigail decided, as she felt tarp under her fingers. They'd set it down closer to the front than expected. It was also pretty close to the side of the plane, she noted. If the jump seat Jet wanted her to use was behind it, there was no way she was going to be able to fold it down and sit on it.
Grimacing, Abigail placed her hands against the tarp to give it a tentative shove and see if she could actually move it. But instead of pressing flat against a solid surface, the fingers of her right hand curved around what felt like a bar under the tarp, while her left hand slid forward easily, pushing the tarp between two fixtures before hitting something that grunted in response.
Quickly retrieving her hands, Abigail squinted, trying to see what she had touched. It had felt to her like rather than a shipment of boxes, or even a crate, the tarp covered some kind of cage. A large cage too, she thought, recalling where her hands had been. The top of it was at chest level on her.
"You'll need a flashlight."
Abigail glanced toward the front of the plane at Jet's overloud announcement, then dropped to her knees as she heard the cockpit door being opened. She had no idea if she was hidden where she was, but there was no time to find a better hiding spot, so Abigail curled into as small a ball as she could manage and prayed her butt wasn't sticking out the end and her backpack wasn't showing at the top as the darkness in the hold lightened.
"Can't you turn the damned lights on here?" someone asked. It was a very unpleasant snarl, definitely not Jet's voice this time.
"It's a cargo hold. There are no lights," was Jet's response and Abigail knew him well enough to recognize from his tone that he was lying. "I'll get you a flashlight. Wait here so you don't bump into anything."
Abigail heard the shuffle of his feet as he moved around and then a flashlight beam suddenly switched on just inches from her face. The sudden shock of the bright light almost startled a gasp from her, but she managed to cut it off before it was born and merely blinked her eyes closed.
"There are two more flashlights here on the wall if you need them."
Abigail eased her eyes open to see that the flashlight beam had been turned away from her. She could just make out Jet's shape in the darkness behind the light he was now flashing toward his "clients" and Abigail was pretty sure he was looking at her. She was also pretty sure that the information about the extra flashlights had been for her as well. She wasn't surprised though when the clients assumed it was for them, and one of them said, "One'll do. Just give me the damned thing and get out of here so I can check my cargo."
Jet hesitated briefly, but then moved out of sight. As the light moved away with him, Abigail quickly analyzed her situation. She was crouching between the wall and the tarp-covered crate that the client wanted to check and there was nowhere to go that she knew of. Jet was obviously hoping she wouldn't be discovered, but she was pretty sure she would be.
"Go do your preflight check or something."
Abigail stilled at that order from the snarky client.
"Already done," Jet answered easily. "That's what I was doing when you got here."
"Well, then go sit on your thumbs or find something else to do, I don't care what. I want privacy while I check my cargo," the man said.
"I'd rather--"
"I'll keep you company," another voice said, and Abigail supposed it was the other client.
"Hey, watch it, buddy. I--" Whatever Jet was saying was cut off when the cabin door closed with a sharp click. Abigail could only guess from what she did hear of his comment that the second man had either pushed or dragged Jet out of the cargo hold. It was hard to imagine anyone being able to do either. Jet wasn't a gangly kid anymore. Still, she was quite sure that's what had happened and was straining her ears, trying to hear what was happening in the cockpit when something landed on her head.
Abigail reached up instinctively to feel what it was. She was both surprised and relieved when it turned out to be the edge of the tarp. The client had apparently flipped it up from the opposite side to where she knelt. She might go undiscovered after all, Abigail thought. Maybe.
A groan from the crate she knelt beside made her glance toward it, but she didn't have Superman's eyes and couldn't see through the tarp still covering the cage on her side.
"Just checking your IV, buddy," the client muttered. "Wouldn't want you waking in the middle of the flight and causing trouble, or tearing up the plane like you did the doc's. Especially don't want it to happen once we're in the air. We were lucky you got loose before we took off last time," he added.
Abigail frowned at these words, wondering just what the heck the cargo was. A monkey? She'd heard they could be pretty destructive. No, the cage was too big for that. Maybe it was a gorilla?
Abigail was distracted from her thoughts by a loud sound she instantly recognized as the noise duct tape made when it was being pulled off a roll.
"Just gonna wrap this around your IV. Make sure you aren't knocking this one out with your tossing and turning. This ain't our usual pilot. Can't have you squawking about being kidnapped or something. We'd have to kill the poor bastard . . . or maybe just deliver him onto the island with you. I'm sure Doc has some experiment or other he could use the guy for. Poor bastard. Frankly, I'd rather be dead," he added gravely. A brief silence followed, broken only by the rustling sounds, and then the man grunted. "That oughta do it."
There were sounds that must have been the man backing out of the cage and straightening then, because what followed was the clang of what she guessed was the cage door closing.
"Enjoy the flight," the client said mockingly. "It's the last one you'll ever take. Once we get you to the island, you'll never leave."
Abigail felt the tarp slide off the back of her head and went completely still. She waited for an exclamation of surprise as she was spotted, but there was nothing but the rustle of the tarp being dropped back into place and then the soft sound of the client walking away in the direction of the cockpit door. She heard it open and close and then darkness and silence returned once more.
A moment passed, and then another, and still Abigail didn't move. It wasn't until the idling plane engine revved up a bit and the plane began to taxi forward that she gave up her position and lifted her head to peer around. This time she was glad to see nothing but darkness. It meant the flashlight, and the man carrying it, were gone, even if his words were still spinning in her head.
Kidnapping? Her mind shrieked the word in alarm. And what had that been about killing the pilot or just giving him to some doctor to experiment on?
Jeez, she had to warn Jet. He had no idea who he had sitting in the cockpit with him right now. Shrugging her backpack off, Abigail pulled it in front of her on the floor and began blindly searching it for her phone. She'd send Jet a text. Tell him to use some excuse to shut down the plane and get out of the cockpit. He needed to call the police. They had a situation here.
Cursing when she couldn't find her phone by feeling around in the dark like that, Abigail left her pack on the floor and got quickly to her feet. The flashlights were in front of her, just past the crate. At least that's where Jet had been standing when he'd turned the one on. The client had taken the flashlight Jet had got for him, but Jet had said there were two others there.
Recalling that her back
pack was on the floor in front of her, Abigail stayed where she was and quickly ran her hands over the expanse of wall she could reach. When that didn't turn up anything useful, she muttered under her breath and pushed her backpack forward with one foot. Stepping forward into the small space the action made, she tried again. This time her hand hit something on the wall.
Abigail ran her fingers cautiously over the item, feeling that it was a long metal tube held in place on the wall by a metal clamp. Grasping the bottom of the tube, she pulled, relieved when it slid easily out of its holder. It took another moment of fumbling about before she found the button to turn it on, but then light exploded in the darkness. It was blinding after so long in pitch-black and forced Abigail to close her eyes. She gave them a heartbeat to recover from the shock, and then slowly opened them again, allowing her pupils time to adjust.
Relieved when she could see this time, Abigail started to turn the beam of light down toward her bag, but paused when it landed on the corner of the crate beside her. The tarp was a dark brown color, nothing interesting there. But she couldn't resist grabbing a bit of the heavy cloth and tugging it up. The bottom corner of what was definitely a cage was immediately revealed, but it was the foot lying in the corner of the cage that made her catch her breath.
Definitely not an ape, she thought, but then she had known that when the client had talked about squawking about being kidnapped. Apes did not talk.
Unable to stop herself now, Abigail tossed the tarp up and away so that it fell back on the top of the cage, leaving the side nearest her exposed. Her flashlight beam then slid quickly from the foot she'd first seen, to an attached leg, before bouncing over a bare bottom to the back and arm of a completely naked man lying on his side in the cage.
He was a big one, some part of her brain acknowledged as Abigail let the flashlight beam slide back and forth over what she could see of him from this angle. Wide shoulders tapered down to narrow hips, and both the upper arm she could see, and his revealed outer thigh were huge and muscular. She couldn't see any of his face, though; his head was turned away, long dark hair falling over it and hiding it from her view. But she'd seen enough. He was a sleeping giant, lying drugged and helpless in a cage like an animal.
