17. Viktoria
17
VIKTORIA
I blinked awake. Disorientation fuzzed my brain, and I stared up at the clear night sky through a canopy of leaves. Leaves? Where the hell am I? What happened?
Bits and snatches of memories played in my mind, like a twisted dream I couldn’t shake off. A dream that made no sense but had my heart leaping from my chest.
A violent explosion.
The engine shearing off.
Lee strapping me into a harness.
Wind tearing at my hair and my dress as I plummeted?—
OH MY GOD. I lurched up, then clutched at my stomach. Nausea rocketed up my throat, and I swallowed hard to keep from throwing up.
The jet . I had jumped from the jet. It had happened for real.
Lee . I yanked my oxygen mask off and flung it aside. I couldn’t see Lee anywhere. Where was he? “ Lee! ”
Jerking my head left, then right, I searched for him. My head was pounding, my eyes sore and raw, but I picked out the silhouettes of trees. The forest wasn’t dense, but it was dark. Squinting in the blackness, I scanned for Lee. Where had he gone? He couldn’t have gotten far.
Panic rose in my chest, and I couldn’t get enough air. I rose to my knees and cried out in pain as jagged aches pierced my hips and knees—everywhere, really. My ankles. My ass. Strings from the parachute cut into my arms, and I felt something heavy tug at my body. Peering behind me, I spied material billowing in the breeze. The parachute, still lashed to my back. Unease shot through me . Could it still lift me if it caught enough wind? Drag me off somewhere? I clawed at it.
“Off!”
With shaking fingers, I slid my hands down my body. My palm snagged on the frayed ends of the harness.
What? I frowned in confusion, and then I remembered the glint of Lee’s knife as it vanished behind me. As he cut them apart right before he pulled the cord on my parachute. After that was a blank. I didn’t remember gliding down or dropping through the trees, or landing.
Unsnapping everything I could find, I shucked the harness. The weight of the parachute fell away, and I let my shoulders slump in relief.
I have to find Lee . Gritting my teeth, I forced my legs to hold my weight. Nothing broken, at least. Nothing bloody or…gone.
I spied a messy bundle off to one side, a lopsided lump that didn’t match the terrain. “Lee?” I lurched forward, stumbling with every step. Twigs and rocks bit into my feet, but I refused to stop.
“Lee.” Tears spilled over my eyelids as I dropped to my knees. He lay in a heap with his eyes closed, unmoving. Should I touch him? Was he hurt?
I kissed his forehead, his cheeks. I tried to wake him up, but he didn’t move or react. “Lee, please,” I whispered, straightening his legs and arms to more natural positions. “Wake up.” I kissed his lips and shivered at the chill there. But he was still breathing, his pulse strong.
“I need you,” I told him, and cupped his cheeks in my hands. On so many levels, and more than you know .
His chest rose and fell steadily but he remained unconscious.
“I need you,” I whispered again, resting my cheek on his heart. My father’s words now made so much sense. Lee was my perfect match. He’d embraced my fire and spirit and helped me to soar, and more than anything, I wanted to pull him up beside me?—
Leaves crackled, rocks skittered, and heavy footsteps vibrated the ground. Snapping my head up, I searched the woods for the cause. Lights danced in the distance—bright flashlight beams. It must be Lee’s team. They’d jumped first. Maybe Mike and Andrew had found us already?
Hope surged through my chest, and I sat up. “We’re over here!” I yelled.
The crunching leaves and footsteps stopped.
“Mike, Andrew,” I tried again. “We’re over here.”
A deep male voice called out, and I clamped my mouth shut. He’d spoken Icelandic, not English. He’d shouted, “I hear her,” in my mother tongue.
Not Mike or Andrew. Had Father sent men?
No .
My intuition immediately rejected the thought. Father might’ve sent men, but they couldn’t possibly have arrived this soon. The plane crash might have made the news by now, but how would a search team have gotten here so fast? The actual crash site had to be miles away, yet whoever’s men these were knew just where to look. Knew where I’d have landed, out in these woods.
Lee had said he thought my attackers were from Iceland. Back at the theater, he’d heard them speaking what sounded like Icelandic.
Fear shot through my veins, making me shiver. My attention jumped to Lee. Vulnerable. Unable to protect himself from the new threat approaching.
Hell no . “This time,” I murmured, “ I’ll protect you .” I gave him a soft kiss. “Just hold on, okay?”
I unsnapped his harness as fast as I could, grunting at the struggle of taking it off his heavy frame without any help from him. “Good Lord , you weigh a ton,” I wheezed.
My aching body screamed and quivered, and my head pounded harder, but I yanked on the strings to pull the bright red parachute in. Now what do I do with it? My gaze landed on the harness, and I dropped to my knees, wincing at forest debris digging into my skin. I stuffed as much of the material as I could into the pouch it had launched from, cramming it in hand over fist. Since I hadn’t folded it right, the parachute refused to pack in all the way.
“ Kúkalabbi ,” I snarled, using my favorite Icelandic curse word. Adrenaline pounded through my body, exhorting me to hurry. Any second now, those men would surround me. I needed to run, except?—
No. Whoever’s out there, I can’t let them find Lee .
The duffel bag still attached to the harness shifted with my movements. Yes. I unzipped it and jammed the rest of the parachute inside, then piled the harness on top. Sweating and almost out of energy, I pushed it against Lee’s body, then stretched his left arm over it to hold it down.
Please let his arm be heavy enough to keep the chute from blowing out.
A new voice called out, something in Icelandic that I couldn’t make out. But I could hear that the voices were getting closer.
I’m out of time .
“Stay safe, my heart,” I ordered softly into Lee’s ear. “I’ll send help as soon as I can, and when this is over, you’re going to listen to me.” I pecked him near his earlobe. “Do you understand me, you stubborn man? I know exactly where your place is, and it’s not in some cave. I’ll make you understand that if it’s the last thing I do.”
Hoisting myself to my feet, I hurried away, doing my best to ignore the aches in my abused body. I stumbled as fast as my bare feet would let me, cursing through clenched teeth all the while, as I angled my way deeper into the woods, away from Lee’s body. I had to lead them away from him. Keep him safe at all costs.
Shouts rose close by, moving toward me. I ran faster, and the flashlights followed—away from Lee. At first, my heart sang. Then I looked down at myself, and my heart skipped a beat. If one of those flashlights caught my stupid dress, the silver sparkles that wound around my body, I’d be a giant reflector. A come-get-me beacon.
I ducked behind a tree and wriggled out of my dress, and pulled it back on inside-out. The zipper stuck halfway up, and I kept running, fighting back yelps as stones gouged my feet.
Tears streaked down my face as something sharp pierced my heel. My foot caught in the underbrush, and I stumbled, going down hard and coming to rest against a fallen log. Leaves flew in the air and a rotting branch crashed to the ground. I tried to get up, but my foot was still stuck.
The shouting grew closer, the flashlights, the men. I threw my arm up to shield my eyes, blinking as the harsh lights settled on me.
“Are you Viktoria Jonsdottir?” a man demanded in Icelandic.
“Did my father send you?” I asked instead. A futile question, since I knew he hadn’t, but I wanted to hear what his reply would be.
Instead of answering, the man shouted, “I found her.”
Leaves rustled and crunched beneath heavy footfalls. Two more men converged on my spot.
“Did my father send you?” I asked again, my voice cracking.
No one answered.
Dread leadened my limbs. Lee, please wake up soon ? —
A fourth set of footsteps crunched up behind me. I made to turn, but a soft cloth slid over my mouth and nose.
Involuntarily gasping, I inhaled something vaguely sweet that burned like alcohol, then…darkness.