Chapter 21
CHAPTER 21
W illow
Another flight.
Another scare.
Another tight fit with a man I couldn’t… hate.
The reality of how I felt about him kept me on edge. Hate. Love. They were just two sides of the same coin. Right?
“You’re not as nervous,” he said once we were in the air.
“I figured I’m going to die at some point.”
His laugh sounded full of confusion. “We all will, but not today.”
“You’re so certain of that.”
“Yes, because I’m good at what I do.”
“Your confidence is infuriating.”
“Then I’m doing another part of my job.”
He could turn me upside down and inside out with his voice alone, let alone his riddled answers. “Can I ask you a question?” I was hiding my nervousness well, but my stomach was doing flipflops. The wind was slightly stronger. I was able to feel that in the vibrations of the plane.
“You can ask me anything.”
“I thought we were partners. Then I find out I’m nothing but a ploy. If you’re planning on killing me after we finish this game you have going, please just do it now. I don’t have much to live for anyway.”
I could tell by the way he squeezed his hand around the controls how angry I’d made him. His clenched jaw alone told me that.
“Is that what you think?” he asked, his tone even.
“That’s what I heard. You told your brother I’m an excellent ploy.” I also put my foot into my mouth when I was nervous and around him, butterflies had taken full possession of my stomach.
He didn’t show any additional signs of being furious with me.
“You took the entire call out of context, Willow. Listening in on half of a one-sided conversation will never provide any real truths.”
“I’ll repeat. I thought we were partners. That’s the only reason I agreed to this… nightmare.”
“Marrying me is a nightmare?” He glanced over. While his sunglasses prevented me from seeing his eyes, I was struck by an instant moment of disappointment.
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” I laughed nervously.
“When you do, let me know. It’s important to me.”
The quiet and tension between us was so entirely different than the moments we’d shared for a couple of fabulous days. We’d laughed. Hell, he’d chased me on the beach. We’d had wine outside while we discussed music and where we’d both like to travel. The time spent together had been close to being perfect.
Being shut down was more uncomfortable than before. “Why did you say that?”
“Because it’s what my brothers need to hear. They are suffering, Willow. Like you are. Maybe like your brother is. You are my partner. I made a promise, not just a deal and I intend on keeping it. You don’t need to like me, but you will need to trust me or the murders will go unsolved. I know you don’t want that to happen.”
“No, I don’t,” I told him. “And for some insane reason, I do trust you.”
He glanced out the window then down to his instruments. “That’s good to hear, Willow. It’s important to me. To both of us. I’ll take us out a little further. It’s a beautiful day and there are some islands I think you’ll enjoy seeing.”
For some reason, I got the creepy crawlies and tried to look behind us out the window. Seeing nothing, I told myself I was being silly, but as he made a sharp turn, my stomach lurching, I knew there had to be something wrong.
He said nothing but constantly looked at his instruments, narrowing his eyes as he glared at the gauges.
The stress of the moment hit me hard. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong. Just make certain your seatbelt is fastened as tight as it will go.” His gravelly voice wasn’t helping. I’d heard the tone before. It was the one that said something was very, no, terribly wrong.
“You’re scaring me.” Instead of checking to ensure the belt was clawing into my skin, I stretched it out and turned in my seat as much as the angle would allow. I couldn’t see a thing out the small windows, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t some evil being trailing after us. Wait. Was that possible in a plane?
“Seatbelt. Now!” Up to this point he hadn’t shouted at me, but he was as damn close as I wanted to hear.
I did as he asked, shaking like a leaf the entire time. I glanced out the window and that didn’t help, the instant feeling of nausea almost forcing me to ask where he’d placed the airbags he’d mentioned. “Please tell me what’s going on, Dimitrios.”
He shifted something on the console and adjusted the microphone on his headset, placing the small piece directly in front of his mouth. “I’ll just say it’s about to get real, princess.”
As he started speaking in Greek through the microphone, I didn’t need to know the language to realize he was both angry and nervous, maybe more of the latter. He ended the communication by shouting at the man on the other end, huffing and issuing what had to be Greek curse words under his breath.
“I’m making a dip toward the ocean, Willow. Hold on.”
I didn’t have time to ask why or beg him not to do so something so crazy before he did. The hard dive wasn’t anything like what I’d expected and I was positive I’d left my stomach thousands of feet above the plane. The ocean seemed close. So close.
Oh, my God, close.
When he banked hard to the left, the seatbelt attaching itself to my body, I caught a glimpse of something out the side window. Not something. Another plane.
And they were closer than the water. What the hell was going on?
“What is…” My voice faded off altogether.
Dimitrios banked to the right, dipping even lower. “Fuck. Get off my ass.”
“Who is it?”
“If I knew that, little dove, I’d have a handle on what to do with the assholes.” While there was land on one side, there was nothing but endless, open ocean on the other.
I closed my eyes, shaking so badly my teeth were rattling.
Seconds later, I heard two distinct sounds I would never forget as long as I was alive.
Several popping noises that my gut told me were gunfire and hard pinging against the plane’s surface.
“Someone is shooting at us.” I wasn’t asking a question. I knew it to be true.
“Good guess, princess.”
Another series of gunshots hit, the next set missing as he banked so hard to the left, I was thrown toward him. The thick belt slipped to under my chin, the momentary feeling of being suffocated causing me to wheeze.
A slight rumble was followed by a jerk of the plane.
And a sputter of the engine.
“Did we just lose the engine?”
He said nothing, checking his instruments and continuing to bark into the microphone.
Something was wrong.
Terribly wrong.
As he looked over at me, every part of his face pinched, all I could do was suck in my breath.
“You need to trust me completely, Willow. Hold tight. We’re going down.”
“A crash landing.”
“This baby isn’t an amphibian, but I’ll do my best. I’m throttling down. Don’t worry. I will save us both.”
The water was closer. Closer. The engine was screaming, or was that me losing all sense of control?
I’d always wondered what happened when you had the sense of all time stopping as you faced death. Would you really witness aspects of your life? Would you pray for more time? Would you promise to be a good person for the rest of your life?
Or would you just accept the inevitable?
In the last seconds before the plane took a dive into the water, he squeezed my leg.
Maybe we’d be alright.
Maybe we’d survive.
And maybe…
Boom!