Chapter 21 #3
When we’re six feet from them, Ace glances back at me. His expression is determined, but his eyes hold a depth of emotion within. Fear. Worry. Love. Trust.
And it’s the last of them that gives me the final boost of courage I need.
He trusts me to have his six. And I’ll do anything not to let him down.
Then he turns his focus back to the man ahead of him. Now we’re five feet away.
Four.
Three.
With only two feet left between us and the hijacker, Ace makes his move.
He swipes his leg out, and it collides with the other man’s legs with a heavy thunk. Then Ace grabs the attendant, yanks her away, and pushes her into the nearest row of seats.
I leap forward, catching the hijacker as he’s falling. I jerk the arm holding the gun behind his back, hard enough to hear bones snap. He yowls in pain and lets out a string of curses. The gun falls to the floor, and I kick it so it goes skittering down the aisle.
Ace spins the asshole hijacker around and slams his fist into his face. “You piece of shit! It’s Christmas. How dare you!”
Even as Ace is yelling at the man, I’m already wrenching zip ties around his wrists. A little tip from Blade and Arrow that I intend to hang onto—keeping zip ties with me no matter where I go.
In less than ten seconds, the hijacker is restrained. But his explosives on his vest are still ticking away, and the timer is at just under four minutes.
“Turn it off!” Ace snaps. It would be easier if the man just did it himself, rather than forcing Ace into doing it.
But the hijacker just spits at Ace, “No! I hope you all die!”
“Not today,” Ace retorts. Then he looks up at me. “I’m going to need scissors. To cut the wires. Can you find me—”
The silver-haired woman jumps up and rushes towards us. “I have scissors. They’re small, but they should work.”
I take the proffered scissors while Ace crouches over the hijacker. Then I hurry to Ace’s side and ask, “What else do you need?”
“Just keep him from moving around. I should have knocked him out, but I thought he might make this easy for us.”
“I’ll take care of that,” I reply. Pressing my fingers to the man’s carotid artery, I cut off the blood supply just long enough to knock him unconscious.
I’m tempted to do more, but decide against it.
Not because he deserves mercy, after what he did.
But the passengers are going to be traumatized enough already without seeing someone dead on the airplane.
Ace notices what I did and makes an approving sound. “Nice, Tink.”
“How does it look?” I want to look for myself, but I don’t want to get in Ace’s way.
“Not too bad,” he answers. “It’s a pretty simple—” He stops to concentrate on the weave of wires beneath his fingers. Then he reaches out his hand. “Scissors, please.”
I hand them over.
“I’m just going to make one cut,” Ace explains, raising his voice so everyone in the cabin can hear him.
There’s a great inhale, as though everyone is holding their breath.
“He’s a HAZMAT specialist,” I explain. Because, honestly, if some random guy on a plane announced he was about to disarm a bomb, I’d be scared crapless.
Okay, despite my confidence in Ace’s skills, I’m scared crapless. There are just too many things—
“Done.” Ace moves aside so I can see the timer, stopped at two minutes, forty-eight seconds. “This ass—jerk—can’t do anything to us now.”
Standing, Ace turns to face the rear of the cabin. “The explosives are disarmed. No one’s getting hurt on this plane today.” He scowls at the hijacker, now unconscious on the floor. “Other than him. I think his arm might be broken.”
“How do you know,” the cowardly passenger asks. “Who are you to say it’s disarmed?”
“Because I served as a HAZMAT specialist for the U.S. Army,” Ace replies. “I’m certain of it. Now.” He glances at the other flight attendant, the one with the sparkly reindeer horns. “Can you get the copilot out here? So we can fill him in on what just happened?”
She stares at Ace for a long moment before nodding. “Okay,” she whispers. “Thank you.”
A second later, the silver-haired woman echoes her statement. “Thank you. Both of you. That was just—”
“Amazing,” someone else adds.
“Thank you,” the little boy’s mother calls over. Her voice throbs with emotion. “Thank you so much. I was so scared…”
The father pulls her and his little boy into his arms. “Thank you.” His gaze moves from Ace’s to mine. “Both of you.”
And then.
The entire cabin erupts into applause.
Ace turns to me, relief evident in his gaze. “You’re okay.”
“So are you,” I reply. Then I rush forward to hug him. “So are you.”
“You were so incredible,” Ace says as his arms come around me.
I hug him back, hard. “No. You were incredible.”
He loosens his hold on me just enough to look at me. “We both did a great job, Tink. We make an incredible team.”
Oh.
Love sweeps through me, so swift and intense, it steals my breath.
I love him so much.
“Yeah,” I agree as I gaze into the eyes of the man who brought me to life again. Who taught me it’s okay to trust. That it’s not scary to love. “We really do.”