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“You might want to take some more Dramamine.”
“I’ve already taken some.”
“You got them out of the bag?”
She wrinkled her nose. “I met Pinocchio.”
“Pinocchio?” he echoed, seemingly confused.
“The underwear in your bag.”
Ace laughed, and the sound was every bit as rich and vibrant as she’d thought. Like Kahl?a and cream splashed over big chunky ice cubes. And every bit as potent.
“They were a gag gift,” he said. “At the bachelor party I went to a couple of days ago.”
“I could hardly care what you dress in, Mr. Lawson.” Still, she couldn’t help but wonder how they would look on him.
“I assure you, Ms. Jackson, I’ve never worn anything like that.”
She resisted the implied invitation to ask what he did wear.
“Not my style.”
Nicole turned away, looking out the window, seeing nothing except the vastness of water, which she assumed was the Caribbean. “I thought you said we’re landing.”
“We are.”
“Where?” she asked.
“Down there.”
“Down where?” she asked again, not seeing anything resembling an island, let alone a runway.
Outrageously, he winked at her. “Trust me.”
Her stomach dropped when Ace began the descent. Trusting him was the last thing she wanted to do. And the one thing she had to stake her life on.
The plane hit a patch of rough air, causing them to lose altitude drastically.
“We’ll be okay.”
She clutched the metal bar under her seat, the words trust me echoing in her mind.
They emerged from the turbulence, less than a heartbeat later.
“That wasn’t too bad, was it?”
“Terrifying,” she said.
“That wasn’t terrifying,” he said. “Terrifying is when you’re in the air with a bullet hole in the windshield and a fire in the engine.”
His tone was matter-of-fact, and it lit a responding flame somewhere inside her. He’d experienced the danger of living on the edge but didn’t allow it to bother him.
“Are you ever afraid?”
Ten, maybe fifteen seconds passed and she thought he didn’t intend to answer. What was going on behind that smoky gaze? What was he hiding?
Finally he admitted, “Sometimes. Sometimes I’m afraid.”
He looked at her. He obviously had a human side he didn’t want to show often. For some reason, the fact that he’d afforded her a glimpse of his fallible humanity touched her.
“Why do you put yourself in a position like that in the first place?”
“Because life can be shallow and meaningless.”
He specialized in taking people where no one else would. It had earned him a reputation she’d been scared to trust. Until she’d had no other options. “Putting yourself in danger makes life meaningful?”
“Living makes life meaningful,” he said.
She started to ask another question, to dig a little deeper into the character he wanted shrouded, but he interrupted.
“The runway’s just ahead.”
Nicole looked out the windshield, seeing something that resembled a lump of coal, floating in the middle of the sea. “Cabo de Bello?”
He looked at his console again. “Yep.”
A single light reflected in the distance. She felt like Columbus, discovering the blessed sight of land after months at sea.
Ace maneuvered the plane into a descent. Of all the things that could happen, gravity concerned her most.
“Hang on,” he said. “This runway’s still screwed up from the last tropical storm.”
She knew that, but hearing him say it made it more immediate. Alarming.
As they got closer, it appeared palm tree fronds grabbed at them like demonic fingers. She swallowed a terrified scream. The landing gear snagged in a rut, making them careen wildly. Ace swore. Nicole prayed. The plane rocked and shuddered, and the seat belt sliced across her middle.
“We’ll be okay in half a second,” he shouted.
The acrid stench of smoking rubber burned her nose. But before she knew it, they slid to a gradual stop, several dozen yards away from a threatening stand of tropical trees.
He’d performed an exceptional landing.
“You all right?”
Her muscles felt stiff but, other than that, she was all right. She nodded.
“Sure?”
A man with dark skin, and hair black as the night sky, rushed toward them, flashlight casting shadows all around. His face was alive with excitement. He grabbed the pilot’s door and threw it open. “Ah! Se?or Ace. I saw a plane trying to land like a crazy dodo bird...” For emphasis, the man spread his arms wide and turned a circle on the ground. “...I knew it had to be you.” He grinned, sporting a hole where front teeth usually resided.
“Hola, mi amigo,” Ace responded easily, shutting down the engine.
“Ah, Se?or Ace, you brought company.” He punched Ace in the arm. “Is about time. Me and my wife, we think it will never happen. Welcome, lady, welcome.”
He reached across Ace, extending a hand. Ace pushed the man’s hand back. Nicole frowned at Ace.
“Perhaps I should make some introductions, first. Ricardo, this is Nicole Jackson. With WorldNet. Nicole, my friend, Ricardo Maldanado.”
Ricardo quickly dropped his hand to his side, as if the threat of her touch offended him. She turned the full force of her scowl on Ace. He’d known this would happen. But why? She wanted answers. Now.
“Later, Nicole,” he promised. “You can have a piece of me later.”
“You bring her here?” Ricardo demanded, waving his arms like the dodo bird he’d spoken of. “Are you loco? This is too much, even for you.”
“What did you want me to do? Kick her out of my plane?”
“That would be better than bringing her here, no?”
“I don’t think the lady likes parachutes.”
“No. No.” The man frantically shook his head, then glanced over his shoulder, his wide-eyed alarm clear. “Is too dangerous, Se?or Ace. You must take her away. Pronto.”
A shiver of fear, unlike anything she’d ever felt, started at the base of her spine and spiked its way up, until it shimmered at her nape. “No,” Nicole said. She clutched Ace’s biceps and felt the tension coiled in solid muscle. She’d come too far; her future, and everything she’d always worked for, was on the line. She couldn’t quit. Couldn’t lose. “I must meet with Governor Rodriguez. Please.”
Because it vanished so quickly, she might only have imagined the momentary melting in Ace’s glacier-cold eyes.
“Relax, Ricardo. I’ll take care of the se?orita.“
The man shook his head in jerky motions. “No, no. Is too risky.”
“That’s my business, Ricardo. Besides, the lady here knows what she’s getting herself into.”
Under the faded shirt he wore, she felt Ace’s muscles bunch and constrict. “Tell that lazy brother of yours to get his butt over here with the taxi.”
Ricardo clasped his hands together in the motion of prayer and lifted them heavenward. He rolled his eyes. “Madre de Dios.”
“You’ll be meeting Her soon enough if you don’t do as I say, Ricardo. “Comprende?”
“Ah, s?, s?.” He bobbed his head, then hurried away.
With the man’s absence, the cockpit felt even smaller, the air lightning-charged. Frogs croaking and crickets chirping provided the only relief from the eerie silence.
“Satisfied?”
Ace had put himself on the line for her. And she had the uncomfortable feeling his help came with a price.
He turned slightly, his muscle flexing. She realized her hand was still wrapped around his upper arm. With a start, she unfurled her fingers and pretended the queasy feeling deep inside was from the flight and Ricardo’s strange reaction, and not from the powerful effect Ace exacted on her.
“I didn’t lie, did I? You really do know what you’re getting yourself into? You know what you’re up against?”
“You?” she asked, strangely breathlessly.
“Me?” He shook his head. “Hell, honey, I’m the least of your worries.”
His voice contained a grainy undercurrent of urgency that made her uneasy.
“A lot of people don’t want you here, Nicole. That should have been obvious by the meeting you just had with my friend. I can guarantee you my enemies won’t be so gracious.”
“What’s going on here?” Tendrils of apprehension held her in their grips.
“A small revolution, Nicole. Sparked by you and your client.”
She gulped and the blood drained from her face.
“Ricardo’s right. If you had any sense, we’d get the plane refueled and be outta here before anyone knows you ever landed. You can be safe and sound in your bed, probably in your penthouse apartment, before another sun sets.”
Ace shifted. The hilt of his knife reflected prisms of light from the faint runway lamps. She was in a hostile land, entrusting her life to a virtual stranger. Ace hadn’t candy-coated facts. Though the governor extended an invitation, others wouldn’t be so kind.
And the man she’d hired to help her wasn’t on her side. Fear was suddenly very real and very intimidating.
She heard the crank of a car’s engine and loud oaths. After several tries, the engine caught, choked, then rushed on. A moment later, a taxi with a missing headlight and twisted fender screeched to a halt beside the plane.
Ace leaned forward, his shoulder brushing the softness of her breast.
His presence disturbed her, made her undoubtedly aware of being a woman. Made her fear she would never again recoup the control she’d lost to her enigmatic protector.
She sucked in a breath. Deeply.
When he sat back up, she saw something glimmer in his hand. Her heart missed a beat.
In his palm, Ace cradled a large pistol. Dread coiled deep inside.
“It’s your call, Nicole.”
Three
“Well?” Ace watched while a war of indecision waged on her suddenly pale face. He’d scared her. Intentionally. Cabo de Bello was beautiful. Deceptively beautiful.
The governor had managed to keep the opposition subdued...so far. But for how long was anyone’s guess.
He saw Nicole shove away the fear and force grim determination in its place. She’d set a goal and refused to be deterred. It was a noble, if stupid, trait. The same kind of na?vetе had gotten him into trouble. Thank God he was too old for that anymore.
“I want to stay.”
“Yeah. I expected as much,” he said. “Let’s go.”
After grabbing his small arsenal of weapons, the duffel and her suitcase, he joined her on the tarmac.
