An Extraordinary Match (The Match Series Book 3) (19 page)

Jade shook his hand. “Nice to meet you. Thank you for helping me.”

He smiled. “No trouble at all.” He gestured to a row of jump seats along the side of the plane. “Let’s get you strapped in.”

She dried her hands on the front of her jeans. “I’ve never flown like this before.”

“Not exactly first class,” said Sam. “But it’ll get us there.”

“It’s kind of exciting,” she said, determined to push away her heartache.

“It’s also fast,” said JW. “We’ll be at the base in a couple of hours.”

Jade glanced from one man to the other. “How can I thank you for doing all this? I don’t know why you would, but I’m incredibly grateful.”

“No need to thank us,” said Sam. “You’re an asset to your country. We all recognize that.”

Jade couldn’t help but think it was an exaggeration. But she was incredibly relieved to have the nightmare ending. She lowered herself into one of the seats, and JW showed her how to buckle the harness.

JW took the seat beside her, Sam across the narrow plane.

“Anyone see you leave?” JW asked Sam.

“I think we’re in the clear.”

Jade settled into the seat. It wasn’t spacious, but it wasn’t uncomfortable either.

The engines revved, and the plane began its taxi. The uniformed soldier came by and handed them each a bottle of water.

“In-flight service,” JW joked.

As they sped down the runway, Jade tried to hang on to the sense of relief she felt at getting out from under WNT.

But as their speed increased, panic began to build. She was assailed by the realization that she shouldn’t have left Logan with nothing but a note. She should have woken him up to say goodbye. She should have explained to him it was Florida, jail or WNT, and that she didn’t have a choice.

She started to picture him waking up alone, reading her note, thinking she was callous or indifferent, that what they’d had together meant so little to her. Nothing could be further from the truth. What she felt for him was terrifyingly strong.

The plane blasted off into the air, climbing at an almost unimaginable rate, leaving Logan farther and farther behind.

“This is for you,” said JW, holding out a slim cell phone. “If you don’t mind, I’ll disable your old one.”

She battled her distress. “I need a new cell phone?”

“You do,” Sam confirmed. “I’ve shut down all of your e-mail accounts. I’d suggest using only your government one to start with.”

A sense of unease crept through her. What exactly had she signed up for?

“I have some paperwork,” said Sam, lifting a briefcase into his lap and opening it. “I’ve canceled your credit cards and set up a new bank account. If you sign here, everything will be transferred.”

Her worry built. “It’s still all in my name, right?”

“Of course it’s still in your name. And regular government paychecks will be deposited into the new account.”

“Am I in hiding? Am I going underground?”

Sam cracked a smile. “Not at all. We’re just putting some rudimentary security measures around you. You should lie low for a week or two until we get everything settled. After that, as an employee of the US government, you can do whatever you like.”

“And WNT will stay away.”

“They absolutely will not poach employees from the military.”

“What about my apartment?”

Sam leafed through some papers. “I got you out of the lease. Movers will be there tomorrow, and everything will go into storage until you have a place in Florida.”

“You are frighteningly good at this.”

“It’s not me,” said Sam.

“Or me,” said JW.

“The military moves people all the time,” said Sam. “They have experts in everything.”

Though she knew she should be happy, she was desperately sad. It was all executed with amazing precision. She was now under the protection of the government, and she was free from WNT. It was good. It was all good. And the only significant compromise was a potential relationship with Logan.

She knew that if things had been different, she would have said yes to him. She would have stayed longer in Mirror Falls. She could have asked Virgil for additional time off. She’d have met Logan’s family, gotten to know Amy, stuck around to see where their relationship might lead.

Leaving Mirror Falls might be a showstopper for Logan. But Jade would have considered staying there with him, assuming what they had turned out to be real. If it was real, she’d have stuck by his side forever.

*

Logan awoke to
sunshine streaming into the hotel suite and an empty space in the bed beside him. He lay still and listened, straining for the sound of water running, footsteps, or possibly Jade’s voice on a telephone call.

There was nothing.

He sat up, and his gaze caught on a note on her pillow. He smiled as he unfolded it. Hopefully, she was bringing back bagels and coffee. He was starving.

As he read, his smile faded, and he blinked in disbelief. She caught an early flight? What flight? He knew all the scheduled flights in and out of Mirror Falls. There was nothing in the early morning.

She’d wrote that she was sorry and that she’d never forget their time together. What the hell?

He came to his feet. How could it happen? How could she be gone?

He went for his telephone before remembering he didn’t have her number. There’d been no reason to get it.

He’d track it down. He’d track her down. It wasn’t going to end like this, a note on a pillow with a generic “goodbye” and “I’ll remember you” message.

He quickly pulled on his clothes and left the suite, impatiently stabbing at the elevator button before giving up and taking the stairs. Amy’s house first, he decided, on the off chance that she had Jade’s phone number.

But on the way down, he came up with a better idea. He stopped at the front desk and got a copy of her hotel record. Sure enough, it had an address and a cell phone number. He dialed it and got a computer-generated voice message. So he sent her a text, telling her to call him as soon as she could.

Then he took in the New York City address. If she didn’t call him back, he’d go to New York and talk to her in person. He’d check the Treeline Aviation schedule, assign other pilots to his flights, and take a couple of days off. He headed out the front doors of the hotel, turning left toward his office, restraining the urge to break into a jog.

But halfway down the block, his path was blocked. Ewan and John suddenly appeared and closed ranks in front of him, stopping his progress.

“Where is she?” asked Ewan.

“Get out of my way.” This was not the day to mess with Logan.

“Not until you tell us where she is.”

“Back off.” Logan pressed forward.

John put a firm hand on his chest.

Logan swatted it down. “Get out of my way.”

“Answer our question. We know she left the hotel.”

“Bully for you.” Logan stepped to one side.

John moved with him. “We also know you’re fucking her.”

Logan’s lip curled in a snarl, and he squared his shoulders. “You’ve got two seconds to shut up and get out of my way.”

Ewan came up on Logan’s left side, and when Logan turned, John grabbed him from behind. Logan reflexively broke the hold, his elbow cracking into John’s jaw. Ewan took a swing, and Logan ducked. He hit back, smashing his fist into Ewan’s face.

The man staggered back, and Logan whirled in time to deflect a blow from John. Then he punched hard, two in the stomach and another in the jaw. His fist cracked satisfyingly against bone.

“Whoa, whoa, everybody stand down,” came a commanding voice. The sheriff moved in, followed by a deputy.

“They threw the first punch,” Logan told his cousin Clive.

“He attacked us,” said Ewan.

John still seemed dazed.

“I’ve never known Logan to have a temper,” said Clive.

“He does when it comes to the girl,” said Ewan.

“The girl?” asked Clive.

“Jade Korrigan,” John added through teeth that were clenched in obvious pain.

Logan hoped he’d broken the man’s jaw.

“I’m going to have to take you all down to the station,” said Clive. He shot Logan a look of apology.

“I was defending myself.” Logan didn’t have time for the police station or anything else right now.

“I’ll need statements from all of you,” said Clive.

“This is a travesty,” said Ewan. “He attacked us.”

“You want to come willingly or do I have to cuff you?”

“I’m a witness.” Store owner Shelly MacDonald stepped forward. “Logan’s telling the truth. These two guys attacked him. I think they were lying in wait around the corner.”

“I’m a witness, too,” said Dan Solomon, another nearby business owner. “I saw the whole thing, and I’ll testify. These guys grabbed Logan for no reason.”

“Hang on.” Ewan started to back away. But the deputy was there to grab him, swiftly locking him in handcuffs.

Logan felt a smile grow on his face. Then he felt a buzz in his pocket. At first he hoped for a text from Jade. But then he realized it was his search-and-rescue pager.

He quickly pulled it from his pocket, holding it up for Clive to see. “Got a call.”

“Go,” said Clive.

Logan did. He took off at a jog, pressing the response key on his pager to let them know he was on his way.

Five minutes later, he burst into the Treeline Aviation office. Danica was at the counter, talking on the phone. She held up her hand to signal she was on the search-and-rescue call.

Logan grabbed a flight suit and started to change.

“Injuries?” Danica asked into the phone. Then she made several notes on a pad of paper. “Logan’s ETA to the dock is five minutes.”

Logan laced up his boots and grabbed his flight bag.

She pressed the hold button. “Amy and Phillip will meet you on the dock. There was a distress radio call from a speedboat on Crystal Lake, the north end. No other boats on the lake today. They’ve capsized with multiple injuries. Search-and-rescue wants to deploy the Otter.”

“Got it,” said Logan, securing his phone in his flight-suit pocket. “Is Elroy on his way?”

Logan needed a co-pilot, and they’d need an extra hand to extract people from the water.

“They paged him, and he’s left his house. Joe’s also on the dock.”

“Great. We can use the help. Tell the operator my ETA from liftoff will be thirty minutes. I’ll check in on the radio once we’re airborne.” He headed out the door as Danica took the call off hold.

Logan was first to the big airplane. He gave himself thirty seconds to curse the delay in going after Jade, then he went into his pre-flight routine. He double-checked the fuel level and checked the floats for water, making sure none had accumulated since the last time they’d flown the plane.

Amy arrived and clambered in through the side door, removing the back seats one by one. She handed them down to Logan. Elroy arrived, sprinting down the dock to help, while Phillip drove a cart, trailering in the portable stretchers. It took ten long minutes to get everything ready to go.

Then Logan fired up the engines and taxied to the middle of the lake. The water was choppy as they crossed it, the wind buffeting them in irregular gusts. Elroy radioed the tower for a takeoff clearance, while Logan turned the plane into the wind. He rolled one float off the water, getting airborne. Then the twin-engine plane climbed steeply over the hill, turning south to Crystal Lake.

The wind battered them all the way there. The lake was small and narrow, restricting their landing options. They spotted the capsized boat, and Logan banked the plane around to the far end to land into the wind.

“It’ll be a gusty landing,” Elroy said into the headset.

“I’ll put it down in the lee of the point,” Logan answered.

He let it down, skimming the water, then chopped the power to hit the mark. He turned and taxied as close as he dared to the boat. He adjusted the power levers then unbuckled, pulling off his headset and passing control to Joe to hold the plane stationary.

“I can see three people in life jackets,” Amy called from the back.

With Joe in control, Elroy jumped from his seat. He and Logan shrugged into life jackets then swung open the door and clambered onto the airplane float. They could hear shouts for help out in the water. Phillip handed down a small life raft. Elroy flattened himself against a strut while Logan pulled the cord, and the raft instantly inflated. Phillip dropped in a few pieces of equipment.

“Paddles coming down,” he called.

Logan and Elroy each grabbed a paddle and bailed into the boat. They paddled to the nearest survivor, a woman in her mid-twenties.

“Are you hurt?” called Elroy.

“My ankle. We hit some driftwood. My husband.” She glanced frantically around. “Please, please find him.”

Each grabbing her beneath an arm, they hoisted her into the inflatable raft. “We’ll find him, ma’am,” said Logan. “How many of you were in the boat?”

They positioned her injured leg as gently as possible.

“Four,” she answered on a breathless gasp. “Oh, I think it’s broken.”

They paddled swiftly to the plane. As soon as the woman was clear and in the hands of Amy and Phillip, they headed for the next victim. The man was unconscious but still breathing. Using a mini backboard, they strapped him down before pulling him in.