Crash Landing (13 page)

Eventually, her memory of this romantic rendezvous would fade and every once in a while, whenever she saw something that reminded her of him—El Diablo for instance or spider monkeys or passion fruit—she’d smile slyly and leave everyone guessing why.

Until Gibb, she had believed she would never settle for anything in a relationship except fiery passion. Now she knew firsthand that passion was a double-edged sword that cut both ways. While passion was the most intoxicating thing, it robbed you of your reasoning, dazzled your body and dazed your mind.

With this kind of passion, how did anyone ever get anything done? She and Gibb would be in bed ninety-nine percent of the time. He’d lose his billions. She’d never fly again.

Ah, but she would fly in a wholly different way.

She bit her bottom lip. Floated in the drunken embrace of lovemaking’s afterglow. What would it be like with him all the time?

That was just the thing, wasn’t it? Maybe this was fair warning. A danger signal. Ease off. Don’t go any further. Stop now and turn back before it’s too late.

But if switching off her need for him was that easy, she wouldn’t be here right now, basking in this bliss. She shivered, remembering the feel of his lips on her skin.

Gibb moved, reached out, and tugged her closer. He pressed a kiss to her forehead.

“Gibb?”

“Hmm?”

“Are you awake?”

“No.”

“That was...you were...I mean...well, I’m speechless.”

“Me, too, sweetheart,” he murmured.

She buried her face against his neck, inhaled his scent. She felt as if she were walking barefoot across a high line wire. One slip and she’d be electrified.

Who was she kidding? She was gone already.

She could hear the hammering of his heart. Her heart was hammering, too.

Shouldn’t she get up? Put some distance between them so she could think this thing through? Ah, but it was so easy to rest against him, so easy to allow herself to get swept away. Not smart. Not smart at all, but she’d been raised to do what she loved. That if she lived with heart and passion that she would be wealthy in the ways that counted.

Unexpected tears rose to her eyes and her nose burned. She pressed her lips together. No. Nothing to cry about. This was beautiful and she would enjoy every last second of it and when it was gone, well, she prayed she’d be strong enough to let go.

Slowly, she drifted off to sleep.

She was having an erotic dream. She and Gibb were doing all kinds of interesting things to each other with food—smearing chocolate syrup over their bodies and licking it off, eating strawberry Pop Rocks and kissing, feeding each other from clusters of ripe red grapes. So immersed was she in the dream, that at first she thought the faraway buzzing sound was part of the dream. That maybe Gibb had found a beehive and he was raiding it for honey to use in their sex play.

It took a few minutes for the noise to fully seep into her consciousness. Airplane. Not bees at all. It was the sound of an airplane engine.

Sophia blinked awake, cocked her head to listen. Was it really an airplane or just her dream?

The familiar droning lit her up inside. No dream. It
was
a plane.

She flung Gibb’s arm off her chest. Jumped to her feet. The darkness of the jungle was slipping away. Dawn was approaching.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Gibb asked groggily. He sat up, rubbed his eyes.

Even in her haste, Sophia could not stop herself from casting a glance over his naked body. Hombre sexy.

“Soph?”

She pointed toward the sky. “Plane.”

Instantly he was on his feet. “The radio. We have to get to the radio.”

“Clothes. Shoes.”

“On it.”

She searched the dark ground and her fingers hit material. Silk. She thrust his boxer shorts at him. He handed Sophia her cotton crop top.

“Hurry, hurry.”

“We’ll never make it to the beach in time,” he muttered.

“Don’t think negatively.”

“Do you know the way out of here?”

“I think I do. I heard the ocean waves during the night. I don’t think we’re all that far from the beach.”

“But what if where we come out is on the opposite side of the island from the plane?”

“We have to try.”

“You’re daydreaming.”

“Exactly. Remember where daydreaming got me,” she reminded him.

They found their shoes and put them on.

The airplane noises were growing fainter. Still, the plane would be in radio range even when they could no longer hear the engine. It all depended on how long it took them to get to the beach.

“Come on,” she cried, and grabbed Gibb’s hand.

12

S
TUMBLING
OVER
ROOTS
and vines, they ran toward where she thought the beach might be, following the lulling sound of the ocean. All around them animals and insects scurried out of their way.

After several minutes, Sophia was out of breath, but Gibb was an iron man, taking the lead and battling back the vegetation so she could follow him unimpeded. Who knew the city man was in better physical condition than a woman who’d grown up walking mountains? He was something else. Even in haste, she couldn’t help appreciating his body. The man had a lot to be proud of.

She was beginning to despair that they wouldn’t make it to the beach in time. The sound of the airplane engine was long gone, but there was still hope. Since the plane had been flying at an altitude low enough for them to hear it, there was a possibility that the pilot spotted El Diablo on the beach. Wishful thinking, yes, but then again, maybe it was a rescue plane.

A man like Gibb Martin did not go missing without people noticing, but it had still been dark when she’d first heard the engine. Had it been too dark for the pilot to see her plane?

While she and Gibb had been out having frantic sex, they might have lost their opportunity to be rescued for several days. Why, then, was she not upset by the prospect of spending more time on the island alone with Gibb?

Um, remember, you don’t have any condoms.

Stranded on a deserted island with the sexiest man alive. A man she had dynamite chemistry with and no condoms. It was her definition of torture.

At last, she could see the faint glow of dawn filtering through the trees as the vegetation grew sparser. They were almost to the frustration.

Gibb broke through the last column of fronds. He paused, looked back and waited for her.

“Go, go.” Panting, she waved at him. “Get to the radio.”

“No,” he said and held out his palm. “We’re in this together.”

Touched, she slipped her hand into his.

He gripped her tight. “We’re a team.”

They stepped over a fallen log, skirted a clump of felled coconuts and their feet hit sand.

El Diablo sat at least five hundred yards away.

She groaned. More running.

“You can do it,” Gibb encouraged. “I have complete faith in you.”

“Easy for you to say. Your legs are much longer than mine. I have to take two steps for every one of yours.”

From the ocean on the other side of El Diablo a small boat bobbed in the water.

“Hey, look.” Gibb grinned at her. “We can slow down. Someone’s here to save us.”

Sophia squinted into the pale sunlight and an uneasy feeling spread over her. That second sense she seemed to have about people, was warning her. She stopped.

Gibb took a few more steps before he realized she was not keeping up with him. He halted, turned back.

Instinct told her to step back into the tree line.

“Sophia?” he said. “What is it?”

She put an index finger to her lips, shook her head.

“What’s wrong?” he whispered.

She kept walking backward, step-by-step and crooked her index finger at him.

“Soph?” He frowned, looked from her to the boat and back again.

For a moment, she thought that he was not going to follow her and she would have to say something. Although the people in the boat probably weren’t close enough to hear them, she didn’t want to take any chances.

This island most likely belonged to Columbia like the nearby Island de Providencia. Maybe they were drug smugglers who hid their cache of drugs on the island. A ripple of fear moved through her and she kept walking until she was hidden from view.

Gibb came after her. “Sophia, what’s going on?”

“Shh.” She crouched down, hid behind a banana tree and peeked around the wide leaves.

The boat was getting closer. There were three men in it.

Gibb crouched beside her. “You want to clue me in about what’s happening here?”

“I don’t know.”

“Hmm, so you don’t know why we’re hiding out from our rescuers?”

“We don’t know that they
are
here to rescue us. Better to err on the side of caution.”

“If they’re not here to rescue us, who do you think they are?”

She shrugged. “Pirates. Drug smugglers. Who knows? This island is remote and we have nothing to defend ourselves with.”

“We could lob coconuts at them, or hey, passion fruit. They really stung when the monkeys pelted us with them.”

She glowered at him.

“You’re serious about this?”

“Yes.”

“Wow.” Both eyebrows shot up on his forehead.

“We are alone. We do not know who these men are. We have no way of communicating with the outside world.”

“Don’t you think you’re being a bit paranoid?” he said. “What if they came here to look for us and we’re so busy hiding that they leave and no one comes by for a good long time?”

What if that did happen? Sophia bit her bottom lip. What if her instincts were wrong?

Gibb said nothing for a few minutes. They crouched together as the boat grew nearer and nearer. It was going to come ashore right where El Diablo was grounded.

“Look, I understand why you’re nervous. You’re a woman. It’s important not to be too trusting around men you don’t know, but after last night, I figured you’d trust me to take care of you.”

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” she said. “I just have a bad feeling about this.”

“Any particular reason why?”

“The boat is old and looks to be in poor condition. Would rescuers arrive in such a boat?”

“You make a good point.”

The boat was close enough now that they could hear the men speaking. She couldn’t make out the words but it was clear they were speaking Spanish.

Gibb scooted closer to her. “Can you hear what they’re saying?”

“They’re still too far away.”

“Sophia, I respect your intuition, but I can’t simply hide here and let the opportunity to be rescued pass us by. If we get out of here today, I can still make it to Florida before Scott’s wedding.”

“Will you let that go already?”

“I can’t,” he said. “You were right before when you said that I focus more on goals than relationships. Scott is important to me. It’s time for me to put friendship ahead of money.”

“So what is your plan? Just walk right out there and say,
‘Hola’
? You don’t even speak Spanish.”

“Let’s say they aren’t here to rescue us. Just some fishermen who saw the plane and curiosity got the better of them. I’m certain that I could convince them to take us to Island de Providencia for the right price. I do know the Spanish word for money.”

“I bet you know the word ‘money’ in a hundred languages.” She flipped her hair back over her shoulder.

“It’s a plan. You wanted to know my plan. That’s it.”

“Pirates do not take credit cards. And since you are an American, they will assume you are rich. Those expensive silk boxer shorts would cement the impression. They’ll take you hostage and I don’t even want to think about what they might do to me.”

That got through to him. He curled his hand around her shoulder. “You really are serious.”

“Let’s just wait and listen to their conversation when they come ashore. If it’s about fishing and concern that someone’s plane crashed, then we’ll come out of hiding.”

“All right,” he agreed.

She had convinced him, but now Sophia had to wonder if maybe she was being too suspicious. Could this feeling be a subconscious desire to spend more time alone with Gibb, rather than a real sixth sense about the men in the boat?

The boat landed on the beach.

The hairs on the back of Sophia’s neck stood up. Something was definitely not right here.

The men climbed out of the boat and walked over to El Diablo. One of the men picked up Gibb’s suit pants from where she’d left the garment drying on the wing of the plane. He spoke to his companions. They laughed.

“What did he say?” Gibb asked.

“The pilot must be a naked rich man,” she translated.

“Naked is a bit of an overstatement.”

She flicked a glance at his butt in those silk boxer shorts. “Not by much.”

“And what’s with the assumption that I’m rich?”

“Thieves are pretty good at spotting expensive things. There are times when a fancy suit is a drawback. Wear shorts once in a while, why don’t you?”

“So they do know we’re here,” he said inanely.

“The crashed plane was pretty self-evident.”

The other two men motioned for the first to come back to the boat. The man tossed Gibb’s pants over the wing.

Gibb stood up. “They’re leaving.”

“No, they’re not.”

The men removed a large blue plastic tub from the boat.

Gibb squatted down again. “What do you suppose they have in that thing?”

“Drugs. Pirate treasure. A body. Who knows?”

“For a happy woman you can go to some pretty dark places.”

She made a pipe-down motion. “They’re talking.”

The man that had found Gibb’s pants pulled a piece of paper from his back pocket and unfolded it. A map.

“Maybe they’re lost,” Gibb said.

“Shh.”

The tallest of the men made another trip to the boat and returned with two digging spades. That looked ominous. They were speaking low and she could only catch snatches of Spanish words—harvest, shears, potting soil.

Gibb nudged her with his elbow. “What are they talking about?”

Sophia crinkled her nose. “Gardening supplies.”

“They’re gardeners?”

She shook her head just as the tallest man again reached into the boat. The man with the map thumped it with his hand and said,
“Fantasma,”
at the same time the tallest man retrieved what he’d gone after, slung it over his shoulder.

“Do you know who they are?” Gibb asked.

“I do. They’re orchid thieves and they’ve got a gun.”

* * *

S
OPHIA
’
S
INTUITION
HAD
been right. The men were up to no good and the appearance of a shotgun was disturbing. However, this could work to their advantage if they were careful. Stay hidden here until the men disappeared into the jungle after the orchids, then he and Sophia could steal their boat and motor off to Island de Providencia.

Before Gibb had a chance to voice his plan, Sophia grabbed his elbow and pulled him deeper into the tropical forest.

“Where are we going?”

“To save the ghost orchids.”

He balked, dug his heels in. “I hate to point out the obvious, but shouldn’t we be waiting until they go into the jungle and then we take off in their boat?”

She stared at him like he had suggested she kick a kitten. “We can’t let them steal the orchids.”

“Sure we can. It will keep them occupied while we get away.”

“You don’t get it. These are ghost orchids. The rarest orchids in the world.”

“I agree, it’s sad for beautiful wild orchids to fall into the hands of smugglers, but they do have a shotgun and I don’t want to end up on the wrong end of—”

Sophia wasn’t listening. She turned and moved along the way they’d come.

Ah, hell, he was going to have to follow her. There was one drawback to a passionate woman. When she set her mind on something, it was set.

“Wait,” he called as loud as he dared. The worst thing that they could do would be to get separated.

She waited for him to catch up to her. “We’ll have to be quick,” she whispered.

He had no idea what she was thinking of, but at this point, he simply took it on faith. She had been right about the men in the boat. That shotgun made him a firm believer in her female intuition.

It took him and Sophia fifteen minutes to find their way back to the orchids.

“We don’t have much time.” She pulled the Swiss Army knife from her pocket and started hacking viciously at vines. “Gather them up as I cut them.”

He was totally confused. “What are we doing?”

“Last ditch effort to save the orchids.” She was a jungle ninja, running and cutting vines.

Stunned, he started gathering the downed vines, measuring roughly six to eight feet in length. What she was doing made no sense, but he trusted her.

By the time she finished slashing, she was panting and her cheeks were flushed. She cut at least a dozen vines.

“Tie a slipknot by folding the vine in two sections. One side should be several feet long, the second side only a few inches, like this.” She demonstrated as she talked. “Now pull the folded end of the vine up several inches so that you form three loops like this.”

“I’ll do it, sure, but can you tell me what we’re making?”

“Snare nooses.”

“You mean like trappers once used to catch wild animals?”

“Exactly. Pay attention. String the right loop and pull it tight, but make sure to keep a noose in the end. The end of the knot should be large enough to slip the vine through. Finally, slide the long end of the vine through the knot.”

He was highly skeptical that this crazy plan would work, but he indulged her. They could always go back to his plan while the smugglers were busy digging up orchids. The one thing that bothered him though was the shotgun.

“How’s this?” he asked, holding up the snare noose he’d made.

“Looks good. That’s two. Keep going. The more we have the more likely we are to catch them.”

“You plan on catching these men with vines?”

“My brothers caught me in a snare noose more than once.”

“Really?” He was impressed.

“But I was a kid and didn’t weigh much. Like I said, this is a last ditch effort to save the ghost orchids.”

“Is there really that much of a market for illegal orchids?”

“One ghost orchid plant alone would be worth thousands. The tragedy is, I seriously doubt these men are accomplished horticulturists and orchids are delicate. They’ll steal them all in the hopes that one or two plants will make it.”

“How do you know so much about orchids?”

“Orchids were the reason my American mother came to Costa Rica. They were her greatest passion until she met my father.” Sophia tied three snare nooses before he finished his second.