Edwina and the Seven Snowed-in Scientists (2 page)

messenger? My boss told me I had to take this run. Trust me, if I had my way, I’d be curled up under the blankets waiting for my contract

to finish.”

“Curious,” humorless hunk said in a neutral voice. “We were

given the impression that flying us was completely your idea. Why

would someone credit you with a kindness you didn’t offer?”

Edwina ground her teeth together while she tried to figure out if

she should take offense to his words. Transporting scientists to the

outlying research facilities was part of her job. Even if she’d offered, it wouldn’t have been a kindness as such, so maybe she couldn’t take

offense to his wording.

Hunk number one made some sort of physical gesture to

humorless hunk that Edwina only caught out of the corner of her eye

then spoke in his smooth, deep voice. Even over the earphones that

made most voices sound tinny and strange, this man’s voice managed

to curl her toes in her shoes. Luckily, she was wearing thick socks.

“I’m Jake Kodi,” he said with a broad, super-white smile, “and

that’s Kieran, one of my brothers, and we both thank you for the ride to the research shack. You saved us many hours of walking.”

Edwina nodded, not really knowing what to say. If it had been her

choice, they’d be walking, so accepting their thanks didn’t really

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seem appropriate. “So…um…what will you be doing in the shack this

late in the season? Stay too long and you’ll be stranded until October or November.”

“That’s the plan,” Jake said with another of his wide, friendly

grins. “We’ll be snowed-in all winter.”

“Seriously?” she asked, not even trying to hide her incredulity.

Who on Earth would want to stay cooped up in a tiny little science

base for eight months?

“Seriously,” humorless hunk, a.k.a. Kieran, said from his space in

the back seat. Wow, that really was a man without levity.

“Sorry,” she mumbled quietly. “What will you be working on?”

Maybe if she could get them talking, she’d stop putting her foot in her mouth.

“Science experiments,” Kieran said with the slightest hint of

derision. Okay, she wasn’t exactly savvy in the science field, but

she’d passed high school chemistry, so she wasn’t a complete idiot.

Jake gave his brother another one of those gestures and turned the

conversation back on her.

“How did you end up in Antarctica?”

She laughed humorlessly, hoping Mr. Humorless in the back row

caught the irony. “I have no idea. I remember being warm, and then I

wasn’t. Why the hell I would take a job here is completely beyond

me.” Jake gave her a huge grin, but Kieran managed to make an

irritated noise through the microphone. Wonderful. As pleasant as

Jake seemed, Edwina was looking forward to the trip home—the

silent trip home.

But then a warning light started flashing.

“What the fuck!” she exclaimed when she saw the fuel level. “It

was full when we left the base. That can’t be right.”

“Are you sure you refueled?” Kieran asked in an exasperated

voice. Thank God the asshole was sitting behind her, or she might

have been tempted to smack him one.

Edwina and the Seven Snowed-in Scientists

13

“Of course I refueled,” she yelled, fear and anger making her

voice higher pitched than she would have liked if she’d had a moment

to think about it. “Either the warning light is wrong or we’re losing fuel. We need to land immediately, so I can check.”

Jake leaned over, pressed her arm with his gloved hand, silently

offering his support. She nodded, feeling more grounded. Deal with

the immediate problem. Lay blame later. She checked her map against

the GPS, identified a suitable landing place, and headed straight for it.

Of course, they would’ve been fine if she’d had just twenty

seconds more of fuel. As it was, the landing was heavy—very

heavy—and definitely not where she planned. As the chopper’s skids

touched the ground the cabin tilted to one side. She had a moment to

see the blades hit the ice before debris hurtled in her direction and everything went black.

* * * *

“Is she alive?” Kieran asked his brother urgently. It had all

happened so quickly. He hadn’t even been able to call out a warning

before part of the blade crashed through the window.

“Alive,” Jake said as he managed to untangle his seat belt and

lower himself to her position. The helicopter was tilted toward the

pilot side, so the floor was like walking down a steep incline, and Kieran realized if they wanted to get out they needed to go up. There was no way they’d be able to get Edwina’s door open.

Kieran had to wedge himself between the seat bases to be able to

push the door open, but he managed to clamber out of the downed

chopper and position himself so that he could lift Edwina from his

brother’s arms. Normally he wouldn’t consider moving an

unconscious crash victim, but considering their current location, she was at more risk of hypothermia at the moment.

The wind chose that moment to make itself known. Damn, even a

soft breeze could lower the temperature dramatically. Jake managed

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to untangle Edwina from her seat harness and lifted her easily. She

moaned as Kieran grabbed for her, her eyelids fluttering open

momentarily.

“I’m okay,” she grumbled but dropped her head to rest on his

brother’s shoulder. Good. At least she wasn’t fighting them. She even managed to grab Kieran in a weak grip and help to lift herself up, so hopefully she’d hadn’t been knocked unconscious and her injury was

minor. Hell, he hoped so. This was not the place to be badly injured, especially this time of year.

She shivered violently as the wind grew in strength, but she clung

to him when he tried to put her on her feet so that he could help his brother. He frowned at her reaction. If she’d been thinking clearly, he was the last person she would be holding. He pressed her closer to his side, managing to help his brother out of the destroyed chopper

without letting her go.

Jake immediately unzipped his jacket and pulled Edwina inside.

“I’m okay,” she said again but didn’t really resist clinging to

Jake’s warmth.

Satisfied that Edwina was safe for the moment in his brother’s

arms, Kieran turned to climb back into the ruined helicopter. But what he found chilled his blood more than the outside temperature.

Something seemed to have melted the wires, fusing them together,

making them inoperable. The radio had been working when they first

took off, but it was unlikely that Edwina’s mayday call for help had

gotten through. As it was, the radio was beyond repair and definitely not an option now.

Everything pointed to sabotage. The unexpected offer to transport

them, the leaking fuel, and the deliberate damage to the radio all

suggested someone was trying to kill at least one of them, and they

didn’t care who else got hurt in the process.

Kieran rummaged through the contents of the small cabin, but

relief turned to disappointment when he found Edwina’s emergency

heavy coat had also been subjected to some type of chemical that had

Edwina and the Seven Snowed-in Scientists

15

literally glued it into a tight ball. Whoever was trying to kill them was making certain that if they didn’t die in a crash that the weather would finish the job.

Unfortunately, the deliberate calculations behind this also

suggested that whoever was behind it all wouldn’t be silly enough to

leave evidence. As the thought coalesced, he suddenly felt the urgent need to leave the craft behind them, far behind them. The sensible

thought that they should stay with the chopper was simply not an

option until they knew who and why they were being targeted.

He grabbed the first aid kit and emergency supplies and scrambled

out of the open door. Jake gave him a startled look when he suggested they get moving but held his tongue and nodded. Edwina on the other

hand…

“No! We need to stay by the chopper. A rescue team will already

have left the base by now.”

Damn. He hadn’t wanted to explain about the radio. He had no

concern over his and his brother’s safety. They were well-acquainted

with Antarctica, but Edwina had made it very clear that she detested

the cold. The next few days could be seriously uncomfortable for her.

That was assuming of course that the global positioning system hadn’t been tampered with. They may not even be where they thought they

were.

Again, he wasn’t concerned. As long as they could get their

bearings, they could head to the nearest shelter. Of course, having Edwina in tow made that a whole lot harder.

“We can’t stay here,” Kieran said in a voice that often worked on

his younger brothers but seemed to go unnoticed by this woman.

“Fine,” she said belligerently, pulling out of Jake’s embrace. “I’ll

stay here and wait for the emergency response team, and when they

get here, I’ll send them after your sorry asses.” She took a deep

exasperated breath and spoke to him like a child. “We are in the

middle of nowhere,” she said, making a show of looking around them

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as if Kieran may not have noticed. “We need to stay by the helicopter and wait for rescue.”

He should’ve explained his reasoning. He should’ve talked calmly

and rationally, but the woman was pissing him off, and he didn’t want to waste time arguing with someone so stubborn. Kieran bent over,

dropped his shoulder into her stomach and hoisted her over his

shoulder. She screeched like a madwoman, but he held her legs still,

tried to ignore his brother’s amused expression, and led them away

from the damaged craft.

* * * *

Jake had to cover his laughter several times with a cough. He

didn’t think Edwina would hear his amusement over the wind and her

own screaming, but he was pretty sure his brother noticed.

He’d never seen anyone rattle Kieran so much that he was lost for

words, yet that’s exactly what Edwina had managed. Jake had been

waiting for a calm and reasonable explanation on why they shouldn’t

stay with the downed helicopter, and instead Kieran had gone into

caveman mode and swept the woman off her feet—literally.

Jake gazed around the white landscape trying to find a

recognizable landmark so that he could get his bearings, but with the wind beginning to whip snow around them, it was getting harder and

harder to see.

After about a half mile, Edwina finally stopped yelling and started

shivering instead. Jake took his heavy parka off and slid it over her, but, of course, the cantankerous woman started to protest, so Kieran finally put her on her feet and glanced around the area.

“We might need to set up the emergency shelter until this storm

passes.”

Jake had to hide another laugh as Edwina went into another full-

on meltdown. This was ridiculous. They should’ve stayed with the

chopper. The forecast hadn’t included any damn storms, and they

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17

were wasting their time by putting up those ridiculously small shelters that barely fit one person, let alone two giants and a helicopter pilot.

“And besides,” she huffed as she wound down from her rant, “I’m

not sleeping with either of you.”

“Too bad, princess,” Kieran said amiably. “There is a storm

coming, staying with the chopper was dangerous, and you will sleep

beside one of us or freeze to death.”

“Why was staying with the chopper dangerous?” she asked,

latching on to the tidbit of information Jake also wanted explained.

Kieran looked really annoyed that she was asking but eventually

relented and filled in details. By the time he was finished, Jake

wanted a stiff drink. The worst part was having no clue who the hell

would set them up or why. Their family was well-known in scientific

circles, but they weren’t exactly rich celebrities. Jake couldn’t fathom why anyone would want them dead. But the evidence definitely

suggested someone was trying to kill them.

Unless…

“Who are you?” he growled as he turned to one very startled pilot.

Edwina took a step back from his vehement words, and he felt a

momentary pang of regret for scaring her. But then she planted her

hands on her hips, widened her stance and threw the question back at

him. She, however, didn’t censor her words.

“Who. The fuck. Are you?” She stepped closer, getting in his face

as she began yet another rant. “It’s obvious someone was trying to kill you and your brother. I’m just the collateral damage. What the hell

type of experiments are you doing out there anyway?”

Momentarily struck dumb by her confident summation of the

situation, Jake turned just in time to see his brother finish setting up the emergency snow shelter and reach for his bivvy bag. Grabbing his

own bivvy bag, Jake chose to completely ignore Edwina’s

accusations—she’d turned her back and was yelling her irritation at

the landscape—and deal with their most pressing problem. The wind

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wasn’t too bad at the moment, but judging by the weather on the