When Cami nodded and tightened her seat belt across her waist, Mia settled back into her own seat. She recognized when someone pulled into themselves to deal with their inner pain. She’d perfected that move herself.
Except ever since coming to live on Wayfarer Island, she’d slowly begun to poke her head out of the hard, protective shell she’d built around herself.
Maybe it was because the men of Deep Six Salvage and the women who loved them had all known the harsher sides of life in one way or another. Maybe it was because they didn’t try to hide the traumas that still affected their day-to-day. Maybe it was because, like her, they’d all been broken somehow, and yet they’d been able to pick up the pieces to find peace and happiness, and that gave her hope for herself.
Hope that one day she might be able to...not forgive herself. But maybe Andy’s death would stop being the first thing she thought about when she woke up in the morning, and the last thing she thought about after she closed her eyes at night.
And, oh! How she was going to miss everyone on Wayfarer Island once the Santa Cristina’s treasure was salvaged and it was time for her to move on to the next job. Miss Bran’s homemade pasta and his penchant for spouting movie lines. Miss watching Olivia and LT dance on the front porch to the music pouring out of Uncle John’s 80’s era, battery-fed boombox—Olivia danced with grace; LT danced with what appeared to be a permanently broken leg. Miss Alex’s never-ending stream of trivia. Miss practicing Tai Chi with Wolf on the beach in the mornings and fishing with Doc off the end of the pier in the afternoons.
She would miss the way Meat, Mason’s fat English bulldog, liked to spend the night on the end of her daybed, because the screened-in porch where she slept caught the breeze coming in off the water. Meat was happiest when he was airing out his junk by lying on his back.
Then there was Lil’ Bastard, the colorful rooster who was best friends with Meat. Uncle John who made terrible coffee but grew pretty good weed. And, of course, Romeo.
Yes, she would miss Romeo most of all.
Miss the glint in his eye, the flash of his dimples, and the way he could make her feel safe and calm without saying anything at all.
She hoped beyond hope that Mason and Alex found success in the Spanish Archives and located King Philip’s cipher device. But was she being totally selfish to also wish for it to take them a while?
She wanted as much time on Wayfarer Island as she could get. Wanted to spend every second she could with all the people who’d come to mean so much to her. All the people who’d come to feel like family—and yet unlike any family she’d ever known.
A swell of melancholy threatened to overtake her. She considered digging into her purse for her copy of In Darkness and Dreams. Lazarus Luxido and all the other characters in Wisteria Manor would surely distract her from the gloomy turn of her thoughts. But she didn’t like the idea of reading ahead without Romeo.
He made what was shaping up to be a pretty good book even better because he laughed at the funny parts, widened his eyes at the scary parts, and made playful and insightful comments throughout.
No matter how many novels P.J. Warren wrote in the Night Angels series, Mia knew that book seven would always be her favorite. Because book seven would always be the one she read with the man who looked at her with genuine pleasure in his eyes and made her forget, however momentarily, about the thing that would always set her apart from others.
Staring out the window, she watched the light blink at the tip of the wing and then let her gaze slip to the endless expanse of cerulean waves rippling below. The white hull of a speedboat caught her attention as it kicked thick plumes of water behind it. The Otter wasn’t built for high altitude, it didn’t have a pressurized cabin, so they flew low enough that she had no trouble counting the four tiny figures in the boat.
They’re a long way from shore, she thought absently. Sailboats and yachts plied the open ocean, but speedboats tended to stay closer to land since they were fuel hogs.
No sooner did she have the thought than Doc unbuckled from the copilot’s chair. His tall frame was folded nearly in half as he exited the cockpit, stopping beside her to say, “Grabbing a bottled water from the back.” He removed the toothpick from his mouth and included Cami when he asked, “Either of you ladies want one?”
“No thanks.” Mia shook her head.
The lawyer lifted a finger. “I’ll take one. I think I drank almost as much as you did last night. Every cell in my body is shriveled up like a raisin.”
Doc opened his mouth to come back with what was sure to be a wisecrack, but he never got the chance. A weird buzz sounded throughout the plane and the interior lights flickered. A split second later, a deafening boom nearly burst Mia’s eardrums, and the Otter barrel-rolled onto its side.
Had she not been strapped in, she would have ended up in the aisle. Because Doc wasn’t strapped in, he flew across the fuselage and slammed into the bulkhead.
His head bounced off the metal corner with a sickening-sounding whack. And when he landed on the floor at Cami’s feet, his long limbs were all akimbo.
“Doc!” she shouted, hanging awkwardly from her seat strap. Through Cami’s window, aqua waters met her frantic gaze. When she craned her head against gravity to look out her own window, all she saw was blue sky.
Fear threatened to paralyze her as a terrible vibration rattled through the airplane. The shrill cry of alarms nearly drowned out the screaming engine.
She could see Romeo struggling with the throttle and control wheel. She only had a partial view, but enough of him was visible to show the tendons in his tanned forearms stood out in stark contrast against his skin. Sweat rolled down the side of his face, and a hard muscle worked in his jaw.
Whatever he was doing seemed to be working, however. Because slowly—too slowly for Mia’s peace of mind—the Otter pulled itself out of its heavy bank.
“What happened?” Cami cried out to no one in particular as Romeo urged the aircraft to climb higher into the sky, despite the plane having turned into a drunken bird. Its wings rollicked back and forth.
“Feels like a tailstrike!” Romeo called above the beep, screech, and honk of alarms.
Mia wasn’t sure what a tailstrike was, but she assumed the name said it all.
Craning her head around to stare into the back of the plane, she fully expected to see mangled metal and a hole the size of a refrigerator where their tail section should’ve been. She was relieved when all she saw was smoke.
Of course, her relief only lasted a second because...smoke!
Just like snakes, no one wanted smoke on a plane!
She gripped the armrests so tight her fingers hurt. Her blood seemed frozen in her veins despite the pounding of her heart.