Out of Control (22 page)
“If you get a chance to escape, please go,” she said as quickly as possible. “Get yourself to safety. You can always come back for me.”
“Zip,” he said. “It.”
“Promise me.”
“Fuck, no!” He couldn’t believe her.
“But you’ll be able to get away.” The woman would not shut up. “You’re a S—”
SEAL. He kissed her. She had been about to announce to a helo filled with terrorists that he was a SEAL. So he shut her up the only way he knew was guaranteed to work—by covering her mouth with his own.
He just kissed the shit out of her as the helo blades started turning, creating a wash of sound that you had to shout to be heard over. And then, as they lifted into the sky, he brought his mouth right up to her ear, so no one could read his lips. “If they find out I’m . . . what I am, they’ll kill me. Don’t even let it slip that I’m in the Navy, do you understand? Or I’m dead.”
Savannah nodded. She was trembling. He would’ve liked to have thought it was the kiss that had put her into such a state, but he suspected it was the result of the potential threat to his life.
He was the one shaken by that kiss.
Ken looked out the open door. As far as he could tell, they were heading northeast. They were already away from Jakarta, out over the ocean.
He looked around the helo again, noting that the gunman with the HK MP5 machine gun—the one he wanted to get his hands on—was sitting too far away. Even the two Uzis were well out of reach.
He focused his attention on the briefcase, and then on the helo itself.
There was another sliding door on the opposite side of the bird, but it was closed. He looked closer. It was closed but not locked, and possibly not even latched. It wouldn’t take much to push it open.
There they sat, in silence, traveling over the open expanse of the ocean, for well over an hour. Savannah clung to his hand.
Finally, the appearance of an island dead ahead set off a flood of discussion in Russian. Unlike his friend, Johnny Nilsson, Ken wasn’t any kind of a languages expert.
But he did speak enough of what he called “survival Russian” to get the gist of what they were saying. First they would drop the Americans, and then they would make the delivery. Then they would all go back to Jakarta and have dinner with someone named Otto who was either Large’s brother or his cactus. Ken was betting they were brothers.
Savannah had had enough. “Where’s my uncle?” she shouted over the roar at Mr. Large. “Has he been kidnapped? Is that what this is about?”
“Actually, I don’t know where he is,” Large shouted back. “He missed an important meeting and . . . I took it upon myself to regain some of my losses. I make a good imitation of Alexi’s voice over the telephone, no?”
“You called me?” She was stunned.
“ ‘Hello, Savannah,’ “ Large shouted. “ ‘This is Alex. I’m sorry reception is so bad . . .’ Alexi was gone, but he’d kindly left his palm pilot in his hotel room. He’d spoken of you most fondly, so I knew you were the one to call to deliver the funds.”
“Oh, my God,” Savannah breathed. “What have I done?”
This whole thing was just a scam, a con job. Chances were Savannah’s Uncle Alex was already swimming with the fishies. Ken guessed this was a botched kidnapping. And with the kidnappee suddenly deceased, Large and company had had to get creative to get their ransom money. They’d struck paydirt by calling Savannah.
“You got the money,” Ken shouted. “You got what you wanted. Why drag us all the way out here?”
“Because it’s not just about money,” Large shouted back. “It’s about maintaining the necessary respect.”
Oh, fuck. Those were not the words Ken had hoped to hear. The kind of respect Large was referring to was maintained through intimidation and fear. Through making examples of the poor suckers—or the poor suckers’ nieces and family friends—who crossed him. Death was looking to be a real option here.
They were flying over the island now, heading over the lush jungle, climbing steadily in altitude as they headed farther into the interior.
Savannah was silent, shocked by the realization that she’d come so willingly into danger. Ken doubted that she’d made the connection that he had—that her uncle was probably dead, and unless they did something, unless they took action, they themselves had literally minutes left to live.
Ken estimated and counted the number of paces it would take him to cross the helo. To get to the guy with the HK MP5 machine gun. To get to Large. To get to the attaché case. To get to the handle of the closed helo door.
They flew for close to another hour in silence, until Large once again barked out an order in Russian.
“This is far enough. Give us sufficient—”
Ken didn’t know the last word. It had something to do with flying. Ken had learned his Russian by painstakingly drumming vocabulary into his head. Apparently the chapter on flying hadn’t took.
But the pilot sent the helo pretty much straight up, higher into the air. And Ken remembered. The word was altitude. Give us sufficient altitude.
Sufficient altitude for what?
And just like that, Ken knew.
Holy fuck. Drop the Americans meant drop the Americans. As in push them out of the helo at hundreds of feet above the jungle floor.
Unless he suddenly sprouted wings and learned to fly, he and Savannah were in serious trouble.
The missionaries’ boat had an air mattress and a canopy across the bow to keep out the sun.
Or any prying eyes.
Jones couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this nervous. Or this aroused. It was not a good combination.
By some kind of unspoken agreement it was understood that any sex that was going to happen today wasn’t going to happen until Molly had paid her visit and they were on their way back down river, heading for home.
But now here it was. Lunch was over, good-byes were said. And they were alone again on the boat.
All the way up river, Molly had spent the time telling him about her childhood in Iowa, about her mother, about her sitcom perfect, sainted father who’d died when she was only ten.
She told him detailed, personal stories that made him envision her as a child, and he knew she’d wanted him to do the same in return.
He’d managed only a few sentences, scattered haltingly throughout their conversation.
“I grew up in Ohio,” and, “I used to love playing baseball,” and, “I haven’t seen my mother in at least ten years.”
She hadn’t pressed him for more information. She’d just smiled at him as if he’d given her a precious gift.
Jones reached down to start the outboard motor, but she stopped him. “Let’s just drift.”
He couldn’t speak, so he nodded. Drift. Right. Good idea.
“You want some lemonade?” she asked. She sat down right there in the sunshine, on one of the benches that lined the stern of the boat.
All morning long he’d fantasized about this moment. She’d lead the way beneath the canopy, taking her clothes off as she went, smiling that smile that made him rock hard. Then she’d lie back against the air mattresses, completely naked. He’d just look at her for a good long time before he joined her there. Before he sank down into her and . . .
“I’m going to have some,” she told him, reaching for the cooler. “I’m a little nervous in case you didn’t notice. It’s been a while since I’ve tried to seduce anyone. Particularly someone so much younger than I am.”
“Chronological age means nothing,” he said. “I was older than most people I’ve ever met when I was twenty-five.”
She looked up at that. “What happened when you were twenty-five?”
Jones shook his head. “Let’s not go there. I shouldn’t even have brought it up.”
He could see from her eyes that she knew it had to do with his scars. She didn’t press. “Okay.”
Molly had some scars of her own—even more faded than his, pencil point thin on both of her wrists. He’d first noticed them last night, when he’d come to her tent for the second time. But if he wasn’t going to talk about his, it didn’t seem fair to ask about hers.
Molly opened the container of lemonade and poured them each a cup. She handed one to him and took a long drink from the other. “However, there is something you need to know about me before we go any further.”
Jones was silent, knowing that she would tell him whatever it was she wanted to tell him if he just waited long enough.
“True confession time,” she said.
He waited.
She wasn’t done stalling. “Before we, you know, pass the point of no return.”
She took another slug from her cup, then, balancing it on her knee, she put the lemonade back into the cooler. The boat was drifting close to the river’s edge, and the sun was streaming through the trees, the dappled light playing games with her face. Jones just watched her and waited and tried not to worry about what she was about to say.
She was married, she was dying of cancer, she was really a man . . . Christ, he knew. She was a nun.
“I need to tell you that . . .” Molly took a deep breath. “I’ve recently become a grandmother.”
He laughed in relief. He couldn’t help it. “No shit?”
“Nope.”
“Well . . . congratulations.”
She was looking at him as if she expected him to do or say something more.
“Boy or a girl?” he asked.
“Girl,” she said. “My . . . daughter had a little girl. Caroline.”
“That’s great.”
But that still wasn’t what she wanted from him. So he said, “I didn’t know you had a daughter.”
“Yes,” she said. “Yes, I do.” And still she looked at him expectantly.
Jones gave up guessing. “Molly, if there’s something I’m supposed to do or say, you’re going to have to give me a bigger hint. This is kind of out of my realm of experience. Children, grandchildren . . . What am I supposed to say here that I’m not saying?”
“Nothing,” she said. “You’re not supposed to say anything. It’s just . . .”
Here it came, thank God.
“Isn’t it a total turn-off?” she asked. “Knowing I’m . . . Lord, I’m someone’s grandmother.”
Jones had to use every one of his poker-playing skills to keep a straight face. “Gee,” he said. “I don’t know. But maybe if you promise to keep your teeth in while we’re doing it . . .”
She laughed. “Dave. I’ve just exposed myself to you. I’ve shared one of my biggest insecurities, and you’re making fun of me?”
Jones put his cup down. He stood up, took her cup from her hands and put that down, too. Pulled her to her feet. “Give me your hand.” She did. God, he loved her hands with those long, graceful fingers. “Promise not to be offended?”
She nodded.
He brought her hand down to his package. Placed it right there, right on top of him, so she could see for herself that he was far, far from being turned off.
“Oh, my,” she said, but she didn’t pull her hand back. On the contrary, she wasn’t at all shy about exploring what was beneath her fingers.
For a few seconds, he couldn’t speak. He had to clear his throat to get his voice to work. “Say ‘I’m a grandmother,’ “ he instructed.
She laughed. “I’m a grandmother.”
“I don’t know,” he said, gazing into her eyes. “I think that might’ve made me even harder. Kind of tough to tell if it’s knowing more about you or if it’s your touch that turns me on the most.”
The smile and the kiss that Molly gave him was right out of his wildest dreams.
“Do you know what I’ve been fantasizing all morning?” she whispered as he held her close, as he ran his hands up beneath her blouse and touched her incredibly smooth skin. She was so soft.
“No,” he said, “but I’m praying it involves me.”
“I fantasized that once we headed down river, I wouldn’t have to say a thing. We’d both just know it was finally time to make love. I’d just smile at you and go under the canopy, and I’d take off my clothes.”
He had to laugh. “I was thinking almost exactly the same thing.”
“And you’d look at me that way you always look at me.” Her voice was husky. “As if I’m the most desirable woman in the entire world.”
“And then you’d lie back on the mattress,” he continued, “and let me look at you some more—”
“While you take off your clothes for me,” she finished, “and let me look at you.”
“That wasn’t part of what I was thinking,” he said. “But I can work with it.”
“Good,” she said as she pulled out of his arms and headed for the canopy.
Her sandals came off and she shook her hair free from its braid.
She watched him, a small smile playing about the corners of her mouth as she worked the buttons open on her blouse, giving him only the briefest glimpses of what lay beneath. Black lace. Pale skin. Full breasts.
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