“What’s going on?” she says from behind me, and I turn to find her staring worriedly at the controls. “Did something happen?”
Nobody answers. Even Yan has no sarcastic remarks.
“Nothing, ptichka. We’re just getting ready to land,” I say evenly, and taking her hand, I lead her out of the cabin.
54
Sara
My insides feel like leaves in a winter storm as Peter guides me to my seat and straps me in, tightening the seatbelt across my lap until it’s almost hard to breathe. Then he limps over to the couch and pulls off the cushions. Bringing them over, he dumps them in front of me, then opens an overhead bin and pulls down a duffel bag.
“What are you doing?” My voice starts to shake. “Peter, what are you doing?”
He doesn’t reply, just pulls out a long rope and a knife. Grabbing one of the cushions, he ties it to the back of the seat in front of me, exactly where my head would hit if I assumed the classical plane-crash position and something were to push me forward.
Then he takes the other cushion and stuffs it to the left of me, between my seat and the window. It’s wedged tightly in there, so he doesn’t need to use the rope to hold it in place.
“Are we crashing?” It’s a stupid question, as it’s obvious what’s happening, but I can’t help myself. I want him to lie to me again, to tell me that what he’s doing is nothing more than a silly precaution.
“No, we’re landing,” he says as if reading my mind, and then he straps the third cushion to my right by tying it to me.
I was wrong.
I don’t want him to lie.
I want him to tell me the truth, so I can properly freak out.
The plane’s nose dips, and my stomach follows suit as I feel the sudden change in cabin pressure.
“Peter.” My voice is surprisingly steady. “Please, sit.”
“In a moment,” he says and disappears in the back as Yan and Ilya come out of the pilot’s cabin and take their own seats.
A few seconds later, Peter reappears with a few pillows. Ignoring my protests, he ties them all around me, with one small one going on the top of my head. By the time he’s done, I resemble a human marshmallow.
Then and only then does he take the seat next to me.
“Take some of these pillows for yourself,” I beg, but he just tightens his seatbelt. “Please, Peter. Or at least give a couple of them to your teammates. Why should I have them all? Please, listen to me…”
“Don’t listen to her, Peter,” Ilya says gruffly from the other row. “We’re going to be fine.”
“But—”
“Relax, Sara,” Yan says coolly. “My brother’s right. Besides, padding can only do so much.”
Peter barks something sharp in Russian—probably an admonishment for needlessly scaring me—and I feel my ears pop as our descent accelerates.
“Seven minutes to landing,” Anton announces over the intercom, and Peter reaches across the table between our seats, his hand burrowing through the mound of pillows to clasp mine. His grip is as strong as usual, but his fingers are cold as they wrap around my palm.
“Six minutes,” Ilya says as the plane tilts to the left, enabling me to catch a glimpse of the green forest below.
In the distance, I spot a large cleared area with a smattering of small buildings near a bigger white one, but then the plane tilts to the right and all I see is the sky.
A sputtering sound interrupts the steady drone of engines. It sounds like a giant clearing his throat.
I stop breathing, my eyes snapping to Peter’s.
His face is white, his jaw set in a brutal line, but his grip on my hand remains steady and reassuring.
The engines resume their droning, and I suck in a much-needed breath. Cold sweat is gathering under my armpits, and all the pillows make me feel like I’m suffocating.
“Five minutes,” Ilya says hoarsely. “Just a little longer, and he’ll be able to deploy the landing gear without fucking up our descent trajectory.”
The engines cough again, then resume working.
The plane tilts to the right again, and I force myself to glance out the window.
The cluster of buildings—Esguerra’s compound, presumably—is almost directly underneath us now, and I see that the white building is a stately mansion. I also notice what looks like prison guard towers at the edge of the cleared area.
“Four minutes,” Ilya says, and I spot our destination: a paved runway some distance from the mansion, with a thick patch of forest surrounding it on both sides.
The engines cough again.
“Three minutes,” Ilya says, his voice strained as the landing gear starts to unfold with a screech.
With one last sputter, the engines go silent, and the screeching stops.
We just ran out of fuel.
“Ptichka.” Peter’s voice is eerily calm as my terrified gaze meets his. “I love you. Now brace yourself.”