The pilot’s voice comes over the intercom again. “I’m sorry, everyone, but we’re going to need to make an emergency landing. Please ensure your seatbelts are secure and prepare to take the emergency brace position.”
“What?” I gasp.
I turn to Reed, but his expression is rigid with worry and does nothing to reassure me. “Better do as he says.”
No, no, no. This can’t be happening. I feel like I’m stuck in a movie, or in a bad dream. Planes don’t crash anymore, do they? Maybe not big airliners, but small private ones like this? The small ones probably crashed all the time.
My heart races and tears of terror prick my eyes. Do people survive plane crashes? It seems highly unlikely. All the safety information we’d been given flies out of my head. The men all look terrified, too, and the flight attendant has strapped herself into the fold down seat at the back. An alarm is sounding somewhere at the front.
The nose of the plane suddenly tilts downward, and we’re all thrown forward, only our seatbelts holding us into our seats.
I can’t help myself; I let out a scream. My hold on Reed’s arm moves to his hand, so we link fingers tightly. The plane is moving too fast, at too steep an angle to make a safe landing, and I have no idea if we’re anywhere near a runway, or even an airport, for that matter.
I don’t want to die. I barely feel like I’ve had the chance to live yet.
To my right comes an enormous bang, like we’ve struck something, and I’m thrown to the side, my head cracking against the wall of the aircraft.
I don’t even have time to think about what’s happened before nothingness claims me.
Chapter Nine
Darius
I OPEN MY EYES TO DARKNESS, but there’s nothing unusual in that.
What is unusual is that I have absolutely no idea where I am.
I normally have my exact location charted in my head. Though my eyes might not work, my brain visualizes perfectly. In every hotel room, I have the position of every item mentally marked down. In each new location, I learn the number of paces it takes to get from one side of the room the other, the number of paces it takes for me to reach the bed from the door, and again to the bathroom. It helps that I have my father and brother to ensure the staff know exactly where each item in the room needs to be placed, from the toiletries in the bathroom, to the remote control for the television, to the complimentary bottle of water.
But right in this moment, I have no idea where I am.
I catch a whiff of something in the air—pungent and bitter—and then I become aware of the sound. It takes me a minute to place it, the roar like being underwater, but then it dawns on me that it’s something burning. The growl I’m hearing is that of a huge fire.
The moments before I blacked out suddenly hit me, and it all comes back to me.
Fuck. The plane went down. I remember Laney and the flight attendant screaming, and the yells of alarm from the pilots, and my father and brother. I remember being violently shaken, and things flying around me, and the entire plane vibrating.
After that...nothing.
I push myself to sitting and wince. Everything hurts. I test my limbs, opening and closing my fists, moving my toes. Everything appears to still be working.
“Cade?” I manage to croak. “Dad?”
Heat hits my face, and I remember the fire. How far away is it? I picture my family lying unconscious, about to be swallowed by flames. I have to get them out of here.
I force myself to remain calm, though I’ve never been so close to losing my shit in my life—even including the day I learned I’d lost my sight—and try to recall my position. Am I still inside the plane? Am I even still in my seat? I buckled up the moment it seemed like things were going wrong. I don’t know if the seat has broken from the plane. Is the plane even still in one piece?
I remember the girl as well. Fuck. That adds an extra layer of complication to things. My father and brother can take care of themselves, but some seventeen-year-old who probably expects the world to revolve around her, and that we should all be taking care of her, is going to be an issue.
She might be dead.
They all might be dead.
I don’t want to think about what that might mean for me. Alone, in a plane wreckage. Where were we when the plane went down? I’m not sure if we crossed the Canadian border yet, though we’d left Los Angeles behind us hours ago.
Movement comes to my left, followed by a volley of coughing. It’s male.
“Dad?” I call out. “Cade?”