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“Hey,” he shouted. “Stop right there, you mother?—”
The sound of his plane’s engine drowned out his yelling. The blades of the propeller began their slow spin, quickly picking up speed, until they were a blur. The plane turned in the direction of the runway.
Goddamn, they really were stealing his plane. Right in front of him. With Molly on board.
36
It took only a few moments for Molly to figure out that the man flying Sam’s plane must be the infamous Jimmy Marsh. But there was absolutely no way Children’s Services would have just let him walk out with a minor, even if they were related. Someone from the inside must have helped him grab Elias.
She should warn Sam that there was a traitor in the mix—Agent Bradley, maybe? She wouldn’t be surprised after the shit he’d pulled.
But the little plane was headed skyward at an angle that made any movement just about impossible.
“Do you even know how to fly?” Molly demanded as Rover’s engines whined and the gauges went wild.
After a takeoff that felt like a teeter-totter gone mad, they leveled out, flying below the high layer of clouds, but above the trees.
“You’re Jimmy Marsh, right?”
“Shut up.” His growl seemed more distracted than hostile, as if he was trying to concentrate on flying the unfamiliar craft.
Fair enough. First things first. Get back on firm ground. Then she could figure out what was going on and how to get out of it.
The last flight she’d been on—from Firelight Ridge to Blackbear—had been great. She hadn’t gotten sick at all. But now all her fear of flying rushed back. Maybe she had fear of flying with anyone other than Sam.
She did her best to block out the fear and turned to the backseat, where Elias sat pressed against the window. He looked, in a word, traumatized. How much could one kid handle? “Are you okay?”
He nodded. His gaze kept straying to the back of the pilot’s head, as if he was terrified of him. Molly could relate.
If she’d stayed back with Sam, she’d probably still be on the ground with him, waving goodbye to his plane.
On the other hand, Elias would be on his own. At least now he had backup.
All her fierce words to Sam came back to her. I fight for the people I care about.
True. But this situation was different, just like Sam had pointed out. Could she handle an entire family of law-breaking glacier-exploders?
She really, really wished Sam was with them too. At the same time, she had no doubt that he would do everything humanly possible to catch up with them. Until then, she was on her own.
“Why did you kidnap me?” She faced the pilot and gave him a closer scrutiny. Stocky build. Mid-thirties. Sun-weathered face. A heavy flannel work shirt and canvas pants with paint stains. He didn’t look like her idea of a pharmacist, but he was probably a jack of all trades like most people out this way. “You know that’s a crime, right? Even in Alaska?”
“I didn’t mean to kidnap you,” he said, irritated. “You’re just extra baggage.”
Great. Was that better or worse?
“So you’re going to let me go when we get to wherever we’re going?”
“I didn’t say that. That’ll be up to Soraya.”
“Soraya? She’s behind this?”
“She wanted the stupid kid back. So she’s getting him back.”
Molly picked up on something unexpected in his tone of voice. Frustration. As if he thought it was ridiculous to go to such lengths to retrieve a runaway. She could use that, maybe, at some point.
Also, maybe he didn’t like being bossed around by a woman. “So she’s the one who calls the shots?”
“She doesn’t call the shots.” But his face twisted in a way that told her she was onto something.
