Page 107 of Mile High Heist

Madoc’s hand latched onto my wrist. Cold as iron. I jumped, so tense that I could snap.

We needed to move.

“Walk, don’t run,” I muttered to him.

Fifty pairs of eyes were honed in on us. Wide, terrified. Desperate.

Slowly, carefully, we started down the aisle.

The intercom crackled again.

“There is an imposter among you. She wears the uniform of a flight attendant named Emily. She is a dangerous woman. I want her delivered to the cockpit.”

My jaw clenched. That sneaky fucker! I resisted the urge to tear through the plane, knowing it would start a panic.

But the panic was already building. It hovered just on the edge. One wrong move and it would tip.

“If anyone refuses, hides her, or interferes in any way, the consequences will belong to all of you. You have five minutes to deliver her to me. Is one life worth all of yours?”

Madoc’s finger jabbed hard into my spine.

The message was clear.

Run.

30

OLIVIA

Iwas paralyzed.

I was made of stone.

“Is one life worth all of yours?”

The intercom was above the bed. I stared at it with wide eyes, hoping I’d misheard. Or maybe I was dreaming. Maybe I was having a really weird, vivid, nightmare-of-all-nightmares.

The kind that ended with five hundred angry lawyers tearing me apart.

Oh god.

This couldn’t be happening.

Stiffly, I rose from the bed. In the same beat, there was a loud thump on the door. I jumped, my heart shooting into my mouth.

I was completely and utterly frozen.

So much that I couldn’t react when Ryle burst through the door, Nate blazing in behind him.

“Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit,” Nate was chanting. His panic was contradicted by the seamless way he dropped a bunch of items on the bed—makeshift weapons. There was a corkscrew, a handful of utensils, a half-empty bottle of champagne.

This was really happening.

“Olivia.” Ryle stood in front of me, snapping his fingers. “Don’t go mute again. You need to wake up now.”

I slapped my hands to my cheeks, hard enough to sting. “I hope I’m not awake.”

“You are. This is real.” Ryle’s face was grim. “As we speak, the passengers are starting to panic. They’re searching for you.”