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I sat up, a little off-guard. I’d never had sex on a plane before—but that really didn’t do justice to the encounter we’d just had. I’d never had such wild, crazy, amazing sex before. “Maybe I should do it on planes more often,” I said to myself.
I looked outside and saw it was dark. Then, I looked at my watch: 8:45 p.m. We’d be landing soon! Why hadn’t Jake come to wake me up? Even if we were flying on a private jet, it was still important for us to be in our seats as we began our initial descent, which ought to have been at least fifteen minutes ago. I was a little concerned, to say the least.
I stood up and immediately sat back down again, as a combination of sweet pain and guilty pleasure made itself known to my legs. I thought again of how I’d had Jake, lying on his back, his shining green eyes looking up at me, challenging me to give him my all. I had to suppress another wave of excitement as I dressed. For apologies’ sake, I made up the bed. I hope whoever cleaned this cabin wasn’t a gossip …
As I stood up, I felt a slight twinge in my abdomen. I gasped.
Looking down, I unbuttoned my blouse again and stared at my bare stomach. I was fine—Dr. Knightly had explained that to me. I knew I was going to be okay. But as I looked at my stomach, I frowned. Had I put on a little weight recently?
I knew it wasn’t important to think about that for another month or so when I started to reach the end of my first trimester. But it was strange. Try as I might, I couldn’t help but notice that I felt different. I looked down at my body and remembered suddenly, guiltily, that I was carrying a life there, a life I hadn’t intended to carry, and that would soon become a tiny person, a person who’d be my responsibility, to love and to care for…
I leaned over and put a hand on the wall to steady myself.Calm down there, Alicia.I’d suddenly once again been overwhelmed by the expectations of motherhood. Would I make a good mom? Would Jake make a good father? How would we raise this child together? I knew for certain that it wasn’t going to be that simple.
After all, I was beginning to fall for Jake. Hard. I knew it the minute we left Florida, and I realized how much I missed him, and how much I wanted him with me. I knew it the moment he’d arrived in L.A. this morning, and how good it had made me feel to be with him. But the truth was, I knew there were things Jake wasn’t telling me. And I had to be able to trust him—to rely on him. So, I tried to put out of my mind just what a goddess he’d made me feel like in the bedroom, and stepped out of the cabin.
“Jake?” I called once I’d made my way up the short staircase and entered the main section of the plane’s fuselage. But he wasn’t there. A lamp was on, and a book sat there on the elegant, drop-down walnut table by the chair. I stepped over to it.
The book readFatherhood: Its Rewards and Responsibilities. It looked like it had been out of print since 1968. I felt a rush of emotional urge through my heart when seeing it. So, Jake was thinking about it! I smiled. But the smile was wiped off my face when I heard Jake call for me through the tannoy.
“Alicia,” his deep, masculine voice said on the microphone. “Are you awake?”
I walked to the intercom on the wall by the plane’s door. “Sure am,” I said. “What’s going on? Why haven’t we begun descent yet.”
“Come to the cockpit,” said Jake. “I’ll explain.”
I crossed the floor of the aircraft up to the front. I’d been in once before when during my flight with Jake I’d brought drinks for the pilots. I opened the door.
At the controls, Johnny, the pilot, looked flustered. He was pressing buttons and dials on the complex control panel of the jet, trying to hail air-traffic control.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“No response from air-to-ground communications arrays,” said Jake. His face was grim, as he leaned over the pilot’s shoulder.
I looked through the front window of the plane and into the clouds, expecting to see something there. “What do you mean?” I asked.
The air-traffic control facility at Owen Roberts International Airport, where we’d be landing in Grand Cayman, was manned 24/7, just like any air-traffic control facility. For them not to respond could mean a few things, but neither of them was good.
“We literally passed by a few minutes ago,” said Johnny. “I’m turning us around now, for another pass.”
“I’ll hail them again,” said Jake, stepping into the seat next to Johnny. He pressed a button and a green light lit up on the panel.
“Calling Owen Roberts International, this is private chartered flight N ten, one, thirteen, five, nineteen, requesting permission to land, as per our charter. Repeating, calling Owen Roberts International, this is private chartered flight N ten, one, thirteen, five, nineteen, requesting permission to land.”
“Something’s happened,” I said, and panic began to slowly course through my body. It was every flight operative’s worst nightmare that a terrorist attack or missile strike could potentially damage an airport.
“We’re gonna need to turn it around, Mr. Ryder,” said Johnny. “There’s no way we can land it here.”
“Why not?” I asked. I’d never been in a situation like this before.
“Until we know what’s happened to the air-to-ground communications, it isn’t safe to continue the descent,” explained Jake. “Otherwise, we’re liable to collide with a commercial aircraft making a landing. Plus, without air traffic control, there’s no one to assist us with our landing or direct us. So even if we do make it onto the ground safely, we’re liable to get knocked off the runway by another plane.”
I was scared now, frantically scared. But Jake was calm. I could see from the look in his eyes that he’d faced worse than this.
“Wait!” said Johnny. “I’m getting something!”
A crackling buzz sounded on the radio, and through the static, we heard a voice speaking slowly.
“N ten, one, thirteen, five, nineteen, this is an emergency radio setup representing Owen Roberts International,” said a voice. “Do you copy?”
