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My heart was racing.
He could have taken the second parachute. He could have saved himself and left me here.
He hadn’t done that.
It wasn’t that I had ever thought Jake was willing to let me die. But in the heat of the moment, when it had all come down to instinct and survival, he hadn’t even considered abandoning me and saving himself.
I stared out the cockpit window. It was hard to see anything—I was too short for the seat I was in, and the angle wasn’t doing me any favors.
“There,” Jake said grimly.
“There what?”
“Land.”
“Is it Maui?”
“Too small to be Maui. It’s some random little island. We’re nowhere near Hawaii yet.
“But you can land there?”
“I don’t know. I’m going to have to try. Better than putting down in the water; if we can avoid it,” he said. “At least it’s a small plane. Got your harness on? This is going to be rough.”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
“Okay. Sit back in your seat and try to relax your body. If you tense up, you’re more likely to get injured in the landing.”
That was easier said than done, but I sat back like he’d said and did my best to relax my muscles. It wasn’t easy to ignore the fact that we were plummeting toward the Earth with no working engine, but it was easier than it should have been.
Having Jake at the controls was oddly reassuring.
He’s not going to let me die.
He hadn’t left the plane when he’d realized we were in danger, and he wasn’t going to let anything happen to me now. I was sure of it. Maybe I was foolish to put so much trust in him, but I couldn’t help it. It didn’t seem to matter to me that he wasn’t even a pilot. I knew he was going to get us to the ground safely.
“Here we go,” he said through gritted teeth. “You should probably close your eyes.”
I wasn’t about to do that. I couldn’t. Trust was one thing, but closing my eyes while we landed in a broken plane was a different proposition altogether. So I watched as the ground rushed up to meet us.
We hit hard. It felt nothing like a normal plane landing. My teeth snapped together, and I bit my tongue accidentally. My mouth filled with blood as I heard the screams and complaints of metal dragging against the ground.
Jake was silent. It was worse than when he’d been cursing. It was terrifying. His hands gripped the controls so tightly I thought he might break them right off the panel.
The plane’s tail fishtailed around, lifting up in the air so that we were pitched forward. I was caught and held by my safety harness, and I could tell I was going to have bruises across my chest later.
And then, suddenly, the plane stopped moving.
It settled onto the ground slowly, the tail end rocking backward, then tipping back forward a little bit as it found its balance. I let out a little cry of fear—I couldn’t help it.
“We’re all right,” Jake said quickly, but he was unsnapping his harness. “We’re okay. We’re down. Take your harness off.”
I couldn’t move. I was too overwhelmed by everything that had happened.
His hands were on me, unclipping the harness and pulling me out. I went to him as willingly as if I was a rag doll, unable to muster the strength to resist.
“You’re in shock,” he mumbled. “Okay. We have to get off this fucking plane, though.”
His arms were around me, cradling me against his chest, and I was aware of being moved. My eyes slipped closed, and I found myself longing to let the world slip away, to fall asleep and let Jake take care of everything.
