Jean Thomas - AWOL with the Operative

“We went down in the woods, and the plane caught on fire.”

“Everyone get out?”

“Not our pilot. He died in the crash itself.” Like Charlie, she thought, the pain of his death registering all over again. “With the plane burning as it was,” she managed to explain, “there was no time for me to try to get his body out of the wreckage.”

Eve didn’t want to think about the loss of Ken Redfeather, the family he might have left behind. Didn’t want to remind herself of Charlie and how much the memory of him hurt. She’d start to bawl if she permitted herself that lapse, and she had to hold herself together if she stood any prayer of getting out of this mess.

Sam had swung his attention away from the wreckage and was gazing at her again, this time not with concern but realization. “I was unconscious. I couldn’t have helped myself out of the plane and over here on the ground. That was all you, wasn’t it?”

There was gratitude in his voice. And, yes, admiration, too.

“You are some woman, Eve Warren.”

His praise was unexpected. And recalling the Sam McDonough she had experienced before the crash, another complete surprise. That it had lit a glow deep inside her was probably not so good.

Eve covered her fluster with a hasty “I’m sorry I wasn’t able to find and rescue your gun when I recovered your coat. But you have your passport and your wallet with your FBI ID. Maybe seeing them will help you get your memory back.”

From the movement under his coat, she assumed he was feeling for the passport and wallet in his back pockets. “No, they’re not in your pants pockets,” she corrected him, remembering he had shoved them into a side pocket of his coat after showing them to the Mountie. “They’re in one of your coat pockets.”

Hands emerging from beneath the coat, he burrowed into its pockets. “No passport or wallet,” he said. “Just earmuffs, a pair of gloves and a scarf.”

“But they have to be there. Are you sure that— Oh, no!”

“What?”

“I was in such a rush I must have grabbed the wrong coat, thinking the pilot’s coat had to be very different from yours, when all along— Oh, Sam, how could I have been so stupid?”

“You weren’t stupid. Anyone could have confused them in a situation like that.”

“But your passport and wallet—”

“Destroyed in the fire. So, Eve, I guess I’ll just have to trust that I’m who and what you say I am. But while I’m doing that…” Coat sliding down to his waist, he lifted himself into a sitting position. It was apparently an unwise action. It was followed by a sharp “Whoa” and his hand going to the lump on the side of his head.

Eve was instantly alarmed. “How badly does it hurt?”

Sam felt around the swelling. “Has to be a souvenir from the crash.”

“Your head connected with the window hard enough to crack a fairly thick pane of glass.”

“Which explains my memory loss, I guess. Actually, it’s just a little tender. But I do have one hell of an old-fashioned headache.” He eyed her purse on the ground. “I don’t suppose you’d have a couple of aspirin in there?”

“I do, but I’m not sure you should take them. You could have a concussion, and taking anything like that might not be safe.”

“I’m willing to risk it. I’ll have those aspirin, please.”

Eve hesitated and then reluctantly reached for her bag, finding the aspirin inside and handing two of them to him. She watched him swallow the pills, washing them down with a handful of snow he scooped up from the ground. She was putting the aspirin container back in her bag when she spotted her cell phone in one corner. She had forgotten it until now.

“Look!” she said brightly, holding up the phone. “We’re saved!”

But they weren’t saved. When she flipped open the instrument and powered it up, the display indicated a strong battery but no signal whatsoever. What had led her to believe there possibly could be one when Ken Redfeather had complained of the scarcity of communication towers in the region?

She closed the phone and put it back in her bag. “No signal,” she reported. “And no distress call from the plane, either. The pilot never got the chance to send one.”

“Looks like you and I are on our own out here, Eve. Just where are we, anyway?”

“Canada. Somewhere along the British Columbia and Alberta border, so the pilot said. We were headed for Calgary, and from there…”

Eve was prepared to fill him in on all the rest. She figured he’d want to know everything from the time he met her at the ski lodge, but he halted her.

“Just what I’m doing here and why can wait. In case you haven’t noticed, the light is growing weaker, which means it must be late afternoon.”

“And?”

“We have to find shelter of some kind before night closes in. It’s winter, isn’t it?”

“Getting on toward late April, actually. It’s cold but not as cold as it was up in the Yukon where we boarded the plane. I suppose because we’re much farther south now.”

“Yeah, but the temperatures are bound to drop after dark. We could freeze out here.”

“What are you doing?” she challenged him as he climbed to his feet and bundled into the coat.

“Trying this on for size. Not bad. A little short and a little too roomy, but it’s plenty warm.”

“You shouldn’t be up yet.”

“You think it’s a lot healthier for me to have a wet backside on the ground?”

“But if you do have a concussion—”

“Maybe, but I don’t think I have any of the classic symptoms.”

“You have a headache.”

“So would you if you smacked your head into a hard surface. It’s not conclusive evidence of a concussion.” He looked down at her where she was still crouched in the snow, a glint of humor in his eyes. “I love you fussing over me, angel, but don’t.”

Angel. He had called her angel again. Now why on earth, in a situation as bad as this one, should she suddenly and out of nowhere recall the memory of her mother teaching her when she was a little girl how to bake an angel food cake from scratch? How, through the years of growing up that followed, her mother had taught her so many other culinary skills. A joy that stayed with her to this day. Warm, pleasant memories. Maybe that’s why she recalled them. Because at this moment she needed something that was ordinary and nonthreatening.

Sam was still gazing at her. “Have it your way,” she mumbled. “Just be careful.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Come on.”

Before she could prevent it, he leaned down from that six-foot-plus height of his, caught her by the hand and raised her to her feet. Eve didn’t need his help. She wasn’t used to men helping her. She had always been independent and self-reliant. Well, maybe not with the same certainty since Charlie’s cruel death. Everything had changed after that.

She waited for him to release her hand once she was standing. He didn’t. He pulled her against his hard length. She felt suddenly light-headed as he pinned her there to his chest, his eyes searching hers. Not only light-headed but powerless to resist his sexual charisma. And she needed to do just that.

Thankfully, it was all over in a brief moment, although Eve was shaken when he let her go and she was able to step safely away from him.

He zipped up the coat that was now his as if nothing had happened, added the scarf, drew on the gloves from one pocket and covered his head with the earmuffs from the other pocket. His suggestion that “You might want to raise the hood on that parka” was a casual one.

How could he be so confident and unconcerned when he’d lost his memory, when calamity had landed them here where their very survival was in jeopardy? Could being relieved of your conscious memory also relieve you of your cares? Was this an explanation for the drastic change in Sam’s disposition? It was a theory, anyway.