1
Before you find yourself stranded in the woods with a cranky apex predator, ask yourself—do I really want to go on a camping trip with a vampire?
—Outdoor Underworld: A Survival Guide for Camping with the Undead
Some evil transportation-hating monster had devoured my plane.
And in its place, the monster had left behind a little bite-sized plane crumb.
I stood on the tarmac of the Louisville airport, staring in horror at the plane crumb as my brown leather carry-on bag dangled from my fingers. This was not a momentous beginning to my trip to Half-Moon Hollow.
Despite the fact that I could see crowds of people milling around the airport through the windows, I felt oddly alone, vulnerable. A handful of planes were parked at nearby gates, but there were no luggage handlers, no flight staff. I’d never boarded a plane from the tarmac before, and the short, rickety mobile staircase being pushed up against the side of the plane like a ladder used for gutter-cleaning didn’t make me feel more confident in the climb.
When I’d booked my flight to westernmost Kentucky, I knew small planes were the only models capable of flying into Half-Moon Hollow’s one-gate airport. But I’d thought the plane would at least seat thirty or so people. The vessel in front of me would maybe seat a baker’s dozen, if someone sat on the pilot’s lap. There were only three rows of windows besides the windshield, for God’s sake.
“This is the right plane, in case you’re wondering,” said a gruff voice that was accompanied by a considerable whiff of wet tobacco.
I turned to find a florid, heavyset man in a pilot’s uniform standing behind me. His wavy black hair was counterbalanced by a pitted sallow complexion and under-eye bags so heavy they should have been stored on the nearby luggage cart. A lifetime of drinking had thickened his features and left a network of tiny broken capillaries across his broad nose. Given the sweat stains on his uniform, I might have doubted his current sobriety, but I supposed it took considerable motor control to keep that large unlit cigar clamped between his teeth. His name tag read “Ernie.”
“That is not a plane,” I told Ernie. “That is what happens when planes have babies with go-carts.”
Snorting, he pushed past me toward the plane, his shoulder bumping into mine. The olfactory combination of old sweat and wet cigar made me take a step back from him.
“Well, if you don’t want to fly, there’s always a rental car,” the pilot snarked, climbing the stairs into the plane. “It’s about a four-hour drive, until you hit the gravel roads.”
I frowned at Ernie the Pilot’s broad back. If there was anything I hated more than flying, it was driving alone at night on unfamiliar, treacherous roads. Besides, there were too many things that could happen to the package on a car ride between here and the Hollow. I could spill coffee on it while trying to stay awake. It could be stolen while I was stopped at a gas station. A window malfunction could result in the package being sucked out of the car on the highway. I needed to get it back to Jane as soon as humanly (or vampire-ly) possible. So driving was a nonstarter.
I gritted my teeth and breathed deeply through my nose, watching the way the sickly fluorescent outdoor lights played on the dimpled metal of the wings. The tiny, tiny wings.
The pilot stuck his head out of the plane door. “Plane’s not gonna get any bigger,” he growled at me around the cigar.
“Good point,” I muttered as I took the metal stairs. “I really hope that’s not some sort of euphemism, Mr. Creepy Late-Night Pilot.”
Even though my cargo was completely legal, I still felt the need to look over my shoulder as I boarded. My superspy skills were supremely lacking. It was bad enough, the looks that security gave me as I visibly twitched when sending my bag through the X-ray machine. But I’d never hand-delivered an item to a customer before, especially an item of such high value. My bonding and insurance couldn’t possibly cover an item that was considered priceless to the supernatural community at large. I just wanted to get it out of my hands and into those of my client, Jane Jameson-Nightengale, as quickly as possible.
The plane was not at all TARDIS-like. It was not bigger on the inside. And besides Ernie the Portly Pilot, it was completely empty. This was, after all, the last flight from Louisville to Half-Moon Hollow for the night, which made it a risky proposition, layover-wise. From what Jane told me, most Hollow residents didn’t want to risk being stuck overnight in Louisville, so they planned their connections earlier in the day. But I’d had a client meeting that kept me in Atlanta until the last minute and had booked a late flight. It worked better for me to land late anyway, since Jane, an oddly informal vampire who insisted on a first-name basis, would be picking me up from the airport. Pre-sundown pick-up times didn’t work for her.
Though minuscule, the interior of the plane was comfortable enough, with its oatmeal-colored plastic walls, the stale, recently disinfected smell, and its closely arranged seats. I clearly had my choice of spots, but I took the time to find my assigned seat in the second row. I declined putting my carry-on bag in the tiny storage compartment in the front of the plane. I was not comfortable with the idea of not being able to see my bag at all times. I turned, checking the distance from my seat to the door-slash-emergency-exit. Studies showed that passengers were five times more likely to survive a crash if they sat close to the emergency exits.
I knew I was being silly. The flight would only take an hour or so. What were the chances of the plane crashing when it was only in the air for sixty minutes? I was thankful that my brain had not absorbed and catalogued that particular bit of information. Just then, the pilot belched loudly.
OK, maybe my chances of crashing were better than average if this guy was at the controls.
And for some reason, as I boarded, the cruel, ironic bits of my brain were running through the list of famous people who had died in small plane crashes. Ritchie Valens, John Denver, Aaliyah.
My brain could be a real jerk when it was under stress.
I flopped my head forward, smacking my forehead against the seat in front of me. I was too tired for this. I’d spent almost two hours in Atlanta traffic just to get to the airport in time for the flight to Louisville. I’d braved lengthy and multistepped security checks. I missed my cozy little restored home in Dahlonega. I missed my home office and my thinking couch and my shelves of carefully preserved first-edition books. I promised myself that when I survived this trip, I would reward myself by retreating to my apartment for a week, bingeing on delivered Thai food and Netflix.
I heard footsteps on the metal ladder but did not move my head from the seat back. I heard whoever it was move down the aisle and slide into the row of seats across from me.
“Fear of flying?”
I ceased my forehead abuse long enough to look up at him. The other passenger smiled and quirked his eyebrows, the sort of “we’re in this together for the next hour or so, so we might as well be polite” gesture most people appreciated in a fellow traveler.
I, on the other hand, drew back in my seat. Oh, he was handsome, in that polished, self-aware manner that made women either melt in their seats or shrink into themselves in immediate distrust. Unfortunately for him, I fell into the second category.
I did not dissolve at the sight of his high cheekbones. I didn’t coo over his dark chocolate eyes or the dark goatee that defined his wide, sensual mouth. The collar of his blue V-neck T-shirt showed a downright lickable collarbone and the beginnings of well-defined pectoral muscles, and I did not liquefy. In fact, my initial reaction was to trust him far less than I trusted Ernie. So I might have been a bit more snappish than polite when I responded, “No, fear of awkward conversations before crashing.”
But it seemed my curt tone only made him grin. It was a sincere grin, without an ounce of condescension, which made him even more handsome. Some tiny nerve inside of me twinged, and I wished, just for once, that I could be the kind of woman who could start a conversation with a handsome stranger, approach some new experience—hell, try a new brand of detergent—without analyzing all of the possible ways it could go wrong.
While my mother had made it clear on more than one occasion that I was not “conventionally pretty,” I knew I wasn’t completely unfortunate-looking. My DNA had provided me with my father’s fine-boned features and my mother’s wide, full lips, though mine weren’t twisted into unhappy lines as often as hers were. My skin was clear and soft with warm peach undertones. My eyes were large, the amber color of old whiskey, with a slight, undeserved mischievous tilt. Taken all together, my slightly mismatched features made for a pleasant face. And yet, thanks to my wounded ego, men like this, completely at ease with themselves, sent me into a spiraling tizzy.
The handsome man’s smooth voice interrupted my mental self-flagellation yet again. “It’s too bad the flight is so short. They don’t even have a beverage service. You might have been able to take the edge off.”
“I’m not much of a drinker,” I told him, giving him a quick, jerky smile that felt more like a cheek tremor than an expression. I nodded my head toward the back of the plane. “Besides, where would they put the beverage cart?”
“Oh, well, maybe I’ll be able to distract you,” he offered, the corner of his mouth lifting again.
The intimate way he’d said it, the way he was smiling at me, eyes lingering on my jean-clad legs, sent a little shiver down my spine, despite the simultaneous warning Klaxons sounding in my head.
“And how are you going to do that?” I asked him, holding up my well-worn paperback. “You’ve got some very serious competition.”
Thank you, conversational gods, for not letting the phrase “stiff competition” leave my lips.
“Oh, I’m sure I could come up with a way to entertain you.”
And his smile was so full of naughty promise that the only response I could come up with was “Guh.”
The conversational gods had abandoned me more quickly than I had hoped.
I blushed to the tips of my ears, but he seemed amused by it, so maybe a red face was considered charming on the planet of the narrow-torsoed.
Given that I was from a very different planet—home of the ladies built like lanky twelve-year-old boys—I doubted very much that our definitions of “fun” matched up. He looked like the sort of guy for whom bottle service was invented. My idea of a good time was a movie marathon with my friend and assistant, Rachel, featuring at least five different actors playing Sherlock Holmes, and then a debate over who did the best job.
That’s right. Anna Whitfield, one-woman party.
“Do you consider Dante’s Inferno a little light travel reading?”
“It’s an old favorite,” I said.
“Well, you’ve successfully intimidated me, so congratulations.”
I laughed, but before I could answer, the door slammed behind us and the plane started to taxi. A small overhead speaker began to play pre-recorded safety instructions and I relaxed back into the seat. I pulled the safety instruction card from the seat pocket in front of me and began reading along.
“Really?” the stranger asked. I nodded without looking at him, checking the emergency exit door for opening instructions. It looked like a case of “Turn the big red handle upward and left while trying to contain your terror.” Excellent.
I followed along, checking the location of the air masks (there weren’t any) and running lights toward the emergency exit (also no). They really needed to make safety cards specific to tiny planes.
“You have flown before, yes?” the stranger asked.
Although he was distressingly attractive, I ignored him. I would not die in a fiery plane crash because I had neglected the safety card for a pair of beautiful blue eyes. I tucked it away in the seat pouch in front of me, tightened my seatbelt, and clenched my eyes shut while the plane struggled to lift off from the runway. I pressed my head back against the seat rest, as if holding a rigid posture would somehow get the plane in the air safely.
I prayed the only way I knew how, visualizing the exact opposite of all the horrible potential outcomes running through my head. I pictured the plane lifting off, maintaining a nice straight path through the air, and landing in Half-Moon Hollow with my suitcase intact. Oh, and I pictured the antianxiety meds releasing into my system exactly as I’d timed them, so I wouldn’t climb the walls of the plane from the moment it took off.
And when I opened my eyes, my purse was open on my lap and my hands were swimming through the contents, searching for the package I was bringing to Jane. Across the aisle, the stranger’s head was bent over a magazine. I felt faint, as if I were falling inside of myself, separated from my own body as my arm started to lift. I could see myself yanking the package out of my purse, as if I were watching it happen on a movie screen.
This was wrong. What was I doing? I hadn’t pulled the package from my bag since getting through security; why would I show it to this person I barely knew?
As suddenly as it began, the spell was over and I practically sagged against my seat. My long, sweater-clad arm was still raised and my hand still stretched as I shook off the strange dizzy sensation. I’d never felt anything like that before. Was I coming down with something? Had I had some sort of stroke? I didn’t feel tingling or numbness in my extremities. I wasn’t confused, beyond wondering what the hell had just happened to me. Maybe it was an inner ear problem? Or the veggie wrap I’d eaten at the airport sandwich shop? I should have known better than to trust airport cuisine. I probably had some sort of dirt-borne E. coli from unwashed lettuce.
I glanced across the aisle to the stranger, still poring through his magazine, completely unaware of my inner turmoil. I sighed. I was a very special sort of weird. I turned my attention back to my book. While the takeoff was fairly smooth, the rocking of the plane and the dark, quiet space actually made me a little dizzy again, and I wondered if I really was coming down with some strain of E. coli that affected the inner ear. Stupid airport lettuce.
With the stranger distracted by magazine articles about abdominal workouts that would change his life, I traveled through Dante’s rings of hell with the aid of the weak overhead light. After twenty minutes or so, I got tired of the weird, dizzy sensation intermittently flashing through my head and set my book aside.
“Not quite the beach-read romp you were promised?” the stranger asked.
I looked up to find him staring at me again, intently, on the border of attempted smoldering. Frankly, I found this to be unnerving. Either the stranger was the world’s chattiest traveler, or he was one of those skeevy men you saw on Dateline who targeted women who travel alone and tried to lure them into a human trafficking scheme. Forgetting every lesson my mother had ever drilled into my head about good manners, I gave him my full-on “disapproving professor” face I’d learned as a teaching assistant.
He was not fazed.
He did, however, get distracted by a child’s truck, a toy left over from a previous flight, rolling down the aisle toward the cockpit. The plane’s nose seemed to be tipping downward. I checked my watch. We were only twenty-five minutes into the flight, which was way too early to be starting our descent into the Hollow. I exchanged a glance with my handsome seatmate, who was frowning. Hard.
A metallic crunching noise sounded from the front of the plane, catching our attention. After flipping a few switches and hitting some buttons, Ernie the Pilot yanked what looked like an important lever from the control panel and stuck it in his shirt pocket. And then he took a large hard plastic mallet from his laptop bag and began swinging it wildly at the panel. He got up from his seat, snagging what looked like a backpack from the copilot’s chair. The stranger and I sat completely still as the pilot eyed him warily.
“What the hell are you doing?” I demanded as the pilot slipped the backpack on and clipped the straps over his thick middle. Some instinct had me reaching for the strap of my tote bag, winding it around my wrist. The plane continued to descend at a smooth, steady pace. “Get back to the controls!”
“I don’t want to hurt you. I just want the package you’re carrying. I know it’s not in your suitcase; I checked at the baggage screening,” Ernie told me, raising his hands and reaching toward my lap. The invasion of space had me grabbing at my bag to feel for the little canister of pepper spray I usually kept clipped to the strap. Of course, that little canister was not currently clipped in place because that’s the sort of chemical agent the FAA frowns on bringing through security. If I got through this, I was going to write them a long letter.
I clutched the bag to my chest. Why was Ernie doing this? How did he know what I had in my bag? Hell, how did he manage to get into my suitcase? Did someone send him after me? And what sort of person could bribe a pilot to commandeer a (admittedly underpopulated) commercial flight?
Another wave of dizziness hit me, full force this time, and I had to fight to keep my attention on my mind-numbing terror. This was it. This was the worst-case scenario. The pilot was abandoning the airplane while trying to mug me. I ran through all of the transportation studies I’d read on flight safety and crisis management to try to come up with some sort of solution to this problem . . . and nothing. I had nothing. None of them covered purse-snatching, plane-jacking pilots.
Shrugging off the heavy, sleepy weight that dragged at the corners of my brain, I took a deep breath. OK. I would handle this one problem at a time.
Problem one, no one was flying the plane. And Ernie—who I was absolutely correct in not trusting, yay for me—appeared to have broken off something important from the control panel, which probably rendered the plane unflyable. So, I could draw the conclusion that Ernie was a horrible person and that he had no plans to land the plane. So I seemed to be screwed on that front.
Problem two, Ernie was trying to snatch my bag. All of the personal safety guides I’d read said you should hand over your purse if you’re being mugged. Nothing in your wallet could be worth dying for. It would be easier just to hand him my bag. I might as well let him have it, a soft voice that didn’t sound entirely like mine whispered inside my head. It isn’t worth dying for.
I could feel my arms lifting, my hands unwinding the strap from my wrist. Suddenly, a loud, shrill warning beep sounded from the cockpit. I whipped my head toward it just as the plane dropped suddenly, throwing me against the seat in front of me. I hissed as Ernie bent and tried to yank the bag away, dragging my strap-ringed arm with him.
I was going to die. Whether I handed over the bag or not, the plane was going to crash with me on it.
A heretofore unknown spark of anger fired in my belly. I’d been entrusted to take care of Jane Jameson’s package. Jane was a high-ranking member of the local World Council for the Equal Treatment of the Undead. She’d trusted me with Council business. She expected me to take care of the package for her, to deliver it safely. She was paying me a handsome sum to do so. And this pilot was trying to take it from me, to kill me for it. He’d put me in a terrifying, no-win situation to intimidate me into handing it over.
This was bullshit.
That little spark burned into a full-blown stubborn flame and I wrapped the leather bag strap around my wrist even tighter.
I wasn’t going to give it up. I couldn’t do anything about the plane crashing, but I could keep Jane’s package from falling into clearly unscrupulous hands. As much as we both loved books, I was sure Jane would rather see it destroyed than dropped in the hands of people willing to kill for it.