Superb and Sexy (Sky High Air #3)(66)

“Atta girl,” Rick said approvingly.





Chapter 25


M addie and Brody made it back to Sky High Air, where everything seemed so normal it was hard for Maddie to adjust. She walked into the lobby with the inviting leather couches, the tall, leafy plants, the huge maps spread over the walls. The scent was distinctive—jet fuel and oil—the sounds as familiar as breathing. She could hear a jet engine roaring, the thunk of a candy bar falling from one of the vending machines, a lineman yelling to another…

Home. She was home.

Too bad it wasn’t to stay. She had to find her sister, and in that vein, pulled Leena’s cell phone out of her purse to turn it back on from her flight.

It immediately vibrated, which had her heart racing. She retrieved the voice mail—from Leena!—but the fear in her voice reactivated Maddie’s.

“I’m on Stone Cay,” Leena said.

What?

“I’m here to…um, visit.”

No way. Whatever reason Leena had for being there, it wasn’t to “visit.”

“Anyway, it’s been so long since we’ve all been together, and Rick was thinking you might come back. For a family reunion sort of thing. Yeah. So…see you soon.”

Okay, this was bad. Maddie shut the phone, her brain racing.

Rick was on to them.

Somehow, he’d found out he’d had Maddie there on the island instead of Leena. Even worse, Leena was now bearing the brunt of his rage by herself. Now Rick wanted Maddie back on the island, and the only reason for that had nothing to do with a family reunion.

A family funeral, maybe, but not a reunion.

Brody came up to her, rifling through a stack of phone messages. “We’ve got a problem in maintenance,” he said. “Vince is freaking out, so if you need me—” He broke off, catching the look on her face. “You need me.”

From the corner of her eye, she could see out the window, across the tarmac to where Vince, their mechanic, stood in front of the maintenance hangar, waving wildly for Brody. “I’m not first in line.”

“Maddie—”

“You’d better hurry. He looks apoplectic.”

Brody’s mouth went grim. “So we’re back to that already.”

“Well, we are in the real world, right?”

“And what the hell does that mean?”

“In the real world, we’re not married.” She had no idea why she said that or why the words brought her a little pang. She’d never wanted to be married and in fact, had promised herself she’d never give any man that much power over her.

She wasn’t safe with anyone having power over her. It was why she was the one who always walked away.

Always.

“In the real world,” she said, “we’re not a unit. We’re not lovers. In the real world…” In the real world, they spent their time bickering and butting heads at work. They didn’t see each other outside of it. “We’re not even friends.”

His eyes never wavered off her face. “In the real world, things change—” His cell phone buzzed. At the same time, Vince stuck his head inside the lobby, giving Brody a hands up that said, what’s keeping you?

“Popular man,” she said softly. “And you’ve really got to go.” She turned to walk off, but of course, he grabbed her arm and pulled her back around.

“I have a feeling you have to go, too,” he said tightly. “Am I right?”

“We can’t do this now, Brody. You have a job.”

“And you?”

“I have other things.”

“Goddamnit, Maddie. Don’t do this.”

She had to. She couldn’t let him go back with her, not when this time, Rick was on to them. He knew he’d been fooled, and he would not be happy, or kind.

Not that he was ever either of those things anyway, but it would get ugly. No way in hell was she going to risk Brody’s well-being again. But she was going to risk her own this one last time.

For Leena.

All she had to do was get there, get Leena out, and then they were home free. She’d worry about the particulars later.

Brody hit the ignore button on his phone, yelled something to Vince, and then turned back to Maddie, still holding on to her arm. “Why do I have the feeling that if I so much as turn my back, you’re going to go do something rash and stupid?”

“I think I resent that.”

“You mean you resemble that.” Two line guys came in from the tarmac, also looking for Brody. “Goddamnit.” He turned to Maddie. “I need ten minutes, okay? Give me ten minutes to see what I can postpone and what I can’t, and then we’ll go over our options.”

“Our options?”

“You are not going to do whatever it is you’re planning to do all by yourself.”

Oh, yes. She was. Stupid or not, she had to. There was no choice.

“I mean it, Maddie.”

“I can see that you do.” She craned her neck around his huge shoulders to see Vince pacing. “Now you really have to go. You’ve wasted enough time on me.”

“Not a minute of that time with you was wasted.” But he relented. “Ten minutes. Be here, Madelyn Stone.”