Shiver

his crutch.
    The other bad news was, he had no idea where that mightbe, although he had a pretty good idea about what was going to happen when they got there.
    The long, low, white building that the van was parked beside looked like an airplane hangar, Danny saw as he and Sam were hustled past it. A faded sign on the side of the building confirmed that. It said Hayfield Airport, but if this was an airport it was a long-abandoned one. The place was deserted. Because of the cloud cover, the night was dark as pitch. The only light to be seen was a yellow bug light beside the hangar’s garage-type door. That made it hard to be sure, but aside from the hangar, and a paved parking area surrounding it, he got the impression that there was farmland all around. The smell of crops and fertilizer blew past him on the breeze.
    Just beyond the hangar, sitting on a turf runway carved out of what looked to be a wheat field, sat a Cherokee Six. Danny knew from planes, and he recognized it instantly just from its shape. This one was a little beauty: a six-seat, single-engine, fixed-landing-gear light aircraft with a range of around eight hundred miles. Which just went to prove that crime paid way better than law enforcement.
    As his eyes ran over it, Danny slowed down. Wherever this sweet little bird was taking them, he didn’t want to go. Plus, the chance of rescue went way down if they were flown, say, eight hundred miles away.
    Making a stand here and now, out in the open, occurred to him, but the odds didn’t look good. Veith and company had at least three guns to his zero (and if he knew Veith, they probably also had ammo out the wazoo) and he had a bum leg to hamperhim in a fight, plus Sam to worry about. Avoiding getting killed himself was doable; keeping her from getting hurt or killed might be harder.
    Because they would use her to control him.
    Veith was a fast learner, and he had already learned how well that worked.
    Until he had Sam where he could protect her, he was better off waiting, Danny concluded. If Veith had been going to kill them immediately, the showdown would already have occurred. Apparently he had something else in mind, something that required a plane ride. Which meant that they still had some time.
    As Sam reached the Cherokee, its lights came on, the engine started to rumble, and the propeller started to turn with a fast whap-whap. A pilot must already be on board. The plane was vibrating, readying for takeoff as soon as they climbed inside; the steps were already down. Veith meant to waste no time, clearly. He must be concerned about a rescue party, too.
    Where the hell are you, Crittenden?
    Sam boarded at gunpoint, and a few minutes later, Danny did, too, blinking at the brightness of the cabin after the almost pitch darkness outside. The interior was tiny; he had to bend almost double. The seats were configured two by two by two. Sam was already strapped into a middle seat, with her hands bound in front of her this time because the seats were so small there was no room to put them behind her back and still allow her to sit properly. He saw at a glance that Veith retained his fondness for zip ties. The thug who had Sam in charge ostentatiouslyaimed his gun at her head as Danny hobbled down the narrow aisle. Silently, Danny promised him a world of hurt when the time came.
    Then he found himself praying that he could deliver.
    Sam’s eyes met his as he got close to her. If he had expected to see panic in her face, he’d been wrong. She looked surprisingly composed. There were shadows underneath her eyes, and maybe some tension around her mouth, but although he knew how terrified she must be—he well remembered how fierce her determination to survive for Tyler’s sake was—she didn’t show it.
    Jesus, she was pretty. No, not just pretty, but mind-blowingly beautiful. Even the plane’s harsh light couldn’t blunt the impact of her delicate features, or the thick-lashed blue of her eyes, or the creamy perfection of her skin. Her glorious mane of hair hung loose, waving over her shoulders, black as soot. His too-big white T-shirt didn’t cling, but since he knew that she wasn’t wearing a bra he had no trouble at all visualizing the firm round breasts beneath, or the pert nipples that he actually could see nudging the cloth. Not an hour before, she’d been lying naked in his arms, and they’d been having some of the best sex he’d ever had in his life. Now the effect she had on him was so