Her questions are probing. Invasive. With each one he’s liking her less and less. Instead of answering, he puts it back on her. “What’s for you in Kansas City?”

“A sister who can stand me,” Amelia says. “You have family in New York? Friends? Are you running away there?” She waits for his answer. She will not get one.

“It’s nice that you have someone in your life who can stand you,” he says. “Not everyone has that.”

Then he turns to look out of the window, and keeps looking out of the window until she’s moved across the aisle again.

51 • Tarmac

There are more than three thousand abandoned airfields in the world. Some are the relics of war, abandoned during peacetime. Others were built to handle air traffic in places where the population has declined. Still others were built by misguided investors, banking on a growth boom that never arrived.

Of those three thousand airfields, about nine hundred are still viable. Of those nine hundred, about one hundred and fifty have long enough runways to accommodate a craft the size of the Lady Lucrezia. Of those hundred and fifty, twelve are regular stops for the Lady—and they are spread out on every populated continent.

Today’s itinerary features northern Europe.

Six small private jets are already on the weedy tarmac of Denmark’s Rom Airfield, lined up like chicks awaiting the return of the mother hen. It’s a ritual repeated several times a month in each airfield, with no fear of government interference, thanks to some well-placed palm greasing.

Distribution is a procedure much simpler than the actual unwindings. The Lady Lucrezia lands, her hinged nose rises, opening her voluminous cargo hold, and the crates, already sorted to their various destinations are loaded upon the smaller craft, representing buyers anxiously awaiting their purchases. No worldwide delivery service is more efficient. No businessman is prouder of his operation than Divan Umarov.

52 • Risa

She watches the off-loading activity from the guest room window, getting only a small glimpse of it. This is the third time they’ve landed since she’s been conscious. The first two times had them on the ground for less than ten minutes before accelerating down the runway once more, and she imagines this will be the same. Divan dispatches his cargo even faster than he unwinds them.

She turns at the sound of someone at the door, expecting to see Divan. Maybe he sold her after all, and the buyer is waiting on the tarmac to appraise the merchandise. She wonders if a swift kick to the groin would diminish her value in the bulging eyes of the recipient. Instead of Divan at the door, however, its Grace’s half-faced brother.

“Unless you’re here to spring me, I’m not interested.”

“Can’t do that,” Argent says, “but I can take you to see Connor.”

And suddenly Argent’s her new best friend.

“Gotta be quiet, and gotta be quick,” Argent tells her as he leads her out of the room, sounding a little bit like Grace. “Divan’s outside supervising the off-load, but he’ll be back in just a few minutes.”

Argent leads her farther back in the plane to another guest bedroom almost as richly appointed as hers. At first appearance, Connor’s merely tucked into a well-made bed, until she realizes those aren’t blankets, but dozens of thick canvas straps wrapping around him, locked into steel screw eyes in the floorboards, on either side of the bed. Those straps aren’t just keeping him from escaping, they’re keeping him from moving.

Yet in the midst of all this, Connor is still able to smile at her and say, “So I’m beginning to think this spa isn’t what the brochure promised.”

Risa swore to herself that she wouldn’t let him see tears, but she doesn’t know how long she can hold to that.

“We’re getting you out of here,” she says, kneeling to see how the bands are secured. “Argent, help me!”

But Argent doesn’t move. “Can’t do it,” he says. “And even if we could get him loose, we won’t be on the ground long enough to get him out.”

“That’s no reason not to try!”

“Risa, stop,” Connor says quietly.

“If I had a sharp enough knife . . .”

“Risa, stop!” says Connor a little bit louder. “I need you to slow down and listen to me!”

But the tears she kept from her eyes seem to be flooding her thoughts instead, filling her with panic. “This isn’t going to happen to you! I won’t let it!” And she continues to fight against his bonds until Argent says, “I told you she’d be useless.”

That, more than anything else, clears her mind enough to listen to what Connor has to say.

“I have a plan, Risa.”

Risa takes a deep breath to calm herself. “Tell me. I’m listening.”

“The plan is . . . you stay whole, and I get unwound.”

“That’s not a plan!” she yells.

“Shh!” Argent says. “The whole plane’ll hear you!”

As if in response the whole plane shudders and emits a mechanical grinding.

“Risa, it is a plan. Not much of one, but at least it’s something. Argent knows the details. He’ll fill you in.”

“The nose cone is closing!” Argent whines. “Divan will be back on board any second, if he isn’t already. I can’t be caught in here!”

But Risa can’t leave yet. Not without saying those words that come so hard, but mean more than anything now. The words she fears she may never get to say again. “Connor, I—”