White Jade

Chapter Ten

Selena looked over at the man sleeping next to her.

Who is he, she wondered. They let him take his gun right on the plane. He's some kind of spy or something. He lost half an ear and killed five people and never blinked an eye. All I know about him is he's got a mother and a sister, had a jerk for a father and he probably saved my life yesterday.

His fiancé died. He didn't say how. Maybe that explains the wariness I feel in him. Like he's waiting for something bad to happen. Like he thinks something is going to jump out at him.

She watched Nick twitch in his sleep.

Black hair, strong jaw, he's already got a trace of shadow. He's not handsome, but he's not bad either. Black eyebrows. And he's got those odd eyes. I've never seen eyes like that, like some kind of animal, a big cat or a wolf. He's built, but not like one of those body freaks in the gyms. I wonder how he is in bed?

Sudden heat and moisture between her legs took her by surprise. She couldn't remember the last time she'd had that thought about someone.

She shook her head. No way was she getting in bed with him. She felt too vulnerable to deal with the intimacy sex would bring up. Besides, this man was dangerous.

Selena looked out the window at a layer of white cloud passing below. She thought about her uncle and her parents.

She could remember her parents, but she couldn't quite remember their voices. The day everything changed, she'd been playing by the window at home. She wasn't supposed to. She was sick and supposed to stay in bed while her brother and her mother and father headed down Highway One toward Big Sur.

When her Uncle came into the room she'd known something bad had happened. He'd started to tell her but she wouldn't listen, drowning his words with a song she'd learned in school the week before.

The engines droned outside her window. I should have been with them in the car, she thought. If I'd been there it would have been all right. We would have stopped somewhere, to get something to eat or so I could go to the bathroom or something. Then they wouldn't have been there when the truck came around that curve.

Her fault.

She'd buried the guilt and armored herself against the world. She knew she'd done it, she wasn't unaware. Be the best in everything. Sports, dangerous hobbies, martial arts, academics. All that success, all her training, hadn't prepared her for this. She wasn't in control anymore. She couldn't make things work the way she wanted.

It scared her, and that was something new. She didn't like it.

She took a few deep breaths and glanced again at Nick. This man doesn't scare, she thought. Maybe he'll make it right, if anyone can.