Luca grimaced. ‘I hope so. I’m not sure how stable the chopper will be if I have to climb up onto the stretcher and pull him from there. The tail’s wedged fairly solidly so I doubt it’ll tip backwards. I’m not so sure it won’t tip forward.’
Mia swallowed. So this was the meaning of being stuck between a rock and a hard place. But Luca seemed so confident—like GI Joe, Action Man and Inspector Gadget all rolled into one.
‘It’s going to be fine, Mia.’ He smiled. She returned his smile with one that was suddenly wobbly and thanked any and all deities out there that if she’d had to be in a helicopter crash, at least Luca had been with her.
‘Okay. Let’s do it.’
Twenty minutes later, after a lot of effort and pain, Brian was on the stretcher, an IV had been inserted, fluids were running, nasal prongs with a trickle of oxygen had been applied and, because they could, he was being monitored. His badly fractured leg had been left in the splint and he’d drifted off to sleep on a morphine cloud.
Finally they both settled back into their seats. The wind howled around the chopper and whistled through the shattered glass at the front. She could feel the slight shuddering of the aircraft as the wind buffeted it from what seemed like all directions. The steady beep, beep, beep of the monitor seemed alien amidst the wild brutality of Mother Nature.
‘How long do you think the oxygen will last?’ Mia asked into the growing silence.
She knew that Brian didn’t really need it but she was aware it was a finite commodity and that they had no idea how long they’d be there. They’d completed a thorough primary and secondary survey of Brian’s injuries but what if they’d missed something? What if his condition worsened?
‘Quite a few hours, I expect. It’s only running at one litre.’
Mia nodded. Would that be enough? How long would it be before they were rescued? The way the wind howled and the rain beat incessantly against the window, it didn’t look like any time soon.
She tried really hard not to think about the precariousness of the situation. Their position might feel stable enough but that didn’t alter the fact that they were still in a great deal of danger.
‘So, now what?’ Mia asked.
‘We should get some sleep too,’ Luca said into the silence.
Mia shook her head, reaching across to feel once again for the pulses in Brian’s foot. They were there but feeble and Mia guessed the injury was compromising the blood flow lower. ‘I’m worried about the circulation,’ Mia murmured. ‘It’d be awful to survive a crash like this then go on to lose your leg.’
Luca, who was worried too, gave her a reassuring smile. ‘Hopefully we’ll be out of here before it comes to that.’
Mia nodded. Suddenly aware she was still wearing her helmet, she pulled it off.
Luca placed a stilling hand on her forearm. ‘You should leave it on,’ he said.
Mia shook her hair free and finger-combed it. ‘I’ll feel ridiculous sitting here for the next who knows how long in this stupid helmet.’
Luca sought her gaze. ‘If whatever’s supporting us gives way, that helmet could be your lifeline.’
Mia glanced away from the stark reality she saw in his deep, dark eyes. ‘Well, I doubt very much it’ll prevent
my neck from being broken, which is the most likely outcome if this thing plummets to the ground.’
Luca knew she was right. Spinal compression injury would be the true killer. That and the many other possibilities in between flitted through his mind as he watched Mia with a growing sense of helplessness.
He hated being powerless to affect change in this situation. That all three of them were dependent on things outside his control—the weather, branch structure, the expertise of others.
He’d been taking care of himself for a long time now. So, he suspected, had she. This kind of impotence was reminiscent of his past. And he’d had a little too much of that already this last week.
He took off his own helmet and ruffled his hair.
‘We’re going to be fine,’ he murmured. If he had to hold this helicopter in place through sheer force of will, he would.
He wouldn’t let Mia down
. He tapped the top of her helmet. ‘Keep it close.’
Mia nodded. ‘I don’t suppose Air Control said what was happening with the patient we’re supposed to be evac’ing?’ Luca had talked with Air Control while she’d been inserting the IV.
‘They’re coming in by road. No choice now.’
Mia knew that would be an hour or so’s drive in these treacherous weather conditions, even with lights and sirens. The mountain roads were dangerous when wet and low cloud would further inhibit speed.
‘Hopefully the patient’s spinal condition is minor,’ Mia commented, rubbing absently at her arms. Although she doubted very much they would have been sent out on such a night for a chipped vertebra.
‘You cold?’ Luca asked.
‘A little,’ she admitted. The breached cabin was a perfect conduit for the freezing wind and the temperature inside the crippled aircraft had dropped considerably.
They’d covered Brian in a space blanket but now her adrenaline had settled and their activity had ceased she was starting to feel cold gnawing at her arms. ‘You must be too,’ Mia said. ‘Your overalls are wet around your shoulders and chest.’
Luca wasn’t really. His body was still on high alert, his metabolic rate steaming along like a whistling kettle. But they were probably going to be there for a while …
He leaned across and dragged a pack out from under the stretcher, locating the stash of space blankets folded neatly into playing-card-sized packaging.
‘Here,’ he said, passing her one. Then he opened another and unfolded it. The thin, metallic, foil material crinkled noisily, like a chocolate wrapper, as he proceeded to scrunch it up.
‘What are you doing?’ Mia asked as she unfolded hers and stood so she could wrap it around her entire body.
‘I’m going to plug the hole with it,’ Luca murmured.
‘Ah … good thinking,’ she said as she moved aside to give him more room to manoeuvre.
Luca carefully leaned over Brian’s seat and gingerly stuffed the whistling hole with the scrunched-up foil blanket. ‘That should do it,’ he said, standing back to admire his handiwork.
‘Sounds like it,’ Mia agreed as the whistling magically stopped.
He smiled down at her and in the confines of the helicopter a hunched Luca seemed to take up all the space.
She hadn’t had time to think about her startling revelation from earlier, but now it was all she could think about.
She was in love with Luca di Angelo.
For better or worse. And surely this
had
to be the worst?
‘It’s going to be okay,’ Luca murmured, lifting his hand to cup her cheek. ‘You’re going to be okay.’
Mia wasn’t sure if she’d ever be okay again. She’d gone and done something she’d sworn she never would—fallen in love. How could life ever be okay? How could it ever be the same?
The air seemed to thicken as they stood hunched over in the middle of the helicopter, staring at each other. The howl of the wind and the steady beeping of the heart-rate monitor twirled around them like a symphony.
Brian chose that moment to stir, crinkling the space blanket and setting off the monitor alarm. Luca’s hand dropped as he started guiltily and immediately switched his attention to the stretcher.
Luca placed his hand on the pilot’s shoulder. ‘Hurting, Brian?’
Brian’s eyes drifted open and he gave them a goofy smile. ‘Nope. Everything ish wonderfullll,’ he slurred. ‘That morphine is gooood stuff.’ And his eyes drifted shut again.
Mia, who was once again checking Brian’s foot pulses, smiled. Obviously the pain relief was working.
‘How are they?’ Luca asked.
‘The same, I think. The foot seems a little cooler, though.’
They resumed their seats, Luca wrapping himself in a space blanket as well. He checked his watch. ‘Nearly
four-thirty,’ he said as he peered out the rain-spattered window.
They sat in silence for some minutes, both looking out at the watery blackness. ‘This wasn’t quite how I imagined my first visit to the Blue Mountains would pan out,’ Luca murmured.
Mia’s gaze slid from the window to his profile. ‘I recommend driving next time.’
There was a pause as their eyes met and then they both laughed. Mia’s stomach rumbled. ‘Are you hungry?’ She grabbed her backpack from its hidey-hole. The foil of the space blanket crinkled with her every movement. ‘There’s usually some exceedingly fattening, sugar-loaded snacks in here.’
She gave a triumphant whoop when she located two chocolate bars and handed him one. She tore off her wrapper and sighed as she savoured that first sinful bite. ‘To think, this could be the last chocolate I ever eat.’
Luca glanced at her sharply. ‘Don’t talk like that.’
Mia shrugged as the other lasts competed for equal placing. Last time smelling eucalyptus. Last time seeing rain.
Last time being with Luca.
She wondered if she confessed to these crazy new feelings whether Luca would pretend that he reciprocated. He could renege when they were safely back in Sydney, she wouldn’t hold him to it, but if she was about to meet her fate then … why not utter the words?
Because she didn’t want her last moments filled with an awkward silence and an even more awkward Luca trying to figure out how to let her down gently before they crashed to a fiery death.
Or worse—watch him lie to her.
Yes, he wanted her. But that was different from love. And, faced with her own mortality, nothing less would do.
She sighed again. ‘Just being realistic.’
Luca shook his head. ‘We’re in a stable position. Air Control has our ELT signal. We just need to wait out the weather and then they’ll get us out of here as soon as they can.’
Mia nodded. Listening to the sure, steady note in his voice, she believed him. ‘I know.’
They finished their chocolate serenaded by the moaning wind and the rhythmic beeping of the monitor. Luca shut his eyes briefly and let his head flop back against the headrest. The fine crinkle of the space blanket sounded like crickets chirping as he shifted to get comfortable, stretching his long legs out into the confined space.
His legs brushed hers and he lifted his head. ‘Sorry.’ He grimaced as he shifted them slightly to one side.
‘It’s fine,’ she murmured.
Their gazes locked and for the longest moment they just sat and watched each other. Luca was the first to break the connection.
‘So … you’ve never seen
Swan Lake
?’
Mia didn’t say anything for a minute. Then she just shook her head. ‘Have you?’
He nodded. ‘My grandmother adored things like that. Opera was her first love but she enjoyed ballet too. And she insisted we all be well versed.’ He smiled at the memory. ‘She took me and my sisters to Rome when I was twelve because it was playing at the Teatro dell’Opera.’
Mia remembered he’d mentioned having sisters before. She heard the affection in his voice and felt a corresponding ache of longing deep inside. Her life had been far from family outings to the opera and ballet.
‘You have three sisters, right?’
‘Yes.’ He toyed with leaving it at that but was surprised by the urge to confess all. ‘And a brother.’
His accent thickened and Mia heard the regret in every syllable. He’d mentioned he’d been ostracised and she could hear the pain in every husky nuance. How terrible to have lost an entire extended family. Two people had been hard enough.
‘What happened, Luca?’
She’d told him she hadn’t wanted to know. And she hadn’t. But that was before feeling the power of a love so deep that, even now, despite its newness, it was nestling in to her bones, bedding in for the long haul.
Now she wanted to know everything about him.
She wanted to know it all.
Luca hesitated at her soft enquiry, knowing the answer involved a trip down memory lane. And he’d just flown halfway round the world to come back from there. But somehow, with his recent trip back to the scene of the crime and the potentially dire situation they were in, it didn’t seem so confronting.
In fact, it seemed kind of cathartic.
And in this strange metal cocoon, perched in the treetops of an ancient forest, it seemed as if they were the only two people in the entire world. Despite the beeping of Brian’s monitor, the occasional staccato chatter from the radio and the ever-present potential for disaster, the atmosphere was intimate.
Maybe it was the rain—the whole dark, stormy night
thing—but somehow the mood was conducive to confidences and deep dark secrets.
And it was Mia. The one woman he instinctively knew would understand. But where did he start?
CHAPTER TEN
M
IA
watched and waited. She could see Luca was grappling with some demons and she held her breath, hoping like crazy he’d open up to her.
‘I fell in love for the first time …’ Luca paused. ‘The only time … when I was sixteen.’
Mia steeled herself against the jab to her chest. He seemed so definite. So absolute.
He snorted. ‘At least, I thought I had. I think lust or infatuation is probably more appropriate when I think about it now.’
Mia tried to ignore how the spike of jealousy hurt
. It was an ancient love affair, for crying out loud!
‘She must have been a hell of a girl,’ she said, forcing lightness to her tone, and turned to look out the window because she couldn’t bear to see what love looked like in his eyes. Not when it was for another woman.
He nodded. ‘Oh, yes. Her family was an old, important family in Sicily and our two families had had a deep and abiding friendship for generations. She was promised to my brother.’
Mia’s gaze snapped back to his. ‘Promised? Like an arranged marriage?’
Luca smiled at her shock. ‘Yes, Mia. An arranged marriage. This is Sicily where the old ways still rule.’
Mia blinked at the strange concept. ‘But … you fell in love with her instead?’
Luca shook his head. ‘As well.’
Oh
. Mia felt goose-bumps on her arms as if the wind had found its way in again and blown right up beneath the blanket. There was nothing as heart-wrenching as brother against brother. She hunched into the space blanket a little more with a corresponding ruffle. ‘Ah.’