Page 77 of Shared By the Pilots

“They’re endangered, and apparently worth a lot of money,” Adam explained. “Yeah, we’re just as surprised as you are.”

“You’re dressed as though you’re an Excelsior flight attendant,” I said.

“Everyone’s tryin’ to get a cushy job with them,” Taylor said.

“No, it’s not like that,” Adam replied. “Luke convinced me to do it, but not for the money. We did it to try to help you.”

“To gather evidence to prove that you were right,” Luke chimed in. “Or wrong.”

For a few seconds, it felt like my heart was lighter than air. Adam and Luke were supporting me. They werehelpingme. I gave them both thankful smiles, struggling to find the words.

“Wait a minute,” Adam said to Taylor. “Who are you?”

“I’m somebody who thinks we ought to hurry up here. Let’s grab one of these suitcases. My plane is over… aww, hell. They’re coming back.”

I zipped up the suitcase and closed the hatch quietly before Broussard and his associate came around the side of the plane. He gave a start, then looked suspiciously at the four of us.

“What’s going on here?”

We’re screwed,I thought.

“I was chatting with Taylor here. He’s another pilot,” Luke said. “I was looking for an alternative flight attendant for the flight back, since Adam was so troublesome.”

Adam was troublesome?I had so many questions.

Broussard looked like he bought the explanation. But then his eyes settled on me, then widened with recognition.

“You…”

Shit.

He was looking around, panicked now. “The four of you, give us a minute. We need to discuss something privately.” He and his associate stood by the loading hatch, waiting for us to walk away.

“What do we do?” I whispered to my three men. “We have him caught red-handed.”

“You two get out of here,” Luke said to me and Taylor. “I’ll do my best to calm the situation and convince him that everything is all right. We’ll regroup in Houston.”

I gave them a final grateful smile, then Taylor and I returned to his plane. We walked slowly, in the hopes that our calm demeanor would make Broussard relax.

But when we got into Taylor’s plane and climbed into the cockpit, we were greeted with a depressing sight: Broussard and his friend were pushing a luggage cart across the tarmac, back in the direction of their pickup truck. And there were four suitcases on the cart.

“They’re getting rid of the evidence!” I exclaimed. “We have to do something!”

Taylor sighed back into the pilot’s seat. “We missed our chance, Veronica.”

“We can call the local authorities!” I insisted. “If they come right now…”

Taylor put his hand on my leg and squeezed it. “Veronica. It’s over. We can report everything we’ve found to the authorities when we get home, but we’re done here. It’s time to go home.”

As we taxied, I got a text from Luke.

Luke: Don’t do anything yet. We’re going to land and then figure it out.

Me: Okay. I’m so upset that we didn’t catch him red-handed.

Luke: I know.

Luke: I tried telling you what I was doing, but you didn’t want to talk to me. I wish I had known you were flying down here on your own. A little communication and we could have worked together on this.

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