Deadly Race by Margaret Daley

these?” she asked, examining the box while she wrestled with the disappointment his declaration had produced. Marriage wasn’t in her future either, so why should she care what he felt about the subject?
    “You never know when one of those tools will come in handy. We have no weapons, since that soldier took the gun that I so kindly persuaded the nice man in my hotel room to loan me.”
    Ellie lifted a screwdriver out of the box. “Come any closer and I’ll use this on you.”
    “Laugh all you want, but I seem to remember you using your purse as a weapon this morning.”
    She replaced the screwdriver in the box and put her hand in her pockets. That was when she realized her brooch was missing. “It’s gone!” She dove toward the plane and Slade.
    He tried to scramble out of her way, but she hit him square in chest, barreling him over into the copilot’s seat. She was halfway on top of him, frantically searching the inside of the cockpit.
    “I’ve got to find it!”
    “What?”
    “My grandmother’s brooch.”
    “You probably lost it back at the airport or—”
    “No.” She rounded on him in the small confines of the plane. “It’s the only thing I have that belonged to my grandmother. She raised me.”
    “We shouldn’t stay around here much longer.”
    “I’m not leaving until I find it.”
    “It’s that important?”
    She nodded, then leaned over him and began to rummage through the debris.
    “I realize the brooch means a lot to you, but—”
    “No buts,” she cut in. “You go on without me. I’ll follow when I find it. It’s my lucky piece. Nothing’s going to happen if I’m wearing it.”
    “And that’s supposed to reassure me after the events of the past twelve hours? You were wearing it then.”
    “I’m alive right now and the odds were against us.” She fixed him with a determined look. “I’m not going. Short of carrying me out of here kicking and screaming, I’m staying.”
    “Woman, you’re exasperating.” He stared at her long and hard. “Okay. I’ll help. But it doesn’t seem to be in here. Maybe you lost it outside when you fell.”
    “It can’t be under the plane.” Ellie scrambled out of the cockpit and on her hands and knees began a careful search of the area around the plane. Tossing branches out of her way, she painstakingly went over every inch of the ground near her before moving onto the next area.
    Slade went down on his hands and knees, too. “This really does mean a lot to you.”
    “My grandmother is probably turning over in her grave right now. My grandfather gave it to her on their wedding night. It symbolizes fifty years of marriage.”
    “Ah, the romantic again, and after all that has happened to you.”
    “Haven’t you had anything you treasure more than anything else?”
    “Yes, my skin.”
    Her hand closed around an object buried partway in the dirt under a branch. She dug at the earth and uncovered the brooch. Hugging it to her, she closed her eyes in thankfulness.
    “Now, may we go?”
    Hopping to her feet, she looked down at him still kneeling on the ground. “What’s taking you so long? We need to get out of here.”
    He stared at her aghast, then suddenly began laughing. “Coming.” He started to pick up his duffel bag and stuff some of their extra supplies in it. He stopped. “We can’t go quite yet.”
    “I thought you were in an all fired hurry to leave.”
    “We should try to camouflage the plane, so an aerial survey of this region won’t disclose its whereabouts.”
    “How? Look at its size.” She gestured with a wide sweep the length of the plane.
    “With branches. They’d search in the air first if they want to find us. The delay will be worth it to us.”
    For the next hour they worked side by side in silence, disguising the plane’s location with branches and leaves. When they were through, Ellie had to acknowledge they had done a great job of hiding it. But the fact they had stayed to camouflage it in the