Hank Lockridge scowled at his wristwatch. "We'll be there in six minutes."
Gabe struggled into his backpack chutes and asked, "Think we'll get a clear shot at our jump target, Hank?"
Trish spoke up, her voice heavy with sarcasm. "Stop bleeding at the pores, Gabe. It doesn't become you."
He glared at her. "Kiss my ass."
She gave him a twisted smile. "I wouldn't know where to start. You're all ass."
"Cut the shit," Hank Lockridge grumbled as he picked up the bag of money and prepared to move toward the rear exit that would be their point of departure from the Boeing. "If you want to play the dirty dozen with each other, do it on the way down. "Let's hit it."
The seminude stewardess still lay on the deck. Hank filed past her. Gabe next. Trish brought up the rear. She paused for a moment, smiled at the girl and said wickedly, "A word of advice, pussycat. Before you run forward to cry on the captain's shoulder, scrounge a tissue from somewhere and wipe Gabe's cockjuice from your chin."
Sandra's body jerked as though she had just received a vicious slap across the face. Shame flooded her system for a moment. Then came anger. She locked glances with Trish and hissed, "Drop dead!"
Trish laughed. "I'm going to drop, pussycat, but not dead. All I'm going to do is drop into obscurity… with one third of five hundred thousand pesos to keep me happy for the rest of my life. How does that grab you, cocksucker?"
Sandra lapsed into silence.
Trish laughed harshly and stepped toward the rear. Hank Lockridge and Gabe Penner were ready to make like big-assed birds. She donned her motorcycle crash helmet, thinking, In these outfits, all of us look like freaky spacemen.
Hank opened the rear exit door, and now Trish lost interest in everything except getting out and down as cabin pressure and temperature readings dropped faster than a desperate whore's panties. Silence and warmth vanished. Cold air roared into the cabin with bated teeth and started biting her. Trish cursed and muttered, "Let's get the hell out of here before I freeze my pussy!"
Hank Lockridge was the first one to vanish, along with the bag of money. Then Gabe Penner. Now it was Trish's turn. She slid down the flight steps on her ass, gripping the railings with both glove-covered hands, her heart pounding heavily. She reached the bottom, hesitated.
Do your thing! her mind shrilled. Keep the lights of Lone Pine to your right and hit the nylon! Now!
A heartbeat later she stopped gripping the railings and tumbled from the bottom step.
Chapter 2
Instant terror shocked Trish's system as the turbulence around the steps snatched and started to suck her upward. For a hairy second she expected to be splattered against the tail, but the maddening moment passed, and she exhaled in relief and she felt herself dropping downward.
Doing a free-fall at night didn't bug her, but freezing her ass off while dropping at the approximate speed of two hundred miles an hour was something else. The chill factor was a bitch. She felt numb all over. Blackness threatened. She shook her head and muttered. "Easy does it, Trish baby. Don't blank out now. You won't have to put up with this stinking cold very much longer. This jump for the money is almost over." She stopped talking to herself and pulled the D-ring. The chute opened beautifully, and a relaxed laugh ripped past her lips as she watched the earth come rushing up to meet her.
She landed a few yards off target and missed getting her body smashed against a giant boulder by inches. She struggled free of the chute, stared at the king-sized boulder and thought, Damn! A few more inches, and my partners wouldn't have found enough of me to fill a flea's vagina.
A sudden frown wrinkled her brow. Hank and Gabe. Where the hell were they? Her eyes started prowling among the trees and shadows that. I crowded this isolated valley Hank had chosen as their landing target. She looked, listened. Somewhere in the distance a coyote howled at the moonless night, while off to her immediate left she could hear Axehandle Creek slapping at the rocks in its bed, but, outside of this, there was nothing to see or hear.
She started calling. "Hank? Gabe?" Nobody answered.
She took a deep breath that shook her breasts and called again, louder this time. Her voice echoed off into the darkness. A few seconds passed, then the silence erupted; bushes rattled at her back, and she whirled to find Gabe Penner lumbering toward her, his arms loaded with spent parachute. She heaved a sigh of relief and said, "Man, am I ever glad to see that ugly face of I yours! Where's Hank?"
He shook his head. "I'm not sure. The last time I saw him he was fighting a losing battle to stay on target. I think the weight of the money sack had a lot to do with pushing him off course."
"How far off?"
Gabe shrugged. "Hard to tell."
Concern mirrored on her face. "I hope he landed in one piece."
Gabe grinned. "Stop worrying, puss. Hank is an ex-paratrooper who knows every trick in the book when it comes to avoiding getting hurt. Hell, he's probably on his way, or already at the cabin by now."
"How long will it take us to get there?"
"From here? About ten minutes."
Trish gathered up her parachute. "Let's roll."
They waded across the icy creek and moved side by side across the valley. A sickle moon slid out from behind a cloud when they reached a stand of cedars, and Trish saw the ancient log cabin many seconds before Gabe pointed and said, "There it is, puss."
"Yeah," Trish said pointedly, "all nice and dark."
"Relax, puss," Gabe grumbled as he led the way inside the musty building, dropped his bundle and collapsed parachute on the floor, and scratched a kitchen match into flame. "Hank won't get lost with our money."
Trish stood quietly in the doorway until Gabe lit the kerosene lamp they had packed in, along with other supplies. Then she slipped out of her spare chute pack, and a wry smiled curved her lips as she said, "I'm still too damned cold from the free-fall to sweat anything, including Hank Lockridge."
Gabe blew out the match and grinned lewdly. "Climb out of those overalls, and I'll see what I can do to warm you up."
Trish closed the narrow gap that lay between them. She reached for his crotch and found him soft. Amusement glinted in her green eyes. "What are you going to use for a heater… your tongue?"
Gabe bared his teeth in a mirthless grin. "Get rid of that monkey suit and I'll show you."
"How about a drink first?"
"Screw the drink," Gabe said roughly, his slightly sadistic nature coming to the fore. "I want a piece of your pussy, and I want it now. Skin down, babe."
Trish knew better than to turn him down. Gabe was an unpredictable bastard. One minute he would be gentle, and the next he would blow his cool and go the dump route with the girl on hand. Trish wasn't in the mood for a dumping. Not tonight. No, better to get fucked than to get hurt.
Trish stepped back and lowered her shapely haunches into a chair that had seen better days. She unlaced and removed her jump boots. Then she stood up and did the same thing to her insulated coveralls while Gabe watched her in silence. A minute later she stood facing him, clad only in her bra and panties. She studied the sometimes cruel man and suddenly found herself wishing for an interruption in the form of Hank Lockridge's arrival, but it didn't happen.
The silence lingered on as Gabe did a fast strip of his own. Trish watched him knife forward to get rid of his coveralls. When he straightened, her eyes widened in surprise at the sight of his huge erection.