Her eyes were narrowed on Jill’s face. “You think you know me so well. I might surprise you.”
Jill shook her head. “I’m not confident. I know you can surprise me. You’re very complicated, and bad things can happen to any plan. I’m just hoping I’m not wrong about you in this instance.” She got to her feet. “I’ll go back to the cockpit. I’ll stay on the plane until I’m sure I won’t be seen getting off. After Gideon lands, he’ll take care of you from then until we stage our meeting at the press interview.”
“Gideon,” Eve repeated. “You’ve dropped that name through the entire conversation. You’re talking about Sam Gideon, our pilot, whom you introduced me to at the beginning of the trip?” She vaguely remembered a good-looking, dark-haired young man with a flashing smile. “I’m to put myself in his hands? I take it he’s another friend of yours who is a bit more than a pilot?”
Jill nodded. “Well, he does own this Gulf Stream. And flying would be his career of choice if it were up to him.” She made a face. “But he owns mega stocks and diamond mines and other boring stuff here in Maldara that tend to get in his way.”
“Poor guy.”
“Don’t be sarcastic,” she said quietly. “He’s my friend, and he did me this favor. He’s helped me before, and I trust him. The fact that he inherited a good portion of the entire wealth of this country made that a hell of a lot easier. I’ve known Sam Gideon ever since I first came to Maldara. He was born here and lived on a family plantation near Jokan before he graduated from Oxford and moved to London. He knows everybody who’s anybody in the country. He won’t let you get in trouble. And if he does, he has the man who can get you out of it on speed dial.” She stopped at the door of the cockpit to look soberly back at her. “You might find him a little unusual, but you can trust him, too, Eve. I’d never turn you over to someone you couldn’t trust.” Then she was opening the cockpit door. “I’ll see you Thursday if you’re still here.”
Eve watched the door shut behind Jill. That last sentence had probably been said to convince her that she wasn’t being taken for granted. Yet every word Jill spoke sounded sincere. But the fact that she’d let her get here to Maldara before she’d told her that she happened to be having trouble with the ruling head of the damn country was both frustrating and suspicious. Trust her? Trust this Sam Gideon?
Eve shouldn’t even get off the damn plane.
But she was already here in this place where savages had thought nothing of killing children as they studied in their classroom.
And she knew she was going to go to Robaku.
* * *
“Jill says you’re very important to her and I’m to be polite and respectful.” Sam Gideon’s dark eyes were twinkling with mischief as he came out of the cockpit after he’d landed the Gulf Stream. He had just a hint of an English accent that made the mockery in his tone take on an additional slyness. In his thirties, he was very good-looking, with olive skin, dark hair cut close to tame a tendency to curl, and that smile that was definitely reckless. “I told her that I’d been so polite to you when we were introduced that I’d never be able to do a repeat. So what you see is what you get.” He shook her hand. “But I did promise her not to try to seduce you. Though it was a sacrifice since I do have a thing for intense, stormy women.”
“Stormy?” Eve studied him. Jill had warned her that he was unusual, but it was clear there was much more to Gideon than what he seemed on the surface. He had chosen that remark deliberately because sex was blatantly inappropriate in this situation and definitely would have been forbidden by Jill. That opening could have been meant to either put her at ease or shock her. “Then it’s lucky you’re wrong about me. I have a very calm nature and avoid turbulence at all costs. Besides being married to a man who makes every effort to keep me from having to deal with the storms of life.”
He chuckled. “And you’ve firmly put me in my place and given just a hint of a threat in case I