over the aisles and seats. No one had been allowed to recover their personal belongings yet. The fire had left a gaping hole with black char climbing the walls and the carpet still seeping and stinking from the water and extinguisher chemicals.
“As bad as it is, it’s still like looking at a miracle,” Matthew said soberly. “I don’t know how anyone walked away from this. It’s too damn easy to imagine everyone being killed, the whole thing up in flames.”
“Yeah. If this was the act of a terrorist, I hope to hell we get him. And soon.”
For a moment Justin couldn’t speak. His fingertips went ice cold, the way they did when he woke up from nightmares sometimes, memories of Bosnia still moaning through his mind. This kind of crisis was exactly why he’d accepted the Texas Cattleman’s Club’s invitation to join their group. Maybe outsiders thought they were a male bastion social club, but Justin knew how committed the men were to saving innocents. Too damn often, neither the law nor any government could protect innocents. Not in any country.
He sucked in a breath, forcing those old nightmare memories to fade. At least there’d been no small children involved in this plane flight.
His gaze swept and reswept the plane’s interior. He saw an overturned romance paperback on the floor. A woman’s red high-heel shoe lying on its side. A black driving glove. A small carry-on had upended, revealing a spill of lingerie that looked like a bride’s trousseau-Matthew muttered something about Jamie Morris and what he’d heard about her marriage to some higher-up dignitary in Asterland’s government. Down the aisle a little farther was a snakeskin purse, also lying open, with lipsticks and combs and what all strewn down the aisle. There was a sweater here, a coat there. The acrid after-smell of burned plastic and chemicals.
The door to the pilot’s cabin stood ajar, the cold morning sun streaming through the windows. It seemed crazy to notice the dust spinning in the sunlight, as if anything about this scene were remotely normal.
But then a sharp, bright glint caught his attention. On the carpet, near where Lady Helena had been sitting on the flight, Justin hunkered down, frowning.
“Matt. Dakota.”
“What?” Matthew bent down, too, but Justin raised a cautious hand to prevent him from touching anything.
Dakota pushed closer, sensing from the sudden excitement and seriousness of the other two that they’d found something important. He looked over Justin’s shoulders. “That
The two stones were just lying in the carpet, not noticeably separable from all the other debris. A handkerchief wasn’t far. The black driving glove. Ash and messes from the fire. But the two stones were a startling contrast to everything else.
One was a black harlequin opal.
The other, a three-carat emerald.
Justin exchanged glances with Dakota and Matthew. Matt’s face had bleached white. Probably his own had, too.
None of the men could give a holy hoot about gems-but all of them recognized these two stones. The jewels were too rare and distinctive to be mistaken for anything else, even by lay people such as them.
The whole town knew the legend of the Texas Cattleman’s Club’s three jewels. And Justin distinctly remembered the old story being retold at the last Texas Cattleman’s Club party- Riley Monroe recounting the old yarn to one of the Asterlanders. The townspeople never seemed to get tired of the jewel tale, even if they never believed it was true. It just didn’t matter. It was a great story, and specifically a story with a message about the values of leadership, justice and peace-the Club’s motto.
Two of the stones in the old legend, of course, were a black harlequin opal and a great big green emerald.
Just like these two.
Amazingly like these two.
Exactly like these two.
Matthew wildly shook his head. “I don’t get this. Someone tried to steal our stones? But I didn’t think anyone really believed they existed-much less that anyone had a clue where we had them locked up all these years.”
“Neither did I. In fact, none of this makes any sense. If there’d been a break-in at night, Riley Monroe would have immediately contacted one of us. And obviously nothing happened during the day, when people are around, or we’d have easily known about that, too.” Justin was already lurching to his feet. So was Dakota. “But the frightening thing is…if those two gems
All three men swore at the same time, even as they were pawing and prowling around the plane, searching every nook and cranny and sifting through all the debris. All three stones were priceless, but the red diamond was so rare it was literally beyond price, beyond even a collector’s dreams. “It doesn’t make sense that anyone would have taken the other two stones and left the diamond,” Dakota grumped.
“It doesn’t make sense that any of them could have been stolen to begin with,” Justin shot back, and then sucked in a swear word.
“What?” Dakota demanded. “Did you find it? The red diamond?”
No, he hadn’t found the stone. He’d found a creased sheet of paper that would never have drawn his eye if the word
“What else?” Matthew couldn’t see at the same time as the other two men.
“The whole thing about the jewels. That red diamonds were traditionally called the stone of kings because they stood for leadership. There’s a scrawled history of black opals here, specifically black harlequin opals, and how, symbolically, they were credited as being healing gems as well as allowing their owners to ‘bring justice’ to those around them. And the emerald is described as a symbol of peace and peacemakers.” Justin looked up.
“Leadership, justice, peace,” Dakota echoed. Again, the men exchanged quiet glances. They all knew why those words had been chosen as the Texas Cattleman’s Club motto-and what each man had vowed to protect when he’d been asked to become part of the group.
“I still don’t understand any of this,” Matthew said irritably. “The whole world knows about the legend. But who could possibly have known that the stones were real, much less know where we had the jewels locked up? Where’s the damn red diamond? And…for God’s sake…do you two think the jewel theft had anything to do with the crash landing of this plane?”
Justin lifted a hand helplessly. “I don’t know how it could. But the coincidence is pretty hard to ignore.”
Dakota said swiftly, “We need to get together-as soon as we can get hold of Aaron and Ben. But even sooner than that, at least one of us needs to get to the Club. Find out if the red diamond is still there. Talk to Riley Monroe. And find out what happened to our safe.”
Justin pushed a hand through his hair. “I’ll volunteer to do anything you want…but to be honest, I’ll have a hard time meeting until later tonight-say, eight o’clock, earliest. I have patients back-to-back until then. I realize how critical this is, and I
“No, it’s all right, Justin. I’d rather wait until after dinner tonight, too,” Matt concurred. “We’ve got a better chance of Ben joining us. And if Aaron isn’t back, we could at least have consulted with him by phone before then. Because of his diplomatic connections and knowledge, I really think Aaron should be brought into this before we make any decisions.”
“Yeah. Agree.” Dakota nodded. “But I’ll hit the Club this afternoon-or as fast as I can. I have to cancel a meeting to get freed up-but I’ll try, because I think we’ll all go nuts worrying whether the red diamond’s been stolen until we know for sure. But as far as a meeting time for all of us to get together, I agree with you, too. Let’s aim for tonight. Justin?”
He’d already turned toward the plane door, as the other two had. “You want to take the emerald and the opal back with you?” Justin asked, assuming that was why Dakota had signaled him out.
“No. Hell. If the safe’s been broken into, we all need to decide together what to do with these two stones for security in the meantime. But you hold them until then. No, that wasn’t the issue. I was going to suggest that you be careful what you say to Winona Raye.”
Justin’s expression had to reveal his astonishment. “Why on earth would you think I’d be seeing Winona?”
