She’d checked out the flight attendants as well, along with the pilot and co-pilot, who were Icelandic. As she eavesdropped before they closed the door to the cockpit, her Icelandic was good enough to understand they would be returning to Iceland the day after they landed in Frankfurt and missed home. It made her nostalgic for the time she’d met with Lachlan in Reykjavik.
The jumble of languages and accents from the other passengers washed over Gina, soothing her. Even the dogs were quiet and well-behaved for the most part. They ranged in size from the Malamutes down to Vreni’s Dachshund—who never left his mommy’s lap—with Fleur somewhere in the middle. The plane’s cabin was modified to hold parallel rows of kennels toward the back.
Sal was much better at tending the dogs than Florence ever gave him credit for, which made the job of feeding and watering them much easier than it sounded. Once the dogs were settled and snoozing in their kennels as they flew somewhere over the North Atlantic, Gina actually drifted off, awakened only when one of the attendants placed a covered dish on the table in front of her. Florence did not skimp on the food and had special catering brought in. Gina dipped a cracker into the Icelandic reindeer pate—which added to her nostalgia—and handed it to Fleur, who’d already eaten her own meal, judging by the empty bowl on the floor.
After she ate, Gina fell sound asleep again. She dreamed vividly, the past and the present mingling in her sleeping mind. In her dream, she was headed for Iceland instead of Germany. Greenland lay white and massive below the airplane, giant icebergs calving into the Arctic Ocean, then suddenly they were landing. Reykjavík–Keflavík Airport always reminded her of an IKEA with airplanes. In the dream, they didn’t pull up to the terminal, but parked some distance away. They were let out straight onto the tarmac to stretch while a new crew cleaned the cabin and fresh pilots rode out on a shuttle from the terminal.
The Icelandic air smelled like no other place in the world—a mix of volcanic brimstone and salty ocean. Gina grinned at the fact that she could theoretically take off running with Fleur across the mossy, lava rock landscape without ever clearing customs. She could just disappear with her dog and live off stolen boiled eggs and lava bread buried in metal pots and cooked along the shores of boiling lakes. They would be two thieving trolls, slinking around at night and scaring the sheep.
The thought made her laugh out loud, waking her up just in time for breakfast—muesli with yogurt this time. Just a couple more hours to Frankfurt and everything had gone well on the flight. She even felt rested for the first time in forever. Fleur yawned loudly and looked at her, tail thumping. She took her to the doggie bathroom then visited the human one. After she helped get the other dogs fed and settled—which took a while, they were ready to be done traveling—she washed her face and brushed her hair.
On her way to her seat, Hans trotted down the aisle toward her with his gorgeous Weimaraner who Fleur had already snubbed.
“What is funny earlier?” he asked in heavily accented English. She was confused for a moment as she quickly scanned him for weapons or any threatening moves, back on her guard.
“Funny?”
She’d nearly forgotten the dream but it came rushing back to her. Oh yes—she’d awakened laughing. And he’d been watching her.
Her response in French gushed from her along with more laughter—that she was exhausted, delirious, getting high on the memory of volcanic air. Not entirely untrue.
He smiled politely and backed away, saying his doggie needed to wee-wee.
Gina returned to her seat and Florence and Vreni’s laughter and applause. With all the dogs safely fed, watered, and kenneled, she buckled into her seat and gossiped with her friends. She had less than an hour of normalcy left, then Gina and Fleur would part ways with them in Germany.
And from there? God knew. But if God didn’t know and she didn’t know, then no one else could predict her movements. If she stayed unpredictable, that might keep her from being followed, at least for a little while.
The next big challenge came at the airport. Now all she needed to do was get through customs, hop a train before she was spotted, and disappear into the EU. The U.S. let Gina and Fleur leave relatively easily, but any country that had animals coming in—especially ones who weren’t going straight into quarantine—scrutinized them pretty hard. Gina got Fleur’s papers ready—the ones that listed her as Jasmin and marked her ID chip as being in her neck. Neither was true—her real chip was in her shoulder, and a fake chip was embedded in her collar. She hoped the vet would be fooled when the scanner picked up the fake chip, and that it didn’t pick up on the real one.
Gina hugged Florence, Sal, and Vreni goodbye before they all got in line.
“Remember, don’t be a stranger, Jenna. If you need help, give me a call,” Florence said. She hugged her again as Gina’s heart broke. This wonderful woman didn’t even know her real name and never would.
Florence got her dogs through the line first, then Vreni. Gina waved to them from the end of the line behind the other passengers. If anything went wrong, she didn’t want them to see.
Finally, it was Gina’s turn. Outward she was relaxed but inside she was a ball of tension. If they took Fleur from her here and put her into quarantine, that would be a disaster. If they ID'd Fleur correctly and it hit the system, they would be found and killed. Because there was no way Gina was leaving her dog behind.
The vet took out the scanner as Gina mentally ran through scenarios to break her out of a German doggie jail.
“It’s in her neck,” Gina said in German just to be clear. The vet side-eyed her and scanned Fleur’s neck.
The scanner beeped and the vet hesitated.
Oh, shit. It’s over. We’re done.
“Welcome to Germany,” he said, running his hand down Fleur’s back. “Pretty dog. Matches your eyes.”
“Danke,” Gina said quickly as she walked herself and Fleur away to freedom.
She was so distracted she never noticed the person walking up to her, and by the time she did, it was too late to escape.
TWENTY
Lachlan, present day, Newark Airport
“Elissa,” Lachlan barked over the phone when he finally landed in Newark. His flight had been delayed in the air for an hour and he damn near burst out of his skin at the thought of barely missing Gina. Visions of her boarding a plane for God-knew-where as his plane was touching down tortured him. He could only hope that she was in Key West instead. “Is everything alright? Is she there? Did you find her?”
“No, boss, I didn't,” Elissa answered, her voice full of defeat. “I got to her gate before the doors opened and she never got off the plane. I didn't see her or any dog that even remotely resembled Fleur. I kept one eye out the window and watched the plane in case she decided to do what Gina does best and escape a different way. Nope. She’s gotta be there in Newark.”
