Lincoln ignored that suggestion and directed his frown at Mathilda. “We can’t bring any girls with us. Jesus, Rory.”
“We need her to?—”
“All we need,” he interrupted, “is a phone so I can call an Uber. Better yet, I’ll call Max, he can send a helicopter from Maui.”
Over Mathilda’s smothered laughter, Rory said, “None of those options are going to work?—”
“Phone. Where’s my phone? Where’s my briefcase? Where’s…” Lincoln turned around in a tight little circle. Rory realized that he wasn’t as back-to-normal as he’d seemed when he first woke up. His beard was coming in, too, much thicker than Rory’s. He’d lost weight during the two days he’d been unconscious. Instead of an athletic billionaire, he looked almost…homeless.
He stopped Lincoln’s frantic spinning by planting his hands on his shoulders. “Little reality check, boss. There’s no cell service out here. Those goons took the emergency sat phone. We have no way to contact anyone. The only way out is to hike through the jungle to the nearest road.”
“What?”
He’d explained all of that to Lincoln when he’d first declared his intention to leave. Was his short-term memory shot? Or had his boss simply ignored him, as usual? “You’ve been through a lot, Lincoln. Two plane crashes, a coma. Let’s be realistic here?—”
“Reality is, I’m not sticking around here to get kidnapped again. We need to get out.” His gaze shot back to Mathilda. “And we can’t have anyone slowing us down.”
She bristled at that insult. “I was planning on showing you the way so you two idiots don’t get lost in the jungle. Do you even know where the closest road is? Or how many valleys there are between here and there? No, I didn’t think so. But if you think you’ve got this…” She threw up her hands with a shrug.
Good, thought Rory. He didn’t want to put her in any more danger than he already had.
But also, crap. He didn’t want to be apart from her. He wanted her close so he could protect her.
And sure, kiss her at the very next opportunity. But that was another matter.
“Who are you, exactly?”
“Mathilda Wheeler.” She held his gaze without a hint of backing down. “This is my camp, this is my jungle, in the sense that I know it better than you, and you should have a little respect.”
After scrutinizing Mathilda for so long that Rory wanted to smack him, Lincoln turned to Rory. “Is she trustworthy?”
“I’d say yes. She rescued both of us from the SyberJet. She made sure you were taken care of. Someone sent drones to defend the crash site, and she got targeted. About that, do you know why or who?—”
Lincoln cut him off with a sharp gesture. “We don’t have time for all that. We need to get away from here.” He shouldered the overnight bag in which Rory had hidden the crystal. Rory had moved it since then, but he hadn’t told Lincoln. Given the kidnapping, it was safer if he didn’t know. “You can come, Mathilda.”
He said it as if he was doing her a favor instead of the other way around.
Mathilda shot Rory a look, but he just shrugged. Billionaires are going to billionaire, he thought.
“Sasha hasn’t even checked you out yet,” she told Lincoln coolly. “I have some basic first-aid training. How about I take a look?—”
“No.” Lincoln stopped her with a dismissive hand. “I’m going.”
“You know, I liked you a lot better when you were in that coma,” she snapped.
If only Rory had a camera to record Lincoln’s look of shock at being spoken to without a hint of deference. “Before you overreact, we need her, Lincoln. I don’t know the way to Waipi’o any more than you do. You might want to consider an apology.”
He could practically see Lincoln’s gears turn. His billions meant nothing out here. He wasn’t used to that.
“I apologize,” he finally said. “I’m still catching up here. If Rory says we need your help, then we do. I appreciate your willingness. I can compensate you once I have access to?—”
Mathilda waved that off. “Instead of money, how about just acting like a decent person until we reach civilization?”
“I’ll do my best.”
Wow. Rory had never seen Lincoln quite so humble before. Being stranded in the jungle could do strange things to a person, apparently.
Before they left the camp, Mathilda hid a note for the others in a place where no potential commandos would find it—inside the box of coffee filters. Lincoln didn’t even want her to do that, but she insisted since she didn’t want anyone to worry that they’d all been kidnapped again.
